Iron Woman

Posted on April 27, 2012 by rathi

No, this post is not an addition to that endless list of posts on Evil Men vs. Evil Women.
And it is not an ode to my mother, who brought me up fighting many odds etc.(I don’t think there were that many, and I was fairly well-behaved, at least as a child).
So, those of you who entered this post all set to comment on how I should stop the male-bashing and get on with my daily-soap-watching, cool down and read on..
There was a time in school and later at work, when my teachers/managers used to appreciate one quality in me – they called it ‘perseverance’. I did not fully appreciate their perspicacity at that time. I simply thought they had received that word in their ‘A word a day’ mail the previous day or saw it in the solution for the day’s crossword and wanted to show-off their new-found knowledge! However, at moments of deep introspection – you know those moments, when you start with the thought ‘Who am I?’ – I am struck by the perceptiveness these great souls displayed.
Every time I introspect, I realize that I am crazy about films and TV shows. And my love for well-made mysteries and thrillers has made me search the internet relentlessly for information on movies/shows in any language and then get hold of them to watch them in the evenings or over the weekends. (And with that, I hope I have justified my hitherto unjustified meandering over-long introduction!!).
I don’t know what I was searching for, although I know that definitely one thing (which one, I can’t say), led to the other and in the end, I came to know about this Danish TV series called ‘Forbrydelsen’  (meaning, ‘The Crime’). It was supposedly telecast on BBC in the original language with English subtitles and was supposedly very well received. Thanks to the internet and the most popular movie source in the world (and I am not going to name the provider), I watched the first season of the series, consisting of 20 one-hour episodes and am now midway in season 2 of the series.
Each series traces the investigation of one murder by the Danish police, specifically by the lead detective Sarah Lund (played by Sofie Gråbøl). Like all good police procedurals, the investigation is painstaking and the results are not immediate. I was reminded of one of my favourite police procedural movies – Zodiac, while I was watching the first season.
I was fascinated by the character of Sarah Lund. I have often mentioned about my attraction towards flawed characters in fiction – especially if the flawed character is the protagonist of the story. The flaws complement the good qualities of the character and makes her more believable. Add to it, the fact that I was really tired of watching women mostly in the sidelines of any good movie/series ( and I wrote a long post about it a while back). I did not read about the story outline before starting to watch the series, so it was a pleasant surprise watching this character on screen.
There are some characters in fiction, that you tend to love. You may never like them in real-life, but as characters in the story, they add another dimension to it. Their unpredictability makes the investigation process more interesting. And if I, a regular viewer think that way, no points for guessing that the makers of such fiction think so too. So the challenge for every creator is to create a slightly dysfunctional protagonist whose quirks are different from those we have already read/seen.
In that sense, I am not able to think of what is special about Detective Lund. She is like any other smartass investigator we have seen umpteen times in other films. She is driven and married to her work. She is a failure with her personal relationships and no matter how much she tries to be otherwise, she cares for her profession more than her family. She has no interests (obvious ones at least) outside of work. She does not treat her colleagues as friends and does not seem to have friends outside of work. She has a son, who she thinks she loves, but it is easy to think otherwise. She has a caring boyfriend, who is there for her whenever she wants, but whom she seems oblivious to. She has a loving mother who supports her when she needs a place to stay. And who is the only person who speaks her mind and constantly chides Lund for treating people around her badly, yet nothing seems to get through the woman’s mind. She is relentless in her pursuit of the killer of a young woman (who we see mostly in pictures) and is willing to concede her mistakes as long as she is allowed to pursue her next lead to the true killer.
Her male colleague, who is supposed to be her replacement (since at the beginning of the series, Sarah Lund is all set to emigrate and settle down in Sweden with her boyfriend and son), resents her attitude and coldness, but cannot help but respect her uncanny ability to see past the facades of people and think from multiple angles on the same issue.
While watching the series, it becomes increasingly difficult to separate the character from the actor and it is to Sofie Gråbøl’s credit, that I will never be able to think of her as anything other than Sarah Lund. I loved the fact Lund is never given any special treatment as a woman. She gains the grudging respect of  her colleagues and superiors purely due to her intellect and steely interior and not because of her intelligence in spite of being a woman. She does not demand respect – in fact she does not seem to care what people around her think about her. And that was very refreshing to see
For all her characteristics, I was not able to think of the character of Sarah Lund being replaced by a man. This, in spite of the fact that she exhibits almost none of the characteristic (and stereotypical) features of a woman – caring, nurturing, working from the heart rather than intellect, having strong intuitive skills etc, nor does she conform to  the other kind of stereotype of the b***y career woman. The series shows no judgement on her behaviour towards her family. The character seemed more real to me than any other portrayal of a woman detective I have seen in movies/television. The character of Kima Greggs in ‘The Wire’ comes close, but she still was one of the team members in that show and was a representative female character in a largely male-dominated story.
I don’t know if I have conveyed my liking and respect for this series and the lead character. But I have got my hands on at least 2 other Danish series. And it appears that in one of them called Borgen, which is again very popular, the lead character is a career woman. So having strong women characters is probably normal in Denmark. ‘Forbrydelsen’ has been remade in English as ‘The Killing’ and telecast in AMC. The first season supposedly received universal critical acclaim.
My insatiable hunger for more interesting and well-made series is exposing me to films and TV shows in languages of whose existence I had only vaguely heard of (I am ashamed to say that I was sometimes under the impression that people living in Denmark were Dutch!!). Forbrydelsen now ranks among my other favourites like The Wire (always the first and will probably remain so), Breaking Bad*,  and Dexter (Sherlock – the immensely interesting and awesomely made TV series is likely to get on to this list pretty soon, but I have seen only the 1st episode – the pilot and the original – so far).

Attack of Technology

The first sign of the impending crisis appeared on our ATL day celebrations in Chennai. Our chief guest was a professor who was working for a research foundation. The topic of his talk was on the challenges of Brain Modeling. I was assigned the task of welcoming the participants to the program and passing on the baton to my colleague who would then introduce the chief guest – I did and he did. Then the professor started talking. That talk opened my eyes – figuratively of course, for the temptation to close my eyes for a second was hard at fight with the inner voice chastising and later ridiculing me on how far I had moved away from science.
Word after word that the professor uttered sounded like nails on the coffin of my self-esteem. The first nail was ‘mitochondria’ and later RNA, synapses and so on and on. By the time he mentioned ‘Golgi bodies’ I was prepared to dig my own grave, get into the coffin after handing over the shovel to my friends in the room (Now don’t ask me how I could enter a coffin that had already been nailed. When a person is extremely disturbed, she tends to mix metaphors). Anyway, when the lecture finally ended after a seemingly never ending 1.5 hours, people in the room were comatose. Some looked like they had been attacked by Dementors while others merely saw the end of the speech as a chance to rush to the pantry to get coffee.
Little did I realize that my brush with science and technology had just begun!! One good thing that this talk did was to make me realize what I had been missing. I had once been in love with science – all parts of it and with time I had moved away from it completely.
The second bout of the attack occurred last week, when I was in Bangalore for the ATL day celebrations there. A few professors from MIT were coming down to talk about their research. The venue was full with over 100 people participating. These sessions were a little better and I could at least understand bits and pieces of what was happening, mainly due to 2 reasons:
a. The first speaker focused more on the applications of his research and although the title (The Inner Beauty of Computational Enhanced Systems) was intimidating, the talk was not. I consider attending a session of value, if I am able to ask at least one question at the end of it and I was able to ask one
b. The second speaker spoke more on market trends and although his topic (Driving Digital Transformation ) sounded like the talk was to do with technology, it was more like a Market Analyst talk.
These 2 talks had lessened my initial fear of attending the EmTech conference that was scheduled for the next 2 days. All the others in my team were attending the conference. I was initially a little worried of coming across as a complete fool while attending this conference , especially in the company of mostly Ph.Ds and veterans in the technology area (I don’t worry too much about being a fool, only about coming across as one!!).
However as I said, when I found that even professors from MIT are human (not that I ever thought they were inhuman, but you know what I mean), I decided, that come what may, I will attend this conference and ask at least one question in one of the sessions. I have had good practice in asking seemingly relevant questions on topics that I have no understanding off, merely by catching some keywords mentioned in the talk. This practice dates back to the time I attended Physics lectures in college and learnt to sleep with my eyes wide open. (Since this information will be presented in more detail in my autobiography, it is ok not to note this down for your reference).
A few in my team had attended the conference in the past and while there were some scattered memories of past sessions, the memory of the food served was fairly decent. The conference was to be held at ITC Gardenia and the food was supposedly good. What more motivation does a technology enthusiast like me need to attend it?
The conference was backed by MIT and so most speakers for the conference were from MIT. The morning’s session started with the welcome address followed by a talk by an MIT professor and no points for guessing that this was the same person who spoke at our office. It was amazing to watch the entire speech unfold before us. I could not believe what was happening. This was the talk on Digital Transformation and like a trained performer, the professor spoke the exact same words that he spoke in the talk at my company! Even the jokes and the sequence in which they appeared was exactly the same. I was thinking of how stand-up comedians like Russell Peters use the same routines everywhere they go. If you have watched it once, you have watched it a hundred times.
After the first few keynotes, the sessions were divided into 2 parts. One part was the innovations track and the other was the technology track. The focus this time was on Healthcare on day 1 and Energy on day 2. We attended a few sessions on both tracks and on both domains. There were also short (15 min) presentations by winners of the TR35 innovation awards sponsored by my company. These winners were mostly young innovators, who were mostly researchers, who had come up with innovative solutions in different streams. I saw the presentations by a few of these innovators.By now, my skin was sufficiently thickened and I had learnt to ignore the constant taunts of my inner voice. As a result, I was not thinking about what I had and had not achieved, but was genuinely happy and taken in by some of the innovations (those that I understood at least).
The highlight of day 1, was a talk by a person who had formerly worked in NASA. ‘Unassuming’ is the word that instantly springs to mind if I have to describe the gentleman. As he waited on the stage for a couple of seconds, he appeared perfectly ordinary and seemed to be one of those many people who talk in a dull monotone – the kind of voice that is perfectly suitable as a background for a post-lunch siesta, but definitely unsuited for a thought provoking conversation in a technology conference. All these thoughts and presumptions occurred before he even spoke a word. But the minute he started talking, he had the entire audience captivated. I have often felt, that great people are often very simple. This person was no exception. The audience were in love with him and his wonderful sense of sarcastic humour. He delivered most of the jokes with a deadpan expression, but what shone in between the jokes, was his passion for his city and the work he had done with the toughest collaborator of all – the local government and that made him better than Superman. While he listed out project after project he had rolled out for Bangalore – the motivation for each project, the work involved and the benefit of the project, we were mesmerized. At the end of his talk, the hall burst into applause and the talk received the longest ovation of the event.
Many of us decided to leave after this talk, even though another discussion with an eminent professor was announced. None of us wanted our high spirits to be disturbed after listening to that awesome speech. The next day started with another repeat speech. This one, by the person who spoke on Computational Enhanced Systems. I sort of slept through the session.
The rest of the sessions were alternatively very interesting- like the talk by a professor on cochlear implants and retinal implants and another towards the end about sensors- and not so interesting – and I would rather not mention the titles here.
My moment of achievement came during one of the sessions on Smart Energy. Since I had been reading about Smart Grids and Smart metering in the recent past, I was able to ask a question on how we were doing in India with regards to this technology. While one of the previous speakers thought I was being sarcastic (although I usually am, but he would not know that!!) and became defensive saying we had a lot of the necessary systems in place, the speaker from GE Energy, to whom this question was addressed, gave a more diplomatic (and to me very sensible) answer that since the Indian setup is very different from the rest of world, we may have to redefine Smart Energy to suit our country.
The day’s sessions wound up by 4:30 pm. We had used all the time given in between under the heading of networking to network within ourselves and getting to know each other better.
If I have to list down lessons learnt from this workshop, they would be as follows :

• Great scientists are not always great talkers and vice-versa
• True greatness and simplicity usually go hand-in-hand
• Age has nothing to do with the ability to innovate and see new solutions to old problems
• Innovations are not necessarily life-saving or groundbreaking – they just need a fresh perspective to normal things – one of the speakers spoke about a new business venture that provides people with the ability to send money using the mobile phone. This has been implemented in many villages in the supposedly remote corners of Bihar.
• To many Indians, networking means talking to one’s own colleagues
• A speech cannot be (and should not be) a series of ‘sort-of’ and/or ‘like, you know’ interspersed with a few other words
• There is no shame in waiting in long queues for the dessert, especially when the food is free
• Indians who have spent a even a few months in America, speak with a heavier American accent than people born and brought up in the US
• Many women are extremely talented and can walk and sometimes even run with very high-heeled shoes
• I still have the capacity to sit and listen to a completely obscure topic and to try and understand at least parts of it

Couples retreat

The girl looked serious. Angry even, if one’s eyes were trained enough to notice. I had some sort of a premonition. He should be here soon, I thought, all the while describing a friend’s troubles in life to another friend on my phone. I could have yelled ‘Eureka’(- wait, that was what Archimedes said, and I surely meant the word that Nostradamus used when one of his predictions turned right. Since I have no idea what that word is, let’s stick to Eureka for now). The guy came as if on cue and looked longingly at the girl. He was trying to say something and the girl was staring straight ahead. A few other ‘friends’ occupied the bench (the real one) nearby and were trying to engage the couple in conversation.
After trying for a few minutes, these friends finally got what I did much earlier and slowly moved away.
Meanwhile the topic of my conversation had changed from the previous one to my friend (to whom I was talking) and I started walking about building up some steam to attack and tease my friend.
When I returned, the guy was still looking at the girl with puppy-dog eyes. And the girl still had her headphones on and resolutely looking straight ahead. The distance between the two on the bench was definitely not what one would call ‘friendly’. My call was done and I walked in, knowing that the play outside had a few more acts before it ended.
After about half-an-hour, I walked out to get coffee and what do you know!! The position of the couple had reversed. The guy was staring straight ahead and the girl was talking earnestly. I understood that the guy was being shamed into admission of all his mistakes that had hurt the girl and the girl was trying to make him a better person .
It has been more than 2 hours since the play started and it is still going strong. And this couple is a regular in the bench.
I don’t know why the word ‘bench’ has traditionally been used for people outside projects. In this office at least, some people take the term ‘bench’ literally. People are found as couples in these benches outside. And I see a few regular bench holders spending almost all the time in the office in these modified park-benches. There is one couple that sits in the chairs outside the lift every day and I find them there any time I venture out. Now I see a few new additions and the locations are almost always outside the pantry or in this balcony-like place we have on each floor – gives the young ones the feeling of spending their time in the balcony of Romeo-Juliet fame (although, to be honest, the guy cannot be standing in the first floor and singing to this girl upstairs, even if she was looking over from the balcony – even to these oblivious couples, that would be embarrassing!!).
A few months back, one of my colleagues who was new to this building, came to me looking very worried. She wanted to know who she should complain to, about people behaving inappropriately. She then took me out to show a couple that was totally oblivious to the outside world, holding hands while sitting in the reception area. I had no idea what to do. After a few minutes, friends in the office started pinging me with this Did-you-know-about-the-atrocious-couple-in-the-reception-holding-hands-and-lost-in-each-other’s-eyes messages!! Apparently someone from the admin team later admonished the couple for it’s behaviour and they scuttled away soon afterwards.
The people who have gone through that phase rarely see themselves in these Romeos and Juliets (R&Js) and the R&Js rarely see themselves when they are indulging in this sort of behaviour. Our R&Js – in their minds at least- are SRK and Kajol or Ranbir Kapoor and Narghis Fakhri (or Simbu and Trisha or whoever is trending these days).
The youth cannot be controlled. They look at anyone laughing at them with hatred and immediately call them ‘oldies’ or ‘hags’ (the latter if the one criticizing them is a woman and the people who are criticized are good at English , else they use bizarre terms like ‘jealousy freak’ etc.!!). And the company does not care what people in bench do, as long as the numbers are met (average bench size per BU, average utilization and all those unmentionable metrics!!).
So what does one do? One of my former bosses used to say, that you should not call anything a problem; Every problem is an opportunity. So what is the opportunity here?
Imagine this situation :
A lovely looking park with lots of trees and floral plants etc. and most importantly plenty of benches under trees. Angry Juliets in the free pool, can get an entry pass which will be paid for a little later by the Romeos who will follow to plead and confess to their guilt. When the explanation phase is on, snack vendors lurking nearby get ready to attack. Once the guy has apologized and all is well, the vendors offer snacks which will be made available at subsidized prices. After this the couple can vacate the bench and take a long walk along the scenic route inside the park to discuss about their future. Every couple can be assigned 1-2 hours and be charged for every extra 10 minutes. This special ‘bench’ area is available only on request. Proofs of being in a relationship like stock photos of the couple with their cheeks stuck to each other and looking at the camera, a few (pathetic or otherwise) attempts at poetry etc, are must.
The video of young couples taking a leisurely stroll in the park, can be used during campus recruitment drives. The voice-over can say interesting captions like –
‘Come work for us!!
Enter as an individual and leave as a couple!!
Very productive ‘bench’ periods!!
Attractive locales!!
Affordable snacks!!
When in a project, earn – when on bench yearn*!!
‘Bench’ area is in a secluded area for your privacy (and convenience of those actually working)!!’
Let the organization take this bold step and then see the kind of talent we attract!!
*no reason except to make the sentence rhyme

The Aquiline-Nosed Detective

I am not going to lie. When I was thinking of the literary character that I most identify with, neither the detective from Baker Street, nor the Belgian one flashed on my mind’s eye. I really wish I could say that I was thinking of one of the many super-heroes/heroines – at least the supposedly brainy guys like Batman or Iron-man. If I have once vice, it is that I can not lie with a poker face, not even to myself. I almost always give myself away by grinning idiotically when I lie!! So the first face that flashed before my eyes was that of a beaky-nosed guy. Since this guy did not have a deerstalker hat on his head, I knew that I was not thinking of the famous friend of Dr.Watson. Instead I saw an oldish guy with a crown with barely a trace of any hair on it, grinning in the same manner as me when I am forced to lie! This guy is a character called Saambu in a collection of stories by the late Devan in Tamil, titled Thuppariyum Saambu (‘Thuppariyum’ roughly translating to ‘investigating’).
There are some books that are like comfort food to me. I go back to them over and over again when I grow tired of reading regular pulp novels or when life becomes too much to handle. In English, I frequently return to my PG Wodehouse collection and Yes Minister series, while in Tamil, I seek refuge in works by Kalki, Devan and Sujatha.
Writer Devan (full name: R Mahadevan), like Kalki, lived a short but full life. He is considered one of the greatest writers in modern Tamil literature. Devan’s writing was sprinkled with gentle humour and in that respect, he was a lot like Wodehouse. It could also be that since people like Kalki and Devan lived during times when India was ruled by the British, they had access to British literature. They were probably influenced by the British sense of humour and hence incorporated that in their writing.
Of all Devan’s works, Thuppariyum Saambu* ranks the highest. Thuppariyum Saambu describes ‘Detective’ Saambu’s many (mis)adventures during the course of ‘solving’ many high-profile (and not-so-high profile) cases. Saambu is an accidental detective and a very lucky one at that. Throughout the series, Saambu always manages to solve cases without actually trying too hard. Things simply come his way. And he is aided by his loyal friend Inspector Gopalan in his endeavours. When Wikipedia comes up tomorrow, you can take a look at the entry on Thuppariyum Saambu to learn more details.
But here are reasons why I identify with Saambu the most :
Appearance – Well, the beak-like nose was the immediate giveaway. While I had a serious complex in my childhood about my nose and always angry with God for wasting what could have helped 2 or 3 other people, on a single person, in my 20′s I decided my long nose was a sign. A sign to me and to the world, that here was one more great person in the lines of Cleopatra, Abraham Lincoln, Virginia Woolf and many others. Your nose will take you towards greatness, the skies seemed to say!! Saambu is described as having a bald head and my comb tells me every morning that I am getting there pretty soon!!
Misunderstood non-genius – Saambu says nothing, but people around him always seem to think he is hatching a plan to catch the perpetrator of a crime red-handed. When he prattles on trivial subjects, the criminal thinks he is talking about him and readily confesses!! When he is at a loss for words, people think he is in deep thought!!
I know this looks like a pretentious mess. But if there is a term that means the opposite of a misunderstood genius, it would be applicable to Saambu and me. Everywhere I go, people seem to always read between my lines (even if I leave that space empty!!) and interpret my harmless comments as intelligent insights. If I am silent, people automatically think I am lost in some profound thought. People appreciate my sarcasm, when I am trying to sound earnest. Like Saambu, I have learnt to use this misunderstanding to my advantage and rarely clarify lest I am found out for what I really am!!
Rare moments of clarity : There are instances in the book when Saambu actually tries to think on his own and comes up with some theories while investigating a case. These theories usually turn out to be the complete tangential to reality and Saambu, with lady luck on his side, escapes from ridicule because he never talks about his theories openly. This characteristic is not completely true in my case. However, there is a special case where there is an eerie resemblance. I often admit my total lack of sense of direction. And every time I drive in a new area, or enter a new building, I make sure to ask for directions before proceeding. In some rare cases, my intuition tells me to go in a certain direction and almost always it is the exact opposite of what is correct. Since there aren’t usually many eye-witnesses to these adventures, people have no idea about this dark side of me!!
Understanding Family : Saambu’s wife is probably the only person who knows that he is not half as intelligent as the world believes and she is the only one who will make fun of him all time.
My parents keep me ‘grounded’ so to speak. They know exactly when I am faking my understanding and sportively go along with my act in public. At home, when no one else is around, I am left to fend for myself to protect my honour!!

There is just one more similarity I am hoping for. Till the end of the series, Saambu is never outed. People around him continue to think of him as a genius detective. I hope to continue that way too till the end of my career!! And for that reason, I would request all of you to forget the contents of this post as soon as you finish reading and comment on it calling it the best post you have ever read…

*Personally I think the Shikari Shambu series was influenced by Thuppariyum Saambu, with even the name being retained. The role of detective was changed to that of a hunter, but the idea was the same.

So What If I am Wrong??

My friend was narrating an incident last week. He is a typical middle-class guy. He was driving to work one day. One of the roads near his house is quite narrow and at any point in time, two 4-wheelers can pass with a little difficulty. Since there is no divider in between, traffic conditions on this road are necessarily dependent on self-discipline of the drivers on the road. So my friend was waiting behind a line-up of cars and other vehicles, while another car was trying to enter the road from the other side. An auto-rickshaw zoomed past trying to overtake all the waiting cars and essentially blocking the path for the entering car (from the other side).
My friend was a little annoyed and rolled down his window and asked the auto-driver what he thought he was doing. To this, the auto-driver said that if he hit my friend’s car, he (the auto-driver) would not suffer any damage (because the vehicle was not his), but my friend would end up spending a lot of money in fixing his car!! My friend realized the futility of talking to such a person and rolled up the window while hitting himself on his head for even bothering to talk.
After a lot of chaos, the traffic cleared up and my friend was driving and noticed the auto-driver chasing him. My friend ignored the guy and kept driving. At some point, my friend wanted to take a left turn and he switched on the indicator. The auto-driver drove his vehicle past the car hitting it on the rear bumper and sped away. My friend got down to assess the damage, when the auto-driver, after dropping off his passenger, came back and with a sneer, said to my friend, ‘Now, what do you say?’. What could my friend say? He simply cursed him and said that the country was going down the drain owing to people like him.
I was mulling about this incident almost the entire week. While work was pretty much uninteresting, discussions in the blog site were heating up. I was following some discussions on blogs on whether criticizing/ commenting on language, grammar or content of the blogs was right or wrong. Some obviously unethical practices were followed in one case and when people complained, I saw that the response was in the lines of – ‘Yes, it may be unethical. What can you do about it other than complaining to the admin. I will continue doing this. What will you do then?’. On comments on other posts, people were advised to keep re-publishing their posts till the admin got tired of deleting them.
I know this sounds terribly silly, but these discussions disturbed me to a great extent too. I was wondering about what we the people of this country were becoming!
The last straw came on Friday. I was driving back home. I am usually a fast driver, though very careful on the road. Since I was driving a relatively less familiar car (my brother’s), I was being extra-careful. At a very busy signal, there was a Corolla on my right and a Tempo on my left. When the light turned green, I started moving very slowly, when the Corolla driver decided that he wanted to be on the left and without any warning moved to the left (ahead of me). At the same time, the Tempo driver decided that I was too inconsequential to give way to and decided to move to his right. I had almost brought the car to a stop when the Tempo hit my left rear-view mirror and smashed it to pieces. I followed the Tempo, and when it slowed down at the signal again, rolled down my window and asked him why he had to hit a stationary car. The only answer he gave was ‘Po ma Po ma’ (‘just Go’).
I was thinking of all these incidents and when I entered the house, my eyes welled up before I could tell my mother what happened. My friend who had come to meet with me and was waiting for me, was alarmed on seeing me in tears. He thought I had met with an accident or something. He was even more astonished when I told him what happened. Of course he thought I was being a baby, crying over something as silly as a broken rear-view mirror.
I was beyond myself – not angry at anybody, but extremely troubled at how easily we brush away any criticism about our behaviour. This is just the opposite of what I have been believing all my life – ‘Forgive many things in others, nothing in yourself’. We wax eloquently about how bad and unruly all Indians are etc., and every time we utter something like that, we only mean all Indians except me .
When we complain on general trend of things, we always talk as though we are completely outside the system. We love criticizing someone or something along with everyone else, as long as we are not the ones criticized. We talk about the sportsman spirit, of the need to accept bouquets and brickbats gracefully and so on, because we are on the giving end of the criticism. Switch sides and you know who is being unsporting !! I have experienced this during a few appraisals where my team members, who were beaming while I appreciated their good work, start blaming everything – from the location of the their house to the customer’s attitude, as reasons for their poor performance in some area.
Whether it is the blogspace or the road or the workplace, getting defensive on receiving criticism seems to be the order of the day. I know I cannot change anything with this post, but I sure feel better writing it all down!! After all, I suffer from the middle-class mentality too

Three Music Fans..

Another music season has drawn to a close and I thought I had attended the last concert on Sunday evening, till my mother told me that there is one more on February 1st by one of my favourite vocalists in a neighbourhood temple. I am way too overwhelmed by all the music to write about the concerts or the musicians. Most days I find it difficult to sleep after the adrenalin rush I experience after a concert.
A change that I noticed in me as a ‘rasika’ was that I seem to have learnt to curb my urge to identify the ragam of any song within the first 5 seconds. In fact these days I don’t feel bad even when I realize I had wrongly identified the ragam of a particular song. My tolerance towards fellow concert attendees has also improved slightly. I still get irritated when people talk during the concert or walk in late and take their own time looking for seats etc., but the degree of irritation has gone down substantially compared to the previous years.
So looking back at the season, I realize that apart from all the music, the memory of some interesting rasikas I observed during the concerts has stayed with me. I may not be able to pick them from a line-up or anything, but I may not be able to forget their antics that easily. Without much further ado, I present to you the winners of the weirdest-rasikas-of-the-music-season contest for the year 2011-2012.
a. Ponytail Aunty : I am not using the usual form of address (maami) here, because the lady involved did not seem all that old. I am pretty sure she had recently attended a course on ‘How-to-pretend-you-are-enjoying-music-in-a-concert-while-ensuring-everyone-in-the-hall-notices-it-too’ or some similarly misguided course run by other veterans of attending music concerts. It was the first concert by TM Krishna (one of my favourite singers) for the season and the venue was a community hall. Thanks to the weather God, Chennai had forgotten to be hot and humid for a short while and I had settled down to enjoy the music, when I found my chair and the ground beneath me shaking. Fearing an earthquake, I looked around for some reassurance and found that my mother and aunt on one side and my cousin and niece on the other were shaking with laughter. They were point their fingers (subtly, according to them at least) to this lady with a high pony tail, in the front row (not the ponytail- the aunty!!). The woman seemed to be out of her mind – why else would one roll her head round and round without fear of it rolling away for good from the stem (neck)?? Now that I had seen this woman, I was having difficulty looking at the stage. The scene eerily appeared to me of the head getting slowly unscrewed from the neck. Throughout the concert I was fearing that the neck would give away at some point in time and I may end up with the woman’s head on my lap – a Tarantinoeque fantasy I admit, but I was really worried that it would happen. What made the sight more amusing was that there was absolutely no relationship between ponytail aunty’s head-rolling and the rhythm of the music. Aunty had learnt the art of rolling one’s head as if in appreciation but had started a few micro-seconds late and it was obvious to anyone, who cared to notice (like me) that she was faking the whole appreciation part!! Needless to say, I remember more of the lady’s antics than the concert itself!!
b. Wet Grinder Maami : This happened during the middle of the season. In typical stalker fashion, I was sort of following my favourite singer Sanjay everywhere he performed during the season. One of these concerts was at a marriage hall. After grudgingly paying Rs.100 per ticket for seats without even armrests and trying to settle down with as little discomfort as possible to take in all the music, my attention was diverted, this time by the lady sitting next to me. Now I was initially a little annoyed with this lady. I was resenting the fact that she seemed young (or at least only as old as me), yet coolly walked in late and disturbed all of us in the row trying to get to a seat next to me. However, as the concert progressed I had forgotten all about the intrusion, and this lady nudged my elbow and pointed at a maami sitting 2-3 rows ahead. Something seemed seriously wrong. I had come for a vocal concert, but off-stage a dance performance also seemed to be in progress. This lady was not just rocking from side to side*, but was sort of spinning on her axis – well, not exactly spinning, in case you start imagining a scene straight out of exorcist, but she was making circular movements with her upright body, waist upwards, with her waist and legs as the axis of rotation. Her movement reminded me of the grinding stone of the old fashioned wet grinder, moving round and round while grinding the rice to a batter. While I was wondering what all this drama was about, the lady next to me was tch-tching in sympathy, murmuring (rather loudly) to me that the maami seemed to have some serious physical ailment that made her restless. I did my duty as a daughter and pointed out this woman to my mother who was sitting next to me and continued listening to the main concert. In between I checked to see if the maami was still sitting up or if fatigue had taken over and she had fallen down. Her performance was going as steadily as the main one, with the only difference that her performance was off the main beat!! A strange thing happened during the ‘tani avarthanam’ – which is the part of the concert where the percussionists play their instruments for a while. Since this is the part of the concert where rhythm, rather than melody takes over completely, I was worried about Maami’s health and my sanity. Suspecting the worst, I looked at the maami. But she had stopped moving and after a while she slowly stood up and left the concert, thereby allaying my suspicion that what she was suffering from was an advanced form of Parkinson’s disease and that I may have to call for an ambulance at any time.
c. Uncle Bob : This happened last week. The venue was the same as the previous one and the singer was again Sanjay (I told you I was stalking him!!). It was a free concert, so we did not complain much about the bad chairs. This rasika, who I will only call Uncle Bob was sitting 2 rows in front of me. He was not blocking my view of the stage as he was sitting to my right. But I was aware of Uncle putting his hand up all of a sudden, like an over-eager student putting up his hand to answer the teacher’s question. The hand would wave for a few minutes and then would go down. I was left puzzling what I missed in the singing, because the hand always seemed to go up at unremarkable parts of the singing. After a while, unfortunately for me, the seats to the left of Uncle were vacated and he moved to my direct field of vision. In between curiosity got the better of me and I observed Uncle Bob for a while. His friend (or someone) seemed to be sitting a few seats away from him and Uncle would suddenly want to show him how music was to be enjoyed. So while his hand shot up and did its thing, Uncle would be looking around to see if he was being noticed and admired. He probably attended the same course as Ponytail Aunty, but his takeaways from the course seemed to be different. Interestingly, when Sanjay was dishing out really wonderful music, Uncle would be distracted, looking around the hall and at people walking in and out. And suddenly as if a thunderbolt had struck him, he would be reminded of his duties as a rasika and put his hand up, totally oblivious to the fact that the entire hall had erupted in applause and ‘aahaas’ and ‘sabash’ a couple of seconds ago, while he was busy looking at the door to see who had entered. Like an actor who keeps up his lip movement after the playback singing has stopped, Uncle Bob, managed to show his faux signs of appreciation at irregular and irrelevant intervals.
As the season ends, I realize that these 3 rasikas unwittingly offered additional entertainment. Since it came for free and like every true Indian, I like anything that comes for free, I thank these nameless people for making these concerts memorable in more ways than one
* which by the way is a pretty normal audience reaction in these concerts, and obviously, by pretty normal I mean I tend to do it at times too!

A Separation

I have this habit of searching for movies that are critically acclaimed (and here I must thank RottenTomatoes, Roger Ebert and Amazon user reviews) and then watch them. It has been many years since movie watching ceased to be merely for mindless entertainment. You can call me a movie buff or a movie fanatic (if my comments have irritated you enough!!). Anyway, this search becomes very frantic near the end of the year since many ‘Best of the year’ lists are out by this time. Then when the Oscars draw near, I try and ensure that I have covered as many of the nominated movies as possible before the actual ceremony, so that I have formed my own opinions about the movie before they are coloured by the awards announcement. I was looking at Roger Ebert’s best films of the year list and read about the Iranian movie called ‘A Separation’. I have watched about 3-4 movies from Iran and liked almost all of them. Ebert’s high praises and my own experience with Iranian movies prompted me to watch this one last week.
From what I have seen at least, most cinema from Iran have very simple plots. The pacing is not what you would see in Hollywood manufactured blockbusters like the super-hero movies, disaster movies or the Almighty-American-President-setting-out-to-save-the-world type of movies (although this has morphed in recent years to the Simple-American-saves-world-from-disaster type). The pace is languid, the people are ordinary, the stories are commonplace and the emotions – very real. As you must have already guessed, I found ‘A separation’ satisfying in all respects.
The film begins in a small court room where a couple – Nader and Simin are seated in front of a judge. They have been married for fourteen years and have a teenage daughter. They are in the court-room asking for a divorce. Simin, the wife wants to leave the country because she does not want her daughter to grow up there. Nader, on the other hand, wants to stay back on account of his old and ailing father, who is suffering from Alzheimers’s disease. Both of them have their reasons for wanting what they want. The judge thinks the issue is too trivial for a divorce and orders them out of the court. Simin moves out and goes back to her parents’ house, but not before helping Nader find a maid who will help him take care of his father. The maid Razieh is pregnant and takes up the job for the money, although she has to travel quite a distance to come to work. Razieh is also deeply religious and God-fearing. These points of the story take place within the first 10 minutes of the movie. There is a small incident in between, which gives rise to the central conflict of the movie (which, by the way, is not only about the divorce of a young couple). Nader, Simin, Termeh (their daughter) Razieh and Razieh’s husband – Houjat become the primary players in an emotional plot involving misunderstandings, mistakes and some minor secrets.
So what is so special about this story, you ask. Like in real life, there are no good or bad people. In fact, Asghar Farhadi – the writer and director of the movie has ensured that all the characters are sympathetic. No one is to be blamed. Whatever a character does, he/she does it out of good intention. But what may be good for one person, may turn out to be not so good for another. Termeh (the director’s daughter in real-life) is the moral compass of the story. She sees her father as a hero in the beginning and refuses to leave him for her mother, even though she knows that Simin is fighting this battle on Termeh’s behalf. But towards the end, Termeh (and we, the viewers) are not so sure any more. The moral standing of each character in our minds, keeps shifting and it is to the director’s credit that when the credits roll, we, like Termeh are not sure about what is right or wrong anymore.
A word about the cast. The acting is uniformly excellent. And I have to say, Iranians seem to be one of the most beautiful people in the world! The actor who plays Nadar resembles Pawan Malhotra, but looks younger and better. He did a great job of a playing a the role of a man with conflicting emotions. Same goes for the lady playing Simin. The girl playing young Termeh, plays her role with sincerity and in the end when she is tears, I was feeling a little emotional too. The actress playing Razieh needs a special mention. She internalized her religious nature, respect for her employer and refusal to take accusations about her honesty and emoted extremely well, without going over the top at any point. The kid playing Razieh’s young daughter is cute as a button and the kid can act too. Even the old man playing Nader’s father did a great job, although he had barely any lines to speak.
My mother loved the movie. Both of us were talking about how our movies today are becoming more and more about people who live nowhere, have problems that don’t happen to everyone and solve them like common people would never do!! You can interchange actors and would not notice any difference. There is no concept of place or culture etc., that would make these people real and relatable. And I am not talking about the Cine-Madurai movies in Tamil that have followed the success of ‘Subramaniapuram’ with youngsters chopping off heads like my road-side coconut vendor slices coconuts. That is not what I mean by real. Morality tales are becoming scarce in Indian movies. And by this I am not saying Hollywood movies are doing any better. Our stories had complex moral questions in the center of them before the attack of the NRI movies started. The character Razieh is one we do not find much in today’s movies from any country. Religion is used to show why a character behaves differently from the rest, or as a plot device to show fake national unity sequences etc., but rarely as a device that governs a person’s moral compass. And I saw that happen in a film after a long time.
There is supposedly a strong Oscar buzz surrounding this movie this year and I wish it wins one. I, for one, would highly recommend it to any kind of audience.