eatprayloving

After <insert traumatic/banal but meaningful event here>, I decided that it was time for me to get to know me. Somewhere I had lost sight of me, the only constant in my life, and it was time for me to find out who I really was.

I wanted to fling myself into this endeavour. I wanted to jump into an adventure, test how I would react. I wanted to throw off all pretence, all the bullshit, be really truly naked to the world, see how I oxidised and how I didn't.

I wanted to find new ways to feel, to feel again. I wanted to search for a meaning that I could feel. I wanted to be among strangers who spoke a language I didn't understand, who looked all different from me. I wanted to learn from them. I wanted to be surrounded by unfamiliarity and relearn the contours of my imagination.

I wanted to look in the mirror and see a new face, my face.

So I shaved my head and wrote a blog post about it.

brown girl gaze

we grow towards hollywood movies and tv shows and boybands.
and then we come to the west. omg the men all look like that! so hot! so far i've messaged my friends that i've seen an edward norton, a definite mark ruffalo, a denzel washington, a nick carter without the long hair, a keanu reeves OMG.
of course soon i learnt what their returning lingering gazes mean on my brown girl body. but omg i look back at them OMG!

what would we do without 'modernity'

what would we critique?

[an academic poem]

my red leather glove in the bowels of M1

They were the richest looking thing I had - and that has so much meaning these days.
Given to me by people who folded me in family and lavished love on me - rare and precious and still a wonder.
They were beautiful. My one concession to leather.
Come back to me please :(

beautiful things the boyfriend says, part 2

"Damn, that's cool"

"Painted jars :)"

"And then you just caught and put some faeries inside, right?"

can you even imagine

A woman, living in this city for under 20,000 dollars a year?

The professor asks, at the end of a wearying lecture on women and work. The hundred-strong class feels hushed, tired, but in the TA corner there is a hulchul, a few of us turning to look at each other and saying, can you imagine? Fake outrage with a bitter edge. Can you even? I think I can imagine!

I'm sorry you're poor! One of them laughs afterwards. I'm just sorry you're poor!

Most of the women in the class live at home and commute 3 hours to come to the university, work 30 hours a week, pay their exorbitant tuition, pay their bills at home, are caregivers; and somehow still have the energy to do their readings, sometimes.

I am only thinking about how I should drink some water and survive the one hour bus ride home and eat some kurma sitting in my fridge. I don't need to buy myself a slice of pizza right now.

a crisis of faith

I think I'm having one.