New Blogerista In Town

Dec 24th 2012... It's tough to forget that day... or night perhaps. I had gone to Opus for a wonderful get together with friends... ended up meeting new ones & ended the night with some wonderful food at Empire. It was also the night that I was introduced to two very significant people in my life... One was the man who was gonna push me hard into the fashion world, telling me I would rock. & the other was my future model when I would eventually begin my clothing line. It took me about a month of thinking back then to convince myself that this risk was worth taking... the risk of venturing into a totally new path of which I had very limited knowledge, not to mention that it involved making some really serious amount of investment with respect to time, money, building clientele, and learning... & also, as I eventually found out, the risk of burning your fingers with the wrong people.
A month later, this man would be my guru and I would begin my fashion course under this worldly freelance teacher. Everyday he taught me how to measure bodies, mark fabric, cut, stitch, formulate ideas to design, the need to make a swatch book of my designs, and, among other things, numerology . I was getting started, at once smitten, intimidated, utterly scared of failure, & suddenly desperate to make it big... I loved this line and had always admired it from a distance. Agreed it was a tough terrain to be in but how much name or fame could I make for myself in my current job/profession? Besides, fashion had always been my thing... It began the time I was born... It began with my dad. Oh! He had the most fabulous choices of clothing.
Ever since I was a baby, I hear my parents were often asked by even strangers where my clothes were bought... That my dad loved to dress me up was something that even my lil brother Grafin held testimony to. The no. of times, my dad left with him to buy him clothes... & the no. of times he returned with stuff for me instead! Even when I was a growing teenager, my dad would try to buy me short skirts and backless dresses, only to be promptly sent back to the store by my mom. All my life, I saw my mom get praises for her sarees that my dad tastefully picked. I still wear some of the stuff he got her... & today I get the praises. I can only hope to God that some of that tastefulness rubbed off on me. 

The Things to See in this City, I say!

Some time last August, I rang my friend who was visiting Bangalore for a week. She had got married and settled in Mumbai just a month earlier. She was in town for the Rakhi celebration with her family. I had it all planned up. I would leave office, drop by her store & meet with her for an hour or so, & then take off to the gym for my RPM class. So after work, I drove down to her store where I was to meet her. For a lack of parking spots, I hovered around till I found a place in a nearby lane. Feeling very smug about other cars still not having found parking, I started walking to her store. As I got to the crossroad, I saw a gathering. Now, normally crowds unnerve me & I usually look in another direction. But then curiosity got the better of me & I decided to take a peak. What I saw was a whole lot of men standing around, some peaking through to the centre of the group where obviously something interesting was happening, and some discussing away in grave seriousness about the happening. As I got closer, I saw that there were women in the middle of the gathering, engaged in some activity that had piqued the interest of the crowd. All of a sudden, I saw sarees being held high to barricade the view... and by the time I turned the corner, I had heard it- the shrill cry of a newborn. It made my heart swell! I slowed down and managed to see the sarees drop. A young girl lay there on the footpath holding her baby now wrapped in some cloth, the umbilical chord still intact. A rickshaw driver was heard saying how they couldn't make it to the hospital in time and had to make this urgent stop. God bless those people on the road who dropped their work & helped the hapless young mother-to-be. How many of us would have, I'm not sure. Truly over-whelming and not to mention, humbling!

In search of oneself...

Identity... What is it exactly? What forms it? What modifies it? What makes it visible or obscure? What makes your search for it one of the most hyped about but still important part of your progress in life?
I've been told that my ethnicity, my community, my parentage... these are what ideally should govern my identity. But clearly that's not the case...
Friends and family? Well evidently then my identity's been changing every year. Nope!
Objects and possessions? Haven't had anything to stick on to forever. Nada!
Appearance.... I'd think yes. You only know as you see & experience. Hence, I've seen & known this.
Beliefs? Yes, provided you find someone who concurs with you or you're just the type to whom someone's approval does not matter.
Interests? Apparently yes. I like to read and write, those are my interests. When I read & write, I explore my thoughts & therefore question. So yes!
Values? One's morals & values do play a part in one's identity formation. Abiding by your conscience does not come easy & anything gained with difficulty is not easily parted with.
Choices? Absolutely yes.
The search of oneself is a never-ending journey and justifiably so. After all, if you found yourself and there was nothing left, is there any meaning left in your existence?

The girl child

You're born... You're judged for your looks, cooking skills, people skills, your surname, your weight in gold.....
You are somebody's daughter... You move on to become somebody's wife... Who are you?
You eat, u gotta wash ur own plate.... & the men's. You do something wrong, u will get a beating. Your brother won't. You have an affair, they'll thrash u for spoiling the family's reputation. If ur brother does it, hes just being manly & he'll come around. You're the one who no one will want to marry. But who are you?
You hop, skip & jump.. u'll get thrashed. If u break ur teeth, who will marry you? You want to find yourself? They'll laugh. Why would a girl want to find herself? Why would she want to be anything other than a daughter or a wife? She is not made to carry her own name. Even government forms want your maiden name & surname. But who are you?
Some day life will take u on a roller coaster ride & if you're lucky like me, u get a second chance & you think it's all over. Now I can finally find myself... I can walk the road, swim the water, fly the skies... I can earn & spend my own money. I can wear a skirt... I carry pepper spray to defend myself... I question without being asked to shut up... I am assertive. I'm individualistic... independent... & along comes a reminder of things that had been. Who are you?

Lovelorn contemplations...

I sometimes wonder how I'd behave
if I were to hear that you & I couldn't be together
& that you have no escape
I really don't know
I always think positively
But when it comes to reality...
I am a lil scared
All I know is that ...
I'm gonna be devastated
I may recover...
But I'll still nurse feelings for you
that'll last me all my life
of that I'm sure
Our journey thus far has been quite a roller-coaster despite its short duration
It takes more than normal effort to be able to cope with its loss
& when you meet someone you instantly know you wanna spend the rest of your life with....
it takes u through intense pain to be able to survive the loss
I don't know if I'd be able to cope with it
But I know I'll always love you
Of this I'm sure
You're my soulmate!
You're the one for me
& as long as I know this fact, I can face anything
I'm brave
...in love
.....with you

Legerdemain by Greshma Dhanarajan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at www.blogger.com.

Six degrees of separation

I read somewhere that everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people. Six degrees of separation between us and everyone else on this planet. The President of the United States, a gondolier in Venice, just fill in the names. I find that extremely comforting, that we're so close, but I also find it like Chinese water torture that we're so close because you have to find the right six people to make the connection. It's not just big names—it's anyone. A native in a rain forest, a Tierra del Fuegan, an Eskimo. I am bound—you are bound—to everyone on this planet by a trail of six people. It's a profound thought: how Paul found us; how to find the man whose son he claims to be, or perhaps is, although I doubt it. How everyone is a new door, opening into other worlds.

So goes the famous monologue by Ouisa in John Guare's famous play "Six Degrees of Separation".
Six degrees of separation: I've heard these words being dropped many a times by a lot of people... enough reason for my interest to get triggered in search for information on it but enough laziness to put the task off for another day...
My ex-manager gave it to me as homework a long time back... Today, all of a sudden, I decided to actually go online & check up for info on it.
A 'degree of separation' is a measure of social distance between people. You are one degree away from everyone you know, two degrees away from everyone they know, and so on. The theory of six degrees of separation proposes that, since we are all linked by chains of acquaintance, you are just six introductions away from any other person on the planet.
The story goes something like this:

In 1929, a Hungarian writer Frigyes Karinthy observed that technological advances in communications and travel were helping form friendship networks that could grow larger and span even greater distances. He felt that the modern world was 'shrinking' due to ever-increasing connectedness of human beings. He proposed this hypothesis in a short story called "Chains" advocating that the more people networking around the world, the less the social distance between people.

This idea is supposed to have inspired social networking sites such as Facebook & Orkut.
Michael Gurevich and Stanley Milgram researched upon Karinthy's theory. One weird story goes that the famous and largely controversial social psychologist, Milgram, conducted studies examining people's obedience to authority by testing how many would administer potentially lethal electric shocks to screaming victims. Shocked? Horrified? Well... if it's any consolation, the screaming victim was an actor in disguise. & the study showed abt 65% of the people willing to inflict this pain. :)
Another story is that he conducted an experiment using residents of America's midwest to send packages to several hundred people in Boston, giving them just a few details of their target such as name and profession. He made a startling discovery that on an average the package went through just a chain of five people before finding the recipient.
It's not so difficult to believe this theory. Imagine your cousin got a marriage proposal. It won't take long for anyone to do a background check on this person because one of them will know someone from their place, who would know their neighbour or relative, who would've gone to school with their father, & so on.
If I were to take an extreme case such as finding a person in say... a remote village in Kenya. What would I do? Hmmm... The first thing that comes to my mind is that a lot of Kenyans participate in the marathons in India. If I were to connect to them, chances are they know someone living or doing business in that area. I have 2 degrees already. :)
Researchers at Microsoft are said to have researched this theory using electronic conversations between about 180 million people. They now deem this theory right-nearly.
Now here's an interesting summary from me. I (1) know this guy from the UK (2) who has about 3 sisters, one of whom (3) has a friend (4) who acted in some of the Harry Potter movies and is acquainted with Daniel Radcliff (5). There! I'm not even 6 degrees away from the Harry Potter actor. Ha! :)

Legerdemain by Greshma Dhanarajan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Based on a work at www.blogger.com.

Singing out of tune...

What would you do if I sang out of tune?
Would you stand up and walk out on me?

... so sang Joe Crocker, "with a little help from my friends".

How many of us can say that the friendships that we held during our life did not have an impact on creating the persons that we are today? Our outlook in life is like a loop of thread... It is vulnerable to the highs & the lows of friendship. A lot of how we are today is due to what life taught us in our growing up days. So why did we need friends in our life? Were we caught up in the hunger for intimacy of mind, as psychologists put it? Or is it the innate desire to be loyal to someone? They say friendships get formed when our personality is in harmony with another's. So then why do clashes occur? Why do we hold these emotions to heart all our life & base decisions on these trials of our life?
Why do these lines from the song relate so much to Kevin Arnold in "The Wonder Years"?

If you are one of those people who, like me, grew up watching this series, you might have been able to identify the pangs of childhood... especially if you had anyone walk out on you back then. :)

Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you're in diapers, the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house, like a lot of houses. A yard like a lot of other yards. On a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back...with wonder.

So while you ponder on that, here's some interesting read.