For my Grandfather

This is a short note for my recently departed Grandfather, because I'm really bad with emotional & dramatic dedications. Rightly so, because you weren't like that either and you wouldn't really approve of it. All your life you were fairly reserved & quiet, you liked being self-sufficient and independent and doing everything for yourself , but thank you for all the small ways in which you were far more approachable to all of us and thank you for letting us reach out to you so strongly, in your last days. All the tiny miracles that I can't speak about, the little ways in which you let us know how much you really loved us & the power you still hold over this house, the circumstances and its people, you know all that better than me.

Mom always says I have your quiet authoritative & commanding streak; the way in which I can dismiss everyone up with a straight "no." if I believe something is incorrect. Thank you so that I don't have to struggle to get my way in life. That is probably the most valuable inheritance ever.

Thank you for our iron & steel blood.

Thank you for setting a conscientious and honest example of living.

Thank you for this home & this family.

Thank you for making sure that the entire future generations won your genes for our height over Dadi's.

Thank you for raising your daughters like men & your sons like warriors.

Thank you on behalf of all the Sr. & Jr. Kapoors and everyone else who's lives you changed in your calm & self-assured way. I'd talk about your contributions to this world, but you never liked to speak about all that, so I'll respect your love for privacy. Thank you most of all, for the time I got to spend with you.

Analogically speaking

To my mind, sports is the perfect analogy for life. Glory, defeat, hardwork, leadership, teamplay, passion. It is a perfect adrenaline rush of everything that's good about life.

People who play sports or even watch, have a better understanding of fairness & sportsmanship.

I'm miserable after India's loss to South Africa last night. We crashed out in the Super 8 stage again, mostly because Australia decided they wanted to lose against Pakistan. Decided is correct. Australia isn't in losing form & a strategic decision to lose the match cost India its place in the 2012 World Cup. Australia should've played to win, which is the essence of any sport.

Anyway, then I tuned into the news channels and they managed to infuriate me further by carrying news on "Dhoni's captaincy under speculation". The day a person accepts captaincy of the Indian cricket team is the day their captaincy is put under motherfucking scrutiny. Technically, you're speculating removing the captain of the defending World Champions. MS Dhoni should be celebrated for the next four years, instead of being threatened. But that's always been our problem hasn't it?

Sourav Ganguly, the most successful captain India has ever seen, was tested remorselessly by Shahrukh Khan. I wouldn't even ask Priety Zinta or SRK about their opinion on stadium lights. India's never treated its legends fairly, be it sports stars, war veterans or anyone else. Its about time we got our attitude in check.

People who are eager to hand over the captaincy to Virat Kohli are the same people who ask questions about marriage on the first date. Kohli is a legend in the making, but he could do with a year or two under 'Captain Cool', for sure. Wild as his passion is for the game, you never want a captain who is teary-eyed at slip, because of a knock-out. He needs time. Dhoni deserves respect. We're still the world champions. Give credit where its due.

Being a sports spectator doesn't come without the responsibility of being a sport. Worshipping cricket and disrespecting cricketers doesn't work.  Shut your pseudo bitchy "cricket worshipping" pie holes, please?

Reverse chauvinism

This is something I submitted to Thought Catalog a month back but since they haven't used it, Its still good enough for my blog. I studied English Literature & the course contained a lot of feminist content, which actually made me question modern feminism, rather than convert me. So here goes: 

Needless to say, the second sex may have fought a long, hard battle to gain the same rights as men, but every scream of feminism in today's time is just a misunderstood version of the movement. Today, most women's understanding of feminism is only good enough to become the lyrics of a Beyonce song. Actually, I do think that if you haven't suffered the strife of people who kicked off these movements and lived through that struggle, then you can never be a follower. What most people are roaring about can best be categorized as Girl Power rants. We've never had to fight for a right to vote or even drive. Its simple, we just don't live in those times anymore. If you're going to college for education, have openings in a career, then you're there. Everything else that you may face is just a bias. This partiality is often personal and there are possibly many such other biases within a person who discriminates based on gender. Its definitely not a fight.

I'd say women are far more comfortably placed now than men. For women, the careers & the success is as much a convenient decision, as it is a compulsion for our better halves. Women will still be accepted as homemakers, worldwide, but we forget how men are conditioned & expected to be the breadwinners, no matter what. Similarly, whenever a woman exceeds herself in her field, she's lauded as an icon, like its an exceptional success, whereas so many men go unnoticed for their triumphs.

I don't even think that men have come to the realization of how they're conditioned to be the meal-tickets. I can't even imagine how immensely stressful it must be to strive to outdo an entire gender, right? Whether its parents, wives, kids or friends, everyone expects their man to be the Alpha Male. Its also a matter of acceptance. Women are now accepted in every role, unlike men, who still have no choice but to be the heroes. 

In times of casualty, all signs read: "Women & Children" first, like a man is legally & socially expected to demonstrate bravery. Sure, its probably chivalrous, but I think that its a bit biased & taken for granted. Maybe a man would put his own woman & children before him, but I'm not even convinced he should throw himself under a bus for hordes of random women. At the end of a hard day's work, if I board the metro & a man gets there before me, why should he vacate the seat just because I'm a woman? We did the same sort of work. If there's an elderly woman or man, or someone who needs a place, then get up, by all means. I'm not delicate enough to not be able to stand in a train for twenty minutes. Its not like we suffocate in 18th century corsets all day. I'll live.

I'm not saying men need to rise up in arms & revolt. They do fine. I just think that women should shut up about women empowerment. I think women in most countries have a fairly good deal & unless you're being beaten or raped or forced to do wage labour, you shouldn't really use the "feminism" anymore, because that's precisely what our ancestors went through before they made their suffrage committees. No girl, don't be strutting in a mall in six-inch heels, talking about equality. Women's lib shouldn't be adopted from Destiny's Child lyrics.

Like a bimbo

I like to nurture all sides of my personality. I also speak a lot of bullshit and use words like 'nurture'. Sometimes, you have to let the Bimbo in you speak. I let the bimbo in me speak a lot of times. I also let the Bimbo in me make most of my decisions. These decisions lead to fun times.

After you write loaded posts about 'Proving God' and what not, you have to speak like a materialistic, snooty, little bitch too. So, here goes.

Today's post is about the 10 must-haves for all human beings, especially women who don't like their money in their wallets.

1.  Lady Million by Paco Rabanne: The main reason why I have no known criminal records is because I smell like a demi-god. Invest in a good perfume/ cologne and get away with fraud. Dibs on using that for an epitaph!

2. Fedora Hats: Like hats weren't cool enough already, Neal Caffrey on White Collar just made the entire idea edible. Prepare yourself, mankind, I'm going to be wearing hats soon. Only insanely cool people can do hats. Like Top Cat. I saw some great ones at Zara & Forever New in Delhi. Help yourselves.

3. Loafers: Have you got your coloured loafers yet? Apparently its cool if boys wear red loafers this season. I say exploit it,before it becomes scary again. I like green better than red though. Green loafers flip my brain over. Everybody get some. FYI-Moccassins work too. But be warned, I'm going to call you Pocahontas no matter how good they look.

4. Coloured jeans: I always tell myself that its okay that my wardrobe looks like a box of crayons because everybody loves crayons. Not a fan of the skinny, coloured jeans on men but try Navy Blue or Mustard, boys. If you're a girl, I think you should go insane and just buy every colour possible. My favourite is that dull rose colour and green, ofcourse. Mint green.

5. A good phone: I don't know what a good phone is but buy a good one. Maybe an iPhone. What I'm saying is- Don't be a noob like me and keep buying blackberries every year just to stay on BBM. I've had to buy 4 blackberries in 3 years. I have to be on BBM though, because all my bestfriends live in different cities now & I love them and I want to buy disgusting phones so I can text them for free and send them pictures of what I'm shopping for and upload statuses about them.

6. Hobby: Invest in a fucking hobby and don't call it social media, cheapskates. Buy some art supplies, books, a gym membership, swim, dance or something. Just go away and be productive.

7. Haircut: Everybody needs a good haircut, but that's the trickiest thing in the world because great haircuts come at a ridiculous price. Great hairstylists not only cost money, they're also hard to chase. Mine's been out of town for 3 months and I finally had to ditch her and switch. It hurt so bad. There was this time when she had left the salon and moved to a new place and I sent out a literal manhunt until I found her. That's how much I loved my hairstylist. Stupid, arrogant bitch.

8. Satchel: I don't care who you are, all I know is that you need a satchel bag. You know it too.

9. Dog: I want a dog. Mom doesn't want a dog. We're not getting a dog. I'm going to get married and be someone's wife and rule their kingdom and buy seven dogs. 

10.Willy Jeeps: Need that bro. Open-roofed jeeps look like fun and they are a lot of fun, but my dad said that I wasn't a gangster in Punjab and I shouldn't cruise like one. I'm going to marry a gangster in Punjab then. The Willy Jeep will happen. Its pure lust.

Proving God

Hey! Higgs-Boson Particle, hey! I suppose nobody cleanly comprehends the Higgs-Boson particle theory, except those scientists in Switzerland. Personally, it means nothing to me if you explain the Big Bang Theory in complex equations. I'd rather watch Sheldon Cooper. That's when I don't even like The Big Bang Theory (the sitcom). Perhaps, there's a reason why we can't grasp the concept. I'm not sure we're supposed to understand the "God Particle" or "God" himself. It literally floats a little above our intelligence. Right out of reach.


While some atheists are saying "told you so", I'm wondering what exactly they told us: "The particle has no intrinsic spin, no electric charge, and no colour charge."? Don't remember that. The God Particle doesn't negate God at any rate. And when I speak of God, I speak of a God devoid of Religion. A higher power without form or folklore attached. Why doesn't God show himself? When do you ever know the names of the architects of a building? Do you ever see the Directors or Producers on screen?. You see the directors names on the rolling credits and that's it. 


I could explain the intangibility angle by comparing God to another really strong force: Love. Nobody knows if love really exists, nobody can define it or quantify it but we all still believe in it. Even if we don't indulge ourselves in the romantic angle of love, we love our pets or parents or children or something. Strangely enough, we all also have our own ideas and notions of love. And that's completely acceptable. Much like how God should be. Again, kindness is an intangible feeling but if you boast about your kind deeds, they don't remain so kind anymore. All these intangible feelings are complex and very powerful, often open to interpretation and beyond accepted rationality.


The only other scientific theory against the existence of God is Evolution. I didn't even buy the theory of evolution when I was 11 years old. It just didn't make sense. Strangely enough, Darwin's theory is scientifically untested and yet, accepted. There could be a reason for that. During the medieval times, Science needed credibility. For all its efforts in ongoing inventions and discoveries and effective approval from society it needed to contest Divinity. My two main problems with Darwin's theory?


1. Haven't seen anything evolving in eons. Something should be in the process of mutating and changing right now? Refer the case of fruit flies on Google for further explanation. Nothing is really evolving.


2. Even if I do accept that humans evolved from apes, what the hell created the millions of other species roaming this planet? Even scientifically, dead chemicals cannot prove the origin of life.

This entire planet, solar system and these universes (plural) are the only truly imaginative creations. It was probably made and created and imagined from thin air. And its so pretty. Every thing else that we create is inspired from the original creation. Let's see how. Even if you do create something conceptually new, whether its a painting or poetry or technology, you use things that are available to you, that already belong to this world. Poetry about a lover, Art about the mountains or even inventing an iPhone is still sourced from existing material or muses. Even Cloning is just copying, we cannot envision a new being and give it life. Whoever created the world, pulled this design out of sheer imagination, without any help.


There's also that the placement, location, temperatures at which we exist cannot be a coincidence. A few million kilometres ahead or before and we would have been space dust, probably. The Honda 'Cog' television commercial which is one of the most expensive TVC's ever directed shows a sequence of complex chain reactions of car parts to depict superior engineering for the seventh-generation of Accord. Obviously the advertisement took a lot of time, intelligence and attempts to spark off the right sequence. Much like we need rain after heat, condensation, evaporation, reproduction and even digestion cannot be a matter of chance. Long story short, the precise ways in which the world is running cannot be a mere cosmic mishap.


There are ample observations to suggest that the human form and possibly the entire planet were created by Intelligence. The true and mathematical theory of "The Divine Ratio" popularized by The Da Vinci Code is one. I find it hard to believe that our existence; the human body, the planet and the universe and its complex arrangement and successful execution is a result of neutrons colliding with protons, or whatever. Sure, Science is helpful. We can't do without it. But its pretty obvious that Science only explains, it doesn't create. Respect & ridiculous amounts of admiration to CERN for just building the halogen collider, let alone conducting experiments in it, but it still doesn't negate God or whatever you want to call whoever created this system.  If you still think that the world is an accident then we're a pretty long-surviving and resilient accident with quite a few plans.


Godspeed and May the force be with you.

Reverse Pro-tips to save the world

I'm actually doing a continuation of my previous post on pro-tips because that seemed to have been popular. You guys really do prefer short posts in bullet points, huh? This one isn't for the ladies though, its about the ladies. Men can implement it because they're perpetually agonizing over how they can't figure out women. Be warned though, this post will only help you out with sane women. If you've picked a douchebag to fall in love with, then no Pro can ever help you. RIP.


Here goes. This should help you break down the algorithm and cruise better.


Tip #1 Tell her she can do whatever she pleases and she'll probably let you have your way with everything. What do women really want? They just want to be told that they can do it all, anything that they please. Strike a balance though. She shouldn't read this as a "I don't give a fuck about what you're doing". You tell them that they can have it their way, on their terms and they're going to fall for you so hard, they might let it become all about you. I think I just betrayed a sorority secret, but World Peace is a worthy cause.


Tip #2 Seriously boys, gotta stop being escapists. Unless she's really needy and clingy, in which case its your fault for picking the wrong sort, you need to stop bolting at the slightest show of love. She's not weak or insane and you need to get your need to be a player under control. There's always going to be better stuff in the world. Even when you're married, even when you're CEO and even when you own all the Apple products. So might as well stick to a good thing and see it through.


Tip #3 It truly takes about 3 seconds to text back "ttyl" or "brb", so do the needful. Be busy all day but don't leave all her messages hanging, unless there's 30 every hour. Then run. Bolt for your life. Exaggeration there, but I think you know when its going overboard. 


Tip #4 I know this is hard to wrap your head around, but if you get into a relationship with someone just because they looked pretty or cute, then you're just inviting trouble into your world. If she's pretty, take her out for drinks or coffee or dinner but don't commit on that premise. You're going to regret it when she's bawling outside your house, with a blade in her hand at 3 am. 


Tip #5 You really don't need to make promises of love or marriage if you're unsure and don't mean them. If you make those promises just to get ahead with her, then you're really sick. Lay your cards on the table and she can decide if she wants to go ahead with it or not. Don't create little homely fantasies that you have no intention of fulfilling. Walk out if you don't want the same things.

Tip #6 Maybe never use a pick-up line, please? Its just so much easier to be normal and strike up a conversation with "What do you do?" instead of " I think there is something wrong with my phone... It doesn't have your number on it." Don't induce vomit. 

I was trying to think of 10 tips to round it off cleanly but I can't think of anymore, quite honestly. I don't want to state the obvious like "Don't cheat on her" because you already know that's wrong unless she's in on the three-way scene. I don't want to force it to ten. There are many other issues women have with their male counterparts but most of them are non-issues to me. I don't fret if guys don't like coming on shopping trips, listening to gossip or watching chick flicks or call me 3 times a day. I actually prefer it if they stay out of my business and let me have my time with the girls and my interests.

Long story, short: Just be around, be supportive and don't be a fucking nuisance. 


Continued from Part 1: http://thediaryofabrat.blogspot.in/2012/05/life-skills-for-ladies.html

At the heart of my heart

A few weeks back, me & my father found ourselves in North Delhi with a few hours to kill and we were completely at a loss for ideas. North Delhi isn't exactly someplace we'd go willfully. For the uninformed, its where the famous DU North Campus is situated. The sprawling university campus is dominated by student cafes, hostels and low-budget joints which aren't my Dad's sort of place at all. My Das isn't a fan of shady, small, cheap places and neither does he like teenagers. I had to come up with a plan & quick. That's when I remembered that we were also in the vicinity of the legendary Chandni Chowk, although I didn't know If I was upto the heat & crowd on a Sunday.

I'm fairly ashamed of this fact, but in my 21 years in Delhi, I've never been to Chandni Chowk before this & it literally makes me want to slap my elitist, stuck-up face. Chandni Chowk is where the epic Paranthe Wali Galli is situated. It is also where you get some of the best damn food and a feel of Dilli and not Delhi.

I know I'm not supposed to write a food blog but then I've purposedly never given a theme to the blog. I'm also going to  pull a cliche and write about Paranthe Wali Galli and no, I'm not sorry. Firstly, its a really hard job to get a car parked in Chandni Chowk so I would recommend that you take the metro. I think parts of Chandni Chowk are shut on Sunday, so we were lucky to beat the crowds. We were also lucky because most of the food places were open.

First on the agenda was Jalebi. Jalebi is always first on the agenda in our house. There's a corner house right before SheeshGanj Sahib Gurudwara where this fellow was frying saucer-sized Jalebis in a wok. I don't think I've ever seen such humongous Jalebis in my entire life. They also make samosas. So obviously we told him to fry as many that could fit in a pan & wrap it up in brown paper. Brown paper is so amazing. I freakin' love brown paper. You know how happy it makes me when you open brown paper & it contains Jalebi? I even pretended to be surprised, later.

We stashed the Jalebis and samosas in the car and headed to Paranthe Wali Galli. So this galli is literally a galli. Tiny, narrow passages with parantha shops flanking the entire length of the by-lane? I don't think you need any other definition of "my happy place". Its insanely quaint, monochrome brushed structures are any Instagram-ers paradise. The corroding paint and discoloured sign boards behind braids of electric wires and cobwebs is like looking into a world long lost.

But back to the food. You should ask one of the completely jobless locals standing around, about which Parantha place to pick.  The parantha menu is just completely ridiculous. I don't think there is any condiment/vegetable/edible food item that they haven't stuffed in bread and fried. There's dry fruits, pulses, cheese and even Poppadums. Its completely maddening. We ordered the punjabi staple- Aloo Paranthe, Dal ke paranthe and Pea paranthas with lassi. It was served with some Pumpkin vegetable and 300 kinds of achaar and a potato vegetable. So ideally, 1 person can eat a meal to last 3 days in Rs. 35/-. Dad asked if we wanted to get 1 of each paratha packed for the peeps at home. Our family doesn't know how to not order everything on the menu. But I put my foot down and said no. The damn things were being cooked in enough oil to attract America's attention. I'd only nibbled on the little oil suckers and I was in no mood to be tempted to try each one out at home. So we took just 7 types of paranthas back. I never said I'm good at ordering proportionate amounts of food either. 7 out of 40 varieties was good restraint, I'd say.

This food blog is probably a rarity, so I should let it be known that I can't be best friends with people who don't bring the menu down. My family and all of my best friends have no control over their menu lust. I don't get people who measure out their orders. I'm sure the portion of pasta is enough for 2 people but do you not notice the bruschetta on the side? And there's always another Main that's begging to be at the table, right?

Anyway, back to Chandni Chowk. We got done with our lunch (and dinner) and headed to Chainaram Sweets. Don't ask me. My father is obviously over the edge happy with Old Delhi at this point, but we have this rule about how there's always supposed to be a dessert stock in the house. He got some mithai packed and I did not even have the strength to look at food anymore so I tried on some juttis but they were all uncomfortable and I just wanted to go back to the car and pass out in front of the air conditioner.

Chandni Chowk was pretty darn fancy in a completely austere way. I'm intending a good, long visit sometime during the winter, when Delhi is gorgeous and the weather is a complete beauty. That's also going to be a good time to swing by Paharganj, as well. I know that the Old Dilli/ Paranthe Wali Galli posts and reviews have been done to death but I think it deserves every one of those posts. Its like nothing else in the world. Each and every little tribute to Purani Dilli is justified, so here's mine.