Bending Laws, Breaking Rules

Khaleej Times (LIFE) April 9, 2013

I have recently assumed office as the spokesperson for a spanking new organization – GRuBA – Global Rule Breakers Association. Yeah, sounds kinda grubby, but that’s how some acronyms are. There has been a need for a club of this sort since the time man has been eating and drinking, but the absence of a concerted effort has seen this slighted lot of rule breakers getting their most basic rights crushed under asinine rules and statutes.

When I was offered the role of GRuBA’s brand ambassador, I asked, why me? They were candid, and said my space in a national newspaper could just be the right thing for them. They said they wanted someone who could genuinely understand them and propagate their ideas. I pounced on the opportunity. Of what use are my skills if they can’t be utilized for ‘larger social causes’?

After great deliberation, a charter statement was created and I have been given the task of floating it. The following is the gist of the document.

The primary objective is to claim our right to break rules as fundamental to our existence. We believe in democratic values and consider the world to be a huge republic with no stifling regulations. (One can choose to call it a banana republic at one’s own peril). Our fight is for establishing a freewheeling system where pointless Dos and Don’ts don’t bind us.

For starters, we would like to highlight issues that may sound downright frivolous to an uptight conformist, but to us are distressing because they hamper our movement and have a debilitating effect on our lives.

We are a lot born with mobile phones as an appendage and we carry rights to employ it at our discretion – in the plane, at a concert, in the prayer hall or at the meeting.  Asking us to arbitrarily switch off or silence it is tantamount to gagging us. So, let the ringtones play and let’s discuss the day’s menu with the cook or fret over an undelivered consignment even in the midst of a spiritual discourse, or give a running commentary on the flight even after we have belted up or update our FB status at a live show.

We can fight over our freedom on the roads till eternity, but you cannot deny us our right to not use indicators, cut lanes, zoom past the amber and red, or honk. Rules are for ninnies and you follow them at your risk. If our approach irks you, cross over and join us. You will then feel less violated as a driver.  

As pedestrians, we have been a hassled lot. We’re not ‘joy’walking, we’re merely crossing the road wherever we want to. Why should we cross elsewhere when the store is right in front of us? Please stop cribbing and start using your brakes and reflexes wisely to avoid mishaps.

Jumping queues is a genetic issue with us and pardon us for it. Further, if there is a privileged line with a fee, we shall jump more happily. Money can sometimes be useful, you see.

We shall dump waste outside garbage containers, photograph when prohibited, (double) park where we like, spit, litter and do all we please.

There are larger aspects of rule breaking that will need extensive debate within the existing parameters of morality and social code. We have yet to examine and establish to the world how rule breaking in many instances is forced and how it is even for the general good. These are intricacies that we shall discuss continually as we evolve as an organization.

We don’t seek political rights. We only demand social recognition and respect from the righteous wing that never errs and constantly demurs against us. Rule breaking is our birthright and no law can stop us from exercising it.

God bless (save) the GRuBA community!

Disclaimer:  Readers are advised to use due wisdom and judgment before seeking membership.

 

Too Cool to Care

Khaleej Times (LIFE) / 21 March 2013

 

THERE IS something I quite like about Facebook — that little, blue ‘Like’ button.

It’s a blessing in a fastidious world, where making impressions and earning brownie points is as tough as getting a raise at work these days. It has become an effective agent of appreciation in a tight-lipped age that for some reason can’t utter the ‘Wow!’ too easily.

A niece recently wrote in asking me to add some punches in a speech she had prepared for a contest at her pubic speaking club. She wanted me to add a few gag lines that could make people crack up, because, in her words, “people there don’t laugh easily”. Now, why people don’t laugh easily is as much a mystery to me as why people don’t applaud at a concert or a man doesn’t tell his wife that she looked pretty in her new outfit. The reason, in my limited understanding, is that we are very stingy with open acknowledgment.

The popular theory is that appreciation at the work place breeds complacency; that it reduces excellence to mediocrity. The added danger, according to some, is that it leads to expectation of an incentive for the good job done. So the boss opts to keep words of appreciation in his chest pocket than hand it out. It is as true of the corporate world as it is in the domestic set up. Housewives and house help will vouch to being equal victims of this grudging. Ask them. Wangling out a mere “well done” is as impossible as squeezing superglue out of a year-old tube. 

I wonder if you have noticed our behavior as audience at concerts and live shows. We had been to two music performances this month, and on both occasions, the host had to appeal to the crowd to be generous with their applause.  At the second event, the honourable Consul General of India, in his inaugural address, rightly pointed out that it was as if we had “fragile hands” that was at the risk of breaking if we put them together. What an inglorious tribute to our pathetic sense of appreciating talent and giving due credit to those who deserve!

Oh, did someone out there say that well-mannered people don’t overreact and there is prudence in muted responses? Come on folks, discretion on such occasions is not the better part of valour. It doesn’t matter what the person next to us thinks about us, let us hang bells and whistles to our manner when it comes to appreciating effort and excellence, and imagine, it doesn’t cost a dirham!

Nothing satisfies an artist as knowing that he has regaled us with his performance, so let’s make him know that from the distance of our seats. Nothing satisfies a chef at a restaurant than knowing that his guest has had a delectable meal, so let’s tell him that we just had the best biriyani ever. After all, he never gets to hear our ungracious belches, and who knows who pockets the tips we leave?

Nothing thrills our children than knowing that their parents consider them intelligent and smart, so let them know. No, they won’t ‘climb on our head’ if we know our job. Nothing gratifies a dedicated worker than knowing that his management values his work. So give the devil his due and he will not rue about the long pending hike. Let’s raise a toast to our friends and family and tell them once in a while what they mean to us. No, it is not mushy or clumsy, it’s just being audibly grateful.

The next time we have an opportunity to applaud, let’s do it loud till our palms tingle. There is a lot that a generous heart and two unrestrained hands can do than a small, blue button on a social networking site can.

When the Shoe Fits

Khaleej Times (Life) / 15 March 2013

My flat feet that can walk only in a particular brand of footwear had a fancy for other people’s shoes. The tall kind, the stiletto sort, the open toes, closed ones — everything except the ones that they are destined to fit into.

Imagining myself in the another man’s (actually, woman’s) shoes has been an amusing distraction for me. There were many things that I wished I had been, many others that I wished I hadn’t been; roles that I wished I could revise to live the lives of other people, especially the illustrious and industrious ones.

For instance, if I were to be born again, I had wanted to be an investment banker-cum-author. There is something beguiling about these folks who crunch numbers for lunch and munch alphabets for supper; something romantic about the idea of being a banker by the day and a writer by the night and eventually a best seller by the morning after. Amish Tripathi recently landed the biggest signing amount ever for an Indian author, Chetan Bhagat continues to rake in the moolah for his highly ‘flick’-able texts, David Lender made a ‘tsunami’ of a fortune with his e-book, Ravi Subramanium made a banker out of God Himself…the tribe is growing and how! Seriously, do they teach creative writing in Business Schools?

When I saw my friend and former classmate take home a jolly good pay cheque from an MNC, I wished I could be like her. A working woman enjoying the professional roller coaster and leading a happily chugging family life, she has the best of both the worlds. Women like her who juggle business at home and work amaze me beyond words. A woman entrepreneur I met a while back as part of a freelance assignment is a powerhouse of hardcore professionalism. Living the high life and constantly on her toes, she is a go-getter, with precise ideas of what she wants out of life. I wished I was like her, knowing what I really wanted to do with my life and then knowing how to get there. Those were times when the feeling of acute inadequacy over powered and crushed the stay-at-home woman in me.

When I saw young reality show contestants sing, I wished I had taken music lessons and given my latent talent some chance to bloom. My voice has now gone down the drain and presently I am a match only to the monsoon ragas of toads and frogs.

Often when I saw Barkha Dutt, Christian Amanpour or Lyse Doucet on TV, I wished I had carried my talent as a scribe further and given my journalism degree some credence. I wished I had grilled and barbequed public figures with my questions. Now I try to wring answers out of a reticent husband who descends into diplomatic silence whenever he is carpet bombed with questions.

I marvelled at the eloquence of eminent orators and wished I could reel off expressions as easily. I drooled at the talent of my young nephew who runs public speaking courses and wondered if I must join Toastmasters just to fork myself out of the pits of inferiority. I wished I could ‘speak’ and not just ‘rattle’; be articulate and not be just verbose.

As ridiculous as it may sound, I wished I was in the shoes of all those I admired for all that they were, but I was not. I wished I could do many things that others did and be them, until one day a friend casually remarked, “I wish I could be like you. Busy, doing things that you so love to do, at your own pace and will. You are one blessed soul. I am jealous of you.”

It was a truly defining moment for me.  After a whirlwind tour of fancy footwear stores, my feet returned to my own shoes, where it fit snugly.

Climbing the cliff

Khaleej Times (Issues) / 6 March 2013

THE KIND of things people tell you soon after you return from a vacation!

Most of it has to do with your looks and overall bearing – a kind of ‘before and after holiday’ reaction. How can you escape a comment or two on your bulk from people who seem to keep such a close watch on you?

The last time I returned from India, a friend said, almost with alarm, “Oh my God! Whatever has happened to you? Lost so much weight!”

She sounded as if I had shrunk so miserably in a month that I could now pull out my primary school outfits and fit in comfortably.

“Oh yeah? Good for me,” I said.

Soon a second friend came along and exclaimed, “Gosh! Look at her cheeks! So full and rasgulla-like. Looks like you have been eating like a horse for a month!”

The hilarity of the situation made me want to whoop out loud, but I quashed the urge in time. I tried not to look at my first friend for the fear of finding her acutely mortified. “Mom’s cooking,” I said and shrugged.

That was in the halcyon days when I did not care a fig about fitness for I wasn’t bulky, nor did I belong to any of the weight watching categories because I wasn’t a victim of slimming woes. Bathroom scales were then used only to weigh holiday baggage. It was a time when life was awash with ice creams and faloodas, garnished with butter and cream and I lived in the blissful ignorance of a silent scourge in my body called LDL cholesterol.

Actually, there was no blessed need for me to go and take a test, but I did. A regular check-up was warranted after forty, people said repeatedly, and after a long period of inaction I finally subjected myself to a complete medical assessment in the supreme certainty that all would be well. But Murphy has testified that things would go wrong if they possibly can, and so I returned with figures that ushered in forbidding terms like clogged arteries and heart attack into my chirpy life.

The wickedest thing you can do to yourself is to go to the physician when you are in fine fettle and there are no major anatomical grievances. Wisdom has always made late entries in my life and so I got a fool’s due. A moratorium was declared on all my dessert drives, and my daily bread lost the intimate company of butter. Milk was toned down and yogurt became enviously fat free.

It is only some weeks since the heart breaking news rattled my peace and so far it hasn’t been easy to follow the doctor’s diktat of salad and ration. What do you do when you have a three-day wedding to attend with four meals to savour every day? What do you do when you visit relations after four years and they serve you copiously? What do you do when a young nephew takes you out for a treat to celebrate his new job? Imagine telling them all that I have become a rabbit and would henceforth eat only carrots and cabbages, and so would they please make arrangements for the flavourless fare? 

It is going to be an uphill task to shed the bad fat and burn the calories, but when the menace is stark and staring in the face, one simply has to comply and tighten the belt. I have no clue how I am going to achieve it, and how much of external counsel from veterans and internal control from a weak will I am going to follow. But the writing is on the wall – age is catching up and it is no more fashionable to say it is enough to feel young at heart, when the heart itself is at stake.

Foggy memories

Khaleej Times (Life) / 16 February 2013

IT IS ONE thing to cherish wintry mornings and another to confront foggy conditions.

Fog can be a nasty thing, especially if you are on a snarled up highway and you can almost hear the driver behind breathing down your neck in pointless exasperation. It is worse if you are at the airport waiting for a flight on a foggy day, biding your time between dumb display monitors and clueless duty managers.

Airports are chaotic places, but the eagerness to reach a destination often makes the difficulties of modern-day international travel seem rather trivial. Everything is taken in the stride – security checks, snaky lines, knocks from trolleys behind, baggage woes etc. But what we do not bargain for is an indefinite delay. 

It can make the waiting lounge look like a tin of sardines. The air conditioner suddenly seems ineffective and soon the boarding pass doubles as hand fan. The man at the counter asks us to wait for the elusive announcement.

“Can you please tell what the whole thing is about?” we ask him politely.

The fog, he says, while pointing at the clear, mid-noon light outside. He doesn’t deem it necessary to divulge the details, but we try to gather information from other sources. We eavesdrop a bit and learn that incoming flights are delayed. But the arrival board reads that our flight has landed, which means that it logically has to take off on its return journey soon.

I approach an airport staff member with my queries and he says that the flights that have come in are being diverted elsewhere. This is not fair — this jumping the queue business, I fume inwardly. Moreover, do pilots on the Indian route know the aerial path to Aleppo or Alexandria? Won’t they lose their way and land somewhere else, I wonder aloud. My husband gives me a glare  that expresses his annoyance.

There aren’t enough chairs to seat all the passengers and some are beginning to squat on the floor. We are lucky to find two seats, but one latte and fifteen minutes later, I feel a need to go to the restroom. I shun the sensation and glue myself to the chair. But you can’t ignore nature’s calls for long, so I risk losing my seat and rush. The restroom staff is livid over the massive footfall in the facility and grumbles that people are flocking there because they have little else to do. I return to see my man struggling to keep my seat safe from the onslaught of chair hunters. Now he needs to go too. I have an obligation to guard his place. “Make it fast,” I say. He glares again and mumbles. Indefinite delays can make devils out of saints too. Patience is running out and tempers are flaring at some distance. I crane my neck to know what’s transpiring, but the argument is in Arabic. I rue not having learned the language in all these years. I miss the action unfolding there.

We are three hours behind schedule. I am bored. I try not to fall asleep for the fear of tilting and spraining my neck. The elderly gentleman next to me strikes up a conversation. He is hanging his boots and going home leaving a working wife behind. Isn’t she going with him, I ask. “The secret of a happy marriage is separation,” he quips. I grin at the wisecrack and ask, “Especially after retirement?” He is chatty, but I don’t mind. We spend an hour in conversation. He tells us many interesting things. He is a man who has seen and known life. Listening to people like him is like viewing through a kaleidoscope.

The plane to our hometown is finally ready. We take leave thanking each other for the company. I may never see him again, but the thoughts he shared with us in that final hour of our waiting will stay with me forever. Foggy arrivals can sometimes end in happy departures.