Malaika???

Do we love Malaika or do we hate her?? Yeah, the one and only Malaika Arora Khan... Perhaps she's the Indian equivalent of the blonde--all curves, no brains. Am I jealous? A teensy bit... Wish I could retain my pre-mommyhood figure just as effortlessly. But did she do it effortlessly? Nah, I think... but she had all the time in the world to look after that particular hourglass (it's part of her job description, after all). Me, I have to squeeze in my dance classes in between bringing out a newspaper supplement and sundry edit jobs, and believe me, the day I decide I'm going back to dance class, I have a morning interview/other assignment that puts paid to my curvy ambitions.

Another model-wife I was really amazed to see on the ramp was Waluscha Robinson: her weight loss took some doing; a whole 22kg! Wow!!

Back to Malaika; she's on the cover of Good Housekeeping, and seems to have dropped the Khan from her name. Proofing error, trial separation or elaborate PR arrangement (remember her last fiasco?)... only time will tell.

My former employer's son named his first daughter Malaika, which is apparently Swahili for 'angel'. The Malayalam word for 'angel' is 'maalakha'. What was that about the continental drift?

P.S. Oh, the continental drift theory reminded me of a joke. I have a very good friend who specialises in dirty jokes. Let's just call him S here, for the sake of brevity (I'm sure he'll have no problems being 'outed'). His theory goes like this: Before the continents drifted apart, Brazil was right next to India, specifically Kerala. Both the places have the same kind of tropical climate, you see. But when the continents began drifiting apart, the Brazilians left all their clothes on this continent. Which explains why the Brazilians wear next to nothing and the Indians (he especially meant Keralite women) wear the sari and a host of other things underneath. 

Back to childhood

My parents are back from a month-long vacation in Pune, visiting my sister. They got here at four in the morning. I was up and had made tea for them, and was generally being woman of the house but the moment they stepped in, something changed. Perhaps it's my perspective: once my parents are here, somehow, sometimes the child in me inevitably peeps through. It starts by my automatically assuming that my Ma will take on my burdens: in this case, feeding Ditu (a laborious three-hour task divided into three acts during the day). Never mind that my parents had just got in after a 36-hour journey.

Usually, I would even hand over the kitchen as well, including preparing the menu. That, I skipped 'cos I have a maid-in-residence who had been briefed extensively the night before. (The maid is a whole other story that I will put down in another post.) 

The contractor doing my new apartment's interior work is presenting the plans today, and guess who's coming with me: my dad!! Of course , I can do it without him... And we'll probably never agree on the design anyway (I'm all for contemporary lines while he half-lives in the past). Yet, it somehow seems important that he sees it.

My mobile phone company's innovations mean that we can talk endlessly on our cell phones (closed group or some such thing) for a nominal 99 bucks a month. So we end up chatting on every little dustball spotted, Ditu's little spills and thrills, maid woes and a whole lot of 'relative' banter, which adds up to more than seven phone calls a day. And some of those calls can go on up to 20 minutes or so! Just thinking of it gives me earache... but this whole month (when their phones were on roaming), it was pure torture not calling them up the moment my maid upped and quit without a notice, when Ditu said something particularly funny and when I had 'in-law' trouble. On second thoughts, maybe I wouldn't have told them about the last even if they were here; it might be just easier for me to forget the whole thing than to erase 'how bad my daughter must have felt' ideas from their minds.

And now, though I'm running tight on an impossible deadline, I feel calm and collected. Mom hai na!

P.S. Thank you, Anna, for pushing me to post. Love u

Cutting edge of depression

Some people shop when they are down in the dumps; some, I hear, can't stop gorging on calorie-rich goodies. I do things to my hair that I normally wouldn't dream of.

After more than a week of feeling out of sorts and snapping at Ditu and Abhi (but never at the maid), I just had to do something to feel better: so I went out and got a short haircut; I wanted a short-short one but my hairstylist refused on account of may hair's propensity to turn African bush on me. And I also got some reddish-brown highlights... forgot to check out the shade name in the Szchwarzkopf (did I get that right?) shade card or else I could have flaunted names like chestnut brown or golden blonde. Let's just say it looks something like plum mixed with walnut and a pinch of crimson... name it what you will.

Do I look good? Yes, say my gal pals; but after all, they are my friends and i am trying to come out of a depression... so do I believe them? Well, I want to...

I am happy seeing myself in the mirror, though; so that's something. Waiting for Abhi to get back from work: I've already warned my neighbours to ignore loud noises from our flat tonight in case he thinks I look like something the cat dragged home.

Whatever. I feel better; and if it takes some fighting to prove it to hubby dear, bring on the boxing gloves. 

Mommyhood: the difficult times

What is the most difficult part of being a mom? For a new mom, it may seem like it's the endless sleepless nights and the seemingly endless, designed-to-irritate-the-hell-out-of-you wails and colic... Oh, and the guilt afterwards (when baby's fast asleep) for thinking badly of the little angel. But what gets me nowadays is the back-to-work dilemma! Being a freelance journalist, it sounds as if it must be easier than for say, a teacher or a lawyer who has to be at a specific place at a pre-appointed time, and no, you can't bring baby along.

For me, it's just as difficult to leave Ditu home for those few hours that it takes for me to get the pages laid out at office or when I am out at an interview. It's okay when she's at playschool... Going out to work then is hardly heartwrenching; per haps I think she has less fun at home with the maid than at school with her peers. Yet, if I am home working on a story, she rarely disturbs me and is content most times to play in another room... until she wants to know what colour dress her imaginary playmate is wearing (and God forbid if you say red when she's actually 'wearing' blue!!).

I totally admire those seeming supermoms who seem to have it all: a career, a social life, lovely children, loving husband and great in-laws, to boot. Was I daydreaming when God was handing out the good bits of kismet?

Do I have school today?

Most times, that's one of the first questions my three-year-old asks even as she's opening her eyes. Tell her 'yes', and she'll snuggle back into her pillow for some more shut-eye (or a rendering of what she considers 'deep sleep'... and I'm supposed to be taken in by the act!). Answering 'no' inevitably elicits the difficult-to-turn-down request: "Mumma, come to bed..." I wish!
To think all this melodrama from someone who basically likes doing her yogasanas and practising her Shut Up & Bounce routine at playschool. Sometimes, I want to tell her, "Baby, this is not even school... Just some version of fun, where you sing, dance, swim and drive toy cars." Some days, she wants to hop on to the 'big yellow bus' and buzz off to school with the big kids... That kind of school is okay, she seems to think. She's always trying to get hold of a neighbourhood seven-year-old's schoolbag... just for the sheer fun (?!) of toting it around on her back.
"Mamma, read me this story," she yells, while I try to get a morsel of mashed idli and chutney into her never-still mouth. And then: "I want to read it myself." Are those the words all moms want to hear? I don't know.... Oh, I am sure I want her to read and write and be an achiever and all that... (I also get my kicks out of making her say 'Czechoslovakia', like in the ad) but I also want her to be happy. And happiness seems a more distant dream every day. the more you know, the more you want; your needs are more specialised and ever-evolving... 
Will I be able to nurture her spiritual self even as I queue up this year with the hefty admission fees for a seat in the kindergarten at the city's most elite (and with a seemingly refreshing, liberal approach to the curriculum) school? I don't know. Will she lose herself so in her textbooks that she won't have the time to enjoy the Famous Fives and the Harry Potters that I did? I hope not.
 In the interim, I now have to find an answer to her most pertinent question these days: "If Cheryl's [her best friend] mom doesn't go to office, why do you?" Some day soon I'll probably have to go into the intricacies of choosing to work because it's your passion. Right now, I have to deal with a whimsical little onw who insists she will not take an afternoon nap 'cos the moment she closes her eyes, "Mumma will go away to office". Aww, baby...