On House Hunting In Bombay

Sat pillion behind a man named Faiz

The name of my

First love.

“My girlfriend is Hindu,” he asserts

Narrow, hazel eyes and a kind disposition

I would say a kind heart but you never know

Around here.

I nod, my eyes fixed vacantly, my hands clutched aggressively

at the Angry sea – blurs of grey and mud, screaming at me to tell

him that my mother is Hindu too.

Us both, ignorant, unabashed

about wearing our bigotry on our sleeves.

“Look at me, my blood is mixed up of those who you hate – where do I fit in?”

Cut up the city in tiny boxes

Cut up its people, cram them into the boxes

Al Hilal, Al Qareem, Al Saba

Each house smells different – years of pain, age, wisdom, heartbreak, love, loss, death, bills, taxes, payments, cum spreading itself across is walls

“Where do I fit in?”

Close your eyes and imagine yourself within the four walls – talking to somebody you love,

Envisioning last night’s orgasm as you smoke a cigarette and watch the tea boil over.

“My boyfriend’s Brahmin,” does that help?

His blood looks the same as mine. He has strong arms and a lovely smile and he holds me when I keel over, my uterus exploding into a thousand prickly stars

and I imagine we can do this within the four walls of this house.

Hazel eyes replace the jade ones of the white colony cat who’ll take its pick of roti

irrespective of your name –

Sundar, Darshan, Ajanta, Kalpana

Look at the lot of us – waiting to be boxed in.

The angry sea, a moment’s respite, from the relentless holes I try and skip over

but fall flat, face down into;

Inhale the dust.

Brush it off, begin again.

Close your eyes – can you picture yourself within these four walls?

Image credit : Anurag Banerjee

Obscure Ways I’ve Taken To, To Kill My Time

1. 1. Watching Boiler Room sets long enough to pretend that I don’t live in Bombay
   2. Downloading and using trial versions of paid apps
   3. Obsessively cleaning any surfaces that reflect light
   4. Logging onto Pornhub more out of technical interest than any sexual interest
   5. Taking walks around the neighbourhood to run imaginary errands
   6. Fruitlessly stalking my ex on social media while being aware that he’s blocked me on all platforms
   7. Carrying out a six-step skincare routine every morning that gives me the vague impression that I have my life in order
   8. Lying down very still and pretending that I’m not alive until the phone rings
   9. Staying up at night to listen to the tree rattling to the storm outside my window
   10. Avoiding said phone calls but immediately texting: sorry, missed your call. is everything okay?

 

Kinds Of People I’ve Met In Bombay (so far)

1. Basic ass bitch in Adidas with a latent STD and a gym membership.
2. Magnetic Fields attending bro-dude who’s actually in audit but DJ’s on Fridays at the local bar because he still stays at home and saved enough money to buy a turntable. Also dates women who still wear white sneakers (like it’s 2013). His idea of excitement is a meticulously sliced hari mirchi in his weekend G&Ts.
3. The guy who made a word up for his Instagram handle and believes that that makes him unique. Also got into Cryptocurrency two years back but considers himself an expert on the same.
4. The dude dressed in all-black (forgetting that we live in Bandra, not Berlin) who’s in his late-thirties but still works at Viacom and vehemently claims to anybody who’d listen that Nh7 is still relevant.
5. The screenwriter with a cross-body leather satchel. Often dabbles in LSD for “creative inspo.” Often searches for deeper meaning in Colaba.
6. The guy with the black and white Instagram feed who painfully insists on referring to the aesthetic as “chiaroscuro.” He is also still learning how to spell said word.
7. The “wild Bandra chick” (who’s actually from Agra) with orgies in Parel and threesomes in Bandra who claims that rampant, unprotected sex with strangers is a great way to burn calories and “work that bod.” Her dad still pays her rent.
8. The rich SoBo guy who bought a Hasselblad for the sole purpose of clicking shots of skinny, dusky women with daddy issues and low alcohol capacities against the Goan sunset.
9. The over-achieving assistant director who claims to have been “doing it for a decade” like it’s something to be proud of. Like, I dunno, read a book or something instead.
10. The tired assistant director who wants his big foray into directing but spends more time on shooting schedules than treatment notes. Is also often found siphoning off footage and making his own edits that he later uploads on Vimeo with descriptions that often involve emoticons.
11. The actress turned producer (because that’s her only shot at actually starring in something).
12. The struggling actor who thinks gym time is equivalent to acting props.
13. The coder who accidentally discovered sex while he was chasing money. Also pumps iron similar to gym-dude and considers himself an artist because he once read a quote by Borges – by mistake.
14. The girl in fashion who routinely doesn’t shave and insists on wearing a septum ring and shirts unbuttoned down to the navel – until you realise she’s actually a boy.
15. The capitalist white dude who would be a “Ramu” back in white-land but now has a hot, dusky Indian girlfriend with an ass & gets invited to a lot of parties to balance out the brown:white ratio. Owns a sherwani but still carries tissue paper wherever he goes.
16. The buzzfeed/scoopwhopp/social media champion who can’t sleep at night because of what he has created (or so I hope).
17. That one feminist woman director with less talent, more grudges.
18. People who routinely think it’s still acceptable to read Murakami and worse still, search for meaning within its glib-Jap pop culture nonsense with cherry blossom fields and dream sequences.
19. The chef who went to an obscure town in Europe to study gastronomical food engineering and now only drinks locally brewed IPAs and proceeds to write an essay about it on Instagram. Or, a kala khatta chuski. Or, a bread and butter sandwich. You get the drift.
20. A plethora of people who grew up in Chembur/Andheri/Powai eating missal paav but are now gluten-lactose-dairy-carbs free & wear a shirt with a pattern of fruits on it at some point during the week. Said pattern is also often turned into themed parties (for reasons I will never understand). Something about being from the suburbs gives unprecedented power to start cults. Think about it
21. That upright bassist who used to have taste before he started playing in Bombay.
22. Freelancing ad lady who hates on capitalism(irony lost) just cos she spent a year in Eastern Europe. Considers herself a writer with a blog called “a maverick’s monologue” updated every 10-12 months (aka me) (courtesy Aman, my forever NemesisxMuse)

(whoever gets that Nicholas Cage meme, hmu. I wanna be friends)

 

What I Learnt Today – III

Source: What I Learnt Today – III

What I Learnt Today – III

1. the degree to which you want something is inversely proportional to your chances of wanting it once you have it.
2. “true love is an ordeal. the lesser loves, a respite from it,” is the kind of romantic notion that feeds heartbreaks.
3. true love is a sense of peace you can’t put your finger on, when you can’t say why you love somebody.
4. growing up is realising and accepting that being self-published isn’t just okay, but sometimes necessary.
5. return policies are sexy.
6. if it makes you hate yourself, it’s probably not worth it.
7. eye-contact is underrated.
8. living somewhere with actual seasons makes you feel like you’re actually living.
9. allowing yourself bad moods keeps you sane.
10. seeing anything – love, life, work, art – to the end is its own reward.

What I Learnt Today – II

1. some couples dye their hair the same colour.

2. some people still use their selfies as phone wallpaper.

3. there’s something sexy about asking someone to fix your collar.

4. to create is to be happy.

5. loyalty & fidelity can be two entirely different things.

6. genuineness only thrives in obscurity. like, celery.

7. cruelty is the cruelest when unintended.

8. getting what you want takes bravery most don’t possess.

9. travelling makes you homesick but also teaches you that there is no real home.

10. it’s okay to be yourself. it’s necessary to be unapologetic about it.

What I Learnt Today

1. your body is the most accurate measure of how you feel. listen to it.
2. monogamy is a social construct.
3. guilt is a strong aphrodisiac.
4. people don’t care about each other as much as they care about airbrushed bodies of famous women.
5. if you knew what you were doing with your life, you might be bored.
6. hugs are sexy and terrifying at the same time.
7. if you want to fall in love, try by starting with yourself.
8. sadness can, and will follow you everywhere, like a dog you turned away returning with dead birds to leave at your doorstep.
9. fuck belonging to rightist parties, yogic clubs, fuck karmic exchanges at the bank or belonging in the arms of your lover – start by belonging to your consciousness.
10. spending time with yourself will exhaust you. do it anyway.