vaLAnTinE blues.

Epilogue

Ever since my schooling days, I was famous or rather infamous for running behind schedule, (I tried running behind girls, but was more successful in running behind schedule) every schedule, just like this post is running 2 days behind schedule. The truth of the matter is I never intended to post a vaLAnTinE special blog, however considering the number of people who have asked me about my V-Day plans, I thought this story no matter how pathetic it is, needs to be told.

On the eve of the vaLAnTinE’s day, my roommate (someone who was never constant in Love, but was always constantLY in Love) was composing an SMS to his to his beloved N^th girlfriend in (N² +1) years, had asked me how would to spell vaLAnTinE, as the Nokia’s T9 dictionary failed to recognize the word vaLAnTinE, I was wondering if people would hold the Shivasena responsible this too, and thought to myself that for someone like me who didn’t know how to spell vaLAnTinE doesn’t deserve to have a vaLAnTinE.

My V-day plans were fixed 3 days in advance, yeah for a change I wasn’t running behind schedule, cause my Boss had fixed up my plans this time around, and since he wasn’t running a charity, he delegated the task of meeting two of our clients and discuss probable business opportunities (on a day where I should have been discussing probable valentine opportunities).

I reached office at 10:00 AM in the morning, and got a VERY PLEASANT surprise when I saw a rose on my desk, all those years of waiting had probably paid off…, but soon I started to wonder, if this joy would be a short-lived one, as my office was the last place where I would have looked for prospective valentine opportunities. I rushed to one of my friends who always ridiculed my ‘single’ status, with a moment of pride, and flashed the red rose, and was taken aback to see a similar rose on his desk, and soon realized that there was a similar rose on every desk, and I soon learned that this a part of our HR department plans to make everyone feel important on a special day, which almost spelt doomsday for me. For me this was an insult to injury, every time I hear the word vaLAnTinE I feel pricked by someone who probably wants to remind me of my ‘single’ status.

Even before the incident could sink in, I got whisked away by my sales force to the customers place, on my way, while I was passing through the streets and by-lanes of Delhi, it was the colour red all over the place, I started to wonder if I was suffering from conjunctivitis (that was a pj), by the time I reached the clients place, I got pricked enough and my heart turned numb.

The sales guys did their job promptly and I aided them with some technical inputs, and we almost had the deal bagged (on a day where I should be thinking of bagging hearts), a quick lunch at one of the Restaurants, where we had to fight for a table against the couples who probably were expressing their love, as if they were no tomorrow, or probably if they wouldn’t be together tomorrow. We soon headed to the other client, who was equally impressed with us or rather the proposal we made, and wanted to finalize the deal on the day itself, may be it was auspicious for him; so I was given the onus of drafting a letter of intent/acceptance (on a day where I should have been drafting letters of a different kind).

The ordeal ended and I drove my way back to Gurgaon, hoping the nightmare would soon end in a couple of hours, the moment I reached home, my roomie came up with this idea (which was wonderful according to him) of visiting the nearby malls just to ogle at the females, who were decked up or rather dressed down.

Although my heart had gone numb by this time, I still wasn’t comfortable with the idea of 2 guys hanging out in a Mall on a valentine’s day, the fear of being misunderstood haunted me, and I preferred some lonesomeness to ‘brokeback mountain’-ess.

All though the series of events and the way they mysteriously unfolded were different, the fact that things haven’t changed much, apart from the hope of a turnaround which is as stronger as it was ever before.

If you are a female, you would be curious to know what happened to those roses that were kept on our desks, One of my colleague wrapped them around (about 20-25 of them) a ribbon, and took them home to surprise his wife. I thought to myself what a cost-effective V-DAY!!!

PS: While writing this blog I was thinking of other valentine surprises, like diamonds. The very thought of diamonds reminded me of the Hollywood movie, “Blood Diamond”, which was touching enough to motivate me to give up on the idea of putting on the colored stones (will have to wait and see how long would I stick to my decision)

The Race against RACISM

Epilogue

Although I was always confused about blogging, I was pretty much clear on what topics would be part of my blogs. Having never tried my hands on serious blogging like humanity, ethics, patriotism, for the fear of not being able to do enough justice to them. Here I am to talk about RACISM, just to break a barrier which I created for myself.

SAY NO TO RACISM

Thanks to half a dozen news channels aired everyday, Shilpa Shetty seems to be the only name that would flash across our minds, every time we talk about racism, for the next month or so.

But how serious is racism in India, does it prevails only in the east, are we well equipped to fight against it, is it over-hyped by the media ? are the unswered questions.

Inpite of spending having spent 20 odd years down south (if you call Hyderabad South), Hindi is not an alien language to me, much against the perception of most people in Delhi. However words like “Ghati”1, “Chinki”2 & “Madrasi”3 weren’t a part of my Hindi dictionary until I reached Delhi.

Will someone take the pain of explaining people that, it is not that tough to find fair people in Chennai and not every Mallayalee makes a weird sound while eating, not every Andhrite has pickle 3 times a day, and you get sandwiches and toasts in Bangalore apart from the regular Idli, Dosa, Wada, Uttapam.

And by the way, neither does every Punjabi uses the term “benc***d” twice in every sentence, neither are snakes & reptiles a part of the regular diet of people from the NorthEast, and not every Kashmiri is a militant.

Such perceptions are something that have unfortunately been imbibed into the society, I would definetly want to live in a society without perceptions.

The media (both in India and abroad) have raised a furor on racism about Channel 4’s Celebrity BigBrother show involving bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty who has been been subjected to bullying, allegedly with undertones of racism, by fellow participants Jade Goody, Jack Tweed & Jackiey Budden.

Shilpa’s victory is a mere eyewash, as it highly likely that the result has been tampered by Channel 4, so that victory would be overshadowed the entire racism episode, also considering the fact that they were far more deserving candidates in the form of Jermaine Jackson & Dirk Benedict who managed to stay away from controversies all along the show.

However, I must admit that I have rejoiced Shilpa’s victory like any other Indian would have, but the focus here is on racism not on the victory.

In a country like India where racism prevails within our own people on such a large scale, where the fairness products market is worth a staggering Rs 800 crore, what example are we setting to our younger generation as well as the people outside India ? Is it fair enough to blame the entire west for the racist slurs raised by a few individuals??

Have similar protests be raised (anywhere in the world) when Rohit (Kushal Punjabi) abuses Stephanie (Shannon Esra) and terms as her as a “Blonde Bimbo” in the Bollywood movie SALAAM-E-ISHQ ??? NO !!!

The only reason why “White” is considered superior to “Black”? is the fact that most of the developed countries have white skinned people.

The moment a country starts making economical progress, people stand up to respect its culture, its movies, its people (which has started to happen with India now, and has been happening with the US in the past 50 years).

So the day when the term “White skinned” would be marked as a racist slur is not far, considering the progress India has been making off late…….

What path each one of has to take to make turn this dream to a reality, is the crux of this post, which is unfortunately a missing piece of the puzzle.

PS: Off the record, In the Times matrimonial, I would still hunt for a “Fair girl” and will continue to use Emami’s Fair & Handsome Men’s fairness cream….. [:D]

1. "Ghati” (A derogatory term used to describe people from smaller towns who have vernacular influence on their accents, and fail to match the living standards of people in the bigger cities; Considered to have originated from Maharashtra)

2. “Chinki” (A term associated with people from the North-Eastern States, & a few asian countries (China, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Hongkong)

3. “Madrasi” (A term used to associate people from Madras and every other place down south)

Disclaimer: The opinions and views mentioned in this blog are that of the authors and might have either been influenced by a section in the society or under the influence of alcohol. No individual/community/religion has been targeted either intentionally or unintentionally, any offence taken is purely unintentional, and intentional ones do not deserve any apologies. The author’s views or not biased towards any individual/community/religion. Any objectionable content would be brought to the notice of the author, which would be reviewed and taken off the blog, if found genuinely objectionable.