Open Sesame ... to the 40s!

Me, my frizzy hair turning slightly grey, a face that has never seen makeup, all of my wobbly bits, and Bengay are together marching proudly into our 40th year. Before you mistake me for someone who has just "let it go", let me assure you that on the contrary I follow a healthy vegan diet, have an active lifestyle combining yoga with a decent gym routine, not to mention the weekends when I strive to do something that lets me and my family soak in some nature. Yep it takes all of that to even have what I have. I just never cared about how I looked and more importantly what others thought about how I looked and never bought into the world view that women somehow magically go from looking like Jennifer Lawrence for, I don't know, 40 years and then overnight in their 70s turn into Meryl Streep/Judi Dench with no stops in between;  That is not going to change suddenly today.

This post is more about 2 events in my life which if you had asked me 20 years back I would've never thought would happen to me, and yet they did happen to me, and one incident makes me feel old, and the other makes me feel much younger than I ever felt before.

The first takes me back exactly 20 years. I was then 20, zipping through the streets of Chennai with a two wheeler sans license, so much so, my dad a conscientious citizen, and stickler for rules decided to take off from work one day, made me skip college and insisted on accompanying his procrastinating law breaker of a daughter to her driver's license exam. I was mortified as my dad (who BTW could never even ride a cycle and sat behind me as I drove him to my license exam) stood there urging the inspector to actually test me harder before approving my license. "How come she was not asked to trace the infamous 8", he asked the examiner. "Dad, whose side are you really on?", I yelled! Despite his machinations and reservations I was granted a license with a 20 year validity. The day the license arrived, my dad took a hard look at the date and said, "Fat chance when you turn 40 I am going to be there to get your license renewed". We had a good laugh and forgot all about it, until today. My dad passed away 11 years back after a 3 year painful struggle with cancer. At 20 if you had asked me to imagine my life without my dad I would have had a hard time. I spent every spare moment with him - doing crosswords, talking about books, discussing Melville movies, or him poking fun at my taste in music ("Kurt Cobain sings and looks like the guy begging in the Chennai local trains!"). And here I am, a wise old woman of 40 who has no plans to renew her two wheeler license as her dad is not here to make her do it. I can't believe so much time has passed and when I think of him I realize that I have suddenly grown up and turned into an adult, and if I can say so myself, a responsible one at that, and he completely missed my metamorphosis and one of the most important events of my life - the birth of my daughter!

That was another thing I could've never imagined when I was 20. My daughter was probably the first baby I ever properly held in my hands! I never for once thought I possessed any maternal instincts or skills. I was surrounded by other girls (especially some of my cousins) who were skilled in multiple ways around the home, and whom I knew would make amazing mothers someday! As for me, all I ever saw in my future was interesting work, combined with lots of travel and lots and lots of reading and music. All of that happened along with the chance meeting of a wonderful guy who has been my partner-in-crime ("husband" seems so archaic) for the last 15 years and whose partnership with me, my dad on his death bed thought of as a silver lining to his otherwise cloudy last days. Our daughter arrived almost 9 years back to fill a void that I didn't think existed in the first place. She forced me to learn a bunch of new skills, mostly on the job, improvising all the time. Instead of making me feel old, she actually keeps me young as I am re-discovering the world through the eyes of a curious 8 year old. My dad would have revelled in her company. Her taste in music and her passion for books are two qualities which can be directly traced back to him.Through her I got a taste for western classical music which I never thought I would. I frequently go on adventures with Percy Jackson, Taran the wanderer, and shall I dare publicly accept, little talking magical ponies. When she read "The Red Pony" and her heart went out to Gabilan and Jody, I realized why I love Steinbeck! Travel with her is pure unadulterated fun as she is game for anything(including wearing adult size snow shoes, trying to find a trail in deep snow, with no lunch, no dry socks and a couple of adults who were out of their element in snow...all when she was 5!). When she plays DJ on our driving trips we move from Disney songs to Mozart to Edith Piaf to Radiohead to T.M.Krishna to Illayaraja seamlessly. Thanks to her I am a better birder, hiker, reader, cook, mom and person.

So as I turn 40 i am not going to fret about my first mammogram, my first grey streaks, or start fearing the weighing scale. The past 20 years have had its ups and downs, but I have had more to be thankful for than not. I can say all experiences I've had and people that I've encountered have added to my 40, and I am having an open mind about what the next 20 will bring. Honestly between work, "what can I make with Parsnips", "Is that a Falcon or a Kestrel?", and "Was it Colonel Mustard in the study with the knife?" - my brain is on overdrive already that I am not going to waste precious moments or cells worrying about a number and if I look the part.

Earth, Wind and Fire

We spent a week in April completely unplugged and in the wild jungles of Amazonian Ecuador in close contact with nature. Wake up calls were delivered by howler monkeys and lullabies sung by thunderstorms and frogs. Not once did I hear "Can I have your iPhone" or "I am bored". My 8year old stood in the Sun for 2 hours trying to catch a piranha (and let it go after that). With a pair of binoculars around her neck and claiming to be "birding" she was happy to just BE and so were we!

 I remember telling my daughter that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and sadly i think that might very well be the case. Cruising down the Napo river you are suddenly stunned by the sight of natural gas burning - not trapped and shipped elsewhere, not stored, just burnt as it is the easiest thing to do when drilling for oil in the Amazons. Will these forests be around when my daughter turns 40 and wants to bring her kids down here to experience the wild? Sadly I am not so sure.

When we met the people of the Sani community who call these forests home we could see they were divided about the oil drilling. As a volunteer I have lent support to the struggle by the Adivasis of the Narmada Valley fighting for their way of life against big dams in India. I had always wanted to visit the valley but never did. Standing in the Sani village, i was struck by how similar the struggles were. Oil companies have built schools (with no regular teachers), hospitals (doctor doesn't stay there all the time and for emergencies you have to take a boat to Coca for 2 hours) and there is even Internet.

What right do I have to pass any moral judgement over Ecuadoreans if they decide to ride the oil ticket to get to economic success? I live in California one of the largest economies of the world. Just living in California makes my footprint huge despite being a vegan, going solar and driving a hybrid. The recent climate change report that came out brought dire news to the US, and we in California experienced wild fires like never before in a month when normally weather used to be described as "May Gray".

Not all is doom and gloom. We did love the pristine forests of Ecuador (eco-tourism is certainly doing its bit to help indigenous communities in many parts of the land achieve financial success without exploiting resources), and now that the fires have died down, we spent the last two weekends watching the endangered California Least Terns come to our hood to nest. The enthusiasm with which my daughter has taken to Ternwatching and doing her part to protect the terns can only give me hope about the future!  

OBOC - Turkey & Mali

Why didn't I pick "Snow" or "My name is Red"? Well for starters they weren't readily available at the library, and I do like museums so I decided I couldn't possibly go wrong with "The Museum of Innocence" by Orhan Pamuk. So that was my pick for Turkey. On hindsight I would have loved to read "Forty Rules of Love" by Elif Shafak. Oh, well

I don't know how I really feel about the book. A tale of unrequited, obsessive love driving the hero Kemal to build a museum in honor of his object of affection - Fusun - certainly not the kind of book that I normally like to read.  With 80+ chapters and not much of a plot, I wonder what made me not give up the book, and it was because of Istanbul!

I have heard about Istanbul from a few Turkish friends that I had the fortune of knowing a few years back. Still, what I was not prepared for were the remarkable parallels between Istanbul in the '70s and '80s to the metros of India that I grew up in, minus of course the political violence (at least in my hometown in India). I was also stunned by the cultural similarities between the two countries - both dealing with their secular image vs religious right, on the path to modernization vs long held cultural values, trying to protect their industries while facing increasing global competition, and their women struggling to find a place for themselves amidst all these changes.

Everytime the story focused on Kemal's lifetime of obsession with Fusun i lost interest, but the moment Istanbul showed up even as a backdrop I was drawn back in. Although it is not a book I would recommend to everyone, it still was worth the effort.

Onto Mali now.

My only exposure to Mali is through its glorious music. From Ali Toure, Toumani Diabate, and the unbelievable Khaira Arby, music from Mali has enriched our lives! Mali has a rich oral tradition and therefore it's literature is not widely known as much as its music. Thanks to Amadou Hampate Ba, Mali's most famous writer/historian some of these traditions have been captured for posterity.

I read "Fortunes of Wangrin" by Amadou Hampate Ba, which traces the rise and fall of the savvy Wangrin as he navigates the French colonial system and his own countrymen, amassing wealth by exploiting the loopholes while at the same time doing Robinhood like deeds. The book is full of wit, and is also a nice window into the early 20th century Mali - the local customs, colonialism, French administrative practices and the griots. The griots were the original "memory keepers" - people of the oral tradition and one can trace the roots of Malian music to the griots. Every time Wangrin gets into a tough situation he uses his uncanny intelligence to get out of it, in the process making more enemies who want to see his downfall.

It was quite an easy read, and anyone who has experienced the colonial system either first hand or been in a country still recovering from it (even after 60+ years as in India) will find this book interesting.

My Reading Pile

My pace of OBOC has slowed down, but have been reading a number of other interesting books.  Given that 2014 has been declared as the year of reading women, I too want to make an effort to read more women than before but with foreign literature it is certainly more difficult. I finally read Isabel Allende's "Daughter of Fortune" and re-read Atwood's "A handmaid's tale" after many many years. I have Kate Moss's Labyrinth and Kingsolver's Lacuna and J.K.Rowling's Casual Vacancy on my reading pile but I doubt if I will get to them in the next couple of months. Men are coming in the way :)

I finished T.M.Krishna's "A Southern Music: The Karnatik Story" and have been so engrossed in it.  I wished my paternal grandmom was around so I could debate and discuss the issues raised by TMK. This is a must-read book for anyone remotely interested in Indian Classical Music.

As part of OBOC, i read "The Blue Sky" by Mongolian writer Galsan Tschinag. Set in Mongolia in the '40s it is the first part of an autobiographical trilogy by the author. Covering his early childhood years spent as the son of a herder in the Mongolian Steppes, the book is narrated from the perspective of a child. Day to day life, sheep herding, grandma, pet dogs, migration, clash of tradition and modernization are all covered. After reading the book I wanted to go back and watch the Story of the weeping camel - a movie i had watched many years ago, set in Mongolia. Couldn't find it on Netflix so ended up watching Julia Roberts adventures in Mongolia instead.

This year being the 100th anniversary of World War I i am sure we are going to be bombarded by books on this topic. I am going to try and read "A world undone" to refresh the history in my mind. If i have time i will probably read "Guns of August" by Barbara Tuchman in the spirit of reading more women.

I am also working on the Master and Margarita (Bulgakov - Russia), The museum of innocence (Pamuk - Turkey) , and yet to start The Fortunes of Wangrin(Amadou Hampate Ba - Mali) all for OBOC.

This blogpost is very incoherent I know, but am in bed with a bad back, surrounded by a pile of books. My spouse is bewildered at how my daughter and i both read so many books simultaneously. She is getting through Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series, and re-reading the Goddess girls, switching to Shel Silverstein poems and also has to read a book for class (Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo). I guess women can indeed keep track of multiple narratives at the same time.

Enough said, have a bunch of books to read, so will get on with that!

A post for all the Goddesses

I can't remember the last time I read a non-fiction book cover to cover in 2 days! "Goddesses: Mysteries of the Feminine Divine" was one of those books that once you start reading is so hard to put down. When I heard that Joseph Campbell's book on Goddesses was available I didn't think

twice and got it right away. I've read his Power of Myth, Hero with a thousand faces and have always felt he should have done the same for the heroines of Mythology. Now someone finally pieced together his lectures and writings and put out this volume which is a must read at least according to me.

As a modern, so-called liberated woman with a feminist bent of mind, I constantly juggle different roles throughout the day. My choice of career has also put me in a setting where i am always in the minority w.r.t my gender and have to negotiate work spaces that are often male dominated. To add on top of that, I was brought up in a patriarchal culture (India) and although born a Hindu and very familiar with the goddesses of the indian pantheon, i felt most of them were seen as consorts to the men in power, mostly role models for a domestic life (except for Kali of course) that left me wanting.

East or in the West women are now at exciting crossroads. I read somewhere that in the next decade 800M women are going to enter the formal economy as wage earners for the first time - majority from the so-called emerging markets! Everyone is touting the "She-economy". On the one hand, individual achievement of women is lauded and many barriers have been broken, but on the other our biological and social instinct still reigns supreme. In a non-scientific experiment i scanned through the facebook feeds of my women friends to see what topics they write about and this seemed to confirm the fact that biology and society trumps! No wonder Katniss Everdeen resonated with millions of women and girls who are looking for an alternative mythology.

How do we women (and men) find our footing in these times? What is the role of the goddess? Is it primarily biological - the giver of life? Hasn't the Goddess also been the symbol of transformation throughout history? Hasn't she also been a muse, the inspiration for creativity? You will find the answers in this book.

Campbell traces the origins of the Goddess mythology and how it differs from plantation tribes (that are feminine) and herding/warring tribes (which are more masculine). What happened when these two groups of people met? How did one mythology overtake or incorporate the other? I personally liked the section of the book where he compares the Illiad and the Odyssey and how you could view the former as masculine and the latter as feminine. He draws on all religions and shows us how these myths are universal.

It was sheer joy to read this book. At many times in my life i have had to move from one role to another and in most of these transformations i have learned something about myself, grown through that experience although some of these were very difficult circumstances. Luckily i am also married to a person who has been with me through these circumstances and has not shied away from his own transformations either. It also happened that this weekend we finished watching the final movie of the Linklater trilogy "Before Midnight". Celine struggling with motherhood, her career, reaching her 40s, feeling like not having any time for her own passions - i felt like telling her pick up a copy of "Goddesses" and let Joseph Campbell guide you through the myths of the goddesses who were and will always be.

And no this is not a self-help book, and this is certainly not a  Sheryl Sandberg "lean in". JC doesn't have all the answers, but he thinks that today's Goddesses will find a way out and write their own myths. In his own words.....

"The challenge of the moment—and there are many who are meeting it, accepting it, and responding to it, in the way not of men but of women—the challenge is to flower as individuals, neither as biological archetypes nor as personalities imitative of the male. And, to repeat, there are no models in our mythology for an individual woman’s quest. Nor is there any model for the male in marriage to an individuated female. We are in this thing together and have to work it out together"

Three Generation of one-time liars

My maiden attempt to tell a funny story in verse. Some of it happened as is, and for the rest I've taken poetic license

====================================================
“Mama I’ve lied” she cried

"I know I’ve been bad

Didn't want to make you sad

Throwing out my report card

As my grades weren't up to par

Now I know I have no recourse

As you have an inside source

And as my plans went bust

Didn’t want to lose your trust"

“Mama I’ve lied” she cried
Braced herself for the bumpy ride

There she stood a figure so sorry
But all that she got was....
A hug and a story!


Now, now, dear. Don't fret my baby
Argus with hundred eyes, I maybe
But this wise mom was a child once
Who did things best fit for a dunce
"Papa I've lied" I had cried
I know I've been bad
Didn't want to make you mad
To your numerous warnings, i paid no heed
Ambling along alleys, caught up in greed
Like a pirate on rampage hunting for gold
Looking for treasures on streets so cold
Lost in the labyrinth, when darkness came down
Until I was found with tears streaming down


"Papa I've lied" I cried
Braced myself for the bumpy ride

There I stood a figure so sorry

But all that I got was ...
A hug and a story!

Now now dear, don't fret my baby

Theseus in a labyrinth I maybe

But this wise man was a child once
Who did things best fit for a dunce

To dad's numerous warnings, I paid no heed
Ambling along orchards, caught up in greed

Craving for blueberries, that tasted like manna

Dived under a fence, stole and did a runner

Feasted on them till i could take no more

Washed the stains off, till my tongue was sore

'til the news reached him embellished like a story

And there I stood a figure so sorry

But all that I got was....

No hugs, no stories, and no dinner too

Just plain old tirade and a smack or two

Since then no berries and no lies for me

This is my message for you from me

So you see my dear, we've all been there
Three generation of one-time liars

Terrible at lying although we were

At least we got a story to share

Not ready to accept defeat .... yet

It has been 4 years since i started the OBOC project, and i am still only a little more than half way through. Since then as it has been kindly pointed out, I realized a number of others have been doing the same thing, and recently Ann Morgan did 197 books in 1 year while, just like me, holding a full time job! Kudos to her, and her idea of getting books from readers around the world. I have exclusively relied on the public library system here in the US which is pretty amazing, still not complete.

It calls for a special kind of discipline to be doing a project like this and frankly I don't seem to have it. I have often gotten bored, felt stifled by the project, experienced withdrawal symptoms from not reading my favorite authors and picked up a number of other books, including children's literature which was a goldmine that i stumbled upon thanks to my 8 year old, instead of focusing exclusively on OBOC. So, should I give up? I thought about it long and hard for about 5 mins and concluded, no. I am doing mainly for exposing myself to literature and culture from around the world. This can be a lifetime quest, so what's another year to OBOC :)

On that note, just wrapped up "How to get filthy rich in Rising Asia" by Mohsin Hamid the brilliant and funny writer from Pakistan. His Reluctant fundamentalist had received rave reviews, but I decided to pick up this one as i was intrigued by the concept of a Self Help Book, a category that i absolutely loathe. Although not set in any particular country in Asia, it is self-evident that he is inspired by Pakistan and for me, the setting could have just as well been in any town in India. Written in second person and structured like a self help book it tells the rags to riches to moderately-comfortable life of the unnamed protagonist who had the small luxury of having moved to the city and receiving basic education - both of which are critical elements for breaking through in the new Asia.

It is a very colorful account that captures the excitement of the burgeoning middle class in Asia and how one breaks the poverty cycle by hook or crook in an attempt to get ahead. Of course this involves a lot of personal sacrifice - time, money, morals, health and love, and our protagonist hasn't a moment of rest or peace until the end arrives.

By not naming any character, or city Mohsin Hamid has created a novel that is representative of the millions in Asia that are trying everyday to break the poverty cycle.If Hamid was trying to make a statement against globalization or marketization I failed to grasp that from the novel. I found myself caught up in the life of our unnamed hero and even when he was selling expired goods or packaging tap water as bottled water, I didn't feel like completely giving up on him. Although I can't condone his actions I can claim to understand him. When corruption is rampant at all levels what is our poor hero to do?

It is a short novel (more a novella) and an easy and quick read, almost a page turner. I think one can expect more exciting works from Mohsin Hamid as he certainly has a pulse on his native Pakistan.