Aaj Banda tere liye nachega

 This song is probably the cleverest part of the entire movie that i just came back from watching... Happy Patel is so strange and frankly cringey full of cliches that it gets hilariously funny in parts... or maybe my laugh filter is broken..

I would say that this film has some lovely moments-- the "item song" where the GUY for a change is doing all the dancing and making fun of the titillating dances that our films are usually full of-- AWESOME!

plus Vir apparently CAN dance... 

identifying the "instinctive" response of most Indian women to random male touching-- we all WANT to respond with that tight slap instinctively.. unfortunately most of us suppress that anger for fear of what else may happen... thankfully Happy Patel accepts the slap and the reason behind it. and does a marvellous job giving Rupa the chance to initiate any physical contact.. kudos for that

also.. the Mama -- she starts out at as sociopathic little girl who takes the ring of power from her dad.. kills her brothers.. takes the throne.. but stays in this very traditional feminine role of cooking and poisoning people to death... hell she even seeks validation from a male chef-- Sanjeev Kapoor in a very very cringey parody of some of his own shows and the greater world of reality cooking shows

absolutely every woman - feminine role is powerful in the movie-- even the tech genius is a girl- Roxy

the dead mother Sukhubai -- also this great sacrificing strong mama-- mixed in with the "kaamwali bai can do anything while doing jhaadu" joke

but when you have creative geniuses like Vir, Sumukhi and Amir khan working together.. WTF is with the very strange very cringey story?? 

I mean you repeatedly use random gaalis as "mispronounced" words and phrases.. the "tom" gag is just too silly for words.. and I am hard pressed to actually say what the point was-- except to make a parody of spy movies, "main apne baap ki maut ka badla loongi" trope and the "entire village comes together" trope.. all at the same time

like you took a whole bunch of tropes and stereotypes.. put them all together and made something silly

I usually LOVE Vir Das's stand up shows.. he is clever and witty and sharp as a needle and can make very intelligent jokes.. 

but this movie felt like it was meant to just do slapstick bollywood cliches and give Vir Das and Amir Khan a chance to repeatedly say-- "Main Hindustani hoon" after all the damage that has come their way for criticising the current political dispensation

It's been years and I need a release

 I feel like my brain.. my self is being erased slowly... Question by question.. comment by comment.. and thanks to a large part by my own creeping depression... 

It's been six years since I last wrote here.. why? Because someone said something.. parents decided to push the "why are you writing personal things in public"... someone said something weird about something I wrote.. 

And i stopped.. 

Over the years I've lost places to vent... Diaries have been torn, blogs have been questioned.. and WHY? 

Because writing down what is in my head apparently is "washing dirty linen in public".. 

And then I was reluctant to put things on a blog.. because I didn't want to start another argument with the person i loved.... 

Slowly my desire to write eroded because each sentence was being read and discussed and commented on by someone who felt "hurt" by what I felt in my head.. 

Even when this was part creative outlet, part venting space.. 

In today's world when everyone is chronically online and insta and threads and twitter are virtually used as daily diaries.. i can't remember the last time I actually wrote in my diary.. 

I went through Cancer last year.. diagnosis February 2024- stage 3C. 

Put a photo on insta with my shaved head after the chemo started.

 Immediate backlash-- why the hell would you put it online? We hadn't told extended family yet... 

It's MY body.. my social media.. and hello? I just told everyone who cared to look.. WHY do I need to "break the news carefully"? 

I genuinely can't remember the last time I wrote a story.. or poem, or even listened to music in peace.. it's like the cancer and the sadness has taken every creative instict away.. though I'm not sure which one actually came first.. 

i'm back to working.. going to office.. 

Officially Cancer free but on maintenance meds so it doesn't relapse.. 

But it's like the light has gone out in my head.. 

It doesn't make me happy or excited or even satisfied anymore.

 It's just a job.. 

Journalism used to MEAN something.. to highlight what's wrong and how it can be resolved.. 

But 13 odd years of writing the same articles over and over again while things keep getting worse is making me wonder why anything survives at all.. 

Literally every few days we are doing the same story of violence and depravity and apathy of those in power and those watching 

Even in office there are times when I wonder if everyone has shut off their humanity to cope with the awfulness we see or am I being over sensitive..

And through it all i feel a sense of aloneness that screams even though I know there are like minded people put there.. there are people who see things, write things, create things in this fucked up world.. 

I used to be able to disappear into a book and forget about everything.. reboot my brain a bit.. now nothing works.. maybe it's because "adult world" means reading books about reality and darkness and politics.. even a fantasy book these days a LOT darker and politically nuanced... I lost my taste for reading happily ever after romances a while ago when things crashed and burned in my love life.. 

That's another set of scars.. from feeling insane and questioning something as basic as morals and cheating and allowing someone to drag me through thoughts and feelings and situations that I seriously don't know WHY I went through.. 

I used to be all about sunshine and finding the silver lining and seeing the happy and hopeful bits.. but now I just can't seem to find it in any part of my life.. 

And i don't know what to do about it.. 

He walks.. I watch

I watched him walk towards me today

Feet splayed

Arms akimbo

Balancing carefully on the bricks of the lane leading home

Slow but sure

Not needing a hand to hold him steady

Watching each brick under his feet

And then watching me watch him walk

The slight frown on my face as I watch each careful shuffling step

The stubborn look in his eyes that says

I don’t need a mommy to hold my hand as I walk

Looking up and to the side as a bird flips past

As I wait

Hoping that the uneven bricks and the slush left behind by the rain doesn’t trip him up

Making sure that he sees the little bit of mud right outside the door

so he doesn’t get his shoes muddy

I watch,

worried but proud

Much as he must have watched me take my first steps as a toddler

My grandpa

The 95 year old who still won’t carry a stick

Labels are a BITCH

Labels are an odd thing..

A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose…

Sure

But what happens when a Rose is told that it is nothing special but simply a member of a large family of the genus rosacea?

Does that not detract from THE thing that is a Red Rose in Full Bloom and reduce it to a “just a rose”?

I had a shitty relationship.. I was a fool in love with an ass who didn’t respect me.. I took everything he dished out for years and still loved him, fought with him, stayed with him... till I finally had enough and told him to fuck off…

That was my reality. I was an idiot in love as a teenager who let that idiocy define years of her adulthood too..

That was me. ME. As the actor who chose to behave in a certain manner and CHOSE to be  a certain way..

But now the label has been changed

Ironically by the same Ass who I told to fuck off from my life

The AB’s back in town for a flying visit.. and has recently been sitting through some seminars on domestic violence and abuse..

So he decided to assuage his guilty conscience and come to me to APOLOGISE for the emotional, mental and sexual abuse he put me through during our relationship....

A relationship that ended 7 years ago.. one that scarred me so badly that I’ve only recently  begun healing..

He came to APOLOGISE… 

and in the process took away my agency, my choice, MY decisions..

I was an Idiot in love with an ass

I’m now a Victim... a survivor of domestic violence whose abuser came back to apologise for his behaviour..

I’m no longer the person who made the wrong choices.. I’m a victim who  “suffered through abuse”

Who was this apology for anyway??

I was okay with my original label.. I was okay being the idiot who made bad relationship choices.. I was OKAY

Now I’m not

Now I find myself reliving everything about the years of our relationship.. wondering which part was my choice, where was it that I had the agency to do something but chose not to, and where were the parts where I could have done nothing…

isn't there some rule when it comes to shit like this that it should be the so called Victim who should ask for and lead the confrontation with the abuser and then walk away after receiving an apology feeling bolstered and vindicated???

i now feel more violated than i ever felt during the worst parts of our relationship... back then i was Choosing whether or not to pick a fight.. i was choosing to react or not react.. or maybe overreact if i felt emotionally wrought enough.. it was MY CHOICE

or so i believed..

now the apology has been given to me.. has been thrust at me really.. and i'm writing about it days after the fact, still dazed at what happened.. 

i didn't really react in front of him.. just gave him a polite hearing and said Okay.....and i let him go.. 

i wrote to him the next day.. with a long list of things that i REMEMBER hurting me.. asking whether he acknowledges and apologises for all of them..

got a reply saying. i apologise for all the things you've listed and things you've not...

and now i'm spiralling in my own head wondering what other abuse have I suffered that i didn't even KNOW was abusive behaviour??

labels are a BITCH i tell you

Soul Fury- Rumi- Coleman Barks

I ask the reed flute, why are you crying

How can there be such tears,

When nothing has been lost

The reed flute says, Not so

They took me from the lips

that once made sugar throughout my whole and silent body

Now I live letting others

Make crying sounds

With my emptiness

The trope of loss and emptiness is a strange one.

Even when the world sees you as an art form, making beautiful music that touches souls, the beauty may be coming from the depths of emptiness and deadening inside.. we believe that the music is divine, but it is ultimately the expression of the emptiness through the various holes torn through the reed’s body

The purpose of a story is not to hold your attention
but to put you back doing your work, inner and outer......

there's no shame in being crazy....

I'm not the one who broke you I'm not the one you should fear We got to move you darlin I thought I lost you somewhere But you were never really ever there at all



there are days when i stumble across a song whose lyrics are like a fist to the gut...



when does this end really???