The Legend of Bloody Mary

This the story of a mother’s fight for her daughter’s sleep! A true Halloween tale!

It all started one night when darkness had fallen and everything was quiet.

A little girl in her little bed somewhere in exotic Goa has a question for her mother. “Mama, is it midnight?” The mother who is also tired after a long day says “no, baby, it is not yet midnight, you should be fast asleep by then”.

The little girl fidgets for a while and says “I don’t want to sleep”.
Now the mother is alarmed, “Why?” she asks.
Lil’ one: “Because Bloody Mary might come”
Mother is now confused, “who or what is Bloody Mary?”
Lil’ one :”My friend told me that if she touched the white of her eye and said Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary came and took her at midnight, but her mama got her back. And now I am scared Bloody Mary might come, if I close my eyes”

Mother is amused by the story but also angry at the lil’ one’s friend for scaring her.
“Darling, there is no such thing as a woman called Bloody Mary, the only Bloody Mary I know is a drink, although it is not for kids. You don’t worry about Bloody Mary now, just imagine it as a drink with an umbrella in it!” (Yes, mother had no idea how a Bloody Mary looked either).

After coaxing and cuddling, the lil one fell asleep and so did mother from pure exhaustion trying to convince her daughter to the non-existence of monsters.

The next morning, the little girl had not forgotten the story, she wanted to know the details of the drink called ‘Bloody Mary’. Mother was herself vague on the background, so she pulled up a youtube-video of Jamie Oliver demonstrating the perfect ‘Bloody Mary’. Both mother and daughter were educated.

The story does not end there though. The daughter was still not over her fear of the legend of Bloody Mary.

The mother decided to sacrifice herself to help her daughter. At the next opportunity that presented itself, the mother decided to let her daughter see that there is nothing to fear but fear itself.

The family was out with friends one evening. The mother calmly ordered a ‘Bloody Mary’ and drank it – just so that her daughter could live without fear and see that Bloody Mary is now firmly imprisoned in mama’s tummy or liver or blood stream or whatever and can harm her daughter no more!

Thus was the story of my first (and hopefully only) brush with the alcoholic drink ‘Bloody Mary’!

Are the cockles of your heart warmed now?

Men, Women, Equality

http://www.upworthy.com/a-french-film-showing-men-what-being-a-woman-feels-like-kinda

It has some disturbing content but it is worth the watch.

I ask myself, why do women not behave the way they behave in the video – why do a group of girls never molest a guy who is alone but the other way around happens all the time?

Are we raising our sons and daughters properly? Are we being proper role-models? I pledge to raise my son to be empathetic and my daughter to take her rights to be a human being seriously!

Live and let live!

Condoms Vs Coy

Football world cup is affecting me, I am seeing everything as ‘X’ Vs ‘Y’.

So perhaps the title is misleading. What am I talking about? I am talking about the strange place called (Indian) politics. I am sure, you recognise the garden variety I am talking about – this parallel-universe populated entirely by people that have turned in their common sense and in some cases, the complete thinking apparatus called the brain when they joined this chest-beating, proselytising, moral-policing bandwagon called Politics.

The health minister of India made a statement to  ‘The New York Times’ about AIDS campaign in India. I quote him (from India Today)

“The thrust of the AIDS campaign should not only be on the use of condoms. This sends the wrong message that you can have any kind of illicit sexual relationship, but as long as you’re using a condom, it’s fine,”

Btw, the Health Minister is a doctor and he, more or less, said AIDS can be stopped with moral values!

Look at that quote again “condoms encourages people to think that they can have illicit sex and get away with it”. Wait, what? what did he say? What is illicit sex – is it like illicit liquor? Makes you go blind? Is made up in equal parts of battery acid and condoms(in this case)? In a barrel? A business run by mafia-like cartels?

And more importantly, is he saying that “illicit” sex should be punished by deadly disease?!? Is he seriously implying that?

Has he seen the AIDS campaign Ads done by the National AIDS Control Org of India? I have and I can assure him that the message sent by those Ads do not “encourage illegal activities“- it does not encourage any activity except wanting to kill yourself for sitting through that.

These Ads talk about everything from dirty food to dirty water and also about how the child in the womb can decide the hospital where he/she wants to be born, except sexual intercourse! The baby was probably brought by the stork as a blessing from God.

You have to have seen the ads to believe what I am saying!

The Ad about how you should talk to your children does not tell you what the hell you should be talking to your children about – the Ad asks you “would you let your child eat this unhygienically prepared food? would you let them drink from a dirty pool” – so where is the connection to AIDS? I am no wiser after the Ad than I was before. I only know that I should talk to my children about hygiene. Or where they suggesting that intercourse is unhygienic? Hmm… did not think of that. Or that you could get AIDS by eating street-food (or chow-mein, which of course, causes rapes in India)

The other Ad is to encourage parents to get tested for AIDS so that their unborn children can get better care, if necessary, when they are born but the Ad is so long with such unnecessary details like how the mother decides what to buy at a grocery store based on the baby’s kicks, then she chooses which veggies to buy, which doctor to go to for delivery etc – yes, you guessed it, based on baby’s kicks. Both father and mother are then advised by the doctor to get tested for AIDS. This whole Ad gives you the feeling AIDS is some condition that might just happen during pregnancies, so you should get yourself tested, it is definitely not anything preventable.

I understand ‘better late than never’ and promoting testing for AIDS as doing the right thing by your unborn child but what about not even getting there and preventing the whole disease thing by using c-o-n-d-o-m-s?!?

I leave that to our health minister and his Ministry of Silly Values to clear up.

Don’t even think about saying ‘But…Kama Sutra..’ Oh, India, what a hypocrite you have become!

ps: About being not in touch with reality – all this, comes on the heels of a famous Hindi Actor modelling and endorsing Durex condoms.

Quality Vs Quantity

My current obsession is with Marco Polo and his travels. I have been reading about that incredible journey and marvel at all those things that were available in the 13th century, created just on pure (wo)manpower! Marco Polo describes a lot of wondrous things and the one thing that amazed me more than others was the sheer number of people who lived in the empire of Kublai Khan at that time.

Perhaps Marco exaggerates a wee bit but even if we reduce it by one-tenth- his army would still be stupendous! To have a standing army of tens of thousands of men, coordinating their billeting, upkeep, promotions etc is not a small matter. And all this without instant communication! And yet Kublai ruled an empire that extended from Black Sea to East China Sea for more than 30 years.

He did this with a clever system to training his officers and keeping them happy with a good pay and special perks. At the same time, he expected discipline and honour as it was him they were representing and too much of anything – either good or bad – would tip the scales.

What has that got to do with today, you ask me?

I am back!

After a long hiatus, the monsoons have brought me back to blogging. I was busy with all sorts of things and inspiration was running low but now I have something to say. See you at the next post!

House of Cards – India : a comparative Study

Main Players (based only on first season):

Modi : Francis Underwood – could be the only strong contender as everyone else can be just manipulated/strong-armed away (“Disorganized religion”)

Rahul Gandhi : Peter Russo (sans divorce, kids) – looks ok on paper but is a puppet

Sonia Gandhi : perhaps once Claire Underwood but now more shades of Cersei Lannister (from GoT)

Zoe Barnes : Tarun Tejpal 

Aam Admi Party: clueless cabinet

I am not so clear on the rest as I really don’t know who pulls strings in what. But I can imagine that with elections around the corner, we can give House of Cards a run for its money.

Competition : Real or Imaginary?

An interesting conversation with friends prompted me to analyse the idea of competition.

The premise was “the West has a surplus but in countries like India with a huge population we have to fight for every scrap we can get. So we have to push our child to get better percentage, otherwise they will lose out”. On the surface the argument sounds valid but is it really true? My instinct is that this is not true.

I have no data to support any of my arguments here. So please feel free to shoot me a comment in case, I have written something illogical.

• West has surplus

 I am trying to get some data to support my argument but let me just present my view on this matter based on just my experience (yes, one data-point – what a terrible scientist I am).

Having lived in Germany for 12 years I can attest to the fact that there is no surplus in Germany (Btw, Germany is the fourth largest economy in the world). People struggle just the same to make a living there. There is unemployment there too.

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Pompeii – a 360°

Lots of Spoilers – so please do not read if you do not want me to give away everything!

I have the following tips for Paul W.S. Anderson’s next directorial venture:

1. By all means, assume we did not pay any attention whatsoever during history lessons at school

2. Do not cast Kiefer Sutherland – in any role… please?

3. Kit Harrington’s abs is the only reason for some of us to watch this – next movie, more abs and less of the stabbing in the diaphragm

4. If you need to cut-and-paste a screenplay together, do choose obscure films, we,the movie-going public, do like a challenge

5. Bubble speech works only in Comics – you might want to look for a different dialogue writer for 3-D movies with real people in it

6. Bird’s eye-view shots in a computer generated town works only when you are Peter Jackson and you can slip in New Zealand into some of it

7. Carie-Anne Moss is Trinity, do not waste her as a prop

Overall, I would say, stick to Milla Jovovich and Zombies – you are good at creating mass-destruction in a more of a cinematic set-up than real stories. 

And Kit, I love you as Jon Snow but you got to practise more than just your squinting-menacingly-at-your-enemies look and swordplay. The Abs, you can keep.

Ladies and Gentlemen,I would recommend Pompeii for a different reason. It is an insightful movie. All of you who claim that we are hurting the planet making it sound like it is an adorable furry little animal?  

I have news for you!

The planet is out to get us! Invest in FTL companies Now- Buy, Buy, Buy!

Serenity!

No, actually the boat is called Santa Lucia.

End of a Long Break

Hi everyone!

I am back after my long break from blogging! I am still working on a workable schedule but my blogging has to be put on a slow flame for a while longer. I shall write whenever I find something worthwhile to share. Thank you for not ‘unfollowing me’ (yet!)