Looks and Lessons

Ma and me ;-)

Mitu the model :-)

Me :-)

My friend Sohini's back in town. And this time with an unexpected gift : a little baby boy, Soham :-)

Juieen and I are still debating whether the little fellow looks like his mother or whether that is something we shouldn't be losing sleep over so early in the day; after all children's faces change so much as they grow. Me for instance. When I was young, most people would observe me carefully and then almost unanimously declare that I had inherited Baba's looks. Let me tell you, that seriously dampened my spirits. My father, I was aware of even at that tender age, was not good-looking, even by the wildest stretch of imagination. I reacted to the former observations with prolonged fits of sulking. My looks kept on changing over the years but big awkward glasses, domestic haircuts and a severe inferiority complex in terms of physiognomy contributed much in retarding any possible progress in the confidence sector. It was only when I went for a radical revamping of my image in college with contact lenses, a real haircut and a wardrobe subdued in colour but smart in cuts that I felt I was finally at par with my peers. And yes, when I went to my mamar baadi (mother's parents' place) during my summer holidays sometime around that period, everyone finally decided that I was a xerox copy of Ma. That was one helluva compliment since my mother is the most beautiful woman in the world, well at least in my eyes (see photo above). I still recall Pooja asking me why Ma had not joined the Bengali film industry when she was young ; it seemed a big shame that her looks had never drawn public attention in the way it deserved to. I didn't have a reply of course. Ma just smiled when I repeated Pooja's words to her. Anyway, Mitu, my younger sibling, is modelling big-time nowadays (photo above) and I think Ma derives some sort of satisfaction, however vicarious, from that.

As for me, I'm just happy the way I am nowadays. I 've learned not to overdo it. One celebrity in the family is enough ;-) No make up for me, no loud colours or flashy cuts. No brands, no coloured hair, no fairness creams...nothing that makes me look into the mirror and stare silently at a stranger. I prefer to keep myself low-maintenance and recognisable.

Returning to where it all started out from : I just hope little Soham grows up to be as good as he can be in his own eyes. The rest doesn't matter. Really.

But you have to grow up a lot to believe in the truth about brains scoring over beauty. That's the sad part.

Baby Banerjee

My friend D just had a caesarean. She was supposed to be operated on around late February, but due to complications (which involved a sudden and sharp decrease in the amniotic fluid, triggering breathing trouble in the baby), the entire process of delivery was precipitated much earlier than it would have been otherwise. Her hubby, B, a close friend of ours, called us the day before the procedure took place to inform us about this unexpected development. So, one the next day, we reached the Bhagirathi Neotia nursing home (supposedly the best in maternity and child care right now in Kolkata) and narrowly missed seeing our friend being wheeled into the OT. There was a period of anxiety, excitement and feverish anticipation as I waited downstairs in the lobby in the company of both sets of parents, D's elder brother (who insists on addressing me as a senior each time we meet for reasons best known to him), B's maternal aunt and uncle and a colleague of B. I proved to be an unexpected moderator for the smalltalk that was evidently a strained effort to conceal the concern underlying the apparent composure on everyone's faces. K informed me later that he and his friend were extremely jittery as they sat upstairs, just outside the OT, wondering whether the operation would go off uneventfully or...

Fortunately, everything turned out fine. Debarati gave birth to a bonnie (if slightly premature) boy of 2.7 kg weight at around 11.45 am on Sat, 6th Feb 2010. Everyone immediately embarked on frantic efforts to trace similarities between the facial features of the parents and that of the newborn, much to our mirth. The only assertion that one could possibly and justifiably make at that point of time was that Baby Banerjee sported a fine growth of hair already on his baby head. The proud mama (maternal uncle) insisted on treating us each to Rs 8 worth of gooey, high-cal gulab jamun at the T-Junction stall within the premises of the clinic. We went home, a happy couple, calling up friends and relatives on the way to give them this good news and assuring them that we'd provide concrete follow-ups on the former by way of photos on orkut or via email.

The entire incident succeeded in creating one serious point of contention between K and me : if I insisted on being Mashi (maternal aunt) to the baby and K insisted on being Kaku (paternal uncle); how exactly would bystanders interpret our own relationship ?

Spinning Yarns

I learned knitting way back in school, in MHS, in class VII. I remember picking up the nuances of the craft quite easily and enthusiastically. A little too enthusiastic perhaps. We were all asked to knit a set of clothes for a newborn baby, as per instructions, to create a sleeveless woollen vest (the sleeveless part has always struck me as absurd), a bonnet and a pair of booties (socks). Mine eventually translated into one that when cheerfully displayed to our needlework teacher, Mrs Srivastav, struck her speechless with amusement. After her recovery from a bout of inane toothing, she managed a benign grin and said she was quite pleased with my performance but I needn't really have exerted myself to such an extent. Apparently, my creations were big enough to apparel a six-month old baby quite effortlessly. I packed my bags after the class, hurling imprecations against the world in general for not having offered me any opportunity to develop the slightest idea of the relative difference in size between a newborn and a six-month old baby. No wonder Siddhant struck me as miniscule in terms of magnitude a few months back.


There was a particular reason for my disgust. Salt Lake was almost an island in those days, in terms of transportation options. It did not help that my father is a doctor by profession, too busy to lavish much attention on our arts-and-crafts-related (and therefore entirely optional and futile, according to him) needs. Ma, though extremely street-smart and intelligent, was only courageous enough to venture bravely into the New Market shopping territory. Salt Lake itself suffered from a gigantic dearth of shopping destinations. Hence, procuring all needlework etc related raw materials was really an issue of sorts. After several sharp reprimands in needlework classes for my failure to produce the necessary knitting paraphernalia, I ultimately effected a showdown back home, threatening to boycott education until my needlework needs were taken seriously. Results were prompt. After considerable gnashing of teeth and directing of choice expletives against my hallowed academic environs, Baba took a trip to Gauranga Bastralaya in Gariahat and returned with wool in the brightest, gaudiest shade of chrome yellow imaginable. Even now I shudder when I care to imagine any newborn or even six-months' old baby being attired in clothes of that colour. I wouldn't want this type of misfortune to befall even the child of my worst detractor.


Well. That is my point. Baba excused his colour-blindness by citing the inability to procure so many yarns of such a ply simultaneously at the aforementioned store except in this garish hue. Mrs Srivastav's matter-of-factness therefore had every potential of triggering off any latent hysteria in me. To undergo such histrionics for all that knitting and then its being considered as superfluous. Well, no wonder I've been short tempered since.


Why return to knitting at such a belated stage of life, you're obviously wondering, when it's evident I've unresolved neuroses regarding this area in my unconscious. Turns out Tanima inspired me to re-tread dreaded territory with a very sacred purpose to fulfil this time. Namely, a muffler for K. I wished to gift him something that incorporated my signature and which, he would therefore, treasure for years to come. Maybe he'd show it to our children some day with a glow in his eye, reflecting all the warmth that it bestowed on him and the sense of his worth it distilled. So, though with quite some trepidation, I did buy some wool at Walmart and left him to shortlist the multicoloured yarn he wanted spun into a muffler. It wasn't the typical Libran indecision that he battled this time. The place does offer you exquisite colour combinations and left to me, I might have ended up purchasing more than what figured on my initial agenda. I called up Tanima and verified that I was getting the right raw materials. The needles did scare me a bit, being miles long (not literally, silly) and of Christmas tree ball hues: gold, purple and deep blue. I settled on purple (predictably).


On Monday, after K left for office, I downloaded a couple of DIY (Do It Yourself) knitting videos on YouTube and set about charging my knitting batteries. It took me a day to gain courage and finally embark on the decided project. When I did, I don't mind confessing that I had to unravel the entire thing thrice. The first time, I took too many stitches and then realised that I wanted a muffler, not a shawl. The second mishap was occasioned by my discovery that I was not doing the 'purl' correctly, forgetting to bring the yarn towards the front every time I changed from 'knit' to 'purl'. The third (and fortunately the final) setback was owing to my flipping through a couple of webpages and determining that what I actually wanted was the ribbed look for the muffler. Happily, I still had enough motivation to allow me to proceed. Even after all these unhappy incidents. Only goes to show how badly I wanted to get this gift going. For our sake.


Here's how it looks at this moment. Wish me luck (and no more mishaps) with the rest of it !



P.S. Here is the link to the 2 knitting videos that caused me to sally forth on this voyage, in case you too are stranded in deep waters and need immediate aid.

Btw, I discovered I'm not alone in knitting related fears. Check out this one, if you don't believe me.

Mixed Bag

So Siddhant is into his third day on earth and his parents are, I suppose, slowly comprehending the extent and gravity of their responsibility now. Debarati and I are seriously coming around to the idea of becoming mothers sooner or later some day. We are more concerned about whether our respective husbands are ready to shoulder such responsibility, burdened as they are with work and sleepless nights and liable to turn irritable at the slightest domestic provocation. Not that we're complaining. If we don't understand them, who will ? But what troubles us more about them is whether they are in any position to be shouldering any more worries, baby related and all. K openly admits that anything pregnancy-related makes him feel queasy and although I initially found that material for considerable hilarity, the fact that he may seriously feel that way doesn't exactly bode confidence for the future. I only hope seeing the way Sushmit-Namita are handling their parenthood inspires more respect in him for the role that parents fulfil and reduces his trepidation at assuming a similar status in the not-so-distant-future.

Meanwhile, we have received the second batch of photos from the 'thrilled and proud parents' (to quote them verbatim) and the accompanying updates too over the phone. Baby Sid is not very pleased, it seems, at the excretory operations that the body must regularly perform and announces the fact quite vociferously each time he has to participate in the painful process. Ah, if only he knew that this is nothing compared to what greater obstacles life holds in store for us humans, he would be a happier man. But I certainly (and to my intense perplexity !)prevaricate. Let him become a child first, then ...er well, ok, much later perhaps...we may broach the topic of maturing into manhood etc.

Tanima and I have been discussing the Baby in Our Lives and have arrived at the consensus that He is likely to do us all proud, what with sporting so much hair at birth (apparently the proud parents did not have much of the same at their respective births and hence, feel justifiably relieved at their offspring's accomplishment) and displaying such a prominently aquiline nose (remarkable indeed for a newborn baby) so early in life. I personally think that there isn't much he could do to not blossom into a good-looking chap, with such a handsome father and a petite and pretty mother handing down some real genetic goodies. My only hope is that he turns out to be a lean-and-not-so-mean hunk with a heart as golden as that of his family and on a slightly divergent note, doesn't have our tendency to gain weight at the slightest and sweetest provocation.

Halloween was a big flopshow yesterday. K was in a flurry to purchase some candy yesterday evening at RiteAid nearby to satisfy the trick-or-treat demands of the children in our complex but none turned up. Probably because they supposed we wouldn't understand the significance of their festival. We spotted quite a few of them across the road from Rite Aid, dressed in some grotesque costumes (sorry, I for one can't conjure up any more apt epithet for the same) like that of a bumble-bee and a butterfly and more appropriately (I hope that's the right word in this context), masks of devils and ghouls and nasty other synonyms that escape my memory (thank goodness) at present. We bought a cask of orange-pineapple flavoured coolers and a bottle of mojito at a discount store nearby to cheer us up on such a cold Friday night and to console us on the inability to celebrate Diwali this year, owing to particularly inclement weather. A father appeared while we were there with two tiny children, attired in disproportionately huge wigs in bizarre shades of orange and soot black. I was considerably entertained at the sight of such small children at a liquor store, but thankfully, it seems, they were out on their regulation halloween outing and promptly demanded 'lowwippops' of the Indian lady manning (?!) the counter. They were rewarded with chocolates. Their father had to assure them that they had got a better deal than they had expected, not that the children themselves seemed very convinced of that at the end. By the way, I must confess extreme annoyance at the way a couple of young Indian men ogled at me while I stood by the counter and K had gone to get the mojito. I know it might not be very natural in our country to see women in a liquor store and their behaviour could and perhaps should be excused on that account itself. All the same, it is rather an affront to notice men staring open-mouthed (literally), when they can quite make out that you are not happy at their attitude and would rather be overlooked. I have never learned till date to take any form of gazing at me as a compliment in any way. I'm sure many other women also feel the same way.

This afternoon, we undertook a trip to the Manville Walmart in our new car. K did me proud by driving quite competently despite the entirely different system of driving we have had to get used to here. We had to get some gas near East Main Street and were disgusted to discover the amount we had lavished on cab fares ever since our arrival here, especially after we had calculated the gallons of gas we could have bought at that amount. Well, better late than never. Walmart was crowded as usual on a weekend day, particularly as the weather was quite clear and pleasant. Besides the usual necessities like bread and milk, we shopped for car accessories this time, which was definitely a novelty for me. Car deo, car sponge, ice scraper, wet wipes...wow, we do love our car ! Also discovered potpourri in some interesting fragrances like mulberry, hazelnut cream and apple-cinnamon. The latter was a bit overwhelming and the hazelnut one was rejected on grounds of our common failure to appreciate the thought of our bathroom smelling like a Dunkin-Donuts outlet. The usual and expected confusion took place at the cosmetics section where purchasing a cold cream turned out to be a major headache for formerly mentioned reasons (the monstrous variety, for those who suffer from amnesia like me) and locating a simple pair of socks engendered considerable mirth (since I eventually purchase two pairs in light and deep blue and in material that resembled the feel of a soft toy more than it did any form of cotton or wool). A navy blue tweed skirt on sale was the unexpected additional purchase, more so for the simple reason that it actually did fit my paunch and looked good too (the two rarely go hand-in-hand, in my case).

We had a wonderful but rather belated lunch of ghee-bhaat with daal, alusheddho and deembhaaja at 4 pm. Well, in retrospect, it might not have been that late, considering that we had had breakfast at 10.30 am...