Tanzerin

 I just found out that yesterday was Doctors' day... I've grown up with a few doctors in the family, a few friends are now super duper doctors, and since I've also been ill every now and then, I've been treated by unrelated unknown doctors. So here is my 5 pointer check list for lay people like you and me: 1. The next time you whine about how long you have to wait outside the doctor's office, kindly- yes PLEASE please also make sure you whine while you wait in a long queue outside the box office. After all, both are a matter of life, health, happiness and death NO?! 2. The next time the doctor prescribes antibiotics "unnecessarily", please don't take them. When you go back after 3 days with a condition that's worse off, I love watching the doctor bang his/her head on the wall once you've left. 3. If the doctor said that bump on your head is boil, it most likely is- Oh wait it can't be that simple. Dr. Google says it's a malignan...

A few days ago, my daughter walked off to a birthday party saying "I will go my alone." MY ALONE was her new English phrase for the week meaning 'all by myself'. Not just 'myself', "ALL BY MYSELF"! And as I watched her walk down the hallway to the neighbour's house, I felt a funny feeling in the pit of my tummy. Of all the funny-feelings-in-tummy motherhood brings you, this one was new. WAS MY BABY GROWING UP? You see, mothers are usually programmed to be blind to any of these so-called hints of growing up. So obviously it surprised me that I was thinking this at all! Growing up in Mommy language usually refers to other things like: 1. Baby Being toilet trained after months of cleaning up and mopping up and coercing and making sssss sounds while the bored baby sits on the Potty. 2. Baby Being able to chew food -accompanied by a lot of "CHEW CHEW CHEW" and nudging the food stuck in the cheek. 3. Baby Giving up the feeding bott...

Has it become so difficult to be happy? or even just optimistic? In the days following the O-so-talked-about "India's Daughter", we have been engulfed by a sense of rage- at the government, at the system, at patriarchy, at men, at some women and unfortunately at anyone who talks well of anything! I was chided yesterday for being cheerful. I am chided today for being optimistic. Mind you - I was taken in by the same rage - at the audacity of the defense lawyers, at their attitude that seemed to be not unique to criminals but rampant in our society. I shared the link to the leaked video on my facebook page, urging my friends to share it and take responsibility for being a part of the system that bred such criminals, a society that continued to breed the horribly chauvinistic attitude that women were dispensable. It made me angry and I made that very clear. And then I heard another side of the story as well- some said the real purpose of the documentary was to "put ...

Remember when we were in school and the morning of an exam we fantasised that some extra terrestrial monster would descend and exams would be cancelled? Nothing of the sort happened. We wrote our exam, went home and studied for the next and again wished for ET the next morning. And at the end of a bad exam we wondered why our wishes were never granted- boring lives we had no?! We went to school, played in the grounds, came home to eat our snack, did homework, watched "little wonder" on TV, fussed over the boring dinner and went to sleep. On days that my parents had to be out late or were travelling, they'd inform a neighbour to keep an eye on the house. We ate out of a stocked fridge, watched TV and walked the dog before going to bed. Such boring lives no?! The neighbour's car got robbed of the stereo at 2 in the night- my dog went to chase the robbers, but they had taken off. Now THAT made for a good showoff session at school the next morning, "You won'...

I grew up in a safe Bangalore. At least I didn't have to be taught at 3 what "Good touch" and "Bad touch" was. But I'm not sure I can say that about my daughter's life. With the next door school brushing aside rape allegations, I am agitated and enraged and like several other parents have embarked on a education spree. Several tips have cropped up over the past few days on how to teach your child to be safe. But at two and a half, I may be prematurely killing her innocence, not to mention how confusing I may seem to her. "Why are you screaming? If you scream that Bhoot is going to jump into your room." and I follow it up later in the day with "If someone touches you, scream with all your might and run to your teacher." "You must respect the aunties in school. Say thank you - they help you in the class, take you to the swing..." "If aunty takes you out of the class, shout out to Ma'am that she's taking you....

In recent times I have realised that several people feel obliged to apologise; apologise for being Hindu, apologise for a ‘Hindu’ party winning the elections, updating status messages on facebook or tweeting that while they may be called Hindu, they should not be mistaken to be fundamentalists. ‘I am not a religious Hindu. I am secular!’ I was raised in a Tamil Brahmin household. I remember spending my afternoons hearing tales from the Siva Puranam, the Ramayana and the Mahabharatha from my grandmother. I remember learning to draw a 18-pulli Kolam , making strings of mango leaves for festivals, learning Carnatic music and bharathanatyam, making a compulsory visit to the puja room after a bath every morning. As a young child, the stories of Parvati or Rama were fascinating, festivals were a lot of fun, rituals were intriguing and practices were just that- a way of living. In my growing up years I asked a lot of questions- why do we do this? How will it matter if I don’t do thi...

It's School Time. It started with... "Hah! My granddaughter is so smart- she should go straight to Kindergarten- why are you putting her in Playgroup and Nursery and God-knows-what-else!" Ya Sure Mom, May be I'll just ask the school if she can directly go to say Std 1? And then came activist friends "What are your views about home schooling- Children will remain un-corrupted by the System." Sure- Home schooling is fine with me- If it's YOUR home she can school in. And then that  Aunty "So are you going to send her on the school bus-It'll be convenient. But did you hear about that recent incident in XYZ Nagar about that ....God....I don't know what kind of animals become school bus drivers. Nowadays you can't trust anyone. I heard from someone else that some...." OK No school bus then! And Daddy J "My poor baby is going to school- how can she stay for 3 hours? It's not fair to such a small baby. She'll cry no...