The Dinner Party Bore

 You are bound to meet one; here's how to deal with him (or her)

 

The festive season is in full swing now, and you know what that means, don’t you? Yes, there will be an endless slew of dinner parties that you will have to attend from here until the New Year dawns. And that means donning your finery and heading out for banal conversation and indifferent food night after night, until you are ready to scream blue murder. 

 

If you are anything like me, you will inevitably end up being stuck with the biggest bore in the gathering, exchanging bland platitudes while your eyes glaze over and you slowly lose the will to live. But don’t worry, help is at hand. I have spent the last few years perfecting my technique to end boring conversations and head on to someone more interesting at the party. And today I am going to share some of my tips with you so that you too can terminate your conversations with the resident bore without causing undue offence.

 

·       The most obvious way to move on is actually the most effective. While nodding and smiling at your interlocutor suddenly break away to look in the distance with a huge grin on your face. Wave madly as if you have caught sight of an old friend you haven’t seen in ages. Then, before the bore in question has had time to turn around and look, excuse yourself with a hurried, “I can’t believe he/she is here; must say hello!” and dash across the room.

·       Keep a drink in hand at all times. And when you feel that you are in danger of being trapped by a crashing bore, gulp it down quickly, look down at your glass with some surprise and say, “Oops, I seem to be running on empty. Let me get something to drink. Back in a tick.” We all know you are never coming back, but it’s only polite to act as if that is a real possibility.

·       Catch hold of a passing friend or acquaintance and offer to introduce them to the bore you are talking to. After you’ve made your introductions and they are making stilted conversation with one another, quickly make yourself scarce. Don’t do this too often, though, if you want to retain the friends you have. (Conversely, if you see a good friend stuck with a party bore, do go over and rescue them. I find that saying, in a firm tone of voice, “Can I borrow A for a moment? There’s someone I want him/her to meet” does the trick quite nicely.)

·       Make a pact with a friend who is also at the party and promise to call each other if either of you is stuck with a bore. Once the call comes through, look down at your phone, look concerned – even a bit worried – and say, “Sorry, but I have to take this.” Then move away to take the call – and make good your escape.

·       And if all of this seems like too much effort, then simply be upfront. After a few minutes of conversation, simply hold out your hand and say, “It’s been great catching up with you, but I must circulate now.” In this – as in all of life – sometimes the direct approach is the best one.

 

Got a ticket to ride

 But spare me all the tosh about the 'romance' of air travel

 

I am always astounded by people of my generation who talk about the ‘romance of air travel’. Mostly, because I can’t understand what they are on about. I could understand if those a couple of decades older than me waxed eloquent about the ‘good old days’ when people dressed up to travel by plane, when being an ‘air-hostess’ was a glamorous profession that attracted the best and the brightest, and when passengers were feted as they flew instead of being penned together like battery hens. 

 

But ever since I began flying I have to confess that I found nothing remotely glamorous about travelling in a steel tube, sitting uncomfortably close to strangers, and being fed re-heated food in Styrofoam containers, washed down with lukewarm Cola. Yes, it is indisputably exciting to arrive in a new destination, but as for the process of getting there, the less said the better.

 

Now that I think about it, I do have some stuff to say about flying in the 21^st century. And it’s mostly about how I cope with flights, what I wear to travel, and what I pack in my onflight bag, and a few tricks to preserve my sanity. Here are some of those tips in the hope they come in handy when you next take a flight.

 

·       Don’t eat the inflight meal if you can help it. It’s sometimes made a couple of days before and inexpertly warmed up in the on-board oven before service – which is why it is mostly tasteless muck. Much better to just grab a snack at the airport or pack a sandwich or a stuffed paratha to eat on the plane. If that seems like too much bother, even a small pack of bhujiya or chips can tide you over until you grab a hot meal on the ground.

·       Always pack one change of clothes and some clean underwear in your carryon bag. That way, if the airline fails to load your check-in luggage – which happens all too often – you will have something to wear the following day and won’t need to rush to the shops as soon as you arrive.

·       There are some people who never travel without a neck pillow. But I find that takes too much space in my carry-on. I would rather use that to pack a shawl or a light sweater for when the plane gets over-airconditioned – as is inevitably the case. Yes, some airlines will give you a blanket if you ask, but there is no guarantee that you will get one on every flight. So, if you don’t want to shiver for a few hours, carry one warm garment with you.

·       I simply cannot comprehend this new trend of people ‘raw-dogging’ on flights – that is, getting on without a book to read, a movie to watch, or even some music to listen to. As any seasoned traveller knows, the only way to survive a flight is to keep yourself entertained for its duration. So, pick a gripping book, download a new series on Netflix, or make a playlist that will keep you humming, until you reach your destination. That really is the best way to preserve your sanity on board.

 

Breakfast of champions

It has to be Indian all the way...

 

One of the things I enjoy most about travelling abroad is the opportunity to try new cuisines, enjoy exotic flavours, and immerse myself in an unfamiliar food culture. There is something magical about eating sushi sitting at a small counter in a Kyoto restaurant, slurping up a gelato in a tiny Italian town, gorging on bangers and mash in a British pub, or even having my sinuses opened up by a fiery Thai curry in a Bangkok food court. 

 

I say all this to establish that I am not one of those unadventurous eaters who arrives in a foreign city only to search for the nearest Indian restaurant so that I have some dal makhani and butter chicken for dinner. I am happy to eat the local cuisine, wherever I may find myself, for both lunch and dinner. It’s only first thing in the morning, when I head down to the hotel breakfast buffet, that I miss the food of India. 

 

Don’t get me wrong. There is much to enjoy about a great breakfast spread in a good hotel. And for a couple of days I do just that, filling my plate with local pastries and cakes, and then getting my protein fix with a couple of fried eggs accompanied by bacon and hash browns. But by the third day, ennui sets in. And that’s when I begin to long for the infinite variety of Indian breakfasts.

 

Even as I eat my almond croissant, my taste buds are craving for a pillowy soft idli which I could dunk into a spicy green chutney or gunpowder. The scrambled eggs on the buffet are no substitute for the fiery railway-style masala omelette that we get back home. And while I like a good sourdough as much as the next person, it really can’t stand up to a aloo paratha, eaten with a dab of achar and lashings of dahi. It’s only at the breakfast buffet do I begin to understand why some Indians travel with home-made theplas and achar to give their tastebuds a respite from the bland fare that most Western hotels serve up for the first meal of the day.

 

And it is only the West that is guilty as charged, given that it seems unable to think beyond pastries, eggs, sausages and cold cuts for breakfast, with some cut fruit thrown in for the healthy eaters. If you are travelling East, though, breakfast will generally include a variety of dimsum and congees, all of them served with spicy sauces and condiments to kickstart your palate for the day. 

 

But there is no denying that it is Indian hotels that do us proud when it comes to breakfast. You can order anything from a puri-bhaji to poha, upma or luchi served with channa dal or aloo dum. Most good hotels will have a live station, where you can order a dosa to your specifications. And I have fond memories of a stay at the Grand Chola in Chennai, where they actually have a sambhar buffet, featuring varieties from every part of the south.

 

Which may explain why I find myself increasingly choosing to stay in Indian hotel chains (if possible) when I am abroad. That way, even if I am in London or Marrakesh, I can start the day with a taste of India.

 

When the shiuli flowers...

It's time to celebrate the Goddess once again

 

A few months ago, I paid a visit to my favourite nursery in Delhi to pick up some plants for my balcony. Walking through the rows of spring blooms, I came across a plant that looked very familiar indeed. “Yeh shiuli hai, na?” I asked the gardener who was assisting me. “Nahin madam,” he said, shaking his head. “Isko parijaat kehte hain.” I was unconvinced by this explanation. So, I took a picture and uploaded it into an app that helps identify plants. And what do you know? Both of us were right. This plant is called parijaat in north India; but in east India (where I grew up) it is called shiuli. 

 

As a child growing up in Calcutta, I was always told that the shiuli plant was very auspicious because its flowering – which happens only once a year – heralds the beginning of the Pujo season. Every October, without fail, the white and orange blooms of the shiuli tree burst forth, reminding us that the Goddess Durga is on her way and will soon be among us. These teeny-tiny flowers fall from the shiuli tree every night, carpeting the floor and exuding a heavenly fragrance that I have always associated with Pujo festivities.

 

So, even though the parijaat/shiuli available in the nursery were just small potted plants, I decided to take a couple home with me. In a couple of years, I thought to myself, they would grow strong and high and maybe, in time, they would start to flower and remind me of those heady pre-Pujo evenings I remembered from my days in Cal. So, I transplanted them into roomy pots and resigned myself to a long wait.

 

Well, guess what? Just a few months down the line, as October began to rear its head, these small little bushes that I had been watering faithfully began to throw up little buds on their branches. And in a week or so, my plants were redolent with the shiuli blossoms, exuding their trademark perfume and putting me in the right Pujo spirit. Sure, the flowers were tinier than I remembered from the tree in Calcutta, and they wilted far sooner, but for a little baby plant, my shiuli was doing very well in its role as a harbinger of the Goddess.  

 

But while this gladdened my heart, injecting it with a dose of rose-tinted nostalgia for the Durga Pujos past that I had celebrated in the city of my birth, it also left me a little bit sad. And that’s because this year, Pujo will not have the same resonance in Calcutta. By all accounts, everyone is still shattered by the R.G. Kar rape case, and the Pujo spirit has been diluted with both anger and sadness.

 

And while I know that it will be hard to enjoy the festivities quite as we did in the years gone by, the flowering of the shiuli reminded me that the Goddess will keep her appointment with us this Pujo as well. Now, it is up to us to give her the kind of welcome she deserves and to pray that her avenging spirit does right by the young doctor who has, so far, been failed by the system.

 

Glad to be grey?

Well, it certainly works for some women -- but I think I will live to dye another day 

Glad to be grey? Well, some women of a certain age certainly are. Veteran actress, Zeenat Aman, made her Instagram debut recently, rocking her grey shoulder-length bob, and immediately went viral. Gen Z could not get enough of her pewter hair (and her pithy aphorisms drawn from many decades of toiling away in Bollywood). 

This came as something of a surprise to Aman herself, who wrote on one of her Insta posts: “I didn't intend for my grey hair to be a statement, but a statement it has become. In fact, yesterday I read a tweet by someone who said they know at least three people who have been inspired to stop colouring their hair since I made my Instagram debut! I thought this was a wonderful compliment. If embracing my natural hair is encouraging others to do the same, then I'm all the happier for it.”

Aman is not the only yesteryear actress to embrace her natural grey hair. The ever-graceful Sharmila Tagore has also stopped dyeing her hair, rocking a salt and pepper head that looks both elegant and appropriate for her age. Dimple Kapadia also went grey during the lockdown, saying that it was “so empowering” to stop hiding her natural hair colour.

And this is far from being an Indian trend. In the West, such actresses as Jane Fonda, Andie MacDowell, Helen Mirren, Jamie Lee Curtis, and countless others have cancelled their three-weekly colour appointments and decided to proudly let their natural grey show. Needless to say, all these ladies — both in India and abroad — look truly magnificent. 

Looking at their pictures, I began to wonder if all this palaver involving monthly colour appointments was actually worth the bother? While I am not as old as any of the women listed (though, with a bit of luck, I will get there eventually) maybe it was time to bite the bullet and let my natural hair colour — whatever it may be; I genuinely no longer have a clue — emerge in the fullness of time. After all, many of my friends had stopped colouring their hair a decade ago, having decided to embrace their greys, and they looked pretty good. 

But being of a cautious bent of mind, I decided to do a dress rehearsal of sorts first. So, I duly downloaded an app that allows you to upload your pictures and change your hair colour to see how you look. Well, I did just that, turning my hair grey in one of my selfies — and got a bit of a shock. I didn’t look either elegant or magnificent like the ladies who had inspired me. I just looked ten years older and — dare I say it? — as if I hadn’t slept in a week. 

Clearly that certain something that allows some women to carry off grey hair and look amazing in the process is completely missing in my DNA. I need a pop of colour — be it burgundy, chocolate brown, auburn; whatever my mood dictates that month — on the top of my head to make my look work. 

So, I guess those colour appointments will continue to be a part of my life. The grey will simply have to stay hidden. And I will live to dye another day. 

Childless cat ladies

Do they deserve the bad rap they get?

Thanks to the American presidential election and vice-presidential hopeful, J.D. Vance, the term ‘childless cat lady’ had become a part of the political lexicon. It has been used to attack presidential candidate and the current Vice-President of the United States, Kamala Devi Harris, for not having biological children. This ‘failing’ – as the Republicans would have it – means that Harris has no real stake in the future; that she has no one in her life to ‘keep her humble’; and no understanding of the lives of everyday Americans who are raising families of their own.

 

There are so many things wrong with this view of childless – or childfree, if that’s the word you prefer – that it is hard to know where to start. It is absurd to suggest that just because you haven’t birthed babies, you are willing to let the world go to hell in a handbasket. And those who suggest this don’t understand either the concept of empathy or that of extended and blended families. As for the idea that women need to be kept ‘humble’ so that (presumably) they don’t try to rise above their stations; well frankly, this is a risible goal in the 21^st century. 

 

As the party of Christian values, surely the Republicans know that the progenitor of their religion, Jesus Christ, had no biological children of his own – which is why he regarded the entire world as his progeny. And nor, for that matter, did the mother who birthed him (the Virgin Mary – the clue is in the name), and yet she is revered as a universal mother figure in the Christian canon. So, maybe – just maybe – it is not imperative to have a child who shares your DNA to care about the wider world.

 

I can’t help but be thankful that this sort of narrative hasn’t taken hold in Indian politics – well, not as yet, at least. Our Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has no children and that fact has never been used to suggest that he is not concerned about the future of India. Instead, he is commended for this because it means that he is doing everything for the betterment of the country as a whole and not to improve the lot of his kids. Similarly, the Prime Minister In Waiting, Rahul Gandhi, doesn’t have children, and that isn’t seen as a failing either; rather people appear to be thankful that this fact could signal the end of dynastic politics in this country.

 

It helps, of course, that both Modi and Gandhi are men. And we do not have similar expectations of men as we do of women. Perhaps, if there was a childless woman asking to be Prime Minister of India, the same objections would be raised about her as well. Meanwhile in America, the Democrats and Harris’s own family are trying to defend her by saying that she does have children – step-children, who she has helped raise, and whose lives she is involved in.

 

But if you ask me, this is the wrong response. The right response would be to say that a woman doesn’t need children (biological, adopted, step, foster, whatever) to have her existence validated. Just being a woman – in herself, by herself, for herself – is enough.

 

Turning the page

What happens when an old favourite doesn't appeal any more?

When it comes to reading, I am very much a creature of habit. I have my favourite authors who I go back to time and again and whose new releases I look forward to with keen anticipation. 

So you can imagine my excitement when I read that one of my favourite writers was coming out with a new book. David Nicholls (of One Day fame) was releasing a new novel, You Are Here, which had been universally well-reviewed by the critics. I faithfully downloaded it as soon as it became available on Kindle and in a state of heightened anticipation sat down to read it. 

But only 15 minutes into that exercise I realised that a strange feeling was creeping over me. Could it possibly be boredom? Surely not! This was one of my favourite authors writing a book in one of my favourite genres (romance, for want of a better term). And yet I was finding it hard proceeding beyond the first few chapters. How was this possible? 

I persisted with the book for a couple of weeks, forcing myself to read a few chapters at a time before finally deciding that life was too short to hold myself ransom to a book that really didn’t speak to me at all. So, I turned to another old favourite of mine to repair matters. Daniel Silva had just come out with the latest Gabriel Allon thriller, A Death In Cornwall, and I thought this would do the trick nicely. 

So, I started the book, fingers crossed, hoping that this one would give me more joy. But no such luck. Even though all my favourite characters were in attendance and all the tropes that make an Allon thriller were present and accounted for, I found this book heavy going as well. 

It was when I found myself struggling with Daniel Silva, my perennial go-to when it comes to spy thrillers, that an alarm went off in my head. What exactly was the problem here? Was it the book (or books)? Or was it me? What accounted for the fact that I simply wasn’t enjoying reading the authors that I had always sworn by. 

Could it be that my attention span had been destroyed by too much social media? Had scrolling through Twitter rewired my brain in such a way that I no longer appreciated writing  that was longer than byte-sized? Had the Internet finally fried my head so badly that I could not immerse myself in reading, one of the great joys of my life. 

You may laugh, but I was so perturbed by this state of affairs that I decided I had to investigate deeper. And what better way to do that than to go back to the books that had introduced me to these writers and made me a life-long fan. So I duly dug out my well-thumbed copy of One Day and, much to my joy, managed to get through it in a couple of days, enjoying every second. Then, it was time to delve into Silva’s first book in the Allon Series, The Kill Artist, to check if the magic still worked — and yes, it did. 

So maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t me, after all. It was the books. And I can’t tell you what a relief that realisation was! 

Age cannot wither...

Nor should it come with onerous fashion rules to follow

I don’t know about you but I am getting tired of being told that there are rules about what you can and cannot do as you age. And, truth be told, the more I am told about such rules the more I long to break them — and more often than not, I do just that. 

• The longer your years, the shorter your hair should be, they advise. My response to that is: why? Why is it that women in their forties and above cannot grow their hair beyond their shoulders? Why should they all line up at the hair salon and get sensible bobs and page boy cuts? Is it because long hair is associated with sexual allure and women of a certain age are not supposed to have any? Are they supposed to resign themselves to being invisible as soon as their hair begins to thin and grey? Well, I’m sorry, but I am having none of that. In fact, after spending my entire youth with short hair I have now gone the other extreme in my middle age, growing my hair out till it skims my waist — and I love it. 
• Nora Ephron famously exhorted us to put on our bikinis and live in them while we were in our twenties because that was the decade in which we would look the best in them. Well, maybe that is true. But why would we wear bikinis to just look good for other people? We should wear them whenever the hell we want to because we feel good in them. Speaking for myself, it wasn’t till I was in my forties that I found the confidence to wear a bikini — because by then I didn’t care what anybody else thought of me or my body. And once I started I haven’t stopped and hopefully I will still be rocking a bikini by the time I am in my 70s (if I am lucky enough to live that long). 
• No miniskirts or short dresses for the middle-aged the adage goes. That rule has always made zero sense to me. For most women, their legs remain their best feature long after everything else has gone south. And to be asked to cover them up to fit with some code of middle-aged modesty makes no sense at all. So, if you want to wear shorts when you go for a walk or a mini-skirt when out for dinner go right ahead and do so. The fashion police can go take a hike.

The only rule when you are dressing as a woman or a certain age is that there are no rules. You have come too far to follow some cookie-cutter fashion advice spewed out by some glamour magazine. You have earned the right to dress as you like, without worrying about what the world thinks of your stylistic choices. It’s your life. And you can wear what you damn well please — and who cares if it pleases or displeases anyone else. 

Working lunch

Is a restaurant ever justified in telling people to get off their laptops?

Ever since I began to earn enough money to pay for restaurant meals, I have enjoyed the experience of going out to eat with myself. In the pre-smartphone era, I would take a book along, try and bag a window table, and graze for a couple of hours while entertaining myself with a spot of people-watching interspersed with reading (with some sneaky eavesdropping on neighbouring tables providing some food for thought!). When I stopped working in an office, and got a bit stir-crazy writing in the solitude of my study, I would often head out with my laptop to do a bit of writing while grabbing a sandwich and coffee. And more recently, it is my smartphone that keeps me occupied, whether it is answering emails, scrolling social media, or just reading a book on my Kindle app.

 

I have done this sort of thing for decades, all over the world, in restaurants both expensive and cheap, fancy and fuss-free, and I have never been made to feel that I was making a nuisance of myself, by working on a laptop, an Ipad, or even my phone. So, it came as a bit of surprise to read on X that a restaurant in Delhi had told a female single diner not to work on her laptop as she waited for her meal. This being X, there were heated opinions on both sides of the debate, with some saying that restaurants had the right to ban laptops and others – like me – saying that such prohibitions should be stated upfront and not sprung on guests after they have ordered. 

 

Of course, restaurants have the right to lay down rules about what guests are allowed (or not allowed) to do. Equally, guests have the right to vote with their feet and not go back to restaurants that make them feel unwelcome. But the more I thought about it, the more the laptop ban made no sense. The argument goes that if you allow people to work on laptops then the ambience of the restaurant changes and it becomes like a co-working place. But given how technology works these days, you can do the same kind of work on an Ipad and a smartphone, so why just discriminate against laptop users? And if you are committed to not letting your restaurant turn into a co-working place, then are you going to police your guests’ smartphone usage and make sure that they are not actually doing any work while they wait for their entrée to be served? 

 

And what would be allowed and disallowed? Is it verboten to answer emails but responding to a Whatsapp message is fine? Is scrolling through Instagram allowed but working on a presentation forbidden? A book is ok but Facebook marketplace is not?

 

Frankly, this makes zero sense. And if you ask me, rather than police the use of laptops at the table, restaurants would be better off ensuring that people use their devices with due consideration to others. I have lost count of the number of times I have sat at a restaurant while people at the next table watched video shorts or listened to music clips without the benefit of headphones. Instead of banishing laptops, how about we prohibit noise pollution like this? 

 

Now, that’s a ban I could get on board with. 

 

'Tis the season

Every city has a time when it shines brightest -- and that's the best time to visit

Cities have their good and bad days just as they have their good and bad seasons. And the best way to get the most of your visits is to choose a time when their good days and good seasons coalesce to make for a fabulous experience. 

For instance, you can’t go wrong visiting Calcutta — as I still refer to it, having grown up there — during Durga Puja. There is a particular magic in the air during the Puja season and you can’t help being infected by it. The entire city is shimmering with lights; walking through the streets is to be left awestruck by the inventiveness of the decorations; and the pandals are often works of art in themselves. The idols of the Goddess are stunning and innovative, leaving even nonbelievers in a state of bliss. And that’s before they’ve tasted the bhog. 

Similarly, Goa can cast a spell on the best of us during the monsoons. There is something enchanting about the landscape dominated by varying shades of green, with the foliage wiped clean by the incessant rain. The sea is grey and stormy and this is probably not the best time to swim. But just sitting on the beach and watching the swell of waves can be mesmerising in itself. 

Every city presents its best face during spring but no one does it better than Delhi. This is the season of flowers in the national capital and every roundabout and street is lined with colourful blooms. The weather is just right to visit its many monuments and parks. The worst of the winter pollution has gone but the evenings and mornings are still cool and pleasing. Take a walk in Old Delhi; feast on a picnic in Sunder Nursery; or simply eat some chaat on the streets; you simply can’t go wrong. 

I have my own reasons to pick particular times to visit certain cities. I like to time my visits to Amritsar either around Baisakhi or Diwali because this is the time when the Golden Temple is decked up like a bride, its gold facade lit by thousands of glittering lights. Yes, you spend more time in queues to visit the Darbar Saheb but the view is totally worth the wait. 

That’s much the same reason why I like to visit London during Christmas and New Year. Yes, the days are short and it is dark by 4 pm but the Christmas lights shine all the brighter for that and there is a feeling of festivity in the air that is truly infectious. And there is no better feeling than sitting by a roaring fireplace with a glass of mulled wine and a mince pie while a shimmering Christmas tree looms in front of you. 

Winter is also the season when my thoughts turn to Venice. The first visit I ever made to La Serenissima was in December and I fell in love with the city as I walked the near-empty streets completely free of tourists. Ever since then I have chosen to visit Venice during the off-season to enjoy the city when it is not heaving with the hordes that invade it in summer. I can’t recommend this enough (having suffered the crowds during one ill-judged summer visit) especially since hotels cost far less at this time. 

Not all men?

 That is true; but believe me, it is Every Single Woman

There are no words to describe the horror that every woman felt when the facts of the rape and murder of a young woman doctor at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata came to light. Sadly, though, there were enough men who found it within themselves to shout “Not All Men” on social media when they were confronted with women expressing shock, sadness and, indeed, anger, at this horrific incident. 

 

Of course, they are right to the extent that not every man is a rapist. But it is equally true that every single woman – and believe me, it is Every Single Woman – has faced sexual molestation of one kind or another at some stage in her life. In fact, to be a woman in India is to live with the constant fear that one day the rape story in the newspaper could be about you. And every woman who reads about any such incident has the same thought in her head: There, but for the Grace of God, go I…

 

No man can possibly understand what it means to live as a woman in this country. For starters, you have to live in a state of constant vigilance, never letting down your guard just in case some threat was to present itself. Men walk down deserted streets without giving it a second thought; women would never venture into the shadows for fear of what they would find. Men can hail a cab to go back home late at night and nod off without a care in the world; women will take a picture of the number plate and share it with friends, map the route, and stay alert just in case things went awry. No man I know has ever considered pepper spray on his person or clutched a bunch of keys in his hand as an improvised weapon; every woman I know has done both at one point or another.

 

What’s worse is that it’s not just stranger danger that a woman has to guard against. She doesn’t just have to worry about the man pressing himself against her on public transport but also about the boss who makes lewd remarks about her figure. It’s not just the man at the street corner who shouts vulgarities at her who is the problem; it’s also the lecherous uncle who has been feeling her up since she was a child. Not only does she have to guard against all these predators she also has to constantly police herself so that she doesn’t “provoke men” or give them “the wrong idea”. And that’s harder than it sounds because anything from a loud laugh to a sleeveless blouse or a short skirt can set these men off – because, don’t you know, she was “asking for it”.

 

It's an exhausting way to live and that, quite frankly, is what every woman is: completely and utterly exhausted. Exhausted trying to find a safe space where she can simply exist without worrying about where the next attack might potentially be coming from. Exhausted because there seems to be no end in sight to the constant threat of sexual violence. And exhausted by the physical, mental and emotional toll this constant hypervigilance takes on her.

 

“Not All Men,” you say? Probably. But it is “Every Single Woman”.

Death becomes her (and him)

 Death is the ultimate whitewash; making saints of ordinary men and women

The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones. So William Shakespeare wrote about Julius Caeser, putting his words in Mark Antony’s mouth. But I can’t help but think that Shakespeare got it wrong this one time. The truth is that death is the ultimate whitewash, cleansing the deceased of all their sins and leaving behind a saintly figure that often bears no resemblance to the person they actually were while alive. 

The revisionism starts soon after death. All eulogies by family members and friends focus on the many virtues of the recently departed, some real but many imagined. Even the worst parent is recast a doting presence by bereaved children. The surviving spouse of the most fractious relationship will have you believe that their’s was the love story of the century. And so on. 

That’s not entirely surprising given that we are constantly being exhorted not to speak ill of the dead. If you have nothing nice to say, we are told if we are even mildly critical, then it’s better to say nothing at all. If you must speak then make sure that you are devotional rather than derogatory in tone. 

In time, this message becomes so internalised in us that we are programmed to look at the dead through rose-tinted glasses. The mother with whom the daughters had a difficult relationship riven with arguments and fights morphs into a maternal figure who was nothing but sweetness and light. The father who never had time for his kids while alive is celebrated as a benevolent patriarch who led by example. The spouse who was controlling or emotionally distant is portrayed as the ideal partner who could do no wrong. 

I suppose at one level this makes sense. When somebody you love dies you want to focus on their best selves — and the only way to do that is to wish away all their jagged edges. So you endow them with a persona that you wish they had had in real life. You lavish them with virtues they never had. You create memories that you wish existed. And in time you come to believe that your revisionism is, in fact, the truth. 

But the truth is that we do a disservice to those no longer among us when we ignore their full selves in favour of just celebrating their best bits. It takes courage to look at the life and legacy of the deceased in a way in which we acknowledge their flaws, their human failings, their failures. The truest expression of love is to admit that someone you loved was flawed — but was worthy of love, anyway. 

Selective memory can sometimes be a way of protecting ourselves from hurt. And what could hurt more than the thought that your mom didn’t truly love you, that your dad was indifferent to your success, or even that your husband/wife regretted marrying you. But it is only when we admit these possibilities and learn to go beyond them to arrive at a purer love that we can truly honour the dead. 

Home is where the heart is

And for me, it will always be India... 

Whenever people ask me which is my favourite city in the world, I don’t even have to pause and think. No, the answer is always on the tip of my tongue. It’s London all the way. I love the city for its magnificent monuments, its beautiful parks, its fun pubs and the glorious countryside a short car ride away. And yet if anyone were to ask me to move to London and live there full-time, I wouldn’t take a second to say, “No, thank you.”

 

And no, that’s no reflection on London. I am happy to spend weeks there on holiday and have done so for many years. But the very idea of moving to a foreign country – whether it is England, or Thailand, or even my eternal love, Italy – to live there forever leaves me cold. 

 

I know what you’re thinking. I am one of those spoilt upper middle-class ladies who is so used to other people cooking and cleaning for her that the very idea of looking after myself in a city where domestic help is hard to come by makes a shiver go up my spine. And yes, I agree that when it comes to domestic help, people of my age and class have it extremely easy in India. But it’s not the cooking and loading the dishwasher that gives me pause – in fact, I quite enjoy fending for myself when I am abroad – but the feeling that I would never flourish far away from my natural habitat, in a country that I cannot really call my own, no matter how long I live there or how hard I try to assimilate.  

 

Nor do I think that this is a function of age, and that I am now too middle-aged and set in my ways to countenance such a change. Even when I was in my early twenties and had several opportunities to move abroad and start a new life, I always declined the opportunity. The thought of being a legal alien in another country just didn’t appeal no matter how good the pay packet that came with it. To me, it was far more important to live in a place where everyone else looked like me, where I could speak, read and write the local language, and where my family and friends were just a phone call away.

 

The comfort of familiarity is what always anchored me in place. And that feeling has only got stronger with time. The very idea of living in a place where nobody else speaks my language leaves me cold. And even though globalization has created a world in which you can get Indian food anywhere in the universe, you simply can’t replicate the taste of home anywhere abroad no matter how hard you try. 

 

Which is why, while I love to travel the world, sampling the delights that it has to offer, I am never as happy as when I am coming back home to my own country, my own home, and my own kitchen. The first meal I eat when I arrive back is always a khichdi with copious quantities of ghee, with some alu choka and mango pickle. 

 

That’s the taste of home to me; and home can never be anywhere else but India.

 

Moving house

It's supposed to be a traumatic experience -- but I must confess I rather enjoyed it

I’ve had to move house many different times in my life. And while those who say that moving home is as traumatic as experiencing the loss of a loved one may have a point, I must admit that I rather enjoyed the process of uprooting myself and setting up again in an entirely different locale.

 

There is nothing quite like a house move to clarify your priorities for you. For me, whenever I have moved into a new space, the first thing I have done is set up the kitchen. I get all my appliances – coffee-maker, oven, microwave, electric kettle, fridge, etc. – up and running well before I move in. That’s because when I wake up for the first time in a new house, the one thing that makes it feel like home is a cup of coffee made exactly how I like it. And if I can’t cook myself a meal in a house, then it fails the ‘home-test’ as far as I am concerned.

 

Setting up the bedroom comes a distant second for me. I will happily camp out on a mattress on the floor for weeks on end, so long as I can roast some vegetables in the oven, or even just heat up last night’s leftovers in the microwave. And as for the living room, I take my time putting it right because sometimes I need a space to speak to me before I make any permanent design choices.

 

I realize that I am probably in the minority here. Most people would make sure that they could sleep in comfort in their bed (with their stuff piled on the bedside table) before they moved in. They would happily live off takeaway meals so long as their bedroom was set up to their specifications. But what can I say? That would be a deal breaker for me. As far as I am concerned, the kitchen is the heart of every home – and if it’s not functional, well then, neither is the home.

 

In the end, it all comes down to priorities. Some of my friends maintain that the first thing you should do when you move into a house is fix the in-house entertainment system. Make sure you have a wi-fi-connection that is strong enough to stream Netflix or Amazon Prime, get your TV hooked up and connected to the surround sound system. Then, once you’ve done your unpacking for the day, you can order in some food and chill in front of the television. That, they say, is the best way to make yourself feel at home in a new space.

 

I guess, when it comes to the crunch, it is a case of each to his or her own. But I think it gives us an insight into our own personalities to examine when we truly start to feel at home in a new house. Some people prioritize getting a good night’s sleep; others may want the public areas of the house (where they would entertain guests) to come together at first; some would be lost if they didn’t get their daily streaming fix every night; and then there are those like me, who only feel at home if they can rustle up a meal for themselves and their loved ones in their own kitchen.

 

Which of these categories do you fall into?

 

Serial killers

If Bridgerton can make it to Netflix, why not the Regency Romances of Georgette Heyer?

Regency Romances have always been my preferred comfort reads. But it wasn’t until Bridgerton premiered on Netflix that I first heard of the woman who wrote the books that the series was based on. Delighted to stumble upon an undiscovered author of this period, I hastened to download my first ever Julia Quinn and settled down to devour her in one gulp. 

 

Well, imagine my disappointment when I found the book very heavy going indeed. At this point, perhaps, I should mention that when it comes to Regency Romances, my benchmark is the late, great Georgette Heyer. Her plots are ingenious, her characters are captivating, her dialogue positively sparkles, and she brings the historical milieu alive with the lightest of touches. Julia Quinn, not to put too fine a point on it, achieved none of the above – well, in my opinion, at least.

 

But as I forced myself to read until the very end, I couldn’t help but wonder why this series of books had found a visual home on Netflix while nobody seemed to have the slightest interest in making a series out of the splendid novels that Georgette Heyer wrote in her lifetime. What I wouldn’t give to watch a series that featured the most feisty of Heyer’s heroines, feminists of their time, who found a way to flourish in the male-dominated world of Regency England? 

 

Can you imagine The Grand Sophy on the small screen? With Jacko the monkey perched on her shoulder, a tiny but lethal pistol tucked away in her reticule, her riding habit clinging to her statuesque form as she cantered through Hyde Park? Or the lovely Venetia, languishing in the countryside with only her disabled brother for company, where she meets – and subsequently, tames – the tempestuous Lord Damerel? Or the infamous Lady Barbara Childe, the scandalous widow who sets all of Brussels talking with her wild ways as the countdown to the battle of Waterloo begins?

 

I could go on, because every book of Heyer’s could provide great material for a TV series; but for some mysterious reason, she just doesn’t make the cut. 

 

The same is true of another great favourite of mine: Daniel Silva and his series of spy novels featuring the Israeli assassin, Gabriel Allon. But though, over the years, we have heard the odd muttering about how a TV series or movie is in the making, nothing has appeared on our screens as yet. And now, with the Israel-Gaza conflict dominating headlines and dividing world opinion, I guess we will have to wait for calmer times until someone is going to risk bring Allon to life on the small screen. 

 

Until that happens, I would be quite content to see Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti series, set in beauteous Venice, brought to a small screen near us (there is a German production that has done that, but I’d rather hold out for an Italian or English version). Or, at the very least, I would like to see S.J. Bennett’s series of books in which Queen Elizabeth (yes, the very same!) moonlights as a detective in her spare time translated to TV. 

It would be like The Crown and Christie coming together to create magic, and who wouldn’t pay good money to see that?