Man is Matter

"The least you can do is ensure comic relief at my funeral."

2012-01-22T19:51:00.000-05:00

My mother gives new meaning to the notion of "going against the grain." No, she is not a nudist, she is not a Ron Paul fanatic, and she is not allergic to sunlight. Rather, she hates birthday cake, she falls asleep in houses of worship, and she wants to free the world's horses. And, she likes talking about funerals.

While my sister, father, and I prefer not to talk about the loss of a close loved one, and would rather enjoy our Saturday morning lethargy in peace, my mother likes to lead discussions on mortality. "Old people die, and young people are born. It's beautiful. It's a circle of life."

Having experienced this circle of life through Simba's coming of age in Lion King, my sister, father, and I try (and fail) to nod away the imminent discussion on death, and try (and still fail) to veer the conversation towards Michele Bachmann or hot yoga or unopened boxes of Christmas truffles.

"Ruch, when I die, I want you to write my eulogy."

After I spit coffee onto my iPad, my mother will then elaborate. "You're funny. I want there to be lots of laughter and joy and a celebration of my life, not a commiseration for the loss."

I usually smile insincerely, and my sister chimes in. "I'm funny, too, why can't I write it?"

"Of course you can, but you'll be busy with the after party. I want lots of food, especially peanuts and tea, and lots of cute babies. Make sure they're cute and fat, the kind I would have liked if I were alive."

My father then looks up from his magazine. "You are alive."

My mother scoffs. "Make sure there is also lots of dancing. Don't skimp with this party." My father nods his head, in hopes that the conversation is close to a finish, and then looks back down at his magazine.

Since my sister is still angry that I was given the task of writing the comedic eulogy, I decide to change the subject. "Mumma, the world is ending this year, and we might not make it after December 21st, so I guess we can't have this after death party for you anyways."

Every single line in my mother's face is now infused with fury. "Ruch, don't talk about death like that in front of your sister. You'll scare her."

All celebrities have to start somewhere.

2012-01-22T00:14:00.004-05:00

RMR-Debut

RMR-A Capella

RMR-Obama 2012

Stay tuned!

burn your fancy candles, eat pizza in your prom dress, and tell her, "I love you."

2012-01-21T14:22:00.006-05:00

330-something days till the world implodes.

(No, it may not necessarily end, but the very fact that large waves of people still bow to the likes of defeated Michele Bachmann as she leads the nation's moral recovery [post-Obamacare, no doubt], speaks to the steep decline in our global welfare. The Economist now talks about an imminent "sub-Saharan Spring," China and India are up in hydropolitical arms, and it barely flurried once this entire winter. Human development has progressed to its peak; the social institutions of marriage, government, education, and medicine have ceded to carnal desire [#willworkforfood]. Science, cultivated over centuries of meticulous research and analysis, has ceded to the whims of the one social construction that has sadly maintained: religion.)

In fact, let's just say the world will explode. Seriously, the Mayans were on top of their shit.

At the risk of sounding like a poor cocktail of Oprah, Simple Abundance, and the usual trite New Year's carpe diem sentiments, I must say that this is the year to claim. It's the year when you travel to Zimbabwe just because it was the only Z-country you could think of when you played Scattegories; it's the year when you wear fuscia pants to work, even if it's a Wednesday; it's the year when you burn your fancy candles, the ones saved up for a special occasion.

It's the year when you rid yourself of fluff--of the shapeless pink dress in your wardrobe, that will only increase in its aesthetic horror, of the friend whose lies you continue to forgive, of the piles of miscellaneous papers gathering dust under your bed.

This isn't like any other new year, when you resolve to lose weight, work harder, and "be better." The time for nebulous goals has passed. In fact, the time for all goals has passed. Wistfulness ends. Fantasies end. Delusions of friendship, of happiness, of success end.

The time has now come to just do.

This is the last chance we have to turn our dreams into reality. All wishes must be fulfilled. All fantasies must be carried out. And the delusions upon which we have built our lives must crumble in the face of our own awakening.

On December 21st, if we're all still here, then we'd have spent an entire year living life, not just surviving. And if we're not, then we'd have spent our last year without secrets, without regret, without the uncomfortable uncertainty that the girl you've fallen for is yours for the taking.

Ten bucks says, she is.

And the clock's ticking.

fingernails grow back.

2012-01-02T23:17:00.001-05:00

My best friend's dog bit me about four months ago. My finger was in pain and quite mangled, but after a heavy dose of antibiotics and compulsive slathering of topical ointments, the bites soon faded, my skin grew back, and my finger looked almost human.

(Almost.)

While there were no traces of trauma on my finger (insert plug for Neosporin), my finger nail was cracked in the middle. After three months, the crack only worsened, and what was initially a slight discomfort grew into a routine nuisance that prevented me from running my fingers through my hair, typing without a Band Aid, or eating spicy food with my hands. After I returned from India, I discovered the snag had become a hole in the middle of my nail.

I was permanently damaged. I was 23, had three white hairs and a dosa belly. I had a flesh wound without even having joined the CIA (yet).

And so while I sat in a corner and wailed about the end of my life, my mother stroked my hair and told me what she tells me whenever I have been hurt, wounded, punctured: "Let it air. It will soon grow out, beta, and you won't remember it ever pained so much."

So I aired it (much to the dismay of work colleagues and unsuspecting subway car passengers who were forced to be in proximity to the flesh). I threw caution (and all my Band Aids) to the wind, and as I consumed myself with life, I did not realize my nail bed was slowly and steadily restoring itself. I promised myself that I would get a manicure (I actually hate seeing paint on my nails) once it was healed. The hole had moved up several millimeters. Diaphanous fibers had begun to germinate.

I was cured.

At least, I was en route.

Vestiges of the wound now remain only in the crooked tip of my nail, and in a subtle dent right in the middle that I can only feel with the pad of my other index finger. It was an ephemeral pain (unlike my three white hairs, which have refused to budge), and it's been rendered obsolete with the new year.

I am getting a manicure on January 16th.

And all I did was air it out.

No white Christmas, but a potted plant.

2011-12-26T15:59:00.001-05:00

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

The Manushi Who Stole Christmas

2011-12-26T15:53:00.006-05:00

There was no white Christmas this year. Rather, the weather was dry, grey, and insufferably banal, and the usual surge of cheer that lit the streets had been slightly dampened. People sent e-gift cards instead of buying lumpy sweaters, and ate apples instead of truffles (well, I ate both.)

My family, however, spent one of warmest and most colorful Christmases, the kind that Jesus himself probably intended (no e-gift cards).

A few weeks before the holiday, my home had already been littered with red and silver cellophane, gold ribbon, boxes of Godiva, and empty bottles of Japanese plum wine. We neglected to go to the gym for the sake of "holiday chores" and by the time Friday, the 23rd, rolled around, I could barely fit into my pink snuggie.

Still, we were excited to spend time together, to love each other, to enjoy some time without the vagaries of our work. I came home early the day Manu and I were going to assemble and decorate our tree. We're raging Eco lovers who have come to enjoy the tradition of building the same tree every year, saving the whales one Christmas at a time. This year, Manu took issue with the whole procedure. She wanted to go to the mall instead. I looked longingly at the wine and chocolates that would have accompanied the assembly line (a new aspect of the tradition I included this year).

I swallowed. "Yes, let's go." We never got a chance to put up or tree, so we put all of our gifts beneath another fauna.

We had intended to wrap lights around our potted plant, but forgot to do that, too.

That evening, I wrapped my mother's gifts, a chore I find quite pleasurable, and after several hours of talking about nothing whilst curling ribbon, we finally went off to bed. It was a bit difficult to get up for work the next morning, but since our new way of functioning was indulging in confectionery and cocoa, somehow we managed to get through the day.

My aunt and uncle had flown in from Alabama, and so my cousin's family and mine enjoyed Saturday morning, Christmas Eve, doing nothing but eating fruits and chocolate and fried Gujarati foods that we judge other people for eating. (I most likely will have type 2 by Wednesday).

While my aunt and mother divulged their 2011 regrets and their 2012 goals and their innermost secrets and their deluded love affairs with Bollywood actors, my cousin, my sister and I filmed ourselves and posted videos on YouTube and Facebook. We learned three things through our endeavors: rapping is difficult, the pain from stubbing your toe is difficult to conceal, and the three of us will probably be famous by Thursday, the day after the effects of our gluttonous consumption will kick in.

(this video doesn't show on all web interfaces, so if you want to see it, shoot me an email!)

We opened presents on Christmas morning, after another round of goals and feedback on these goals (read: unsolicited adult advice on life and that funny thing they keep mentioning, "future.").

My parents had gotten me a snow globe.

We then drove for many moons so we could test the malleability of our seemingly pregnant stomachs, which within three days were carrying approximately 9 months of food. We ate (devoured, ravaged) South Indian food at a restaurant where seating was first come, first serve; naturally, the survival-of-the-fittest Indian roots surfaced, and my parents and aunt and uncle circled the full tables like hawks, eyeing the contented patrons with glares.

Yes, how dare they chew their food before they swallow. Chop, chop, unassuming diners, it's time to go.

We finally saw some people take a pause for breath, and in the hiatus that followed, they were suddenly surrounded. My family did not even wait for the waiters to clear out the tables before sitting.

After our glorious meal, we rested our hands on our protruding stomachs and walked over to the real Christmas spectacular: Don 2, Shah Rukh Khan's newest film.

I almost peed in my pants with excitement (and from washing down spicy sambhar with 4-5 glasses of water).

The movie was brilliant, as expected. All we needed to end the weekend was the drive into sparkly midtown Manhattan, where we all argued about the expression of the lights (were they tear drops or melting icicles?), shared bags of roasted peanuts for which my generous aunt overpaid the nutsman, and the youth issued declarations about the commercial banality of midtown and while the elders of the pack mused about their next snack. Once my mother reminisced drinking tea in silent, suburban Ridgewood, where we could also fill up our almost empty tank, we drove back up north.

Back at home, we loudly claimed a lack of hunger, and then continued to eat popcorn with chaat masala, peanuts, grapefruit, ice cream, blueberries, more Gujarati specialties dear to our clogged hearts, and Godiva truffles whose caloric count is nonexistent on December 25.

We ended the evening by Facetiming (if Google is a verb, why not Facetime?) our grandparents in India, who were too fascinated with my cousin's new abominable snow man look (read: strategically grown beard), to realize that we were all present, connecting to each other through a small machine thinner than my diary, each of us thousands of miles apart, and still within three inches of each other, grasping for the other's face, unable to touch.

The next day, everyone dispersed, and all we had left of the weekend was a few dozen boxes of chocolate, my pink snuggie still sprawled on the couch, and a few music videos we had created to change the world.

No, Manu didn't steal Christmas. She actually brought it to life.

And we get to keep our potted plant all year round.

snow globes

2011-12-22T12:02:00.001-05:00

When I was a child, my family used to get snow globes as gifts. We were new to this country, and so the true gift was the ability to hold the reverie of our future lives, as idyllic, peaceful, and soft as what lay behind the glass. My mother always loved them because she could enjoy the snow without my father having to shovel, and without her children having to get pneumonia (or what she thought was pneumonia, but what was usually a runny nose.)

Over the years, the clutter of our dreams undermined the initial giddiness of their tangibility. Soon, dreams gathered dust, as did our snow globes, and many of them were lost or shattered, the viscous suspension staining our carpets.

We're no longer new, no longer young, but remain exceedingly restless, as we seek a way to rebuild these shattered snow globes. We seek the stillness behind the glass, the sense of easy tranquility, the furry boots and the Eskimo caps that never induce static cling.

My hair still stands up when I take off winter hats, I have been punished for my dreams, and the sounds outside my window are loud, raucous,and jeering. And still, my slippery hands are doused in glitter and minuscule tile roofs and powdery, white, soft snow.

very good bad day

2011-12-19T13:38:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, days are just plain terrible. The universe decides to work against you for 24 hours, and so the same day your hair is puffy is the same day your dog dies or your heart breaks, which inevitably coincides with the day your boss actually notices you walking in late in your less-than-business-casual torn Converse to mark the occasion.

A few days ago, I decided to return to my 5:30 AM workouts, in a move to to restore a sense of order and sanity in my life, (a move which conveniently followed a moment of angst last week when my favorite black jeans tore as I made futile attempts to pull them up and over my increasingly large behind). I returned from the Iron Yoga class feeling a bit weak, most likely because I returned from my three week hiatus only to use the wrong weights (the heavier ones) throughout class. I decided to make some eggs and coffee for me and Manu.

My parents woke up and filed into the cold kitchen. My father leaned over my mediocre egg production and sighed. His latest hobby is making elaborate, gourmet meals of restaurant quality, and my omelet did not seem to cut it. I ran out of time, and so made the omelet into scrambled eggs, much to his dismay, and my mother muttered something about my ability to survive in the real world. (Not sure why people in the real world can't just eat scrambled eggs.)

I scarfed down my meal and ran into the shower, where I slipped on a bar of rose soap.

I then ran into the kitchen to grab some bananas, for even in my haste to make the train I knew I needed to start saving money (the world is ending in 2012, so I need to buy some flashlights). As I ran into the kitchen, my mother handed me a hot cup of coffee. I told her I didn't have time to drink it, and she looked utterly crestfallen. I poured it into a thermos, and with my new magenta ear muffs sliding up to my forehead, my bananas sticking out of my coat pockets, and my purse wide open and dispersing receipts and chocolate wrappers on the ground, I ran with my thermos of steaming coffee to the car. My sister was waiting at the wheel. "Ready?" I looked at her, and was about to nod yes, until I yelped. "My phone!!"

She had begun to slowly reverse, and then stopped. "Go."

I ran back into the house, threw my gloves on the counter so I could adeptly search for my phone. It ended up being in my jewelry box, so I grabbed a pair of earrings with my phone, and ran back downstairs. I left my gloves on the counter, so that by the time I reached the train station, my hands had become brown icicles.

I had missed my train, and I didn't have enough cash to go to the French bakery next door.

As I waited twenty minutes for the next train, I sifted through my personal mail for anything interesting. I was hoping for a love letter or an invitation to Hollywood, but instead saw Merriam Webster's Word of the Day (yes, I'm a word nerd. And I'm proud of my subscriptions.)

The word of the day was swivet.

Swivet means a fluster or panic or extreme state of agitation.

Rucha flew into a swivet as she was an hour late for work, could not feel her frozen and sore extremities, and smelled like a sweaty rose with coffee breath.

I smiled (to myself, of course. Lunacy is in the eyes of the beholder.)

I had learned a new word.

the Family Circus

2011-12-05T18:26:00.216-05:00

I wish I were Beaver Cleaver. I want a white picket fence and perfectly round pancakes and a family that functions completely in synch.

The problem is, I hate fences, perfectly shaped food terrifies me, and my family seems to inevitably collide and implode, almost as if in competition with the Higgs Field.

Twelve hours ago I returned from a two-week trip to India, where I partook in nuptial celebrations in various cities and a whirlwind tour of South India. I woke up at four this morning with a cold, a sore throat, and that dreadful feeling of adrenaline receding from my core.

(So, the sun has not even come up yet, but I'm now drinking my second cup of Madras coffee, imported from the source.)

After several days of truly fun festivities for my cousin's wedding in Mumbai, my family was to ship out to Gujarat, to prepare for another wedding. My mother, her two sisters and their husbands, my cousin, my grandparents, and my mother's aunt were going to take a train out of Bombay.

Our train was at 6:50 in the morning, but given that we were travelling with about two carloads of baggage and three elderly folks, we decided to leave the place at which we stayed at 5:30 in the morning. The ride was ten minutes.

My mother's cousins had driven us to the station. After they parked, we faced our first obstacle: crossing the street. With a sense of romantic adventure, we trekked across the highway, avoiding impassive cows, unrelenting motorists, and people standing in the middle of the road for no apparent reason, though I presumed each person to be waiting for Godot.

We survived. Our entourage attracted stares and whistles, as we huddled around fourteen bags at the entrance of the station, some of us rubbing sore muscles, some of us rubbing tired eyes, some of us rubbing our fanny packs and visors. My mother's aunt used her cane to fend off stray dogs. I still had not had a single cup of coffee.

We soon found out our platform was on the other end of the station. We had to walk down two flights of stairs, cross the station underground, then walk back another flight of stairs, and progress to the end of the tracks. There were hundreds of people crowding the station; rush hour had conveniently started about three hours earlier that morning. I briefly glanced up at the clouds, in a futile attempt to seek some sort of divine inspiration. As usual, I found nothing particularly revelatory in the skies, so instead scratched a new mosquito bite in my left armpit. Without caffeine or deus ex machina, I lost the thrill of romantic treks through the rough, wild terrain of the Indian train stations, and so picked up four heavy pieces of luggage and embarked upon the pilgrimage to Platform 7.

Some of us were tasked to escort my grandparents and great aunt. I had heard some commotion behind me after walking down the second flight of stairs, but assumed it was the usual buzz of a Bombay train platform. As soon as I reached the top step, I set my bags down for a small break. I glanced over my shoulder and saw my mother and her sister yelling at my grandfather, who unabashedly forged ahead with his lavendar napsack.

My mother motioned to me. "Ruch! Please get the backpack from nanaji."

I ran back down the steps and grabbed the lavendar napsack. My grandfather looked back up at me. His grip tightened. "No, beta, no problem, I have it." I tried again, but he pushed me away. I skipped back up the steps. My mother glared at me.

"Ruch! Please help your grandfather!"

"Ma, he said--"

My mother threw her hands in frustration. I was not completely sure what had spurred on her anger, but I decided to keep a 3-foot radius around her.

My grandmother and my mother's aunt were slowly making there way up the stairs. My mother's two sisters were walking with them, providing them with support up the slippery staircase (I don't know why everything in India is perpetually wet, despite an alleged water shortage).

My uncle told me he and some of my mother's cousins were going to go ahead and make sure the bags reached our platform. He told me to help out my mother.

Suffering a sort of dizzy spell, I turned around once again to my mother, who at this point was cursing in the train station. My grandfather was still holding his lavendar napsack. My aunt was hunched over trying to pry his fingers from the bag. I was not sure with what I was to assist, so I stood back and waited. All of a sudden, my mother and aunt burst into tears.

My grandfather smiled at me and walked on with his lavendar bag. I walked over to my mother, and put a reassuring (though I did not know for what I was providing consolation) hand on her shoulder. She waved me away. I took her bags from her, and added it to my increasing pile of luggage. I trudged on alone, swaying from the weight of everyone's bags and emotions.

My grandmother and my mother's aunt were still slowly and steadily making progress behind my bellowing mother. My grandfather was walking a few feet to the left of me, in utter contentment. My uncle and my mother's cousins were all up front. I walked alone, through the crowds and the dogs and the strategically placed trash cans. Twice, I almost fell into the train tracks, and almost four times I almost fell on my face, as those originally waiting for Godot suddenly jolted awake, and frenetically pushed through me, despite the clear path two inches to the left of me, and trampled me in their journey to nowhere.

Flustered by my near death experiences, I turned to find my mother, who was now heaving sobs with my aunt. I will still unsure of the source of anguish, so I increased my 3-foot radius to about 6-feet, and continued.

We finally all reached Platform 7. My grandfather was still clutching his lavendar bag and telling one of my uncles about the effects of Mumbai traffic on the socioeconomic development of the city. My aunts huddled around their cousin.

"Has he told you he just had surgery? He shouldn't be carrying bags."

Ah, the source. It was fear, worry, and more than worry, the pain of seeing someone desperately hold on to something that was slipping away.

Or, everyone was just a bit cranky and hungry.

My mother's cousin then shared stories of his father's obstinacy in the last few years of his life. He started to tear. My mother and all her sisters began crying with a renewed gusto. I walked over to my cousin. "Ugh, so much drama! I wish we could postpone the crying till after 9 in the morning."

My cousin was playing fruit ninja on his blackberry. "What? Who's crying?"

In about twenty five minutes, the train rolled into the platform. As it slowed, I felt some naan turned over at the base of my stomach. We had to get all the luggage and relatives onto the train in the five minutes that the train stopped.

My cousin and I went in first. Our uncles threw heavy bags to us and we were to catch them, or at least allow our paneer-bellies to soften the fall. My grandparents and great aunt were escorted into the train amid hundreds of other passengers, all of whom were also tossing bags onto the train.

The train lurched forward. Some straggling youths ran and jumped onto the train as it left the platform. My cousin and I divvied up the luggage. Refreshments were being served, so we maneuvered our luggage around the narrow aisles and wide food carts.

Finally, after having ensured all people and luggage were accounted for, we were able to fall into our seats, completely caving to this insurmountable exhaustion. I closed my eyes.

My mother tapped me hard. "Where's Ma and Papa? I want to go see them." I looked over at my mother, who was still sobbing. With the half ounce of energy I had left, I got up from the welcome seat and showed her to end of the car. My grandmother and grandfather were happily munching on biscuits and sipping their tea. My grandmother looked at my mother, and then looked back at me. "What's her problem?"

My mother squeezed my grandfather's hands, in a desperate compassion. My grandfather looked up at my mother. "Do you have my lavendar bag?"

it's here.

2011-11-11T09:50:00.001-05:00

I'm sitting at the dining table in my underwear eating a breakfast of orange juice, chocolate truffles, and toast with stale cheddar cheese. I have a callous on my big toe from my Masala Bhangra class and chipping red fingernails, which I had hastily completed during work yesterday, after stuffing three slices of birthday cake in my mouth. If I were living in Williamsburg, the current state of my hair would be exalted, but as I am in New Jersey listening to the orchestration of rush hour emotions, rattling New Jersey transit buses, and stalled emergency vehicles, my hair simply reflects my level of hygiene.

Oh, and I'm 23.

(Seriously.)

It has happened.

(My hip hurts.)

It will stay.

(I am going to an early bird special tonight, if you'd like to join?)

And I'm still alive, still here, and still inebriated with a pure, giddy happiness from last night. I've fallen into a delirium, and instead of seeing this as the end, I realize it's just the beginning of an infinity that is as exciting as it is daunting. There are no more aspirations contingent upon age, no more waiting, no more tapping my fingers as my life seems pending, but it all just is. It is now. It is here. We have arrived. It is 23 and beyond.

I rang in 23 last night at my favorite restaurant in my favorite section of the city with one of my favorite people. I woke up this morning to Veteran's Day greetings from people I care most about, and sang "Happy Birthday" to my sister to irritate her. My parents patiently listened to me rant about couscous like a coke addict. I feel loved just like any other grandma. I'm so happy that I'm afraid, and so instead of seizing the day (or even sleeping in like a normal, slightly hungover, 20-something who has the day off) I am frozen in my chair, unsure of how to claim my title.

Maybe it's just a matter of calling AARP.

my brush with fame

2011-11-02T17:48:00.000-04:00

My only goal in life is to be famous. I don't care if I'm rich, fabulous, or powerful; I just want fame. I would even settle for notoriety. Last Sunday, I almost got some.

I was walking to Gabriela's, a Mexican restaurant on the Upper West Side, to meet my parents for my father's 51st birthday celebration. I was going to be early, so made a few stops at gourmet bakeries to have a feast in Central Park after the dinner. After I left Kyotofu, I waited at a stop light to cross the street to get into the subway. Someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to face an old man with a red splotch on his peeling face, yellowing large teeth, and a warm grin. He tipped his fedora as he said, "Excuse me, are you British?"

I was wearing my army jacket with flagrant, liberal pins and a yellow dress. Nothing really screamed British, and I wasn't talking to myself so he couldn't have based his assumption on an accent (albeit nonexistent). I started blankly at him. After the light turned green, and then back again to red, I shook my head.

"Oh, so sorry, it's just that you look just like a friend of mine. I'm from Britain, you know."

(I knew.)

"I mean, what nationality are you?"

"Indian," I replied, as I watched another light turn green.

"Ah, so is my friend!" I was about to explain that all Indians who look like me who happen to be his friends are obviously his friends and not a specific sect of the British population, but since I lost my early edge and was now running late, I resorted to "okay."

He then continued to ask me questions about my life, my work, my place of residence. He asked me about the city, my favorite neighborhood, my favorite type of mac & cheese. After what finally seemed to have been a full fledged violation of the Geneva Conventions (thinking about mac & cheese possibilities is undoubtedly a form of torture), he paused to take breath. I started to inch away.

"Well, dear, I apologize. I don't have a business card on me!"

(I hadn't asked.)

"Hm, what can I use?" He continued to search through his pockets. "I'm on my way to the gym, I didn't think to take one. I would love to get coffee, though, and talk some more. Do you have a business card or a pen?"

"Um, no."

(I did.)

"Oh, but," he seemed absolutely aggravated, "I would really just love to talk. I'm an actor, you know."

I looked up, and finally met his eyes.

"I'm on Law and Order. That's how I got this red mark on my face; the gun got caught on my cheek." He was a Russian spy on the show; a side character, but nevertheless, viewed by millions of people across the country.

"Actually, I," and I took out my phone, allowing the implication to suffice for the incomplete sentence.

He looked thrilled. He quickly gave me his number. "My name is Gary Hope. I promise you, I'm not a serial killer.

(How convincing.)

You can check out my demo on youtube."

I smiled.

"You're beautiful. Just beautiful. Really looking forward to coffee."

I haven't called yet, but I am saving the number in case the rest of my life falls through. If all else fails, I'll always have Hope.

My Father, the most sincere man in the world.

2011-11-02T16:42:00.000-04:00

I always have too many thoughts in my head. The reason I speak so quickly and so frenetically is because all my swimming thoughts comverge into a single, undiscernable amalgamation of anxieties, allusions, aspirations. My mother blames it on coffee. I blame it on Al Qaeda. Either way, something's gotta give.

So, to relieve myself of the burden of my own stream of consciousness, I send my mother senseless text messages and emails throughout the day, sometimes even when I am right next to her. She usually responds with a one word affirmation or dismissal, or sometimes a nondescript "wow," open to interpretation. It's a functional process, one that allows me to clear my head of the "ugh, why did I eat that cookie" and "I think my new favorite color is cerulean" thoughts. And she gets to hear from me several times a day [hour]--lucky woman, she is.

Anyways, last week, my mother was completely immersed in a certification for something technical-and-beyond-me, something my generation is supposed to understand but Rucha-still-uses-a-non-smart-phone-and-doesn't-care so I won't dwell on the details of her week. Essentially, she pulled consecutive all nighters and was in classes all week with the rest of her department. Everyone was to pass this test on Friday. I didn't want to distract my mother with my tempting gossip ("Ma, Bertha is wearing shorts to work"), so I diverted my attentions to other avenues of self-expression.

I emailed my father.

"Daddy, I have chole [chickpeas] burps. Also, I'm tired. Also, miss youuuuu. Ok bye."

My father, unlike my mother's habitual way of responding to what has become a trite monologue, responded in kind:

Re: chhole burps, Twist your stomach. Stand straight and swivel your trunk slowly left and right, with feet firmly planted on the ground. Next, rotate your stomach. Stand or sit, and place arms akimbo on hips. Push out your stomach, then using your ab muscles, with a slight assist from your hands, rotate your stomach in a circular motion on a horizontal plane (left, pull-in, right, push-out...). Chhole burps will be gone in 1-2 minutes.
The second one can be done seated, so you can avoid startled looks from colleagues. The first one is optional.
Best to do this abt 15 min after a heavy meal.

My mother passed her test on Friday. And I got rid of my chole burps.

"ucha? ducha? Manu! Welcome to Mexico." (Part 4)

2011-10-10T10:46:00.001-04:00

Days 4, 5 (Saturday, Sunday): We dreaded the final hours. There were unused gym shorts to be repacked, last helpings of beans and rice to be savored, overpriced souvenirs to be conned into purchasing. I still had not told Nico my true feelings. With so much unfinished business, Manu and I vowed to rage through our last night in paradise.

raging (okay, fine, just kidding. sort of.)

We had our last supper at the Mexican restaurant in the resort. We had a delicious thick tortilla soup, salad (fortunately, the salad was at a bar, so we had a taste of our familiar endless buffet), and an assortment of desserts after the enchiladas/burritos/more beans and rice. Manu became excited over the bread basket, and I was excited about the chips with different salsas. The restaurant staff grew frustrated by our lack of gustatory sense, and the novelty of our existence (i.e., Manu's proficiency in Spanish) soon wore off.

The raging continued onto the beach, through our own makeshift photo shoot. It's always been a dream of mine to be famous (no, not rich, and no, not successful, just famous). We thought we'd play famous on the dark beach.

It didn't last that long.

There was a marketplace on the opposite end of the resort. People took trolleys, but we thought it would be a nice enough night to walk. By the time we got to the marketplace, we were sweating and had each incurred about 6-8 mosquito bites. We walked through the gates like gallant victors, having triumphed over the Caribbean like true heroes.

And that's when I saw him. Nico was wearing a pale blue shirt and khaki shorts, a nice change from his usual maroon uniform. He was browsing the beaded chokers and necklaces. I thought he might be getting something for his girlfriend, which simultaneously devastated and intrigued me. I had just browsed the jewelry, but walked back over as if I had just discovered the beads.

Manu grunted loudly in exasperation as she saw me inch closer and closer to him, flipping my hair and tilting my head even more dramatically. She walked over to me and whispered, "Ruch, he's with a guy."

I looked back over, and suddenly realized a man standing two inches away from him. I had not noticed him before. Manu continued, "Sorry, Ruch, but I think they're even matching."

They were both wearing hues of blue with light pants, and there seemed to be an all too familiar sense of comfort between them. It was worse than sexual tension; it was sexual ease, the period of calm following giddy, initial excitement and tension. The sight was disabling. I could actually feel my already weak knees go even weaker.

Spell was broken. Time to return to America.

Before heading to bed, we made one pit stop at the bar, but since my capacity and willingness to rage had been corroded by the reality of Nico's inclinations and of my own lethargy, exacerbated by a broken heart/spirit/youth and the Mayan massage, we neglected sangria and margaritas and just munched on roasted almonds while we (Manu) carried on a conversation with the bar tenders and waiters. After a half hour, I turned to her, yawning, hopeless, lips covered in salt. "Dude, wanna go up and pack? I might be able to catch the beginning of Sword in the Stone, again."

Waving adios

The morning was painful. There were lots of forms to sign, lots of thoughts to process, and above all, I was afraid to miss the opportunity to get free breakfast. I ultimately used my older sister authority to force Manu to put croissants and Nutella packets in my purse while I checked out. There was no napkin or paper plates, so we had naked, flaky breakfast pastries piled next to our passports and sunglasses and mini jar of Vaseline.

I was too tired to cry, but too sad to sleep. We were at the airport, back in our faded yoga pants and scrub shirts and glasses. We dreaded leaving Tulum, leaving unrequited loves and unrelenting waves and unsuspecting plates of rice, but knew it was time to return to the rat race, back onto our hamster wheels, back to the Sisyphean realities undermining our American delusions of ambition and success and "the future."

My sister interrupted my thoughts. "Rucha, I'm really craving a burrito. As soon as we go back, I'm going to Chipotle."

"ucha? ducha? Manu! Welcome to Mexico." (Part 3)

2011-09-25T16:00:00.003-04:00

Day 2, 3, 4 (Thursday, Friday, Saturday): The next three days converted into a singular, timeless period of mindless indulgence. We consumed the sun, the salt in the waters, the carbs at the buffet. We estimated the time based on the location of the sun (i.e., "it's too sunny for a walk" or "it's not sunny enough to read") and days based on the progression of our sunburn. We ate when we were hungry (and when we were not) and slept when we were sleepy (and after watching the Spanish version of "The Sword in the Stone" which was running on a loop.)

The first two days, we trekked about three hours (well, 15 minutes) in raw, unrelenting heat, to the central pool and beach entrance. By the time we would reach our destination, eyeliner would have smeared and run down our cheeks, cover ups would have been recycled as scarves to protect our scalps, and our heads would hang so low we could see the iguanas behind us. Any sensuality reserved for Nico was further undermined by occasional asthmatic episodes.

On the last day, we discovered a beach entrance, poolside bar, and snack corner about two feet east of our hotel.

Still, the arduous hikes to the central pool area were well worth the trouble. The pool had an erratic DJ who usually played Cher or Wham! but at times would play Top 40 music. The pool would inadvertently turn into a club, people dancing (bouncing in the water) with drinks and beach balls, sun tan lotion leaching into the chlorinated water. Manu thought she would start a pool club (I initially thought she meant at the YMCA), where people would be dancing not on floor, but in a pool. We danced while we swam, floated as we sipped, and ate while we basked in the sun. The idea of a pool club was soon dismissed upon our return home, as the thought of presenting the proposal to the Department of Health might be a headache. My sister has continued to blast her iPod while she showers. That's party enough.

The nerve fibers in my brain had been so weathered by sleepless nights, complex casework, and a generous indulgence in caffeine, that all I could do once in the pool, or once on the beach, was to find a noodle or a tube and float face down in the cool, welcoming waters. Once, I was floating on my back with a mojito, and leaned over to grab a pink noodle from the side. I bobbed up and down with ease, hungrily consuming the buoyancy which I had not felt in months. I had no thoughts, no wants. My butt cooled in the waters as I chewed on the mint dregs in my glass. As I closed my eyes, I heard someone shout, "Excuse me! Excuse me, lady!" I turned irritatingly at the source of disturbance (I also hate being called "lady.") A little girl in a blue bikini with ruffles and a pudgy middle was calling out to me. "That's my noodle!"

After about 12 long seconds of deliberation (perhaps she had been lying?), I obliged.

While I sulked in the pool (standing), my sister was warding off unprompted attention. Wherever she turned, someone was introducing himself to her, or someone was offering her clean towels. When I was not stealing floaties from little children, I would watch her with pride. The first time we ordered refreshments from the little shaded cabana by the pool, the waiter found himself smitten. "Hola, I am Miguel." She looked up from the menu, smiled obligingly, and said (in beautiful Spanish), "Hola, I am Manu. And this is my sister, Rucha." His tan face flushed. He asked the origins of the name Manu, the origins of our journeys, and after she responded to all of his queries, he asked again who I was. "Rucha," she replied. He looked puzzled. "Ucha? Ducha?" She looked exasperated, and the hunger began to creep into her voice. "Rucha."

"Vucha! Manu! Welcome to Mexico."

One of the events to which we were invited was a water aerobics class. Vucha and Manu abstained, but watched the workouts from one of the other pools. They announcer called our names several times, after having forced us (calling me "excuse me lady" is just short of violating the Geneva Conventions) into signing up. We decided exercise, no matter how flamboyant (Miguel et al. wore speedos whilst doing jumping jacks) or absurd, was a matter for America, not for our authentic Mexican adventure. So, instead we opted to watch the exercise routine while eating French fries.

The entire trip we debated whether we should take an excursion (we had narrowed down the choices to riding RVs through underground caverns or swimming in cenotes) or be frivolous and spend an entire day's wages at a spa. We felt morally compelled to swim in cenotes, but our hearts (and bodies aching from lethargy) leaned towards spa. I always strive for logic and clarity over the enigma of the heart, albeit unsuccessfully, so my sister reminded me of my knee problem. Morality/frugality/need to spend a fortune on something that can be photographed: 1. Heart/aching body/desire to indulge: 2. It was settled democratically.

There are some decisions in my life that I have regretted. I have loved the wrong people, I have said the wrong things, I have worn the wrong shirt. As soon as my sister and I walked into the candle lit massage parlor, which had an overwhelming fragrance of cocoa and love (love smells a bit like Juniper Breeze), we knew we had made the best decision of our lives. The vicissitudes of American life had nestled into the crevices and creases of my body, enveloping my existence in a perpetual state of frenzied accomplishment. The weight of my goals, my deadlines, my failures and successes, was crushing my ribcage. I had not been able to breathe for three months.

For three or four weeks after the treatment, I felt a sense of buoyancy, the same refreshing lightness I felt when I was tipsy in the pool with another kid's floatie. My lungs had been freed, the crushing weight of my own thoughts had disappeared with the cocoa butter and mysterious Mayan remedies.

My sister had the same experience. After the massage, we met again, and stared at each other in complete silence. Neither of us had been completely devoid of sound in months, years. The muscles around my mouth were too relaxed to smile.

We hesitantly left the massage parlor and went to nap in our hotel room, where a towel rhinoceros sat waiting on our beds.

"ucha? ducha? Manu! Welcome to Mexico." (Part 2)

2011-09-03T09:44:00.003-04:00

Day 1 (Wednesday) continued: As I slept soundly on the way from the airport to our resort, my sister chatted away with the driver. I woke up to a discussion on the Empire State Building, feigned interest for 12 seconds, and went back to sleep. Finally, after I had almost exhausted my reserves of dreams (I had gone through purple shark attacks, tornadoes, old boyfriends turned into lepers), we reached the resort. I was too afraid to be excited, for fear of another line or delay. Someone helped us down from the shuttle and took our bags, and we proceeded to a large, open lobby, peppered with tables laden with fruit and waiters bearing sparkling wine.

And my initial instincts were correct--there was a small line to check in, as a large British family of about 16 had spread themselves out by the counter, utilizing all of the clerks at the desk. I ran up to one of the waiters to grab some hors d'oeuvres, found that they all had fish in them, and then skulked back to the line.

I was almost at the tipping point (no, seriously, I was about to keel over from hunger) when it was finally our turn to check in. Silently cursing the British, (I never participated in the royal wedding euphoria) Manu and I moved up to the counter and slammed our sweaty, shaking hands down on the cool marble.

We filled out some forms and signed by arbitrary x's. The clerk asked us if we would like a welcome drink, and then, taking note of our haggard, frail appearances, snapped his fingers and asked the man to his left to quickly bring us drinks.

And that is when I met the love of my life.

Nicolas was sandy-haired, tan, and had eager, kind eyes. He brought out two flutes that seemed to contain liquid rubies, and smiled compassionately as we glugged them down like senile men in an Irish pub. He showed us the map of the resort, where we could go for snacks at 2 in the morning, where we could go for tourist-targeted markets that lured with shiny objects (I speak from experience). Enamored of his soft eyes, I asked him where he was from, and he told us about his education in Spain and his internships abroad and the further I fell into a trance, the less I listened to his own history.

I called him, "Nico."

I felt a pang in my stomach. I initially thought it was love, but then remembered how hungry I was. Nico could wait. My sister and I rushed back to the hotel, excited to finally change out of our sweats and get dinner. The hotel room was immaculate, the mini bar was free, and we had a balcony overlooking the ocean. To assert her presence as an artist, our maid had created an elephant out of the towel--stuck on googly eyes.

Once the shock of towel animals wore off, we went to dinner. The amount of fruit had no parallel (except, perhaps, the fruit bowl in our home), the desserts were bountiless, and there were 12 types of salsa for our chips.

This past weekend, Hurricane Irene ravaged the northeastern coast of the United States. Two weeks ago, Manu and I ravaged the buffet at Gran Bahia Principe, the diluvial effects of our hunger destroying any semblance of civility or politesse.

8:02 pm

8:08 pm

My sister and I fell into a food coma that first night. My Facebook status the next morning was something to the effect of: "passed out first night in Cancun! WOO HOO PARTY!! lol. tee hee."

God forgives white lies.

"ucha? ducha? Manu! Welcome to Mexico." (Part 1)

2011-08-27T23:57:00.006-04:00

There are several types of vacation. There's spring break, which equally exhausts as it relaxes, as bebidas (sounds classier in Spanish) and boys (or girls, depending upon your perspective) seem finite, available only to those in the most dire of situations (enter, Fordham College at Lincoln Center); there's the family vacation, which comforts and stabilizes (Monopoly is more centering than yogilates), as everyone remembers how much they love the idea of a traveling family band (before coming home and conveniently forgetting these aspirations); and then, there's the sisters vacation, which is a delicate and comfortable balance of both.

My sister and I are still quite brown (we have suffered a caste downgrade) from a recent four day trip to Tulum, Mexico. The entire month of July seemed to have passed by without pause; between 12-hour work days and failed attempts to give up coffee, the heart of summer seemed to have slipped from my fingers. And so, to celebrate my sister's academic success and the end of one significant stage in her childhood, and, on the flipside, to mourn a senescence increasingly consuming me, we took off, conveniently ignoring raging pieces in the Times about drug wars and gang violence.

Day 1/2 (Tuesday): I had slept very little on Tuesday night, the night before our departure. I came home from work very late, started packing, stopped packing to peruse Facebook, started packing, stopped packing again to Skype with a friend (who I see frequently; the necessity of a 1 AM video chat 8 hours before my flight is questionable). I then spent about an hour transferring the contents of our sunblock into an empty 3-oz lotion bottle in order to avoid checking in bags.

1:27 AM
Last minute projects tend to fare well

Day 1 (Wednesday): By the time my sister and I started posting on each other's walls from inside our adjacent bedrooms, we decided it was time to give up packing and go to bed. Around 6 the next morning, we threw everything, including the new bottle of sunblock, into an already overstretched suitcase, prayed that it would not burst, and reassured our father that we slept about 8 or 9 hours and were 100% prepared for our Mexican adventure. I made some corny joke about warlords and my mother almost had a coronary, but while she was swooning, we slipped out and were happily en route to Newark Airport.

the new face of Jihad

It was the one morning that Route 17 had no traffic, so we reached the airport in less time than it took to eat the omelets our mother had made (for good luck). There was no line at security, and the only usual delay we experienced was Manu's getting stopped and checked in a separate, roped off section of the airport. We had each gone through the full body scan, but the officers must have seen something other than gum wrappers and pen caps in my sister's pockets. Convinced that she was in cahoots with Osama bin Laden et al, the guards enforced special protocol to ensure my sister was not a danger. She was just short of being interrogated. My cackling on the side was of little assurance, and while I was allowed to pass by, Manu had to wait for several minutes. Once the TSA confirmed my sister's connection to Al Qaeda as nonexistent (well, almost), she was allowed to join me in our two hour wait at the gate, sitting among all the other ever so prepared early birds. My sister complained about being violated as I listened to "Somebody to Love" on repeat.

The flight was relatively harmless. I was initially stressed about my drink choice, as flying is the only time I allow myself to go "buck wild" and have soda or canned juice. I finally settled on apple juice, but then also finished my sister's Ginger Ale (the grass is always greener).

We stopped over in Charlotte, NC. I paid no heed to my sister's words of caution and turned on my Blackberry, and immediately saw a flurry of emails from work, the very emails that had driven the decision to emigrate (albeit temporarily). I continued to make phone calls until I was forced to turn off my phone, after which I was able to cherish an untapped, unique disconnection from the world.

After what seemed an eternity, a labyrinth of terrorist accusations, Bieber fever, and Mott's canned juice, we finally reached Mexico. The air in the airport was hot and heavy, and there was an odd smell of steel. Just as I felt in the Dominican Republic, I felt as if I were in India. Conflicting emotions of estrangement and home strangled our sensibilities, and we had to convince ourselves we had not just booked an all-inclusive resort in our grandmother's home.

We turned a corner to find a 10 foot bodacious model bearing Coronas on a poster welcoming us to the country. My sister turned to me. "Bienvenidos." I smiled. We were here. Our vacation had begun. In a few minutes, I would be sunbathing on the beach, falling asleep to the sound of the waves and the potency of the mojitos.

immigration reform, please, so I can get to the beach ASAP

My sister poked me. "Is that line for us?"

There were about 1000 people in front of us. The sound of the waves seemed to have been nothing but earwax rubbing against the cilia in my ears. We were on line at immigration for over an hour, behind a couple in their 50s who seemed to be on their honeymoon (seriously, PDA is so last season), and in front of a 5 year old Chinese boy who kept ramming his suitcase into my ankles.

before MargaritaVille

By the time we finally stepped on Mexican soil (concrete), it was almost 5. We had been awake and anxious for more than 12 hours, running on 4-hour sleep and my mother's delicious omelets. We found the driver of our shuttle, and after he carried on a conversation with my sister in Spanish, during which he frequently referred to me as the 14-year old, he finally divulged the estimated time to our hotel--one hour. Without a word, I turned around and walked back to MargaritaVille, the bar immediately outside the airport doors, and bought a small, overpriced margarita. "Don't judge me," I told my sister. "Sometimes, you just need it."

I slept soundly on the way to our hotel.

after MargaritaVille

the invention of shoes (a mother desai fairytale)

2011-08-01T16:48:00.003-04:00

Once upon a time, in a distant land enveloped in glistening waters teeming with schools of bright yellow and purple fish, there lived a King who loved his feet. He washed his feet everyday in rose water, scrubbing them with pumice stones, and oiling them with almond oil. In this distant land, with shimmering blue rivers and rainbows streaking the evening skies and mango trees peppering the fields of Love and Hope, there was one slight problem--dirt roads. Whenever the King wanted to visit the fish or nap under the shade of a mango tree or skip stones in the river, his feet would get dirty.

One day, after the King got dirt in his recently oiled right big toe, he decided to take action. He called upon his wisest and oldest advisors to formulate recommendations for this issue. "No one shall sleep until all of my people can walk the land without getting dirt on their feet."

After one sunrise and one sunset, the committee came up with a solution. They washed the roads with water from the streams. Hundreds of workers filled buckets of water, some of them with frightened fish, and threw them on the ground. The King looked out his window and was pleased. "I will now walk to my favorite mango tree for a nap." The King stepped outside, and his feet suck into three inches of mud. The water had mixed with the dirt, and the damage was worse than that of the dry soil on his feet. The King roared. "No one shall sleep until all of my people can walk the land without getting dirt on their feet."

After two sunrises and two sunsets, the committee came up with a solution. They covered the roads with Persian rugs. They spent 4% of the King's treasury on importing textiles from the Middle East and the Orient. By lunch time, the entire land was covered in plush violet, red, and cornflower blue rugs. The King looked out of his window and was pleased. "I will now feed my dear fishes." The King stepped outside, and once again his feet sunk into the rugs, which had mixed poorly with the viscous mud, and did not provide any protection. The King bellowed. "No one shall sleep until all of my people can walk the land without getting dirt on their feet."

One young man, who was born in the village, had left to explore the world after his hands and feet stopped growing. He travelled to the deepest cavities of the Earth, where he could feel the heat reverberating through his bones; he voyaged to the highest points on the Earth, where he could feel the stars grazing his head. He came back home to find his sleep deprived family and friends and goats trudging through muddy rugs.

He studied the committee's vain efforts and offered his assistance, his knowledge of the policies of other lands. The King's wisest and oldest advisors laughed and waved him away, and refocused attention on their new idea to sweep up the roads with a broom made of unicorn hair. The young man threw a stone at the King's window. The King looked out and was not pleased. "I will walk out and punish the fool who dares disturb my peace."

The young man was patiently waiting at the castle gates. The King's face looked like a large radish or a ripe tomato or a juicy pomegranate. "Who dares to disrespect the King?" The King shouted, even though the young man was two inches away from his face.

The young man smiled. "I have a solution to your problem." The King's face softened, and his face creased with confusion and anticipation. "Who are you? What do you know?"

The young man pointed to his feet. The King followed his finger to see two strange contraptions covering the young man's feet. They were brown, covered in mud, with traces of purple Persian feathers stuck to the bottom. "Try them," the young man urged, as he took them off, and placed them near the King's feet. The King's curiosity had completely taken over his initial shock, and he delicately, nervously placed his beautiful, smooth feet into the containers. "Walk," the young man instructed. The King walked to the stream and watched his fishes play hide and seek; he then walked to his favorite mango tree and picked three of the ripest and largest fruits, the ones that exploded in juice upon touch. The King strolled back to the young man. He took the items off his feet, which immediately emitted a fragrance of rose and almonds. They were smooth, white, and shimmering in the sun, just as they were before his walk.

Tears streamed down the King's face, into his long white beard, and he put his hand on the young man's shoulder. "Thank you, my friend. You have freed us all from the binds of dirt, from the oppression of uncleanliness. Everyone in the land will be given this protective equipment. I appoint you as my most trusted advisor." The young man bowed his head, and graciously accepted. That night, the kingdom slept, everyone wearing protective gear on their oiled feet.

From that day forward, the young man and the King traversed the kingdom together, and everyday visited the fields of Love and Hope, or the rivers reflecting the rainbows in the skies, or the mountains from where they could see all the mango trees on the land.

And they kept their feet clean.

carpe diem for only 48 hours

2011-07-29T23:53:00.000-04:00

So, apparently I'm one of those people who lives for the weekends. Or, I'm bipolar. I had been in a rotten mood for the past 96 hours, exhausted to the point of tears (and doubly upset that the fatigue was taking a toll on my skin), but I woke up Friday and was exuberant. My mom was not sure how to greet me this morning since I had been a cranky brat (why will no one take my purple pony request seriously?) the last week, but I giggled as I brushed my teeth, skipped rope down the stairs, pranced into the kitchen, and started making inappropriate jokes in my characteristically (genetically) audible voice, shattering the tranquility of 6:30 in the morning. I had two pieces of toast instead of one, and even had milk. I read the news on the bus. I had a free latte from Oren's. There was no line at Port Authority on the way home. Life suddenly worked itself out.

My mother always says it's a matter of perception. She tells me I have a choice of being either one of two men: one is overwhelmed by a promotion, a new baby in the house, and a sailboat, for the upkeep of all of these aspects of his life exhaust him; the other is excited by a lay off, a broken leg, and a flat tire, for the prospect of new discoveries and adventures, even if only to the emergency room or to the gas station, excite him.

She always tells me to be the second man.

Given that I'm a woman, it's inherently impossible (well, I'll say difficult; never say never) for me to be that second man. Aside from that minor setback, I would say I have complied to that rule pretty well. Sometimes, I'm a little sleepy (to the point of tears), and I'm a little frustrated and confused (to the point of clenched fists), and I'm a little short on time (to the point of shopping online while I pee), but I think I generally stay positive about the way my life is going, because just like the second man, I'm excited about the possibility of meeting someone new or doing something new every day.

Well, on Friday, Saturdays, and Sundays. Positivity is a 72 hour stint. Perspective is even shorter. I'll be the second man when I'm rested. It's true that it's my choice to be happy or not, but I choose the two days and one evening when I can walk around barefoot, eating prunes and writing nonsensical epiphanies into this blog. The rest of the week is for existential melt downs.

That second man clearly has issues.

swingers for breakfast

2011-07-28T09:11:00.004-04:00

This morning, before my mother and I had each adapted to the harsh conditions of the pre-6:30 wakeful state, she embarked on a seemingly profound topic of conversation. "Ruch, it seems so easy to find a saathi [partner], so why not just find one and move in together?" I blanched, which in and of itself is difficult given my darker hue. Unphased, she continued. "And then you can split the rent. If you decide to leave the city, he can find another partner."

While my mother is a raging liberal, I was still shocked by her suggestion. Find a boy, move in with him for frugality, leave him when you see fit.

"Mumma, you want me to get married? Really? It's 6:42 on a Thursday morning. Can't we talk about this in the evening, or on Saturday, or in four years?"

My mother threw up her hands in exasperation. "Who said anything about marriage?! I'm too tired for this nonsense."

Apparently, life partner also means roommate.

GMAT (or LSAT, BBAT, WTF, QFTYTF, etc...)

2011-07-23T20:22:00.007-04:00

The future is overrated.

[insert obligatory saccharine Oprah-ism]

That said, as much as my present is working out pretty well, I'm pressured to constantly think of the future. Marriage. Graduate school. Osteoperosis. While much of the obligation comes from extended family and family friends (it's as if my third cousin's neighbor's fiancé stays awake all night because I don't yet own a suburu and live in Hunkydory, Long Island), much of the pressure is derived from an ingrained sense of survival. It's cultural, perhaps even genetic; a unique fearful mindset passed down from generation to generation.

I'm still unsure as to what I want to do with the rest of my life (apparently the aforementioned third cousin's neighbor's fiancé has a general timeline and itemization of practical and attainable goals). I've started perusing different graduate opportunities, skimming exam books and informational leaflets to ascertain even a perfunctory understanding of my future.

I was once holding this GMAT book on the subway, en route to work. I was trudging through the harried and fatigued crowd converging on the E train platform, when someone tapped me on the shoulder. With great difficulty, I turned to find an Indian man sweating profusely in a tan suit, and staring directly at the book in my hands. "GMAT, eh?" I responded with a blank stare. It was about 8 in the morning, I was wearing my knee brace and sneakers, and my purse was damp from my leaking lentils. He endeavored once more. "Business?"

My parents raised me to be polite, especially to unsuspecting Indian men on public transportation. "Yes," I replied, with a desperate nod towards the escalator. Already agitated commuters threw their hands up in despair as they stumbled upon two Indian roadblocks discussing advanced education.

He continued. "Good. GMAT is very good." I smiled and attempted to merge back into the herd, but he stopped me. "So, what are you thinking? What do you want to do?"

For a several seconds, I thought I was obligated to relay the deluge of fears and anxieties and hopes and dreams and pain hidden in the recesses of my heart. Some older balding man holding the New Yorker bumped into me, and I was immediately cognizant of my reality: a strange Indian man was interrogating me about my life choices. I blinked. "No clue," I said, as I turned and walked right into a woman in stilettos who almost fell into the tracks.

I told my mother the story when I came home. I expected her to understand my exasperation, or at least lecture me about talking to strangers, but instead, her face contorted with emotion. "Aww, beta, people care about you so much."

I've now resorted to flipping coins to determine my next step.

My name is Rucha Desai, and I'm addicted to [insert unhealthily healthy fixation]

2011-07-15T16:51:00.015-04:00

I hate addictions. It's not so much the object of fixation that perturbs me. To each his own, I've always believed, and so if you snort cocaine or send women lewd pictures of yourself or drink too much soda, I may hesitate to let my kids stay alone with you, but I would not ever pretend to understand you. (Well, drinking soda, along with microwaving food in plastic containers, is considered a sin in my family. But, still, I won't judge.)

Rather, I take issue to the act of addiction. Addicts lose their sense of independence, the one virtue I place above all the rest (I know it's not really exalted by the Pope, but seriously, prudence is a bit overrated. We can give that one the boot.)

And so, with this in mind, I decided to give up coffee. Since I started working, my love and intrigue of the coffee bean (I want to try coffee from every single country) grew steadily into an expensive and unhealthy dependency. I've always had white teeth and clear skin, even when I was a miserably awkward teenager, but over the last year, I could feel my teeth yellow and my skin curdle, like milk does in our broken refrigerator. I couldn't stop shaking and I couldn't sleep (I tend to fidget and am a light sleeper, but everything just seems magnified when you're hooked).

I decided I would reverse the effects. I came to work an hour early and researched foods that were good for skin--the wrinkle fighters, the blemish blasters, the glow enhancers--and wrote down easy recipies that included all of these foods. I baked a skin bread (whole grain bread with flaxseed, sunflower seeds, onions, spinach), roasted tomatoes and zucchini, and drank flasks of carrot juice, interspersed with bottles of water and cups of green tea. I would not touch my long term abusive boyfriend (whom I will call Joe for the sake of corny puns).

I did put my face in coffee ice cream once, but that was a low point.

The more I read about the effects of Vitamin E and Selenium and Beta-Carotene for your skin, the more I realized I may have a new problem.

Selenium Toxicity--my hair would soon fall out, I would have joint pain, fatigue, and nerve damage, and my skin would blister. And Carotenodermia--my skin would turn orange.

I started drinking coffee again last week. If I were to be a blistering oompa-loompa, I might as well enjoy some Joe.

Plus, coffee is linked to a decreased likelihood of Alzheimer's. I drank three cups yesterday--for my brain, of course.

my mother's first American date

2011-07-03T18:46:00.014-04:00

My mother crashed my date two weeks ago. [take a moment to let that sink in.] It had been a beautiful night. The June heat was tempered by soft zephyrs, and New York was in a good, celebratory mood. I watched the confluence of naked cowboys and tourists with fanny packs and locals with furrowed brows, as I sat at the Rockefeller fountain eating a Magnolia cupcake--with my friend to my left and my mother to my right.

There was much logistical deliberation that day. I was to get dinner with an old friend (who shall remain anonymous for the sake of his reputation and sanity) and my mother was going to visit her sister in the city. My aunt and uncle had come for a physician's conference, and had an event at 6. My mother said she would meet me after work so we could ride the bus home together. I told her I could meet up with her after having dinner with my friend, and my aunt suggested my mother stay in the hotel room for a couple of hours to relax, nap, watch TV, until I was ready. It seemed like a solid plan.

My cousin and his girlfriend came up to the city. My mother felt out of place, and wanted to give them some privacy. She does not like to impose on young people, has always believed in the "live and let live" mantra--which is why she left my cousin and his girlfriend to hang out with my friend and me.

I had barely dug into my smorgasbord of spinach, sriracha, and tofu before I got my mother's first text. She must have initially thought she would feign composure, and asked me, "Ruch, what's going on?" I didn't respond right away, and within twelve seconds I got four consecutive messages from her, each exponentially more desperate than the next. The truth finally came out. She said she wouldn't even mind walking to where I was, so I wouldn't have to take the trouble to get her.

For my mother, anything. It's never trouble. And this case was no different. I was surged with a sense of familial protection, and explained the situation to my friend. I assumed he'd be disappointed, or would want to part ways after dinner, but instead he shrugged and smiled. "I love Mrs. Desai. She's a great woman. I'd love to see her."

And that's when the sense of duty to my mother turned into gastro-intenstinal discomfort. I clearly envisioned the way the next hour would come to pass. I texted my mother, informing her that my friend wanted to come say, "hi." She ignored my information, and continued to pursue my whereabouts. I would provide her with my ETA, and reiterated that I was with my friend but she seemed unabashed. She then called me, telling me she didn't have her reading glasses on and it was easier for her to call me rather than text.

In fairness to my mother, she was in a tough, awkward position. She was trying to give my cousin and his girlfriend time to themselves, trying to give the next generation the opportunity to come into its own, and unintentionally gave me a coronary whilst destroying any perception of cool anyone had of me. The night hadn't turned out the way she had planned, and she felt perpetually uncomfortable and out of place.

Poor thing.

In all fairness to me, my mother should wear her reading glasses.

After we got cupcakes, we met my mother across the street. Her face noticeably changed as her eyes darted from me to my friend. Her face flushed. My friend and my mother exchanged the usual niceties, hugged, she noticed his change in height and he noticed her change in weight, and then everyone sat down by the fountain. I assumed my mother was hungry so I gave her half of my cupcake. I wasn't sure why they were both willingly present. My mother seemed frozen to her concrete seat, clicking away at her blackberry, finally comprehending the messages I sent her. My friend was a good sport, and engaged my mother in discussions on our high school friends, his new job, New York City life. I stuffed my face with cupcake, so I could be relieved of the obligation to speak.

I still felt bad at how terribly the night had turned out for my mother, as I was still too numb from shock to realize how horrifying the night had turned out for me, and for my friend nonetheless. So, as we were walking to Port Authority, I constantly reached back, trying to grab my mother's hand to give her solace. She wanted to give me privacy, and so would not meet my hand, prompting me to reach back even further. My friend was walking slightly ahead of me, and so I was looking ahead, trying to match his enthusiasm as I internally combusted. I was therefore walking sideways, with my chest facing the street. I walked like that for three avenues.

We took the bus back to Ridgewood. Together. Before we got on the bus, my mother had begged me, in Gujarati, to sit with my friend, and apologized profusely for ruining my night, and his, especially. I told her not to worry; I had of course planned on sitting with him, and she had ruined my entire life, not just my night. She then slept soundly in the front, as we chatted in the back.

My mother's first date was almost twenty five years ago, when she got ice cream with my father. Soon after, they got engaged; and the history of my existence thus ensued. The comfort and stability of marriage gradually settled in, and the thrill of adventure and ice cream parlors subsided. About 21 years into the relationship, my parents decided to spice things up. They bought Optimum for our home, so they could see a free movie every Tuesday night. It's usually the 7:00 show, but it hasn't always been a successful endeavor. Sometimes, my father comes home from work too late and collapses on the couch--shoes, shirt, half-eaten bowl of lentils and all. Other times, my mother falls asleep in the movie theater. It's free, so she never feels like she wasted money.

I guess my mother had just needed a change.

As I was getting off the bus, I apologized again for the way the night turned out, and my friend reassured me, "Don't worry about it, Rucha; next time, I'll bring my mother."

SENIORITIS in the geriatric sense

2011-05-16T20:16:00.005-04:00

I'm pretty stubborn. So despite the fact that I have a bad knee and a full time job, I refuse to let go of my diminishing youth, only eluding me as I desperately seek it. My friends planned an explosive week of firsts and lasts, of burritos and beer gardens and rooftop lounges and museum excursions, of typical New York and typical college bonanzas; I resolved not only to be present at each of these events, but to actively partake in all revelry, so as not to miss out on the senior week I was supposed to have last year.

It's Day 4 of Senior Week. I'm bundled up on the couch watching Dancing with the Stars with a mug that reads "Crazy Cat Lady" and body chills. My knee throbs and lazy rolls of fat from the weekend's debauchery are peeking out from beneath my shirt. Inner beauty doesn't exist. And the youth is dead. Mission Senior Week: Epic Fail.

While I am incapacitated today, Friday was a night warranting superlative commendation. FCLC pretended to be real college, and so everyone bought their favorite games to the table--the dining table that had been pushed to the center of the room. One of my friends set up a confessional, which was intended for us to randomly go in and indulge in our favorite college memories, but ended up being a channel for Patrick, Bianca, and I to cry about our long lost youth and beauty and functioning body parts. I took my nighttime dose of fish oil while Patrick was talking about weekly reports for his boss.

After the authentic college party (which included dressing up as ninjas, because that's a universal collegiate obligation, and collectively straightening my hair, because that's a group activity), we moved on to HighBar, a rooftop lounge infused with delicious cosmopolitan zephyrs (that froze us half to death) and swanky cosmopolitan drinks (that no one could afford). After dancing and stealing candy from the bathroom, we decided to leave that pricey lounge filled only with wealthy heteros and free Starburst, and headed to a place where we'd feel more at home: Industry, a gay club 7 blocks away from Fordham.

On the way to the club, I saw Asif Mandvi, of the Daily Show. I walked up to him and introduced myself and said something apparently hilarious (it wasn't funny). I then joined my friends and went to Industry, where I was doted upon and courted, and almost forgot that this was the one place where no matter how straight my hair was or how diligently I did Butt Blasts at the YMCA, boys wouldn't ever look directly at me, but always to my left, where my attractive (male) friends stood. Then we (girls) all realized that we once again voluntarily and proactively put ourselves in that no-win situation that haunted us throughout our college careers. So we stopped dancing, stopped off for late night munchies (I got bananas because old people need potassium), and went to sleep--well, we tried.

It took every ounce of energy I had left (about 2.5) to cancel plans for tonight (Greenhouse lounge with my ladyfriends). Hopefully tonight I'll recover and then spend the rest of the week pretending I'm as young and cool and hip as my friends.

Or maybe I'll take a few more days to rest. I can't handle all the parties and celebrations and late nights. Kids these days, I just don't know how they do it.

ode to mothers everywhere

2011-04-13T23:35:00.009-04:00

Sometimes I wonder why my mother puts up with me. I'm irrational, stubborn, and picky. I seem to actively pursue dysfunctional endeavors, hate being touched, and only like cantaloupe 27 days out of the year. Still, she loves me. For some strange reason, which I can only attribute to her unsound mental state, she unconditionally embraces all of my idiosyncrasies and flaws and "eras" (Foreign-Service-Officer era, Bohemian-carpe-diem-let-hair-loose era, nothing-but-bananas era). And she makes me omelets (when I'm not crusading against eggs).

She's not perfect, at least not in the conventional sense. She doesn't sew (the intention is there), she doesn't like to give her children compliments (that's Oprah's job), and she always decides to (attempt to) be creative during the most sensitive, formative moments in our lives. For the competitive, fifth grade Bake Fair, my mother decided to discover and promote Jell-O. We didn't have any molds in the house, nor did we bother to get any, and she instead rummaged around the kitchen for arbitrary vessels and tea cups and serving spoons in which to freeze the Jell-O, mixed with sliced fruit. We didn't do a good job estimating the fruit to Jell-O ratio, so some of the cups looked like nothing but amorphous gelatinous banana, and others seemed to have infinitesimal flecks of strawberry as mere afterthought.

Except for the frying pan, my mother didn't have anything in which to display this fair contender, so she took out a large, deep pot, in which to steam rice. The flavors were all different, but we couldn't layer the various types as a trifle because we had used a variety of molds, so she simply placed the shapes next to each other. When she was finished, she proudly presented to me her own recipe. I peered down into the bottom of the vessel, covered with wiggling orange, green, and red shapes resembling broken tea cups and serving spoons, laden with sweet, decomposing fruit. I looked back up at her eager face. I thanked her, and from that day on stopped believing in God, because if He existed, she would not have been allowed to play with Jell-O mixes and over-ripe fruit, and inadvertently, my social life.

I didn't win in any of the categories, not even for best futile efforts. One of my friend's mother had made this gorgeous chocolate pudding with violets and dark chocolate shavings, while another friend brought in a tower of cookies, modeled after the New York skyline. My pot-o-gelatin was barely considered.

While my mother tends to ruin my life, she is one of the few who saves it. Whenever I have gotten mad at my mother, I end up angrier at myself, and often retreat in a sort of self-loathing seclusion as I lose equilibrium. Then my mother makes a joke, I make a joke, we laugh at our (my) childishness, and move on. Balance restored. The world goes round again.

Thus, after the Bake Fair, while I was emotionally ravaged by the day's events, I couldn't manage to completely shun the dish. My friends thought it looked weird and unappetizing, and all fleeting notions of embarrassment and social suicide were immediately replaced by a fierce pride and honor. "I love this," I remember saying, as I took several bites of the dish. "It's unique." The tastes of the various flavors of Jell-O and the fruit converged into an explosion of acridity, but I remained firm. I finished half of the dessert myself.

When I came home, I told my mother about the failed dish. She was deeply apologetic and wrung her hands in a sort of despair, and acknowledgement that she'd never be the mother who bakes award winning desserts for school fairs. I hugged her around the middle. "It was good, Mumma. See? Half of it is gone." She hugged me back. "Next time, I'll try to put less fruit. That weighed it down, I think."

I don't know why I put up with her, either.

The Fountain of Youth: Representative Ryan of Wisconsin?

2011-04-07T11:15:00.008-04:00

I overslept this morning. My mother shouted my name from the kitchen, informing me my bus was set to leave in four minutes. I took a cursory glance at my phone and literally leaped out of bed, onto the plug of my rarely used hair iron, and half sprinted, half limped to the bathroom. I prioritized parts of my body that needed soaping, threw on neon blue tights (government shut downs render obsolete business casual), accidentally squirted triple doses of antihistamine drops into my eyes, and stopped only to text Patrick something about my weight or my latest food fantasy or something of paramount significance. I was ready in 20 minutes, and even packed some snacks for the day and took my fish oil.

The last time I had to eject myself from bed with Olympian force was the first day of my International Law class, which started at 8:30 in the morning and never ended (until 11:15). I had rushed through perfunctory hygienic obligations before showing up to class 20 minutes late with my shirt inside out.

Today I slept in till 7:46, which is approximately 1:46 College Standard Time.

The last couple of days have been the most riveting in a long time. With the potential government shutdown, I can focus on nothing else but CSPAN, Politico, the New York Times, especially with its spellbinding political updates (the White House apparently is not for the shutdown; who knew?). Though I work in a political office, enmeshed in the current social and economic issues facing our nation, I have not been this charged since the 2008 elections. Then, I would sit in front of the TV all day, partly to take in all of Anderson Cooper’s unparalleled splendor, partly to stay current on the trajectories of each campaign; during my Sacred Texts class I would compare healthcare and marriage platforms of each candidate whilst listening to passages of the Gospel of Thomas, which my professor would read aloud. Once President Obama won the election, I was in a state of euphoric delirium for several months, hung over with pride, rejuvenation, and $3 Trader Joe’s wine. I was constantly charged, blood coursing through my veins, a constant reminder of my vitality.

Blood doesn’t necessarily course through my veins anymore (it seems to have clotted at the site of the failed blood work), but I do feel alive. I feel youthful. Two nights ago I stayed up watching CSPAN till my laptop died; I exchanged trite jokes with my friends that referenced “Boehners” and “ridin Biden,” as well as ideas about fiscal policy and the 2012 election. The only difference was location. I was not with my friends in the quiet lounge, peering at them over my massive laptop, plastered with sticky social statements (literally—stickers). I was still wearing a hoodie, still drew my knees up against my chest, and still ate out of habit and not hunger, but I was sitting alone in my room. My friends were on the other side of the internet. I finally conceded to Zuckerberg’s brilliance; I could transport myself into the 17th floor quiet lounge via Facebook.

The next morning I confessed to my boss that I was a bit delirious from a late night, and I professed a superficial love for Representative Ryan. She agreed and I wangled the permission to follow the news all day, as the self-proclaimed resident expert and senior counsel on the government shut down.

Between cursing the New York Times for paying reporters to issue “news alerts” about the necessity of compromise and eating birthday cupcakes for a colleague (I took it upon myself to eat several, to fuel my new CSPAN obligations), I assisted a constituent in getting surgery to remove a malignant tumor. By 5:00, I was shaking from caffeine, sugar, and happiness for the patient. And by 6:30, I crashed in my French class.

Last night, I meant to do my homework for my creative writing class, since I had foregone my French homework for my conservative fetish the previous night. As I started writing my story, I was immediately distracted (or I opened a new tab myself) by Kristoff’s Op-Ed piece on Congressional pay during the shutdown. I again took it upon myself to disseminate the information, and essentially ravage people’s newsfeeds.

I still haven’t done my writing homework. It’s a difficult assignment. I need more than a couple of hours to accomplish the task.

But the New York Times just reported what agencies would be furloughed and impacted if our broken bi-party system doesn’t reconcile.

And it’s my job to read the news—I just want to be sure the Bengal tigers are still fed.

The Grotesques

2011-04-05T18:02:00.006-04:00

I must finally confess: I am a heroin addict. It’s consumed me. My arm is scarred with the trauma of this dependency, of this obsession, and I can think of nothing else.

No, totally kidding. Apparently my arm just can’t handle blood being drawn during yearly routine physicals.

As I gain maturity and lose wisdom, I have come to understand that everyone has a little heroin in their lives. Everyone has a downfall, albeit sweet, delicious, refreshing, and we become completely consumed by these disgraces or defeats. My mother has peanuts and Robitussin. Katherine Millay had her weakly received poetry and her older sister’s shadow. Napoleon had his own power trip and Sarah Palin doesn’t yet realize she has one. But she does. We all do. My heroin is the pain from dysfunction. We constantly battle the immediate sensation of thrill and pleasure, partly derived from a fleeting awareness of our self-erosion. And as we oscillate between this corrosive joy and objective detachment, we become our own follies. We are these grotesques, embodying in every aspect of our lives the trauma to which we have been subjected, or worse, to which we have subjected ourselves, over and over again.

The clean shaven blonde who buys his breakfast at Pret A Manger and the puffy eyed MTA worker who idles by the ticket machine and the voluptuous Spanish mother of two who buys her children $1-books on the street—all of them carry with them an addiction, the burden of their own follies. We walk lifelessly amid scores of other people consumed by this fixation, engrossed in their own powerlessness, as they are continually terrorized and claimed and ravaged by themselves.

At least we can all say we’re heroin chic.

PTSD (post tropical stress disorder)

2011-03-27T11:43:00.014-04:00

In the Dominican Republic, we measured time by hunger and by the position of the sun. Therefore, it was always time to eat, and it was always either "too hot" or "most likely after 5." The clocks in the room were 30 minutes too fast (as per our careless estimations), and the man who crooned with his acoustic guitar below us would play with equal fortitude at 6 in the morning and 6 in the evening. Time didn't stop, but it was playing hide and seek.

The four of us were half-expecting (half-hoping for) a cliché week filled with fountains (kegs) of wine (Presidente light), boys (the heterosexual kind) emitting arbitrary, indistinct loud noises, and lots of unabated (threatening) sun. All of our dreams came true (and I'm 7 shades too dark for my own caste).

On our first night, we had found a group of equally excited (aesthetically pleasing) spring breakers taking full advantage of the open bar. We decided to engage them in discussion and before we had ordered more banana mama's, there was a charged and aggressive argument about the welfare state and "crackhead Medicaid recipients." We soon decided we were tired from the long plane journey, and retired to our rooms. When we awoke the next day we were completely refreshed, and after blaming away the world's problems on Republican college students, we reneged cliché spring break and decided to simply indulge in the timeless, drunken stupor created in the convergence of blue ocean, burning sand, languid stillness.

And we indulged in unlimited sushi.

As Americans, we felt completely at home. At the VIP pool, which had exclusive shot and cocktail recipes, teasing garden burgers that rendered our appetites insatiable, and beds with canopys randomly planted on white sand, there were two flags proudly waving in the coquettish Dominican zephyrs: the American flag and the Canadian flag. There was no display of national pride, nor was there a thought to include any of the other countries from which visitors hailed (all over western Europe, Australia, and parts of South Asia). While we would have otherwise cared enough to ask why these two countries were arbitrarily given VIP designation (no, really, Canada?), we were in a constant state of soporific overheating and overeating, and cared only to giggle and take a picture or two before falling sleep on a plate of French fries.

In the evenings, after we ravaged the buffet three or four times (we used bread as chasers), we would sit by the poolside bar with all the other youth, though before making new friends (our move to renege cliché spring break soon conceded to curious new shipments of people), we would sit wide-legged, our hands on our stomachs, in our ever so attractive means of digesting our fourth dinners.

We met several groups of people over the next couple of days, and always ended a night of dancing (at the resort's own night club, Vibe), of rum & cokes (we were just trying to encourage the local industries), of excited chatter (about libertarianism or post-graduation) with games of flip cup at Blue Lagoon, which served burgers and fries and pitchers of Presidente (for the sake of the game). Sometimes, people would get a little competitive. Sometimes, there was flip cup drama between the various tables, which had been hauled together as makeshift flip cup fields. And most times, there was just endless, inocuous rounds of the game, bringing together kids from all colleges, all countries, all levels of membership (VIPs and the common Cheap Carribbean folk, alike) in a monolith of unassuming, joyful youth.

We may or may not have stolen a golf cart one night. We were feeling adventurous (though I decided to leave a cart full of fun and straight kids to go "walk off my bread").

The feeling of adventure lasted over the next few days. One day, the four of us headed on a river safari, where we traveled miles through rural villages and savage wildlife, stopping for freshly ground coffee and ripe pineapple, before stopping at the base of the forest. The guides joked about the severity of the excursion, for "only the strongest survive," as we put on our helmets and life vests. And our used, rental white tennis shoes, which we told were water shoes. They made squish sounds as we hiked on to the falls.

For the entire hike I thought I was going to die. Every time we were to climb up against a waterfall, against the hard current, amid rocks and icy water, I thought it was my last climb ever. I would close my eyes, and for half a second my life would pass before me, my mother's face, my jewelry alcove, my favorite burrito place. And then immediately I was kicked in the face by someone doggy paddling in front of me, and strong, sopping wet Dominican men without life vests or a helmet would easily pull me up (I don't know why I ever bothered with bicep curls).

Once we reached the top of the cliff, we would slide or jump down. Again, every time it was my turn to descend, I thought I would be the one exception who hits her head or breaks her elbow. I would close my eyes again, and try to pray to the Gods with whom I share a casual relationship (it would be complicated on Facebook), but as soon as I barely dipped into a meditative state, I was pushed into the water, and had the thrill of my life, all thoughts of my mother, God, and burritos drowned into the water surrounding me.

With scratches and bruises and popped shoulders, we embarked on a new adventure a couple of days after. We awoke at the crack of dawn to go ziplining. We again wore helmets and harnesses and sneakers, and our safety was joked about. Our guide taught us how to break in the zipline, and as I overcompensated (to save my life) I ended up pulling a muscle. We traversed the jungle like apes. As we slid across these hard ropes, we issued shrieks and hollers, falling back into our primal roots, needing nothing but the biting air and the lush green below.

The rest of the time was prolonged R&R, peppered with desperate attempts to stretch our stomachs to full capacity before returning to America, where it was unseemly to eat large plates of coleslaw between meals. We attended the VIP Welcome party (a farewell for us), with unlimited top shelf drinks, unlimited food (somehow this was different from the buffet), unlimited music and dancing. We started dancing with a group of 20 spring breakers from Maryland, but soon decided instead to dance with recently released cougars, who ended up having more fun that we could ever have.

On our last night, we treated ourselves to a fancy dinner at one of the VIP restaurants. The food was incredibly delicious, and uniquely displayed (the caesar salad was a head of lettuce with a 7-inch crouton). This time, the unlimited imbibements truly were wine and not Presidente. For a full two hours, we pretended to be classy and sophisticated. And as soon as we finished dinner, we played a 50-person game of flip cup on the ping pong tables.

The following day, I felt sick. I wasn't sure if my body was finally violently reacting to what I had put it through the past week, or if it had become dependent on explosive, volatile fun and was simply going through withdrawal. Regardless, we found ourselves sprawled lifelessly at the gate, awaiting our plane home. As if our physical pain was not enough, God/Allah/the jungle spirits/the Man on the Moon found it funny to send us off with music--the man who crooned at 5 in the morning was apparently homeward bound as well. For me, exclusively, (once a VIP, always a VIP) he played Eric Clapton and the Beatles. I almost vomited into his guitar case. My stomach had the capacity only to hold rice and beans, not self-proclaimed balding musicians.

Once home, I tried to reconnect myself. I turned on my blackberry, my phone. Each exploded with text messages, emails, Facebook notifications, and then froze and needed to be rebooted. I knew the time for the first time in one week. And I immediately felt late for something.

It's been two weeks since we've returned, and all we've felt is cold, sore (the pulled muscle was no joke), and incredibly rushed. Our bodies have not stopped protesting our vacation endeavors, but have not yet willed to acclimate to a reality of the gym, of commuting, of sobriety.

And we're still not used to limiting our food intake to three meals daily.

(place)

2011-02-24T23:12:00.003-05:00

The lawn was yellowing and sharp, and the little girl winced when she sat down. The house was small, but to the girl it seemed like a palace, much larger than the old apartment, which had recently become cramped with the new crib, the new boxes of Similac, and the new person hoarding her mother's attention. All the other houses were built exactly the same, with three front steps and a large square window to the bottom right. The only distinguishing feature was color. The girl's house was yellow; the people across the street had chosen red.

The sky seemed so blue above this house. She lay down in the dry grass, grimacing slightly, and stared at the moving clouds. Everything was slow here. She watched a butterfly float above her small body, and reached out for it before it fluttered away, so she was left with her arm outstretched, grabbing a fistful of air. She glanced back at the house--the storm door was still closed but the front door was open, so she could hear her parents loudly argue about placement of the microwave.

She stood up and wandered down the street to the end of the block, which merged into the mouth of an inky forest. She stood on her toes and peered intently into the recesses of the dark woods, made sure there were no monsters, and then walked in. The branches were wild and resentful, and her arms suffered scratches as she forged through the trail, twigs snapping beneath her feet. After some time, she lost sight of the makeshift dirt trail, and when she looked behind her she could no longer see the sunlight from her street.

ode to fruit? or maybe just confessions of a fruitaholic?

2011-01-17T16:18:00.007-05:00

My family loves bananas. I bought about 10 on Saturday night, and we are down to our last one today (it's Monday). I always thought our love for fruit was shared across the country, but recently discovered otherwise. Apparently, it isn't normal to choose a pear before a cookie, to consume a fruit with every meal, to eat clementines when you're bored. The summer after freshman year, I lived off of only bananas. I lived on my own in the city and bananas were cheap and convenient. I ended up eating 3-4 bananas a day. My physical therapist told me that's how I got fat. I would do it all over again if I could. That was one of my favorite summers, after the summer traversing Germany with wine gummies and apple in hand.

Despite all of our shortcomings, all of our differences, I think I finally understand just how my family stays together. Besides all the love, we manage to hold it together because no one else in the world loves fruit just as much as we do. I have to go back to the grocery store today, the second time in 2 days, just to buy some more bananas, blueberries, clementines, apples, pears, and whatever else calls out to me in the aisles. It's not so much a dependence on each other, but rather, a dependence on fruit that no one else can understand save the four souls living at 788.

I hear you are what you eat. I'm therefore either crazy or gay.

Take your pick.

2010: the People's Revolution

2011-01-03T21:54:00.007-05:00

Another year has eluded us. 2010 came and went without remorse, without shame, without so much as a warning, as we all stood suspended in a disarray of broken limbs and broken hearts, of endless chills and heat strokes, of disillusionement and disorientation, and yet also in a chaotic frenzy of new lovers and old friends, of beach vacations and Netflix staycations, of life purposes and life goals. I thought 2010 would go on forever, and while I was still struggling to comprehend all the changes it imposed upon me, it suddenly ended. Enter 2011, the year before the famed apocalyptic global collapse.

Every year I think of new resolutions, the majority of which last all of 72 hours. One year, I wanted to be more assertive, while another year I wanted to be more artistic; once I was too busy with college applications to care about aspirational goals, and three years later I was too busy with my senior thesis to care about anything save breakfast and Kenyans. Sometimes I want to lose 5 pounds; other times I want to lose 6. I always resolve to be better, do better, better, better, better. And then January 3rd rolls around and I lose sight of my overarching annual goals and tend to focus only on today, on tomorrow, and on a hazy, confusing concept of "the future," which continues to disrupt my sleep every night.

Part of me doesn't want to think better, better, better, but rather, happier, happier, happier. 2010 was so kind to me I am almost afraid to keep any 2011 resolutions. I don't want to be resolute in anything I can't finish, in anything I don't want to accomplish. The 72-hour resolutions are good for nothing but carrying on weak conversations and inducing regret. I don't want 2011 to be a year of unfinished business, but rather a year of new discoveries and adventures, just like 2010.

So, no resolutions. No shame, no regret, no hesitation. And no resolutions.

My best friend keeps accidentally calling them "revolutions."

Go forth. Revolt. Write a book. Take a pole-dancing class. Go to Law School. Listen to your mind for two seconds, and then succumb to the recesses of your heart. Buy a hat. Eat apricots on Fifth Avenue. Enable a revolution, but forget the fragile resolutions. Revolt, not for the better, but for the happier. Rebel against yourself, and don't be afraid of 2011. It won't bite. It'll just happen.

India Abroad article on Bharat Yatra 2010

2010-12-27T12:02:00.000-05:00

http://www.indiaabroad-digital.com/indiaabroad/20101224?pg=34#pg34

(yay)

WWJD?

2010-12-09T22:23:00.003-05:00

It's so cold out that it hurts my teeth to drink hot coffee. CNN, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and even the arbitrary psuedo-political and barely intellectual blogs, all circle around the same 4 topics: not-so-secret diplomatic secrets; the surrender of politics to the moral obligations of helping 9/11 heroes, freeing closeted soldiers, legalizing those American in all but name; Obamacare's flaws and inadequacies; Sarah Palin's newest blunder, exalted by the Tea Party and Jon Stewart. It tires me. Everything is the same. People don't want to see Obama's brilliance, the NJTransit bus is always late, politics and the economy and all the other fabricated "isms" that have been so loosely thrown about are nothing more than words, words which don't stop frostbite or runny noses or stiffened toes.

In the midst of political and physical frigidity, the last thing I wanted to do was attend a foreign policy forum at the Yale Club. My juvenile conservative fetish has started to corrode, giving way to the forces of common sense and a more durable liberalism. I wanted to attend for a change of pace, but also wanted to not attend for the same reason. I ultimately decided to go, and after roaming around 42-44th streets on Vanderbilt Avenue for 15 minutes (I work right by Grand Central and yet its precise location still eludes me), I saw the Yale Club as refuge.

After handing in my coat, my scarf, my lunch bag, my overnight bag, (and after the man behind the coat check grew a few white hairs), I walked to the fourth floor, past all the libraries and men in sports jackets and women in pearls, to the forum. For some reason, I wasn't registered (even though I did it twice), so got to scribble my name on a blank card. I found a few other familiar faces, and as if I had not spoken in years, I let loose a tirade about PPACA, about flaky pedestrians, about Coach bags and Ugg boots. In between "Obama's saving the U.S.!" and "I'd rather buy 100 burritos than half a Coach bag," we explored the open bar and welcomed with open arms the waitresses providing endless mini bruschettas and knishes and pineapple.

And then someone clutched my arm. "Is that Jerry Springer?" I looked to my right and saw an older man talking to a group of eager young faces, but could hardly believe it to be Mr. Springer in the flesh. I almost yelled, "Jerry! Jerry!" but decided instead to silently stand next to him till I could confirm it to be true.

Most other groups in the room formed around a topic of interest--North Korea, socialism, the free flowing white wine. As I edged closer to Mr. Springer (not yet on a first name basis), I caught snippets of the conversation. "So, do contestants on your show really have those issues or is it scripted?"

It really was him. I introduced myself, he introduced himself, and then we briefly discussed my boss and her policies before a blonde JP Morgan banker inserted herself into the conversation and stole Jerry from me forever. As she maintained a fixated gaze, I fumbled around for my camera. I didn't have the passion she had, and I just wanted my taste of fame before I headed home.

He said he would be in a picture only if he could get a copy.
The rest of the forum went well. Most of the economists on the panel were conservative, small government folk, the types of people both Jerry and I resented. I stopped caring what they had to say, what Chris Matthews and Brian Lehrer had to say, what my office had to say, what my parents had to say.

I just want to know what Jerry would do.

Catharsis

2010-12-01T11:30:00.006-05:00

It was one of those days when the wind whips your face so hard it looks like you're wearing a cheap brand of blush, when it rains so hard that the windows groan, and when the only relief you have from large muddy puddles of water are smaller puddles to the left. People were poking each other with umbrellas, hurriedly brushing past the AM New York newspaper guy in order to get to the nearest awning, running from one to the next. Despite best efforts, everyone was drenched, cold, frenetic. In an epic battle against the ennui of our fabrications and constructions, of midtown east and overpriced delis, of business casual and leather shoes, of 9-5 and 9-infinity, of Republican filibusters and self-indulgent nuclear warfare, Mother Nature rose from within herself to shatter the very artifice in which we have captivated ourselves. It rained and rained as if the Earth were crying, as if purging its elation, fury, passion, sensuality in one desperate attempt at reinstilling chaos.

j'attends

2010-11-09T13:16:00.007-05:00

I think about 87% of the day goes into waiting. (I also think about 46% of all statistics are made up on the spot.) Life is scheduled, rendered static by the multitude of deadlines, due dates, red flags we impose on ourselves. And still, despite knowing what is next, I find myself constantly suspended somewhere between the past and future, without having realized the present. We just sway back and forth, rapidly tapping our watches in anticipation.

I wait for the bus, for Port Authority, for the E train. I wait for the right word to come to me as I write an email. I wait for the response. I wait for the right time to relay bad news to a constituent, for the right time to finally throw my hands in the air and give up. I wait for Friday. I wait for 5:00, for 6:00. And then I wait for the E train, for Port Authority, for the bus.

And during all this waiting, nothing gets done. The goals to refashion my body, to refine my French, to apply for whatever is next in my life seem to slip from my fingers as I can only focus on the idea of some distant future, not the actual process of attaining it, of making it a present reality. As I wait to fall asleep, I tell myself tomorrow will be a new day, the day I start writing a screenplay, swimming 5 AM laps, reading the books on my ever-growing list. And then tomorrow becomes today, and today we just sit waiting for tomorrow.

Some of us are waiting for Godot. But the rest of us are just waiting, not even sure for what, or for whom, we wait. Such is life. We're at a standstill, breathless.

telephone

2010-11-08T15:21:00.002-05:00

The last time I played telephone was in the first grade. We played during a fire drill in order to pass time. After the initial shock of "chicken nuggets" becoming "Rick and Meg's cats," we slowly grasped the way to overcome the mispronunciation--speak loudly, listen clearly.

I never would have thought that this elementary game would manifest itself in my actual life. Last week, as my family took its usual seats around the kitchen and family room--my father standing above some dark chocolate scattered on a TIME magazine, my sister lying on the couch with her laptop propped on her knees, my mother standing by the stove in frantic disarray, and I sitting at the counter with some cheese--we engaged ourselves in some real-world telephone.

Manu: Guys, you don't have to come to my dance if you want to pick up Dinaben and Nanaji from the airport.

Rucha: Yea, no big deal, I can drop her off at Mexicali Blues. And I'll get wasted while I'm there. Where is it? Is it on Cedar Lane?

Abhay: What about Mexico? Aw, guys, I am so sorry, I didn't know you wanted to go to Mexico for Christmas. Okay, fine, no problem, let me start planning it now.

Parul: Katariiiinaaaaa.

Manu: Who wants to go to Mexico?

Rucha: Isn't Katarina a Russian name?

Abhay: [launches into history of the name, "Katarina"]

Parul: Who cares? I was just saying we should watch "Dancing with the Stars!"

Manu: Oooh okay! But watch my dance first I need to practice for Sunday.

Abhay: Speaking of which, we might not be able to go because we have to pick up Dinaben and Nanaji from the airport. Will that be a problem?

~~~

not so vanilla

2010-10-26T10:39:00.003-04:00

There was a period of time in my life when I would be late for school because it took me so long to swallow pills, even the small ones you could easily lose if you dropped on a tile floor. Now, I take several huge pills a day--calcium twice daily, fish oil three times a day, a multi vitamin with breakfast--all necessary to prevent a complete degeneration of my already debilitating joints. After dinner, as I sit at the counter popping the last round of pills, my family gathers in the adjoining room. The television is always on, and my sister pretends not to watch it as she does her homework. My father is either half-asleep and mumbling about the gym or releasing a full-throated laugh at Stewie's latest antics on Family Guy. My mother is either sending out emails and text messages, inevitably misspelled as she neglects to wear her glasses, or she is periodically shaking her arms during commercials, in efforts to build triceps. At times my father gains a sudden interest, and, filled with an arbitrary energy, he supervises my mother in her peculiar arm movements, shouting out instructions along the way. My sister yells at everyone to be quiet so she can watch her show, and then everyone yells at her to finish college apps, to finish her psych homework, to finish her breakfast every morning. When I finish overdosing myself, I sprawl across my mother's lap, stick my feet under my sister's butt to stay warm, and then loudly recap the contents of my lunch to no one in particular.

And after unsuccessfully resisting sleep for a few hours, we all head to our respective rooms, and four simultaneous screams of "good night" converge in the middle of the corridor, where they stay suspended until the first signs of morning.

Not sure about the other 6, but Sleepy definitely exists

2010-10-22T10:09:00.005-04:00

Yesterday was Thirsty Thursday. I could say it was my first since I graduated, but that would imply that I used to be thirsty every Thursday, straying from reality of my addiction to the study lounge. Last night, the office stayed back to watch our boss debate her Republican opponent, Joe DioGuardi, a wrinkly old man who talks in the third person. There was wine, there was pizza, there were cookies, and there was a seemingly dysfunctional cable television. And yet efforts to exercise before dawn, efforts to defend President Obama's health reform to ignoramuses, efforts to comply with the harsh realities of business casual--all of it converged into some sort of inexplicable exhaustion.

So, instead of waking up refreshed by the anomaly of midweek festivities, I was borderline unconscious on the bus into the city, to the point where a slightly alarmed, older man had to shake me awake after everyone had gotten off. I awoke with a start, jumped of the bus, and walked in circles till I figured out where I was.

I can do without Thirsty Thursdays. But I think somewhere in between the lists of things to do and the plans to make plans and all the other in betweens, I need a nap. Not a nap on the bus, but a real one, with dirty sweats and a soft tee and no coffee-fragranced commuters next to me.

Till then, Thirsty Thursday may have to be put on hiatus, possibly for a Siesta Sunday.

we go back to the bad things for some good times

2010-10-09T19:51:00.003-04:00

Real-life was no fun last week. I had a flu of bubonic proportions, and was surrounded by office politics and grown up street fights. All I wanted was Friday, the start of a 3-day weekend so I could just let loose, wear flip flops, breathe. And finish season 3 of 24.

On the eve of my sister's SAT, we decided to get a nice dinner so she could relax before the big day. The most obvious choice was Matt's, the overpriced, overrated, overcrowded diner in Waldwick. Wanting to forget our present lives in its entirety, we pretended it was one of those arbitrary summer days when the wind messed up our hair and the music on the radio could shatter the suburban silence without reprimand.

Unfortunately, it was a bit chilly. The flu left me weak, and I was not ready to run my fingers through the night air, and instead kept the windows rolled up. My sister protested, and suggested (with exasperation) I put on my jacket. I refused, and insisted the windows stay up. Besides my runny nose, the cold was also bad for my knee. Resigned to life with a geriatric sister, Manu could do nothing but fumble with the radio; finding nothing, we resolved to play her iPod. Since we didn't have the deck with us, we decided to improvise--we set the volume to the max, and I held up the headphones so that we could hear the faint rumblings of something remotely R&B. And so we drove to the diner, with but remnants of our carefree summer nights, headphones and shivers in hand.

Once we sat at the diner, thoroughly looked over the menu as if it had changed at all in the last 7 or 8 years. I told my sister I was really craving their veggie burger. "But I thought you hated it," she said as she briefly flirted with the idea of getting scrambled eggs. "Yes, but I am really craving it. I just want their awful veggie burger. It falls apart every time, but I want that mush." She shrugged her shoulders and went with the penne a la vodka.

Her meal came with salad, which was so unfresh we only ate the kidney beans and stale croutons. My burger was reliably awful, and as I picked it up it fell through my fingers, so that I was forking broken veggie patty doused in ketchup, with lettuce leaves and coleslaw. Once my nostalgia was satiated, I became angry at myself for intentionally paying for bad food. I then resolved to finish my sister's dish, which was just short of authentic Italian, leaning towards something like Kraft or Velveteen.

On our way home, we stopped at Van Dyks, to wash down our gourmet meal. I was too full from finishing 2 dishes, and still too cold from the October skies, but my sister got cookies 'n' cream. On the way home, I held the headphones in one hand and the ice cream in the other, and periodically fed her large spoonfuls so that she could drive with both hands on the wheel. We're all about the safety.

By the time I went to bed (after watching a couple of hours of Jack Bauer saving Los Angeles from a biological weapon), I had forgotten everything I had ever worried about, and fell asleep to the sounds of an undercooked veggie patty swimming uncomfortably in my stomach.

rainy days and frivolity

2010-09-30T16:30:00.003-04:00

Today was one of those days when you're allowed to buy overpriced coffee rip-offs. I seemed to be at a loss with my casework, have a nagging, crippling knee, and, most importantly, have a Visa gift card. All circumstances pointed to the necessity of making a frivolous purchase, one which would usually go against my principles.

I bought a chocolate stirrer. It was a wooden stick with a dark chocolate cube at the end. Again, everything seemed to point to the necessity of this chocolate aparatus in my life.

These edible stirrers were by the register, and so I picked it out last minute when I was paying for my cappuccino, which in and of itself is too wild of a purchase for me. The chocolate cube at the end of the stick immediately started melting away, till my cappuccino tasted like thick hot chocolate and I was holding a wooden stick with brown putty on it.

I threw out the remains of the stirrer and indulged in the hot drink. The weather is still gloomy, the knee still throbs, and New Yorkers still suffer the rising costs of their own existence, but I'm hoping everything just melts away, and becomes a de facto hot chocolate.

buddies

2010-09-29T11:18:00.003-04:00

So as I step off the E train headed in the direction of Third Ave (where I work) I bump into the Deputy Director who was heading in the other direction. He looked puzzled and I told him it was quicker to walk the other way. And then as we made small talk on the elevator, we turned to see the State Director on the escalator right next to us.

And then the three of us skipped to work holding hands.

AM blues

2010-09-24T23:05:00.003-04:00

It was one of those mornings when you heave a sigh, ruffle your bangs, and say with a scowl, "It's just one of those mornings." I woke up more exhausted than when I hit the pillow the previous night; I had waited 2 hours in Port Authority the evening before, nestled comfortably between a pack of Korean tourists and a middle aged commuter who smelled heavily of white-out and cigarettes.

The aftermath of my moving back home as my cousin moved in finally hit me, and in the morning I was scouring through piles and piles of my clothing on the floor, trying to look for a decent shirt. I had no time for breakfast--I was too busy cursing my room, my family, and the gods which rendered me helpless to the clutches of disorganization and lethargy. As usual, I took everything out on my parents, who in turn brandished their most lethal weapon of mass destruction: kindness. Loyal to their origins, the state from which Gandhi hailed, they never reacted violently to my tantrums, choosing instead a path of peace that rendered obsolete any of my concerns. They passively accepted everything I said, and even felt bad for me, before promising that they would build my dresser over the weekend. Their kindness angered me more and I told them I didn't want a dresser. I just wanted conditions to stay miserable for some time so that I was justified in lashing out at the world.

NJTransit proved to be a reliable factor in creating cruel and unusual conditions. The bus was late, and as it started raining, we found ourselves stuck in traffic. The woman in front of me was yelling about her local car dealership. My Sherlock Holmes mystery conceded to the complexities of this woman's life, detailed so clearly for anyone on the bus who had the slightest interest.

I rapidly limped to the E train, only to find the doors close in front of my face. My knee throbbed under my own weight, only reminding me that my new job was a sad excuse to stop working out. The E train arrived 10 minutes later, and, like cattle, we were herded onto the train by the forces of responsibility, obligation, and habit.

Many of the side streets by my office have been closed off for the United Nations Millenium Development conferences, and so as I stepped out of the Subway, I was again shuffled through arbitrary matrices crafted by the NYPD.

I finally neared my building. I stopped at the cart by my building, run by an old Italian man who always says "thank you" to me in Hindi. Instead of the usual small, I ordered a medium coffee with milk, and could barely manage a smile from my immobile lips. The wrinkles around his eyes creased with concern. "One muffin for you, my darling. Just for you." For the first time since I awoke, I felt my own heart beat. I was suddenly conscious of myself, of my own breath, and the slowness of the persistent sunlight, which parted the clouds that had hung heavy during my morning endeavors. I sipped my hot coffee and clutched my muffin as I waved to the security guard inside the building.

The first email I got in the morning was from an agency contact informing me of a favorable decision for a constituent. There was a resolution, some hope, for an economically and physically disabled woman with whom I had been working all summer. I immediately called the constituent to relay the good news, and I could hardly comprehend her words of gratitude as she heaved sobs of happiness.

I felt pretty accomplished. Before 10:00 AM, I got a corn muffin from an old man and blessings from an estranged lady, her face anonymous but her life familiar.

When I got home, I ate Lebanese food with my family. The fattouche was stellar, and the falafel was pretty subpar. I kept staring at all of them. My grandfather read aloud the menu for the entire restaurant to hear; my grandmother and mother sat in fits of giggles; my father was trying to compare all the dishes to Gujarati dishes for easier access. My sister was there in spirit--she kept texting me her misery in SAT class. No one made any sense. I forgot about the morning's fuss, mainly because of the chaos of dinner. I smiled again, as I smiled with my free muffin and my favorable case.

It was one of those days when you heave a sigh, ruffle your bangs, and say with a smile, "Life isn't half bad."

no drama, just life.

2010-09-19T16:24:00.004-04:00

I secretly want to be a Bollywood actress, and dance in the rain and fall in love and fight bad guys. In fact, sometimes I listen to songs, English or Hindi, and create makeshift music videos in my head. Pain, confusion, loss--it all seems bearable when it is accompanied by a background score. But then the song is over, the iPod runs out of battery, or we just grow up, and the beautiful tragedies we have woven are dispelled, rendered obsolete by the cold reality of life, which happens backstage. There is no drama. There is no poetry. Pain isn't beautiful. It hurts. And as much as we have made ourselves out to be the tragic heroes of our Romantic histories, we're just people, without a background score or a rain machine or any hint as to what will happen next. We just are, life just is, and everything else follows.

Woes of a Working Woman

2010-09-03T14:37:00.004-04:00

I oscillate between two different worlds 5 days a week. Every morning, I sit at the cold granite counter in my kitchen and eat plain oatmeal with fruits and nuts, while my grandmother laments about the seeming lack of milk in my diet, and my parents discuss office politics and Tuesday night free movies. I make my lunch, I aimlessly search for shoes before deciding to wear the same black flats once again, and then my mother drops me off to the bus station. I used to pretend to read on the bus, but I have now come to accept the inevitable, and just keep extra tissues to wipe off the drool once I reach Port Authority.

The earth shakes once the bus makes its final stop. There is a thundering of footsteps, of wheels, of a sudden tension and speed. The walk to my office is only about 25 minutes, but my 65 year old knee usually prefers the Subway. Like cattle, we all cram into one train; the really experienced travelers manage to read the newspaper above everyone’s heads and rest their Starbucks coffee comfortably on someone’s elbow. The 5 minute walk from the Subway to work is filled with very distinct types—middle aged workers from Jersey; unattractive and skinny European models; tourists with fanny packs and an illusion that Third Avenue is the place to be.

My work is wonderful. I get to interact with all kinds of people—the sad, the grateful, the crazies, the powerful. My day revolves around service, but is colorfully peppered with death threats and free cupcakes. As wild as my job might seem (the cupcakes are insanely delicious), it is the actual time I spend outside the office and outside my home, in a lingo, where I find myself in a suspension of reality.

Two weeks ago, as I was walking through Port Authority to catch the E train, and someone aggressively taps me on the shoulder. A lady with copper curls started walking in step with me, and in a deep southern drawl said, “Seriously, though, this country is just so obese! I mean, I just look around and see all these fatties. You know what I mean? I guess I could say I am one of them but seriously, what is with this country? I mean, that is why everyone has diabetes!" She laughed and then walked ahead of me. The woman was not fat, and that was our conversation in its entirety.

Since my grandmother is here, my family has been more active and involved with each other than usual. My grandmother yells about the termination of naptime after I graduated Kindergarten (ideally I should be bringing my sleeping bag to the office); my mother simultaneously asks about my pending marriage (I should settle down at some point relatively soon) and my future ambitions (I should not be domesticated and strive for excellence in my career); my father barks about my tangled hair and agrees with my mother on her contradictory advice (I won’t go far with this marital bliss stuff if I don’t brush my hair). My sister is the only seemingly normal one, but the very fact of her functional existence thoroughly perturbs us, so she gets scolded by default. In the midst of all of this chaos, I try to find some peace on the bus. Unfortunately, NJ Transit seems to have also gotten the memo to wreak havoc in my life.

There was one day when I was particularly tired. A plague had ravaged the office, and 5 or 6 people were out with various mystery illnesses. My left eye had been burning and secreting mysterious clear liquid all week, and my knee was reliably acting up. I assumed I was dying, or at least coming down with a cold. My family was in Virginia Beach, so I walked to and from the bus station. Coupled with phone calls reassuring my family that I was alive, filled to the brim with calcium, and taking naps during staff meetings, I was mentally and physically exhausted.

The one day I left work slightly early, for fear of catching some Bubonic strain of yellow fever mixed with pink eye mixed with sun rashes, I came home exceedingly late. The subway was crowded until someone farted and inadvertently kicked off 30 people at the next stop. While this was convenient for my nonexistent personal bubble (which continues to burst as I commute to work with toothless singers and greasy wife beaters), it aggravated my left eye even more. My contact was dangerously sliding up, and my vision kept blurring. I was to meet a friend for dinner in Ridgewood, and desperately needed to get home to pee, take out my contacts, and wash off the stench of underground bodily gas.

I raced to Gate 163, where the bus had stalled for some time. I let out a sigh of relief as soon as I dropped into my seat. A few minutes after the bus left Port Authority, the driver pulled over and parked on the shoulder. She got out of the bus and spoke on her cell phone for about ten minutes. She got back on and told us we had a flat tire, the second one today, and that we would be shuffled to an arbitrary parking lot where we would get on to the next bus. “And I don’t think that bus will be air-conditioned.”

I wanted to call my friend to tell her I would be late, but my phone had died. I didn’t have her number in my work Blackberry, so I tried to email her. The screen went blank about five times before I could finally send her a miserable one-liner: “Bus has flat tire. FML.” My iPod also died before Bruno could finish telling me about the beautiful girls all over the world. My left eye continued to break down, and so reading was out of the question. I stared out in silence until I finally fell asleep.

I was woken up in Paramus. An old Russian man with bad breath was sitting next to me, incessantly poking me. He asked me if the bus was express. We had been on the road for 45 minutes; Port Authority was far behind us. I said yes. And then as I attempted to doze off again, he sustained a conversation with me until I got off at my stop. Then I walked home, ate a handful of wheat crackers that tasted like the box, washed my face, and ate Thai food with my friends.

Yesterday, my iPod was quite functional, but the passengers who elected to sit next to me were not. The first man had just caught the bus about 30 seconds before it left. He was sweating heavily, and sat down right next to me—right on top of my open purse. He said excuse me after he sat down, but continued to deform my purse. With some difficulty, I pulled it out from under him. His cologne was overpowering. My face broke out in rashes and I pressed my face against the dirty glass. He got off after about thirty minutes. I was then alone, and listened to music in peace, thinking of nothing. The bus emptied as it neared my house. When we were about 15 minutes away, someone came down and slammed onto the seat next to me. The person was incredibly close, and I turned to see an old, fat, sleeping man to my left. A strong beer lingered in his breath, which blew out hot and heavy into my face. His legs were sprawled and his hairy arm effectively disintegrated any shred of personal bubble I thought I had left. I was squished into the glass; my headphones knocked uncomfortably into the window as he kept leaning into me. With one final snore, the man fell asleep into my lap. I was too stunned to be disgusted, and then too afraid that I would miss my stop. I sat there in silence, and sent incredulous text messages to all my friends. I held the phone over his head as to not disturb his slumber.

Though I seem to be in a constant state of transit, running from mode of transport to mode of transport, hurriedly shoving slow walkers (seniors included) aside, cursing MTA and NJTransit, I find myself at a complete standstill as I leave Manhattan. I always take a window seat on the right side of the bus, so that when we drive along the river, New York transforms into a frieze. The world pauses, I pause, and together we stop and stare at the dynamicy and vibrancy of grey steel. And every day I close my eyes and smile to whomever is watching, happy that I am still very much a part of such a beautiful city.

DATED JULY 26: Mandawa, Rajasthan

2010-08-25T23:03:00.006-04:00

It pains me that in just four days (I am writing this on the 29th) I have already begun losing any sense of clarity, of orderly memory of each day’s events. Instead, I remember the small details, the feelings, the faces. This account attempts to describe day 2.

We were awoken at the crack of dawn. Some of us were jetlagged, some of us were cold from the excessive air conditioning, and some of us answered early wake up calls. We dragged ourselves to breakfast, still barely knowing each other, and then set off on our first of many adventures.

Our first educational experience was in an educational institution. We visited a school for physically challenged children. We were initially hesitant, scared of being sad, scared of being scared, and generally unsure of ourselves. But the students themselves welcomed us into their lives. In shrill voices, all of the children bowed down in an unsynchronized “Namaste” before they started to show off their skills.

One girl stood up and sang. One boy recited his numbers. Upstairs, in a classroom for deaf and mute children, two boys recited the alphabet in sign language, which was different in Hindi than in English, and then one proceeded to describe in sign language kids in our group as tall and skinny, or too fat. The school was a bit rundown, small, and the classrooms were dingy. But the students were incredibly excited, and the teachers, who didn’t get paid, were incredibly impassioned.

The institution is funded primarily by private donors, with supplemental government assistance. (Any human or monetary contributions would be greatly appreciated. Go volunteer your time!) As we were about to leave the school, we saw that the students in one classroom downstairs started to dance. The organizers of group were in a tearing hurry (a sensation that one feels immediately upon stepping on Indian soil) but we were all drawn by the music and started dancing, too. Forgetting where we were or who we were supposed to be, all of us, regardless of age, size, disability, or any other characteristics listed on the back of an NJTransit ticket, threw up our hands in delight.

After our workout, we visited some bricklayers beside a farm. While we watched, they systematically, without pause, hauled large red bricks into a truck. They made 50 rupees each for every thousand bricks in the truck. Per day they managed to load 5 or 6 trucks. Their practice of laying bricks had been used for generations. Nothing had changed. Life was completely static. The same sect of people, the same location, the same tools. The efficacy of the methods used denied any need for reform. The timelessness of it all rendered our concerns, our reforms, our ideals, and ourselves obsolete. We just stood watching.

The infamous havelis of Mandawa were next on our Yatra. They were splattered with fading frescoes, missing gems, and dusty halls. We felt estranged from a glorious era, from a past we would never know. Cracks in the walls split the frescoes into distorted images, denying us access to any sort of comprehension. An old man was crouched down by the entrance of one of the havelis repainting the thin vines across the wall. He was retouching the walls, history, and promised us with the soft strokes of his brush the potential of the future.

On our way back to the hotel, we stopped to visit a potter. Unlike some of the farmers and bricklayers we had met, this family spoke no English or Hindi, and preferred animated gestures supplemented with Marwadi murmurs. The potter, an old man with a wrinkly face, thin voice, and clear eyes, took a lump of clay, water, and smashed it all down onto a pottery wheel, a perfectly round slab of cement and a rock. Out of one shapeless lump of clay, he managed to make vase, a piggy bank, a tea cup, and a diya. There was absolutely no wastage, and he effortlessly molded the obscure pile of dirt into delicately crafted, functional pieces of art. It was another timeless work—his father was a potter, this man had been a potter all his life, his son was a potter, and his grandson, the little boy running around the place without his underwear, would soon learn the trade.

We got back to the hotel exhausted, sweaty, and grimy, and ready to finally become friends.

The Sound and the Curry

2010-08-21T21:53:00.010-04:00

DISCLAIMER: These aren't generalizations. They are observations, some substantial enough to formulate scientific theory.

1. Gum Thriftiness. My father has always taught me the art of saving. I print on old paper, I rarely wash my jeans, and I use Tupperware. I also only eat half-pieces of gum. Unless it is Diwali, a birthday, or New Year's, no one gets a full piece. My father thinks I waste a lot by eating half-pieces; I have been a bit spoiled by my American upbringing. When there is a strong need, he distributes one-fourth to each of us.

2. Animals. There have been times in my life when a potentially fun night has been ruined by the flu, by train delays, by last minute papers. The second night we spent in Rajasthan, on the Bharat Yatra trip, could have been a crazy night of reckless youths were it not for the herd of stampeding buffalo that ran us out of the streets. We had had enough of the wild evening and after some time (during which we conversed with locals and got out hearts beating at a normal pace) we retired to our hotel.

3. More Animals. At one point in Rajasthan we were stopped at an intersection. Quite frankly, I am not sure if it were actually a designated intersection or traffic was just going in all four directions. I looked out the window only to find the epitome of biodiversity waiting patiently beside our tour bus. There was a camel, a stray dog, and a cow, all among the scooters, the rickshaws, the buses, and the people riding bicycles barefoot. Of course, the cow had the right of way.

4. Bowel movements. No matter where in the world he's settled, the Indian will freely, without moral or social compunction, engage in discussion, deliberation, debate of his digestive system. Diarrhea has the potential to bond or to break. It is not uncommon for relationships to form from a shared bout of constipation--one thing leads to another, and while you're busy not shitting, you make some beautiful friends. My grandmother has crafted philosophies based upon daily fecal patterns. If a person doesn't do his business every morning, he creates heat in the body, which in turn affects his mental state, and thus leads to high blood pressure, short tempers, and obscurity of thought.

Indians can be very real, very authentic; everyone knows shit happens, and there's no need to hide it.

5. The Sound and the Curry. Meals are events. There are pots clanging, flames raging, people yelling. Always people yelling. We yell so that people eat, so that they take seconds, so that they don't be shy; they yell to convince everyone of their small appetites, to encourage others to take seconds, to then dispel the lies spread of their minimal appetites by inquiring about dessert. There is a desperation to share, to make sure the visiting relatives have tried the ingenius foods of the New World (i.e., Pinkberry, Taco Bell); and in the midst of this desperation and excitement, the actual food is forgotten, and everyone concludes that the cuisine in America pales in comparison to the wealth of spices, colors, textures of cuisine in India.

6. Frindles. If it sounds right, it probably is a word. Phrases are made up for people with big noses, small cheekbones, skinny arms, fat ankles. Everything in Gujarati, especially, is rooted in an onomatopoeia. Sometimes, even if it phonetically is inconsistent with reality, if it is fun to say, it will pass. Monkeys say "hookla" and frogs say "chow chow." I say nothing, staring at the ceiling in silence for answers.

More to come.

salvation by salivation

2010-08-21T21:05:00.006-04:00

I still don't know who makes holy water holy. I am pretty confused as to the prerequisites for Heaven and Hell, and I always feel restless in temples or churches. I think my apathy to the institutions, to the pandits and priests, to the rules and the fear, is inspired almost wholly by my parents. My mother and father instilled in me a sense of wonder and excitement, a sense of modesty beside the majestic contours of the Earth; they taught me how to revel in good music, in good art, in good people. And in good food. Apparently, God doesn't just live within all of us, but within gourmet meals and exploding stomachs.

I awoke to a still morning, shattered only by the crackling of morning tea, and then the heavy chatter of humans in the family room. While I was eating my toast, my mother told me we should take my grandmother to the mandir [temple]. I sighed heavily and asked her which one. "Ruch, remember? The one that serves idli dosa?" My frustrations quickly became anticipation. "Wait, there is a temple that serves idli and dosa?" And then my grandmother chimed in. "Yes, we went there last time I came. They serve idli and dosa." Just to reiterate, in case someone had missed the message, my mother repeated herself. "It is a temple that serves idli and dosa."

I went to the gym (I am still trying to work off my paneer from my recent India trip, as well as the implications of free cupcakes at the office). When I came back home two hours later, my father patted me on the head and told me I had an hour to get ready. I asked him if we were going to the temple that served idli and dosa. He shook his head. "No. We decided to go to that restaurant, Moghul Express. Everyone got excited about the idli and dosa so we thought we would skip the mandir and just get the goods."

I agreed with the decision. I got ready in about 30 minutes and we reached the restaurant about 90 minutes later. We laughed and listened to music and wished for world peace en route. As we licked the last of our plates clean, I realized that we managed to attain a sense of contentment for which people search their entire lives. I touched my mother's hand, and she touched mine. And then my dad mistakenly spit ice cream in my face, while my sister videotaped the scene.

Bon Appetit.

DATED JULY 25th

2010-08-16T23:33:00.003-04:00

This was the first thing I wrote on the trip. I am not sure I feel the same way. But, anyways, there it is.

Initially the only difference between this trip and any other to India was that my family wasn’t coming with me. Instead, I held on to my own passport, slept on my own shoulder on the plane, and couldn’t steal anyone’s extra bread roll. Everything else on the trip seemed previously seen—the airplane blankets we desperately wrapped around our small brown bodies despite the static cling and smell of vomit; the discomfort of sitting upright for more than half a day; the luxury of watching multiple Bollywood movies in a row. We were all well acquainted with the journey, just strangers to each other.

Once we landed, that same tearing sense of familiarity and estrangement, one that continually resonated with us since we took the very first trip to the home country years before, consumed us. The same disparity between the tall, glass buildings and the short, muddy huts, the same littered streets, the same potholes and stray cows, the same colors in the street and blatant stares at our bare legs, and the same heat and warmth, all equally confused and relieved us. We got into our Bharat Yatra bus and started a 6 hour journey to Mandawa, Rajasthan. We passed by 2 naked boys showering by the highway, and they waved to us with a sense of wonder. We waved back to them with the same sort of curiosity, and took pictures of them as they became part of the frieze.

It soon became very dark, and the bustling India we know in the day conceded to the vast emptiness of the night. None of us was from Rajasthan, and so the night was even more isolating than in years past. The bus drove past endless fields of green, of bent trees, of dirt. And a feeling of fear suddenly rose in my chest, a feeling I have had in India before. I was in the midst of an impenetrable mystery, unable to solve it, unable to participate. We passed by lots of arbitrary buildings, a lone cement block in the middle of a field, abandoned shops and carts, and miscellaneous wrappers evidencing the day’s events. I wanted to know everything that had happened, wanted to know the purpose of the shed, of the cart, and wanted to know who was there just 12 hours before. Every inch of land had a story, and it was in a language I would never understand. I was watching, I was alone. Like everyone else pretending to fit in with ease, I found myself caught up in my own lies, unsure of my place in this dark, desolate, and incredibly quiet place.

How can we call this the home country when we bring with us precautions, when we make sure to carry repellant and antibiotics and flipflops for the perpetually wet bathrooms? How can we call this the home country when we fear theft and harassment? How can we call this the home country when we sit staring, while everyone stares back at us?

I finally went to sleep, in hopes of finding an answer soon, ideally in the next 13 days.

some call it a stomach infection, some call it vestiges of home.

2010-08-16T23:21:00.004-04:00

I have been wrestling with myself ever since I stepped foot in America, on the subtle concrete soil of the John F. Kennedy Airport. I keep laughing and crying at the same time, happiest when I look through pictures of stray cows and sweaty, tan friends, and saddest when I look through pictures of stray cows and sweaty, tan friends. I have been so incredibly blown away by the Yatra that I don't know how to express my emotions. I meant to keep a blog, but instead kept new friends, new experiences, and found a new me. For fear of sounding too Chicken-Soup-for-the-Soul-meets-Oprah-Winfrey, I find myself completely lost, undiscovered. As much as I can honestly say that the trip helped me find myself, I can just as easily say this trip confused me all the more. In two weeks, I have felt at such ease with a dysfunctional busload of students, cameramen, chaperones, and other randos inevitably on our tour bus. I found solace in strangers, order in chaos, and peace in blaring car horns.

And now that I have returned to an orderly cleanliness, to systematic procedures, and to a house that does not wheel me around a desert state, I don't know what I am supposed to do. Apparently I have to wait on lines now? And I can't just break out in Guju accents to my friends?

I don't know where I am supposed to be. I could be in India, I could be in New York, I could be in a perpetual suspension over the Atlantic. Yatris, please help me find my way home.

back in the day...

2010-06-14T21:14:00.003-04:00

I have absolutely no idea what is going on with my friends these days. Apparently, there has been heart break, newfound romances, new jobs, and people moving to Korea. My life is essentially a constant rinse and repeat. I slip into the pool, I do some laps, and then once I am outstripped by those on Social Security, I dip into the hot tub. The physical distance from my friends has become an emotional distance, and the less I am involved in their lives, and the less I am engaged in what makes the world go round, the more my youth slips from my fingers.

I need to belong somewhere. If I am not part of the young and the restless, then my cane, my gimp, and my dental sensitivity to cold should allow me membership into the Hot Tub Club. Unfortunately, the rushing process is much more extensive than I would have thought. My acceptance is only conditional; I think my knee pain only persists so that I can have friends.

When I got into the hot tub last week, I sat across an old man who had a red face. He frowned at me, and said, "Shouldn't you be in school? Why are you here during the day time?" I replied with a smile. "Well, this works with my schedule, and I have a knee injury so I can't keep up with the night time lap swimmers." He looked confused. I continued. "And I don't have school right now; I just graduated." He looked slightly less angry, but still perplexed. I sighed. "From college. I graduated from college." He looked relieved. "Oh! I would have thought you graduated from high school. Okay, well what's wrong with your knee?" I explained the condition to him, but I did not tell him the name, because so many people have mild cases of my knee problem, that it is embarrassing to let others know that I find it debilitating. He then said some long, Latin word diagnosing my condition as a disease that ended in "iosis." "Yup, I had that. 13 knee surgeries and a knee replacement." He got out of the sauna. "In fact, I was your age when it started. Football injury. Well, good luck kid!"

The next day, there were already 4 or 5 people in the whirlpool. I got in, and immediately all conversation stopped. Everyone looked at me for an infinite moment before resuming conversation about legalizing marijuana. "Where can you buy marijuana seeds?" "My grandson has a friend who deals marijuana. But I don't know if he grows it himself." I blanched (well, as much as any brown girl can blanch). They discussed the benefits of smoking pot, which they "of course do not not know from experience." Apparently, percosets can only go so far, and a full body spell could do wonders for arthiritis. I began to wonder if smoking pot would help my knee pain, but I wasn't allowed entry into the conversation. They then began to talk about smoking cigarettes, and how they didn't even do that as kids, while nowadays kids smoke on their first birthdays. "I mean, the reason I didn't smoke was because I thought that if I had to pay money for something, and I put it in my mouth, I would want to eat it!" And then I laughed out loud, and they all looked at me, and I got out of the hot tub.

I didn't realize how much I needed my new friends, or my new sorority sisters and fraternity brothers, until I went into an empty hot tub yesterday. I sat by a mildly spurting jet with wistful glances into the pool, hoping that one or the other would climb in with me and tell me about their latest gardening fiasco or latest line of dentures. No one ever came in.

That evening, my mom thought I was in a bad mood when she came home from work. She asked me about ten times how my day was, and every time I responded, "Fine. Nothing new. How was work?" And I finally explained to her that I wasn't upset about anything, but I genuinely had nothing new to tell.

Maybe tomorrow the pot-smoking advocate will reveal her red-flag bearing, flagrant Socialist sentiments, and have something to say about DPRK and Brazil. I'm watching the game alone, just so I can contribute to the conversation.

Or, I'll just listen and nod, once again.

French Open, here I come!

2010-06-06T19:38:00.004-04:00

Rafael Nadal just won the French Open. He was off the courts last year because of a knee injury, and today was biting his trophy in triumph. His victory confirmed my own resolve to fix my knee. If he won the French Open this year, then, with steady therapy and swimming and cycling, I can win it next year. Or, if not the French Open, I'll definitely be able to dance on tables with my friends again.

On Saturday, I went for an early morning swim. I woke up at 6 to make my sister eggs before the SATs, but she ended up eating Cocoa Puffs so I ate an egg on toast myself. Since driving aggravates my knee, my mother drove me to the Y. The lifeguard stared at me as I timidly walked into the pool. I walked over to her to confirm that this was the open lap swim. She smiled, and said, "Yes, but it is the Ladies Swim." I blinked. And then I realized the problem. "Oh! Well I am 21. I know I look young, but..." And my voice trailed off in hopes that she would stop suspecting me of traversing age boundaries and just let me swim. She seemed confused. "No, it's not that, it's just that it is Ladies Swim. That is the nature of the swim." I looked down to make sure that I had not developed into a man, and then looked back at her, and shrugged.

There were many old ladies in the pool, all in floral, ruffled bathing suits. I thought maybe the lifeguard was trying to tell me that the nature of the swim was slow, relaxed. I started swimming, and since I was kicking with only one leg, I grew tired very quickly. The seemingly docile women began to lap me. I decided to push myself further; I didn't want to give up just yet. I needed to work out double the time to even get half the workout for my knee, since it was barely doing any work. I refused to cede to the reversal of fortune (the aged lapping the youth) and stayed in the fast lane, ultimately hit women in the head as they caught up with me and I was furiously kicking my left leg to compensate for the immobile right. I managed to stay in the pool 3 times longer than the night before. Some of the ladies who had suffered blows ended up leaving the pool 3 times earlier.

Apparently, slow and steady wins the race. While this isn't a competition, and I am just trying to rehabilitate myself to live life like a 21 year old again, so I can dance with my friends and go shopping with my sister and walk in the park with my mother and learn tennis with my dad, I wouldn't mind if things got a little heated. One day soon, I am going to beat the little old ladies at their game. Until then, I'll just swim slowly and steadily with one leg.

Old may be gold, but I was always more a fan of silver.

2010-06-06T17:37:00.006-04:00

My body is in the process of completely shutting down. I know that technically with each breath we take, we are closer to the end; but I am not talking about oxidation. My body has decided to expedite this natural process. My range of mobility last week was limited to the bathroom and the couch, where I had to continually shift my body so that my knee stiffen in one position. I am not sure if this is a physical reaction to graduation, or just a subconscious effort to resemble my grandmothers, but one thing is certain: this knee condition has further confused my age ambiguity. My face looks young, my gait appears old, and I am neither getting cheap children's menu grilled cheese nor senior citizen NJ Transit passes. So, now you can just add broke to the list of grievances.

As soon as the long weekend ended, my flu/total bodily collapse commenced. Initially, my throat would hurt only in the mornings, which nicely balanced the pain in the second half of my body. By Wednesday, my head was on the verge of explosion and my ears were on fire. I was supposed to head into the city Thursday for drinks and love with friends I haven't seen all semester, but instead I got drunk off of Theraflu and watched The Office.

I usually intersperse my wallowing in self-pity with bursts of determination and positive energy. After seeing a second doctor on Friday, my father drove me to the YMCA to buy a swim membership. I decided I would start swimming again, in efforts to slowly get back into shape and strengthen my atrophying legs. I refuse to be imprisoned inside my own body, by my own body, and so I went swimming that very Friday evening. I was scared to push my knee too much, so in 15 minutes I walked over to the hot tub, occupied by three ladies in their late 50s or 60s. I hobbled over to the other end, where I could directly expose my knee to the jet.

One of the ladies seemed to have taken charge of the conversation, and directed all talk to her intimacy with the director of the swim program, John Duke. "So when I walked into the office to register, they were all wearing green. Even I was wearing green. But John was wearing red, blue, and white. So I said, 'Guess John didn't get the memo.' And he said, 'I am wearing green underwear.' and then, you know me, never shy, so I said, 'That means you should wash your underwear because it has algae on it.'" And she laughed. And I was so enamored of her capacity to tell mundane and hopeless stories with such vitality that I forgot about my throbbing knee.

The lady next to her said, "But why were they all wearing green?" The first lady sighed, explaining that that was part of the joke, that it was a coincidence. The third lady, who had a slight eastern European accent, shook her head. "Maybe it was for a specific purpose, like the environment." The first lady continued to protest, and the other two began talking about climate change, and then all three discussed the oil spill. I was spellbound by their confidence, and began to wonder why they wouldn't just join James Cameron in advising President Obama.

The calamitous oil spill reminded Lady One about the chlorine in the pool. A Hispanic man walked by the hot tub, and she shouted, "Hey! Hey! Are you the Chlorine Man? Are you the man who cleans the pool? Hey! You! Chlorine Man!" His delayed response led to shouts from the other two ladies, who temporarily replaced Jesus with the desirable Chlorine Man. He walked over, looked at me, and then looked at them. Lady One explained that the pool was so cloudy she couldn't see from her end of the pool to the aquacising classes. "Take it from someone who has taken care of a lot of pools, indoors and outdoors, this pool needs to be shocked." And then she complained about how Chlorine Men these days don't check the levels of chlorine every hour like they are supposed to, and then stood up and motioned to her pelvis, because that is apparently what Chlorine Men check every hour. John Duke passed by just then; as she batted her eyelashes, she told him coyly to shock the pool and clear out all the band aids on the pool bottom.

I know when I am a third (or fifth) wheel, and so, without the ease with which she had gotten up to thrust her pelvis just as Chlorine Men allegedly do, I trembled up and climbed out of the whirlpool. The women took no notice, and John Duke and the Chlorine Man seemed to be in a heated discussion about the cloudy water and the Lakers.

When I got home, my mother massaged my knee, and talked to me about Jennifer Hudson's new body and Suri Cruise's fourth birthday party. I explained to her the complications of pool maintenance and how glad I was that I didn't have to walk to school uphill both ways with my bad knee.

No Conclusions

2010-06-01T09:04:00.000-04:00

Professor Toulouse has given me the grade for my senior thesis, but he has not yet accepted my conclusion. It will forever be a piece in the works, without an end, ultimately nothing more than a brief moment in a continuum of learning and exploring and writing and rewriting. Though I initially wanted some closure to this massive endeavor, I realize now (after a week of endless nothings and laughter and knee pain before graduation and then another week of grown up nothings and laughter and knee pain after graduation) that I don't need any conclusions. All I need is a good intrigue. And maybe some painkillers.

I haven't felt the doom of graduation yet. I want to be cool and muse about graduation blues like everyone else, but instead I have gone on seemingly mundane adventures and eaten lots of apples and spinach. Every single day has been superficially ordinary, though bearing one or two small surprises that reinforce a continual summer-induced happiness.

Yesterday, I had to go meet someone in Jersey City. I was scared to drive into the city, scared of parking and scared of tearing out my knee by pushing the accelerator; but I had to face my unfounded fears and just drive. So, with Brian in the passenger seat, unperturbed every time I almost hit someone, I drove off into the blinding glare of the sun. I managed to reach Jersey City unscathed, and had one last right turn to make onto Marin Drive. I was all the way on the left, 6 lanes away from the turning lane, and was about to enter a toll. I tried to get to the right and cars all around began honking and screaming at me. There was nothing I could do. I went through the EZ Pass, and got into the Lincoln Tunnel. I was driving into the city, one of my worst nightmares after cauliflower and bad body odor. After some blood, sweat, and tears, I handed over the wheel to Brian, who managed to get us safely back to the woman's apartment. We drove her back into the city, and after Brian got his little-boy fix by driving around the city honking at innocent passerby, I drove home alone. It was the first time I had ever driven out of the city, and I came home feeling tired, achy, and utterly accomplished.

On Friday, I went into the city for an interview and my physical therapy appointment. I met up with Brian and Bianca afterwards, and we jumpstarted the night at Blockheads, where my taped knee did not get us any discounts on drinks. On our way to the subway, we walked into some swanky lounge, just because we could, and became friends with a Chinese guy who had shown up earlier than the host of his party, and who was only hired because his boss had an Asian fetish. We then made our way to Brooklyn, where we would be sleeping, and ate pizza with lots of spinach and fell asleep in a disarray of clothes, crust, music remixes, and dysfunctional relationships. We woke up feeling younger and smellier than we had ever felt.

Today, I am going to watch Sex and the City 2 with my mother and one of her best friends, because another friend of hers backed out last minute. I watched Where the Wild Things Are earlier in the day, and then I picked up my sister and her friends from the high school, almost running them over because my mind was so consumed with Jay-Z's 99 problems. I used frozen vegetables to relieve my knee pain, and then ate them for lunch. The sunny day converged into a dreary afternoon while I snoozed on the couch.

It is thundering and raining right now, without any signs of stopping, without any hints of hopeful sun. I love the smell of rain, and wet, and greyness, and clouds.

I'm not sure if I have just started something new or if the old thing is still happening; I am not even sure what I mean when I say "old thing." Moments have converged with spaces, and blackness has conflated with whiteness, so that all I can see is myself, right here, right now.

Real World, Day 2

2010-05-24T22:56:00.003-04:00

I have been a college graduate for hardly 2 days. Besides consuming my time tagging graduation pictures on Facebook, I have started to dabble in real grown up, old people things.

My overactive bladder woke me up relatively early today. My knee was stiff and I had some cramps, so I took a hot shower to rejuvenate myself. I went downstairs and had some cereal with bananas and walnuts, which are supposed to help alleviate joint pain. I was still a little hungry, so I ate a few prunes.

During the day, I unpacked my trash bags and sorted through heaps of exam booklets and final papers, none of which will ever matter, and tried to integrate my old high school memories, my faded Hawaiian bedspread and prom dresses and baby pictures, with my new ones, the down comforter on which we would have bed parties in the dorms and Beatles posters that had once revived the dead walls of McMahon. It was difficult to impose my new life upon my old one, and I stopped trying, resigned to the fate of stuffing things under my bed.

Kelsey picked me up in the afternoon, so that I could help her clean the apartment before she checked out. Brian and Bianca joined us, and, in between spraying tables and making pasta, we managed to make the apartment finally decent, just in time for no one to live there. It was the last time we would be in 15F; everything was bare and empty, except for the unclaimed black socks under the dining table.

I went to my physical therapy appointment afterward. I sat between a wrinkly old man and a middle aged Asian woman; the doctor once again commented on my young age, and chuckled at how only older women develop my knee condition. He massaged my knee and I was on my way, with my purse and massive bag filled with leftover tupperware, free brown sugar I had stolen from restaurants, and miscellaneous objects I couldn't let Brian or Kelsey throw out. I took the first bus out of Port Authority, and before we had even hit the Lincoln Tunnel, I had fallen asleep on the stranger next to me. It was about 8:30. I woke up 30 minutes later with a jolt, apologized to the poor man on my right, and then talked to Bianca on the phone in order to keep myself awake and to muse about real life. While mine consisted of intimacy with strangers on public transportation, her real life consisted of a starved cat and dreams of moving to DC. We talked for an hour.

When I got home, I ate leftover pad thai and an apple, and then stayed up late to talk to my friends through all forms of media (Facebook, Gmail, text, etc...) My mother was lying down on the couch next to me, and I realized I was just as exhausted as her. The Real World tired both of us out.

I ate two more prunes before finally going to bed. My knee was throbbing, I still had bags to unpack, and my mind was restless with unfinished conversations and incomplete thoughts. I finally drifted off to sleep to the sound of a deafening silence.

The Graduation Game (by Milton Bradley)

2010-05-23T12:12:00.009-04:00

Till we saw our names in the Commencement booklets, Patrick, Bianca, and I weren't even sure if we were set to graduate. With a sigh of relief, we allowed memories of Petit-Hall's mood swings and hidden graduation requirements to recede into the folds of our brains, which were growing numb as arbitrary board members droned on about Fordham's biggest achievements (namely, U2 and Bono.) The only obstacle to graduating was the graduation itself.

We were all barely functional when we woke up Saturday morning. The medley of pasta, string beans, and frozen pizza I had made the night before remained on the stove and Bianca was passed out on the couch under her 101 Dalmations comforter. We managed to look half-way decent, and then, since it was Commencement, I decided to buy my very first bagel, egg and cheese. I decided to save part of it for later, and "later" ended up being 5 minutes after I finished the first half.

Without regard to the notion of public, the three of us loudly discussed the previous night's events, traumatizing not only the unaware parents, but also the Ram Van driver who then retaliated by playing eerie futuristic music that reverberated deep into our marrow. We were stuck in traffic about 5 minutes away from Fordham, and Bianca held the egg sandwich's brown bag close to her face, heaving every so often as the motions of the car conflated with the motions of the music.

We passed the first test (Bianca didn't vomit and Patrick and I didn't reveal ALL of our personal lives to the rest of the van). We then needed to figure out where to go next. We asked a security guard where we should be, and he pointed in the opposite direction, towards the field where all the family and friends were collecting themselves. We realized we looked just like spectators, and then stopped in the middle of the road to put on our caps and gowns, a feat in and of itself. After about 30 minutes of fumbling and cursing and causing traffic jams, we went to find the appropriate location to check-in.

We received our graduation cards and went off to find a bathroom. The lines were out the door, and it was almost 10 o'clock. I decided to hold off on my pee so that I could graduate. The problem was, however, that no one had told us where to go. We ventured into the lawn, but our section was closed off, and we assumed (or hoped) there would be a much more ceremonial entrance. We finally stumbled upon a line of graduates, all of whom seemed to have received some information to which we were not privy. Some decrepit white lady yelled at us for not forming two single file lines, and any time we stepped out of the line to talk to a friend she would suddenly appear, as if from thin air, yelling at us to "get in two by two's." We found out her name was Astrid, and we feared her wrath the rest of the day.

We were fortunate to sit next to each other during the Commencement ceremony. The heat furthered our drowsiness, and all we wanted to do was play with water balloons and dance on chairs. We found the speeches to be incomprehensible, delivered by people we didn't care about who only showed face at events where they could promote the Alumni organizations. Senator Schumer taught us it was okay to make bad decisions, and so Patrick and Bianca then wistfully looked on at the kids behind us drinking out of flasks.

After about 64 years, the degrees were finally conferred. We had to herd ourselves over to the library, and once again we were confused about where to go. The three of us walked over the library to say hi to our friends and families, and Petit-Hall swooped down on us in her glittering purple robes, demanding us to stop. "Where do you think you're going? You have to line up there!" She pointed to a line of graduates who, once again, seemed to have received some message no one relayed to us. We lined up, ate our rations (Nature Valley granola bars and water), and waited for the ceremonial entrance.

After about 40 minutes, during which no one could answer my any of my logistical questions, we started to walk, down to the library and through crowds of spectators. I was tired, my knee was throbbing, and didn't want to be in alphabetical order. The next test was dealing with Dean Greif splutter and frustrate the entire procession. He was brilliant at being himself, and his classic confusion and nervousness, while normally cute and endearing, considerably slowed down the diploma reception.

Once we had finally reached the W's, I felt a sense of relief. The anxiety of deciphering arbitrarily indiscernible graduation rules and codes and procedures began to fade, and I realized that everything would soon be over and we could just enjoy the rest of the day. I received many loving text messages from my friends after I received my diploma. My parents then texted me from 10 rows back: "How many and what kind of subway sandwiches". Patrick, Bianca, and I had planned a family picnic in Central Park, so that we could all celebrate together without the confines of a restaurant. For the past week, our parents have been constantly texting, calling, and emailing us, not to see if we were alive, but to see if we had planned the picnic in the park. It was the biggest stress of their lives, and at one point during Senior Week, all three of us were in a bar huddled around Brian's blackberry, and wrote a mass email to our parents through group efforts. When my parents texted me at graduation, I replied curtly, telling them I would see them in 10 minutes and we could discuss then.

The stress of buying Subway sandwiches and coordinating lunch with the Shae and Rodrigues families was enough to dispel any emotions of finishing school, and commencing reality. Once we all finally collected ourselves, and Bianca's family finally found the park and I unnecessarily told Patrick's family that my apartment had no toilet paper, we could enjoy the wine and the hummus and the love and the bare feet. It was the complete release of all of our fears and anxieties and body pains and stress. Besides the fact that we could hardly answer Bianca's sister's question, "What are some of your favorite memories of college?" we had passed all tests. We were graduated. We did it, though we were still not entirely sure what "it" was, and were too tired to figure it out. The game had ended, and all we wanted was sleep.

My First and Last Spring Weekend

2010-05-02T09:48:00.006-04:00

The only thing stopping me from having another veggie burger yesterday, at the Spring Weekend concert, was the anomalous bounty of straight guys surrounding me; I was shaken by the high levels of testosterone and Old Spice, and decided that drawing attention to myself through mass consumption of food would not necessarily help me find Prince Charming.

I never truly embraced Rose Hill till this past semester. I used to encourage the racial hatred, the segregation of our two campuses. Now that I am finally leaving, and the word "last" constantly finds itself in my daily lexicon, I have come to love what each campus offers: Lincoln Center has an abundance of falafel restaurants and beautiful people and novelty, and Rose Hill has an abundance of grass and kegs and polo tees.

Yesterday, in an explosion of youth and sweat and actual and spiritual inebriation, Fordham celebrated the beginning of Spring at the MGMT concert. My friends and I got to Rose Hill around noon; Eddie's Parade, which is usually teeming with kids, was strangely empty. I heard indiscriminate noise from elsewhere, and we all walked to a party off campus to start the day. The apartments were overflowing with kids. I knew no one and knew everyone at the same time.

We walked onto the field, and set up our blanket amid hundreds of others. There were girls in bikinis not even pretending to care about the music, there were kids from Lincoln Center wearing fedoras, determined to stand apart, there were guys throwing around water on the bathroom line. People were yelling and shrieking for no reason. It was as if everyone just found their own voice, and needed to express themselves before it was too late, before the sun set and it became Sunday.

During the concert, I was thrown into the air a few times, only to see a bunch of other kids throwing their friends around, too. I don't even remember how good the actual music was; I just remember the incessant beat to which we all pumped our fists in unison, a display of solidarity, of collective youth and illusions and hope.

Afterwards, I met up with one of my friends on my Global Outreach team. The MGMT tour bus was parked outside her dorm, so everyone gathered around the band to get shirts and arms and hats and scraps of paper signed. Everyone was high and tired and drained from the sun, and we sat out on the lawn for an hour, eating chocolate and drinking Powerade, waiting for the breeze to revive us. I took the next ram van back to Lincoln Center, and realized that if I were to stay in Manhattan, if I were to stay anywhere near my desk and my laptop and my list of things to do, then I would never be able to enjoy the rest of the night. I couldn't stay in the same borough as my responsibilities, so I took procrastination to new levels and got on a ram van.

We traveled from house to house, peppered our journey with pizza and skeevy bars, and ultimately ended up at an apartment covered in sand with an inflatable pool. We danced for hours and watched a girl on ecstasy fall into the mud. And then we headed back to Lincoln Center, for the second time that day, and got an early breakfast (at 4 in the morning). We toasted our eggs and grilled cheese sandwiches to the last weekend of our college careers. And to the speedy service.

I went to bed around 5, about an hour before the sun rose. I woke up in a few hours, unable to sleep beneath my down comforter, and ate some caramels. Sounds of Saturday's celebrations echoed in my head, as I flipped through my planner to try to focus on the tasks ahead. I skimmed over deadlines, and then flipped to the 3rd week in May. Less than three weeks till graduation. I ate another caramel and hummed "Kids," wishing only for something that lasted forever.

Transnationalism for $0.75

2010-04-27T11:34:00.003-04:00

Every Tuesday or Friday, I walk across town to intern at Senator Gillibrand's office. Some days, like today, I get enough sleep and breakfast so that I don't need coffee. But after a few hours of work, my head inevitably begins to spin (I usually get lightheaded when I have to tell people their homelessness cannot be resolved this month).

I go downstairs, wave at security, and try not to smash into the glass as I spin through the revolving doors. I walk past the overpriced cafe downstairs, where everyone in suits and greys and on blackberrys gets their croissants and their natural flaxseed smoothies and tins of toffee. And I walk over to the white old Italian man in the cart, who smiles every single week, without fail, as though serving coffee and old muffins is his calling.

I get the same thing every week, coffee with skim and a bit of sugar. I never want a brown paper bag, just a few napkins for my constantly runny nose. I hand him a dollar, he gives me a quarter and says, "Shookriyah gee."

I never respond in Hindi. I'm too scared he'd make fun of my accent.

Story of My Life

2010-04-23T10:26:00.003-04:00

story of my life: I worked on a job application for 3 hours yesterday, only to have Fordham's consistently inconsistent internet connection prevent me from submitting it. After 20 minutes, I lost everything I had filled out, including essays. I woke up 5 hours later to go to work.

story of my life: I had to sit through a 4 hour defensive driving course in order to qualify as a driver on my Global Outreach trip. I learned that I shouldn't drink and drive, and that I cannot control the weather. And apparently, you should always stop at stop signs.

story of my life: I haven't been to the gym in 3 days, but ate so much free food yesterday that I could barely sleep.

story of my life: I have now added a pair of red boots to the collection of clothes that has mysteriously disappeared from my closet. By graduation I will be walking around in flip flops and a parka and my blue fedora.

story of my life: I had a presentation in my Economics of Energy class, and decided to dress to impress (there is more testosterone in that one class than in all of McMahon Hall). Of course, while I am presenting, I am constantly sneezing and blowing my nose, and ultimately attract only distant sympathizers handing me useless Claritin pills.

story of my life: The only job offers I have received for next year are those requiring a bank account and paying over $3000/month for a 2-hr day job. If all else fails, I may get famous by bringing a major scam to court.

story of my life: Everyone got together and decided this semester was the semester to have a boyfriend or get married. I decided I needed to learn how to play the guitar, cook pasta with olive oil and garlic, and buy pretty dresses. A semester has gone by, and I play an invisible air guitar, eat pasta with Ragu, and wear pants because it's easier.

story of my life: The guy at the coffee cart by my office gave me a huge smile when he handed me my regular order (small, with skim milk and a little sugar). He called me sweetie and told me to have a good day.
It's sunny out.

When You're Indian, Push Always Comes to Shove

2010-04-19T00:55:00.003-04:00

This afternoon, my mother had asked me what I would do if the world were truly to end in 2012. Soul-searching is her thing, and an apocalypse is the ideal time to find your soul, before it gets swallowed up in a hopeless abyss. I told her I would want to go to Morocco and Algeria and not look for a job and get a tattoo. She told me she would want to pinch cute babies without worrying about what their mothers would say. Then we chuckled and discussed the fickle weather, the multiple earthquakes, the recent volcanic eruption, and indeed projected the end to come in 2012.

Little did I know, the end was to come today. Every brown person [every person with direct or distant ties to the Indian subcontinent] travelled to New Brunswick to watch Ustad Rahat Fateh Ali Khan in concert. As per usual, as soon we all approached the establishment, our 24th chromosome pair, which is unique to Indians and characterizes a constant, irrational fear of being left behind, began to act up. With a collective sense of fatalism, people pushed, shoved, yelled, and took all efforts to bypass social conduct in order to get into the theater first.

The man regulating the lines was a white man who plucked his eyebrows, with a high-pitched voice and a thick waist. The woman next to him had frazzled hair, frazzled eyes, and small hands. Most Indians had bought their tickets online, and held a ticket confirmation. There was one line for people to pick up their tickets, and one line for people who already had the physical tickets in their hands. It was a simple layout. Two lines. Two doorways. Two line controllers.

But there was one problem. Indians don't do lines. Indians don't do doorways. And Indians definitely don't do people who control the line. They would shout, and we would shout louder. Sometimes, I was sure I heard people just yell out indiscriminate noises just to contribute to the chaos. But, mostly, people were simply indignant about the injustice--"I bought my ticket on the Internet; why must I wait in this long line?!" It was obviously a racist scheme, a post-colonial attempt at keeping the Indians inferior. No. We couldn't stand for this. We needed to band together (except if that didn't work, then as long as the person in question could get in, that was enough) to combat this culturally imperialistic notion of the line.

Following the footsteps of our Great Father, we conducted a Satyagraha, resisting the power of the establishment. Our various efforts simply delayed the entire process, and the show even started one hour late. Some people just kept repeating the same question to the frustrated man with great eyebrows. Every ten minutes, as if inspired by a novel idea, the same group of people would ask him, "but I have my ticket confirmation, can I just go in?" or "It is so cold outside, can't I just wait in here?" Some people would try to bypass the man and wave to no one in particular, in the hopes that someone random would wave back; usually, an arbitrary brown person already past the gate would wave back, and the guest could step inside pretending to know him. Some people even tried to use their children. One lady walked up to the woman with the frazzled everything and explained that she had a baby, a stroller, and that it was cold and the line was long. Her baby cried on cue.

On April 14, 1912, when the Titanic was sinking, women and children were to be saved first, and thus took priority on the lifeboats. Unfortunately, our modern conception of a life-threatening emergency does not entail Indian classical music concerts in New Jersey. So, the baby in the stroller had to wait on line.

Once everyone was finally seated in the theater, and justice was served and Indians were liberated and racism was defeated, (and stereotypes of Indians becoming disoriented and foaming at the mouth when in large crowds were reinforced), the collective resistance against white domination and waiting in line ceded to the excitement about the concert. The announcer declared that this man had gained "international popularity" three times in a row, before she mentioned any of his other feats or musical talents. When he finally performed, we temporarily forgot our fears of being left behind and allowed his enchanting voice to take us away, far from our dusty seats, and to the myths of our own hearts.

The seductive trance was soon dispelled when the fight against social etiquette began to resurface. People began standing, walking, and talking about the singer's father, Bollywood, and Cricket. The lady immediately behind us complained about the loud music, and was offering everyone Kleenex to stuff in their ears. The same people who paid to attend the concert, and who, more importantly, fought tooth and nail to preserve their dignity and not wait on lines, were now trying to partially block out the music.

It was beautiful. Though we are sparsely located, lonely, and perpetually afraid, we were brought together by this one man's voice, the cry of the harmonium, the resonance of the tabla, and the call of the sax. Indians of the tri-state area came together to form a crowd, to displace lines, to frustrate the Establishment, and they came together to rejoice and to agonize, to celebrate and to grieve. And as I looked around me, above me, below me, and certainly to my parents and sister on either side of me, I saw nothing but a sea of short brown heads, all swaying in the same direction, with bits of Kleenex sticking out of everyone's ears. Brava.

i'm running away from home, but my parents will pay my credit card bill

2010-04-13T22:04:00.005-04:00

The reasons why I love my parents, why I prefer them to any others, have become the reasons why I am running away from home tonight. Well, I am sitting in the dorms right now, waiting for my laundry to get done, but when I go home this Sunday, I am going to turn right back around and run towards Glen Rock. My parents want me to have fun and not worry about money. It infuriates me.

I was on the phone with my mother a few minutes ago, and we began to talk about summer plans. I mentioned one of my very close friends decided against a certain program that cost money to volunteer; my mother thought that should have never even been a consideration, for students are already giving their time, and should not have to also give their money. While I whole-heartedly agreed with her, and have always thought that paying money to volunteer was a luxury, I mentioned that I was doing the same thing for my Global Outreach trip. She said it was entirely different because I was going on the trip mainly for fun, adding that my father wanted to get me a better camera so I could take pictures, since my trip would be very "scenic." I told her, for the nth time, that this trip was not all fun and games, and that, while I was looking forward to gaining a new community of friends, that this wasn't simply a hippie road trip with my closest friends to celebrate graduation. She remained silent, and then asked why I don't do Habitat for Humanity in Paterson and then go to Spain for the rest of the month, to finally embrace my dream of spending time aimlessly in Europe. I paused, and told her that besides that issue, I was also extremely stressed about gathering funds for the trip.

She laughed.

I emphasized that I thought I would be able to gather much more money, but the only thing anyone was doing was to send letters for donations. I then hinted that I had no one to send letters to, alluding to the fact that my parents completely rejected the idea of my sending requests for donations to anyone. It is an Indian pride issue, which I have never really understood. We can't ask for money from anyone. Yes, Indians can count very well, and I am sure the numbers are crunching in everyone's minds, but we won't ever ask for money. My mother continued to giggle, acknowledging that I had sent out about 3 letters (2 of which I did in secret for fear of her tampering with the mail).

The funny thing is, my parents are extremely generous, compassionate, and very liberally donate their money to all sorts of charities and fundraisers. In this specific case, they are willing to fund my western rural poverty antics. However, I decided that this project would be my own; I wanted to take complete control of it. I didn't want my parents to just fund what they thought was a post-graduation, peripherally service-oriented trip focusing on cowboys and mountains. I wanted to be independent, raising enough money on my own to completely take charge of myself on this trip.

She continued to laugh. I knew what she was thinking--why start now?

My family has always been very communist about our money; there is no concept of ownership with our money. Mine (which is none) is my mother's is my father's is my sister's (which is surprisingly a small fortune.) This time, I wanted the trip to be funded by the capitalist version of myself.

I told my mother I had decided on many ventures to raise the funds, ventures that failed before they even came to fruition.

I thought about writing papers for people, guaranteeing A's for $50. But, I haven't been writing my own papers; I have barely read a thing since Spring Break, and should probably guarantee a passing grade for myself before raising everyone else's GPA for $50.

I thought I would vacuum people's apartments for $20. But, my own apartment remains completely filthy, and I decided that I should probably attack the monsters under our couch, first.

I thought I would tutor people in French, teach Bollywood workshops, thread people's eyebrows. And then I realized I am barely articulate in French, no one cares to pay to learn Bollywood dancing as long as they can pet the dog and screw the light bulb, and my own eyebrows need tending to.

I thought I would cook for people, and even bring them food to their rooms. I have not eaten a hot meal in 3 days. I am still wondering whether or not people would pay for me to pour milk in their cereal.

My mother continued to laugh. She told me I shouldn't worry; I would definitely make the $800 in 3 weeks. Between her chuckles, I could make out the words "resourceful" and "busy" and "youth." I appreciated the essence of what she was saying, but I was still mad that I was so crippled, that I had such generous and supportive parents. Then she told me to have a good night, and not forget my allergy medicine.

This Sunday, I am going to give my parents the silent treatment. That's what they get for paying for things and forcing me to have fun.

the anti-Globalization movement vis-à-vis Downward Dog

2010-04-11T11:29:00.006-04:00

Yesterday, I threw away all previous notions and values about the spread of ideas and commerce, about the elevation of all peoples through a global network, about the destruction of arbitrary political borders for a universal acknowledgement of the human race. I went to a Yoga class at Bally's. I discovered the most detrimental effects of Globalization. And I decided that people can stay localized and segregated, as long as the ancient spiritual, even ascetic, discipline of early Hindus isn't reduced to a "embrace the present, but tighten those glutes!"

While I have always taken issue with Yoga, as an exotic franchise, I can never claim to know any more than the instructor. I know as little, or even less, about Hindu philosophy than the next unfortunately confused immigrant child. This Yoga teacher in particular, however, gave me some confidence in my religious illiteracy. She was around 50 years old, and thought she was 30; her hair was streaked with different colors and messily tied up in a knot at the top of her head. She had a look of forced relaxation on her face, which would tense up every time we did not properly execute Upward Dog.

She murmured into the mic, so that instead of counting down from 100 and "breathing in the present moment" and "breathing out regrets of the past and anxieties of the future," I kept looking around to see what I was supposed to do. I assume I have just become slightly deaf because I have been playing "Say Ahh" on repeat for the last 3 weeks; the tranquil instrumental she played confused my eardrums, which have habituated themselves to trashy, PG-13 lyrics.

When we started doing the poses, she told us it was the Year of the Tiger, so that we would start with the Tiger Pose. I stared into the mirror in disbelief, as she started tensing up her back like a large cat, ready to claw at the air. The Year of the Tiger is a Chinese categorization. While she was in the general area (Asia), India and China usually don't get mixed up. One of them has Slumdog Millionaire and Red Dots on Foreheads, and the other has Communism and Fried Pork Dumplings. Either way, we did not do a Tiger Pose, and moved on to the next move.

At one point, we held our arms together, as if in prayer, and raised them high above our heads while arching our backs. She described this to be "the way we pray to the Great Spirit." Again, I looked around, hoping someone would ask her to clarify. What Great Spirit? Who is "we?" Are you part of this community of believers who prays to this one Spirit? Are you conflating Cherokee (perception of Cherokee) with Indian? She then told us to recruit the muscle fibers in our abs to pray to the Great Spirit even deeper.

Finally, towards the end of the class, she explained the significance of the cow in Hinduism. We were all contorted in a position she claimed to be "the Happy Cow," though it looked more like we were all holding in our pee. She explained that Hindus don't necessarily worship the cow, but that they consider "the cow to be like a mother, for she gives milk and butter and cheese and ice cream." And her trance-like voice faded away, and everyone began to dream of a mint chocolate chip cow being milked by a shriveled Indian man with a long white beard, all the while chanting to the Great Spirit.

No matter how many Yoga classes you avoid, you can't hide from Globalization. Its effects are everywhere--Whole Foods, 99-cent stores, hybrid children. It's powerful, it's tyrannic, it's unstoppable. There are legitimate reasons people collect themselves to prevent the expansion of telecommunications and commerce that has enabled the diffusion of ideas and cultures and peoples. The phenomenon has essentially subverted any notion of culture, defined as per religion, locality, family, sexuality, etc..., and simultaneously deconstructs and reconstructs borders, as stereotypes are both dissected and propagated. Some argue for labor rights and for cultural relativism. However, I personally fear Globalization because it has turned history into a myth and people into spectacles. But more importantly, as a child of this phenomenon, I reject it using my own myths, my own notions of the truth, of culture, of myself. In fact, the Happy Cow may be the closest I get to finding my own history, which I have frequently romanticized when eating chutney sandwiches.

Regardless of how I feel about the commercialization of Yoga, or rather, the unfortunate conflation of distinct cultures and histories legitimized by an enchanting voice and streaky hair, Globalization happens. The Year of the Tiger will soon pass, and Yoga will continue to gain in popularity. Now all I have to do is pray that my thighs won't be so sore tomorrow.

tribute to Freddie Prinze, Jr.

2010-04-06T10:49:00.002-04:00

I'm not a stalker. I just like to use the internet to its fullest capacity. It would be a waste of modern day technology if I didn't Google image "Freddie Prinze, Jr.," "Freddie Prinze, Sr.," "Freddie Prinze, Jr. with Sarah Michelle Gellar," "Freddie Prinze, Jr. with new baby." It's perfectly legal to Google my interests, as long as I am not in China searching for "Freddie Prinze, Jr. in Tiananmen Square."

I have been told I have an obsessive personality. I get addicted to some good things, like bananas and working out and 24, and I get addicted to bad things, like chasing things I've lost and yogurt-covered pretzels and Facebook. Sometimes, I see myself becoming consumed with something, with someone, and know enough to stop myself, but I let myself be completely devoured by my own passion for the object of my obsession, be it Nutella crepes or 1990s mediocre teen romantic stars.

There was a period of time when I completely forgot about him. It was between 2000 and 2010, the end of the 90s until now, when I am about to embark on a new journey into the real, grown-up world when she isn't really all that and people aren't just head over heels.

I just started watching 24 this season, and my passion for Freddie has been rejeuvenated. He's the sole force of goodness in my life, the only solace I have after a hard weekend of enduring senioritis and seasonal allergies. Cole Ortiz starts and ends my week.

I don't really need a diagnosis, and I have finally accepted the fact that there is no solution. Who says an obsession is an obsession? I call it love.

Freddie, if you are listening, if you are out there, if you have access to this blog, then know that I am here if you need a summer catch.

Manana Culture

2010-03-20T09:21:00.012-04:00

Sometimes in Rincon, the water is "just out." You can't pee, you can't drink tap water, you can't wash the sand out of your butt. No one frets or worries about the arbitrary lack of water because when it happens, it just happens, life goes on, and you can just pee in the ocean. Take shots to dehydration, and worry about it manana.

We befriended a bartender, Maria, who had sold everything in the United States just to realize her fantasy of living on a tropical island. She wore colorful wrap around tops, took care of an old man in order to live rent-free, and never created more than one tab because it was too much work. We asked her what she wanted to do next; she shrugged, and said, "St. Thomas, and at some point Spain." We asked her where in Spain, and Maria didn't know. She would figure it out soon enough.

Her boss, Miserable or Mad Mike, was the owner of Casa Vieja, a small, hot, dingy tavern in a small alley. He was American, old, grumpy, and had lots of opinions and cheap drink and food deals (buy one burger, get one free). Casa Vieja played only 70s American tunes and catered to a unilingual population--American expats and tourists. We went to Casa Vieja every night, for french fries and margaritas and the grumblings of an old man.

Antonio, the bartender at our resort had a soft voice, soft features, and would hydrate us with ice water and stories of his life. His favorite vacation was his trip to Spain and Portugal; he enjoyed himself so much that his 2 week vacation became a 2 month vacation, and he lost his job, spent all his money, and "had to start all over" when he returned home. We sat in a stupor, drunk from the blazing sun and exhausted from our 8 mile walk. He saw all of us staring at him in bewilderment, and said, "It's a once in a lifetime experience."

After we parasailed, we walked back to our resort. We wanted to save money, save the environment from CO2 emissions, and just explore the little rickety fruit carts and fried chicken trucks en route to our hotel. The drive seemed short, (it was 15 minutes), and we wisely concluded the walk wouldn't be that much longer. It took us 3 hours, much of it uphill, to get back to the resort. After two hours, we were unsure whether or not we were wet from parasailing or from sweat. People in cars would slow down, stare at us, honk, and sometimes even yell indiscriminate things in Spanish. We even caused a traffic jam, for one car stopped and then every car behind it stopped. People honked not out of impatience, but to add to the grand orchestration of cat calls. We weren't sure if they were giving us attention because we were girls or because we were tourists, but soon we figured out that our peeling faces, our sweaty backs, and the limp with which we dragged on spoke volumes about our gringa nature.

The Chinese restaurant we passed on the way home had a simple and direct title--"China Rest." They seemed to have gotten over the last 6 letters of the word, and decided a period would suffice to relay the message. However, unlike the other letters in the title, the period didn't light up, and so the restaurant simply read "China Rest" and it still managed to attract a few unaware customers into its abode.

Elaine, our driver on the last night, told us that Puerto Rico may never become its own sovereign because the people are too scared to let go of the US, that the island would have to learn to grow on its own. Right now, she explained, everyone just worked and partied. There was no unified strength, no sense of ownership--just $1 Medallas on the beach. She then dropped us off to Tamboo Tavern, so that we could engage in that culture, too. Work, party, and repeat.

In Rincon, everything moves at the pace of the waves. There is no agenda, no stress, no days of the week--just sun and blue drinks and iguanas. We thought our fantasies would be dispelled when we finally arrived on the island; instead, every dream of island life was true to life, realized by our 4 nights of non-stop nothingness and laughter. It is manana culture but people live today. It is like existentialism turned upside down, transformed from a Frenchman shooting Arabs to Americans getting sunburned. And we could have walked in the sand declaring carpe diem, except that we were always feeling too lazy to seize anything, and simply allowed the waves to wash our footprints away.

Puerto Rico, Day 1

2010-03-16T11:29:00.003-04:00

We knew that our spring break in Rincon wouldn't be the classic college kids gone wild intoxication fest, given that our resort is known for its family appeal, but we were excited nonetheless. In fact, we were eager to be released from the confines of our own youth, and to simply live our fantasy of an island vacation with dresses and blue drinks.

Though we barely slept the night before our flight, (I napped from 2-3, and Asal and Bianca just didn't sleep), and barely slept on the flight (I was scared to miss the free plantains/chex mix and pineapple juice/sprite), we dove into the ocean almost immediately after arriving to the resort. The water was warm, blue, and friendly. We swam for a few hours, got out and got some blue and red refreshments, swam some more, and then passed out on the beach. I woke up to a hostile sun, which had already managed to sautée my skin.

The entire day we ate cookies, crackers, cereal bars, and apples. In the evening, our bodies finally revolted, unable to tolerate the burns and the sporadic snacking, and we headed into town for some hot food and coconut drinks. The hotel to which we were directed by our hotel (attempt to make a cut) was famous for its "pirata especiale," which were sweet cinnamon concoctions in fresh coconuts, which the bartenders and waiters sliced (hacked) open with axe-like knives, spurting coconut water everywhere.

Like true gringas, we ate rice and beans, chicken alfredo, and french fries, listening to the black waves crashing against the beach in between bites. We laughed, we swung on our chairs, we took pictures. We stopped pretending to mingle with Puerto Rico, (except when Bianca speaks Spanish) and colonized the island with our foreign, youthful playfulness and curiosity. The seniors smiled at us and moved away, making room for the three college kids we saw across the room, who became the first group we could finally call our peers. We all decided to hang out the rest of the week, and to explore Rincon nightlife and surf and make bonfires.

And spring break was officially brought to Rincon.

this is why you don't play with fire

2010-03-08T09:28:00.004-05:00

Looks can be very deceiving. Unfortunately, whatever impressions people get about me from the frazzled state of my bangs truly speak volumes about my personality, my behavior, and my currently frazzled state of mind.

Two weeks ago, I thought I should get a haircut to look presentable for all the meetings and interviews and appointments that I have to have to secure a socially acceptable future (apparently Neverland does not exist). One week ago, I burned my bangs, which are now so short and frayed that it will be impossible to get a haircut without scarring my forehead. I was taking notes by candlelight, for the soothing smell and ambience, on the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, and got a text message from Patrick. It was a picture of a cat with the text, "hey there frenchie!" I wanted to reply with an equally nonsensical message, and tried to take a creepy picture of myself behind the candle, hoping that my face would be aglow.

I heard a crackling sound, as though something were burning. I leaned in closer. I couldn't see anything but heard the crackling sound grow louder. I shrugged, took the picture (twice, because the first one didn't come out well), and sent it to him, with the message, "can't wait to punch you in the face! miss youuu." I continued to do my homework. 15 minutes later I went to the bathroom.

I saw mysterious brown bits in my hair when I looked in the mirror. They looked like dead grass. I pulled one out, and saw that I had in my hand what looked like clumps of limp hair. I yelled out in shock and disgust. And suddenly, that putrid smell of burning consumed my nose, my lungs, my flesh, and I realized that that crackling sound had been my bangs on fire.

I look like a cross between Albert Einstein and Kelly Osbourne. And I have not gained the fame to pull off a look of electrocution. I am the ordinary New Yorker, student, girl, all first impressions gone to ashes.

If I don't find a job, I won't be able to blame it on the economic recession. I will, however, blame Pier 1 Imports' line of buttercream vanilla fragrance.

I never turned six years old

2010-03-06T14:10:00.004-05:00

Last night, I decided to renege on all responsibilities and obligations (does my GPA truly matter?) and go down to the East Village to eat couscous in celebration of Lindsay's birthday. The couscous was delicious, small in quantity, and expensive. Everyone wore shiny bangles and eyeliner, and the small restaurant was dimly lit and red and crowded. I ate, I smiled, I chatted. But all I wanted was a piece of caramel.

I don't remember when I discovered caramel, but I have not grown since that one moment. I am still five years old (or seven, or ten, or whenever I first experienced that sweetness). Like everyone else, I pretend to be a grown up and pay my credit card bill and read the Gotham Gazette, but in reality, all I want to do is eat caramels on my front steps in the summer.

When Bianca and I left the dinner last night, we decided to head home to finish some homework. We both needed some candy (her candy of choice was Riesen.) On the way to the F train, we stopped at a Rite Aid, which had already put bars on the windows. The guy in the store told us it was closing in 5 minutes, in hopes that we would turn around and leave. Instead, we raced around the store, breaking a sweat, looking for the goods. We found lots of easter eggs and nail polish, but kept running past the candy aisle. "Why the hell do easter eggs get their own aisle?!" Bianca was screaming and I was flailing around the store. Everyone was staring at us. We thought we were beautiful. They thought we were criminally insane.

Once in the candy aisle, we scrambled through all the piles of candy, rummaging through the bins and the hanging bags, until finally we realized that what we were looking for was right before our eyes. And then we ran to the counter. The cashier had resorted to banging against the cash register instead of tapping her long fingernails. Bianca's credit card had to be swiped 5 times before it registered. Everyone was waiting for us to leave. Our mouths were watering, our foreheads were drenched in perspiration. And as soon as we ran out of the store, they turned off the lights.

We ripped open our bags of candy as soon as we stepped into the frigid night. And then all the purple people in the East Village and the wind and the cigarette butts converged into one single bite of bliss. We held hands as we crossed the street and walked underground, so we could catch our train home.

Observer Blog--Senioritis et al.

2010-02-19T11:56:00.003-05:00

I now write for the new Observer Blog; I contribute stories about being a senior (contracting senioritis, avoiding talk about the future, wishing away my senior thesis).

Check it out!

http://observerblog.wordpress.com/2010/02/19/senioritis-symptoms/

insight from anonymous

2010-02-14T11:30:00.002-05:00

This was the last line of a letter from a NY constituent sent to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand's office:

"I realize that the State of New York is broke. I feel it's pain because I'm broke, too."

I am not sure whether to cry or laugh.

technological breakthrough

2010-02-02T12:49:00.001-05:00

I just figured out how to add images to my blog posts.

The button was right there. I just didn't see it.

By the end of the day, I will add loads of new pictures to old postings.

Stay tuned.

if all else fails, there's always Dunkin

2010-01-25T20:04:00.008-05:00

Patrick's 21st birthday marked his entry into the legal world of substance abuse, as well as the end of ogling at the free wine served at Law School events. Always in want (in need) of an excuse to party, we decided to celebrate with extravagance, style, and glamor, especially since his birthday also happened to fall on the First Weekend of the Spring Semester, the Last First Weekend of our college career, and the one year anniversary of Obama's presidency. We were going to go to the Boom Boom Room, an exclusive lounge that proudly boasted the high cost of its drinks, which supposedly made people "forget that recession even exists." Since we were all well aware of recession's presence in our lives (the extra $0.25 on the Subway fare forced us to curtail Pinkberry consumption), we decided to refrain from buying anything at Boom Boom Room. We were going to go there and sit on a comfy couch, where we could watch people spend money, and simply feel elite.

Though I had called in advance to confirm with an arbitrary British man that reservations were not required, Patrick and I found ourselves waiting in the harsh cold, watching tall Swedish women and men with jewelry walk in. The British man on the phone had been right--reservations were not required; Boom Boom Room operated by invitation only. We then invited ourselves to the bar across the block, so we could pee.

By that point we had met up with some of our other friends, who had only ventured into the meatpacking district because we had promised them a Red Carpet night. Everyone was cold, hungry, and underage. People dispersed--some went to a generic Irish pub, others went back to Fordham, and Patrick, Bianca, and I went to a lounge called "Honey." There were about 5 people inside. We sat down, looked at the menu, were once again cognizant of the financial crisis, and walked out.

We were on the verge of surrendering, completely disheartened and embittered by the gloating wind and the high end, celebrity life that seemed so out of reach. We walked to the end of the block, tired, cold, and ready to hail a cab back to Fordham. We passed by a Dunkin Donuts, and we all intuitively slowed down. I was staring at the empty room, glowing pink and orange, eliciting the fragrance of artificial sweetness and happiness and home. "I mean, they will probably give us free munchkins because it is so late. They are going to throw out stuff before they close, anyways." This Dunkin was 24/7.

The man behind the counter was brown, from some place on the Indian subcontinent. Partly due to evolution, to a biological development, and partly due to observing my aunt in Indian markets, I was immediately consumed by a desire to fight for cheaper hash browns. I glanced over at Bianca, who seemed to have acquired the same aggressive instinct. She told him she was from Delhi; I told him I had only $1 (I had just withdrawn $60). As expected, he immediately fought back, showing us the computer in which he had to punch in the prices, telling us he was limited by Corporate, and simply refusing to listen to reason. It came out to $2.81 for 2 orders, but he "threw in" a few extra fritters, so that the three of us would be satisfied.

Some random white guy walked in and decided to carry out a prolonged conversation with us, though we were to hungry to respond. While Bianca and Patrick humored him, I started talking to the Dunkin Donuts man. As with all Dunkin Donuts men, he was in a state of shock upon discovering I was Indian. He argued with me, telling me I was only half. When I managed to convince him I was Indian, that I was Gujarati, that I was barely conversational in Hindi, the instinct to fight faded from his face. He went to the back and brought out three muffins for us, each warm and toasted.

He asked me if we would sit and eat. I immediately obliged, and we all sat down to feast upon Dunkin. He came over to us and began speaking in Hindi; I understood everything he would say, but Bianca was the only one able to respond. Patrick continued eating his muffins.

The man was from Bangladesh; his entire family was still in Bangladesh. He was so proud of us for going to college; his job didn't pay enough. It was cold in America, and he was alone. He was surprised that we didn't live with our parents. He didn't understand why I couldn't respond fluently in Hindi. He laughed at us. We responded, between mouthfuls, with unsure smiles. He spoke as if he hadn't spoken in months. Soon the table was scattered with muffin wrappers and hash brown containers, and drunk people started coming in to satisfy their munchies. "Wait, wait, please wait. I will be back." He ran off to take people's orders, and then came back to us with three hot chocolates.

He stared at Patrick, who quickly got over his disbelief and shock to start drinking the hot drink. He asked us, in Hindi, from where we picked up "this one." We laughed and explained that it was his 21st birthday, that he is a close friend of ours, that he isn't a random boy from the street. I had the fleeting inclination to assert that his being white doesn't, and shouldn't, necessarily mean that he is nothing more than a stranger; but when I looked over at Patrick, at the way in which he seemed to be nothing more than a hungry deaf-mute, I knew that I was connected to the Dunkin Donuts man in a way I could never be connected to Patrick.

As we considered leaving for home, he told us to wait once again. He came back with hot sticky buns. "I work Friday, Saturday, Sunday. You visit me Sunday nights." We agreed. We finally got our invitation. It wasn't the Boom Boom Room, but it was something much sweeter. We bid him farewell, and held onto each other as we stepped out into the black night. The streets had emptied, the winds had softened, and there was a noisy silence that followed us to McMahon Hall.

Our room was littered with clothes and shoes, as we had been unsure how to dress to impress the celebrities at the lounge, and started off the night by violently ravaging our closets in search for something we knew we didn't own. Exhausted and crashing from a sugar high, we collapsed onto our beds, amid short dresses and sparkly vests and cheap make up, and immediately fell asleep, as the celebration officially came to a close.

we're just numbers

2010-01-16T10:17:00.008-05:00

I may soon be deported. Well, maybe not soon, because I am not yet done with my senior thesis, but definitely by midterms next semester. Hopefully, the State Department will ship me off via Jet Airways, because they have a wide range of movies and complimentary drinks.

Since I have rarely been carded after turning 21 (though still retain the face of a pre-teen), I have not been constantly looking at my license. It expired the last day of 2009, and I did not notice till the beginning of this week. Scared of local government agencies, I asked my mother to come with me to the DMV in Oakland, and we headed over there before she went to work. Everyone in Oakland was friendly. They smiled as they called me over. They smiled as they took my documents. And they smiled as they rejected me.

Apparently the name on my passport ("Rucha Desai") differs from the name on my expired license ("Rucha A. Desai"); my Social Security card wasn't much help, because it not only read "Rucha Abhay Desai," but also declared me as an immigrant, not valid for employment. They needed all the documents to read the same thing. And they wouldn't base a name change off of a passport; they wanted my naturalization papers.

My old passport claims my name to be "Rucha Abhay Desai." I figured that 3 years ago, when I was applying for my new passport, which excludes my middle name, I was in that phase of trying to find myself, define myself, discover myself, or some other psycho-therapeutic process described in an old volume of O. I guess I wasn't sure with what name I identified myself, and needed to explore the depths of my soul on a government document.

The U.S. government is not so sympathetic to soul-searching. I went back the second day, without my naturalization papers, but with my old passport, in hopes that they would see reason, or at least understand the mid-teen crisis that led to my name change. They rejected me once again, this time without smiles. It was my naturalization papers or nothing.

Funny thing is, it is nothing. My sister was born in the United States. My parents have naturalization certificates. I still have my green card, and a Social Security card that portrays me as an illegal immigrant.

Apparently, when my parents applied for naturalization, I was too young to "elect" citizenship, (yet old enough to rediscover myself) and so they presented various other documents to prove their relation to me in order to get me naturalized. Thus, I don't have these papers. I'm just piggy backing off of their citizenship.

When I was waiting to update my Social Security card, at the Social Security Office in Glen Rock, I found myself among old women, Italian American mobsters, and families. Everyone had a number. No one had a name. The woman talking to her daughter in Russian was a only a few digits different from the man talking to his friend about the Yankees game. The security guard flipping through the Sears catalogue was as anonymous to the U.S. Government as I was. My endeavors to re-identify myself, re-discover myself, surrendered to 8 powerful digits arbitrarily assigned to me years ago. I wasn't human. I was 123-45-678, and even that was compromised by a discrepancy between names.

In order to finish some paperwork and life-altering chores at the DMV, I will not return to Fordham till Tuesday night. The only problem is, I seem to have misplaced my student ID.

discounts or good grades? what the asian really wants

2010-01-11T22:15:00.004-05:00

New Jersey just legalized the use of medical marijuana. Malaysia overturned a ban on the use of "Allah" in non-Islamic settings. President Obama has ordered a surge of troops into Afghanistan for next month. Controversial decisions are being made everyday, decisions affecting the hundreds of thousands of lives. My parents are currently torn between making my sister watch Avatar for free or allowing her to study for midterms.

Last Sunday, my sister got another lecture, which evolved into a full-on WWF match culminating in everyone giving everyone the silent treatment for two days. My parents yelled at her about studying, and she yelled back about how she does study and they just don't notice. Then, my mother got emotional because she is a working mom and couldn't always be there to notice us studying. And then, since my father couldn't hear everything my sister was saying and thought she was ignoring them, he banned her from watching Keeping Up With The Kardashians. Reality TV always manages to make its way into family discussions.

After a few episodes of Family Guy and some vanilla ice cream inevitably shattered the angry silence of the household, we returned to our normal routines. I wrote my senior thesis and stalked people I didn't care about on Facebook. My sister went to school and wore cute outfits. My father looked for lost documents and ate dark chocolate. My mother studied for her SAP certification and yelled at me to wear socks.

Every Tuesday, the mundane, the ordinary, the expected surrender to the exciting, the new, the mysterious. Optimum awards my parents with two free movie tickets every week, with all other tickets at half-price. My parents have gone to see their free film in blizzards, hailstorms, and even went during the Nor'Easter. If one or both of them cannot go, they make sure that someone can. It is a societal loss to pass up on a free movie, and my parents have made it a moral responsibility to ensure that someone in the world takes advantage of the Optimum deal.

Unfortunately, my parents will not be seeing any movie tomorrow. Though my sister had already politely declined to watch Avatar tomorrow, on account of her history exam, my father bought tickets in advance, as the free seats on Tuesdays tend to fill up with the other wild, fiscally conservative movie-goers. When my sister saw the tickets on the dining table, she ran into the family room, where my mom and I were commenting on Jessica Alba's hot bod in Blue Crush, and where my father was sending out emails.

"Guys, I told you not to buy Avatar tickets!" She sounded exasperated. My father looked dumbfounded. She sighed, and explained that she had too much work. My parents exchanged blank looks. It was incomprehensible that anyone would want to give up this social good, whose main function was to spread happiness and goodwill among the community.

"Why can't you just finish your work early?" My sister was so confused she was almost in tears. She just didn't know what they expected from her. Instead of being pleased that their daughter actually listened to their tirade on Sunday, and was sacrificing free fun for homework, my parents were disappointed in her distorted priorities.

However, once my sister tried to defend herself, (and clarify whatever incomprehension and confusion caused) my parents understood the dilemma. It was the ultimate Asian question: what came first, grades or discounts?

My father's blood pressure rose slightly, and my mother curled into a tighter ball under her yellow blanket, as each tried to figure out how to reconcile the founding principles. My sister rolled her eyes and got back to making her history study guide. She made her decision, chose her own path to Asian salvation, leaving behind the prospect of watching Avatar for free.

I think my parents are going to ground her tomorrow. It's for her own good, of course.

butt face, i love you

2010-01-07T17:43:00.003-05:00

There was a moment last night when I was in the kitchen bent over, and my friend Patrick was scrubbing my butt with seltzer, while my other friend Dani was holding ice to it. I had sat on gum, the sticky white residue smeared all over the seat of my black jeans. I was freaking out, and my always faithful friends tried to pacify me. As the gum dried, I picked at it throughout the rest of the night.

It's funny how close you become to people in times of need, desperation, heat. While the two who were helping to erase the remnants of Orbit product are two of my closest friends already, it is not until I faced the threat of ruining perfectly good, albeit already bleach-stained, black jeans when I truly realized the extent of our intimacy. Transcending personal boundaries, dispelling human dignity, and neglecting all norms of society, my friends and I treaded upon the threshold of nature, briefly touching the crude aspects of humanity. We were held back by nothing, except the new ice maker.

I guess we're BFFs or BFFLs or something, all because of some uncouth stranger who disposes of their gum in public places instead of the garbage can.

by the way, it is 2010

2010-01-02T11:47:00.004-05:00

I was trying to figure out the bill at Yummy Sushi when the clock struck 12. Happy New Year, we're $10 short and the edamame wasn't actually complimentary.

Every New Year's Eve, I look forward to the countdown, the anticipation of ringing in the new year with family and friends and sparkly confetti. I like that for one minute the entire world (or at least those in your time zone) counts in unison, waiting for a new year to bring about new happiness, new goals, new-ness.

This year, while at Yummy Sushi, an arbitrary Japanese restaurant in the West Village, I sporadically checked my phone for the time. I am usually compulsive about watching the time on Dec. 31st, but no one in the restaurant seemed to care about the symbolic night; the waiters were busy handing out little bowls of wasabi and the diners were busy not eating it. The last time I had checked, it was 11:53. There was still plenty of time before midnight. Our bill came, and we began fumbling for dollar bills and trying to figure out why it cost so much.

Bianca poked my right shoulder. "Rucha, it's midnight." I waved her away, now trying to calculate some tip. "Rucha, it's the New Year. Look, everyone is screaming and kissing on the street."

I looked out the window. The streets were littered with streamers and couples. I looked at my cell phone. I had about 3 new text messages, and my sister was calling me, as we had promised each other we would do right at midnight. I was partly upset because I wanted to be the first one to call (it was a contest in my head), partly upset because I had no confetti to throw, and partly upset because we still hadn't paid tip. But most of all, I was upset because I missed it. It was 12:01, and the New Year had just eluded me.

There was no anticipation, no hoping, no squeezing anyone's hand. We waited for nothing, no one, before the moment had crept past us. Nothing was special, nothing was different. It just was. It happened. It was a night like any other. It was 2010. I was with the same beautiful friends I was with throughout 2009. I still hate cream puffs and boiled eggs; I still love spinach and lychee juice. My sister still wins Best Dressed. I still love family vacations. My hair is still unsure if it wants to be curly or straight. And besides fulfilling my few New Year's resolutions, I want nothing more than that feeling of waiting for nothing--not midnight, not 2010, not anything new. I am here. We have arrived. It's 2010, and everything already looks sparkly.

College: The Makeshift Years

2009-12-31T11:13:00.006-05:00

During finals last year, when everyone retired their high heels and happiness for sweatpants and distress, the Residence Hall Association sponsored a coffee & donuts break. By the time my friends and I got to the table, all that was left was coffee and the cinnamon donuts no one ever wants. There seemed to be a milk shortage in McMahon Hall, for the cartons had been ravaged, a few drops of half and half sliding down the leg of a chair.

I don't like black coffee, but it was already midnight, and I still had a century of Western European art to memorize. My friend and I decided to chase our black coffee with the cinnamon donuts. A bite of donut, a gulp of black coffee, and soon our lips were light brown and our hands were shaking. Success.

I have learned very little in the last few years worth reiterating. War is inevitable. The Boolean system has taken over the world. God is still debatable.

College seems to have been a little blip in the trajectory of our lives. It is an anomaly. It just doesn't make sense. Everything I had ever learned in my life, about life, surrendered to the absurdity of College.

Sometimes, when I am really hungry and have run out of food, I eat my pasta with ketchup. It is now one of my favorite dishes. When I feel really creative, I douse it in red pepper flakes. Other times, I put raisins in a spoon of peanut butter, for a collapsible peanut butter and jelly.

When my roommate and I resolve, for the nth time, to look like [insert arbitrary airbrushed actress], we go to the gym compulsively for weeks before we go home and eat and sleep and forget about resolutions and goals. And then we start all over again.

When my friend and I decided we were in love with Michael Phelps because he consumes 12,000 calories per day, we slept outside NBC studios all night in order to see him on SNL the day after. Obama was to make a surprise appearance, but we weren't as excited about him because he ate arugula and brown rice, not chocolate chip pancakes and Red Bull. At around 3 in the morning, my friend went to Chicken and Rice, the famous Halal cart on 53rd and 6th. At around 7 in the morning, we woke up, the line started moving, and we had hopes of seeing the dress rehearsal, if not the actual show. That night, after showering and napping and eating more Halal food, we went back to 30 Rock. We made it through security, twice, and were waiting at the elevators, about to be escorted to the studios, until they decided they were over capacity, or some lame safety excuse.

There are times when I feel really stressed out, overwhelmed by thoughts of essays and gays and world peace, and so I sit in the middle of my room, on the $2 rug I bought from IKEA, and retreat from the noisy, colorful, dizzy world. After five minutes of kneeling on the dusty floor, my knees start aching and all I feel is a strong desire for Burrito Box.

For Halloween this year, I picked out my costume five minutes before we went out. I was a pirate, which entailed my suitemate's white blouse, my friend's boots, and my own bandanna and fishnet tights. My other suitemates picked other combinations of jewelry and clothes, belonging to whomever, to become gypsies, M.I.A., or just slutty [insert arbitrary noun].

When I turned 21, my friends planned a potluck dinner, to which they even invited my family. The food was delicious, everyone was happy, and I spent the last few moments of compulsory sobriety with the people I love the most. At midnight, my roommate brought out a bottle of champagne that she had hid in the freezer. She distributed plastic cups. I unscrewed the cork, it popped, fizz splattered all over the floor. Everyone cheered. And then we discovered that whatever had not exploded from the bottle was frozen inside the bottle. Everyone sighed. My other suitemate got her hair dryer. We sat for ten to fifteen minutes blowdrying the bottle. Soon, the popsicle became slush. And we toasted my 21st with champagne slushies in plastic cups.

Our lives are handmade, spontaneous, and poorly manufactured. But it works. Our makeshift lives, though incongruous with the rest of the world, with the rest of anything we have ever learned, have brought about a real happiness, transcending the collapsible nature of our creations, to something much more lasting. We have created our own makeshift reality, within the transparent confines of youth, of ResLife policies, of invincibility, of debauchery, of the present.

And the world holds its breath, waiting for us to grow up.

[insert nostalgia]

An Indian Wedding--Part 2

2009-12-26T15:44:00.003-05:00

The second morning was religious ceremonies, pre-nuptial Hindu rites nuanced with Punjabi, Marathi, and Gujarati flavors. As the ceremony proceeded in one corner, families continued to catch up and gossip and eat throughout the rest of the room, as if independent of the wedding's events. My uncle got everyone together, everyone who wasn't directly involved in the ceremonies, and announced that his family was moving to a new bungalow. Everyone became emotional and cried and hugged one another, as the pundits continued to create a s sort of background score with their chanting.

I heard my name being called, and turned to see the bride-to-be and her parents beckoning me from their seat by the pundit. I assumed they were calling someone else, but realized I was the only "rucha" in that crowd of people. I hesitantly walked over. I was told to sit. I sat. I leaned over to the almost-bride. "I have no idea what I am doing." She smiled. "I need a sister to do the next bit." I stared blankly at the pundit, at the cameraman, at my family who wasn't paying attention. After I tied the "thing" to her head, the pundit stopped chanting long enough to tell me to pose for the camera.

That night was the Sangeet. There were classical musicians and singers, as well as my up and coming, already acclaimed cousin who blew us away with his enchanting voice. We listened, we cried, we were trampled upon by wild toddlers, we ate as if there were no tomorrow.

For me, there was barely a tomorrow. I missed many of the typical festivities surrounding the wedding, like hiding the groom's shoes, because I had to take an early car back to the ashram in order to relieve myself, of the itchy gold jewelry, makeshift slip, and last night's dinner. As soon as I had come out of the bathroom, I saw that the rest of our group had followed, and all 10 were telling me to take rest amidst the renewed conversation and random, continual movements.

By the time I woke up, everyone, not only my group of my mother's sisters and their husbands, , but all of her cousins, their families, the drivers, and even the bride-groom's family knew of my mishap. I walked into the reception, head helld high in my sari and high heels, feeling tall and older and sophisticated, only to be met by a barrage of questions and concerns regarding my intestinal health. Soon, I was tripping over my sari, pani puri dribbled all down my chin, and threat of another diarrheic attack prevented from from a second dish of rose ice cream.

And then everyone was crying again. People began to leave the wedding, saddened by seeing empty chaat dishes, and by the realization that this was the end of it all.

Except that in 15 minutes, almost everyone gathered in one of the common rooms at the ashram, and sang songs, ate Skittles, and talked about homosexuality, the crowded commuter trains of Mumbai, and Russell Peters till dawn. My sister and I got little sleep, our minds stirring with excitement, our stomachs with aloo tikki.

And then we awoke to the sounds of chirping burds and my chirping aunts, left only with vestiges of the last three days, a broken toe, sensitive stomachs, and eyeliner smudged beneath our eyes.

Religion

2009-12-26T08:48:00.006-05:00

My family is one of those liberal, confused, spiritual, close-knit, kumbaya types. So, after opening our presents, we went to see Sherlock Holmes. My father, an avid Arthur Conan Doyle fan, was disappointed by the film's version of characters and plot; my mother slept through most of it except those scenes with Rachel McAdams; and my sister and I fell in love with Jude Law all over again.

And then my family came back home, ate chocolate and baked Lays and drank apple cider. I decided to capitalize on the Netflix free trial period, and watched movies all afternoon, including plot-less Indie films like David and Layla, inspirational movies like Jerry Maguire and the First Wives Club, and the classics, namely She's All That.

I felt warm and fuzzy and nostalgic when Freddie Prinze, Jr. and Rachel Leigh Cook kissed. I wanted to be in love and be an artist and be frozen in this one moment forever. The eco-friendly, plastic Christmas tree glowed red and gold in the living room, illuminating the plates and pots from Mexico on the hutch. My family was dispersed throughout the first floor, afraid to be more than 10 or 12 feet away from each other. Every now and then, someone would join me on the couch in front of the TV. And the world comprised me, Netflix, whole wheat crackers, and whoever was under the blanket with me.

Merry Christmas, or whatever.

An Indian Wedding--Part 1

2009-12-03T21:12:00.007-05:00

I got diarrhea at my very first Indian wedding. As people threw colorful rice at the bride and bridegroom around the ceremonial fire, I squatted above a porcelain hole in the floor, in my new mustard and turquoise and gold lengha, all my make up and dignity surrendering to the harsh humidity and stench of the wet bathroom.

My family and I escaped the cold, grey city for to spend a week in the East. Always our most faithful companion, the Indian heat remained by our side for the duration of the trip. The excessive air conditioning on the plane deceived us, and we almost immediately began wilting in the Mumbai humidity upon arrival. We reached my aunt's house at about 4 in the morning. Everything was dark and quiet, except for the excited chatter from my uncles and aunts who also arrived that morning.

As I trudged through the living room, a quick movement suddenly caught my eye. A large figure suddenly arose from underneath the table. I froze in fear. When my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw that it was only the live-in help, some of whom also emerged from the couch. Outsid of their shiny, marble apartment, I could see hundreds of slums in the soft, shy sunlight.

The family rented out rooms in the nearby ashram. It was clean and peripherally spiritual. We stepped out of the car, only to be met by cousins, families, random elderly, acquaintances, and even stray dogs, who, each in their own respective gaits, swarmed us in a predictable frenzy of high-strung emotions, back-slapping, awkward re-introductions, and welcome (or unwelcome) comments about weight gain/loss. I wondered if I could get an extension for my French paper, if I should touch this arbitrary older man's feet, or if there was toilet paper in the bathrooms. Thinking was too tiring, so my sister and I took showers instead.

The Mehndi Ceremony was first. People mingled and hastily caught up with each other as we all waited our turns. I began talking to a lady who was probably my grandmother's age, about my career plans, my outlook on life, and my deceivingly prepubescent face. She told me about her son who is stationed in Jammu, and how the place is both beautiful and fatal. I felt comfortable talking to her in Gujarati. After about 15-20 minutes, she was close to adopting me, and replacing that soldier son of hers. Till the last day of festivities, I had no idea how we were related.

The ladies hired to do the mehndi were hardworking, extremely talented, and brutally honest. They assumed I didn't understand Hindi, and had no hesitation criticizing the hair on my arms, discussing loudly about how I don't wax. In order to create the most intricate designs, they would contort my arms into odd positions, mistaking them for canvas or clay; I had no choice but to lean awkwardly close to them so to prevent a searing pain in both my elbows. And then they would push me back hard into my plastic seat, telling me, "relax." So, I would relax. Mehndi would get smeared on the chair. They would scold me for not holding still, for breathing too hard, for trying to resist the super human positions in which they held me.

That night was the DJ/dance/fun/chili paneer appetizers night. There was not only Bollywood and hip hop, but pseudo-traditional dances from Gujarat, Maharasthra, and Punjab, embracing the different backgrounds of the two families coming together. More relevant to my immediate interests was the chili paneer, followed by a generous buffet, which I attacked while people were dancing. I am still curious as to why my bowels did not cooperate that weekend.

My immediate group comprised my mother's parents, all of their daughters and their husbands, in addition to my sister and me. We were 11 people sharing 2 bedrooms in the Ashram. A few people took beds, and the rest of us threw down mattresses and sheets on the floor. Every inch of the floor was covered, so that my legs were inclined and resting on the side table, and my mother and aunts kept tripping over them as they took midnight trips to the bathroom. Sometimes my mother didn't even attempt to step over them, and would just walk on me in her rush to get to the other side of the bedroom. There was never any dearth of conversation topics, which ranged from politics to Bollywood gossip to menopausal updates, and between their sweet chatter and my mother's violent needs to traverse her children, my sister and I hardly got any sleep.

The mornings were dizzy, frenetic, and taught me truly the nature of a love-hate relationship. My mother would kick me awake, or poke me with her toe because I "look so sweet" when I am sleeping. With a tube of bright red lipstick in hand, my aunt would chase her sister, my other aunt, around the room, which was still littered with bedsheets and people. My grandfather would absent-mindedly read the newspaper among strewn about saris and body insecurities, while my grandmother would yell at him to leave the room. People of all ages threw tantrums, threw cell phone chargers, threw clothes. I blew a fuse with my hair straightener and my grandfather lost his precious shaving kit. My uncles and father peacefully took turns using their bathroom to get ready, and would pop their heads into our room every so often to remind us of their irritating ability to dress with ease, unaffected by raging passions and histories of familial tension and rivalry. On the last morning, the day of the actual wedding, (when I succumbed to the culminating effects of sugar cane juice, binge paneer eating, and everpresent ghee), I was running around in search of a slip, and finally my mother simply wrapped a sheer scarf around my waist and safety pinned it to my underwear. Then, we all went down for breakfast.

soledad

2009-11-17T21:26:00.004-05:00

I am not sure what they call this era. Modernity, post-modernity, recession, depression, crisis. It all refers to the same phenomenon. Everyone is lost. Everyone is running. Everyone is alone.

We all scream about sexual freedom and equality. We want control of our own bodies. We hold a disbelief in God, in love, in anything more infinite than space. And then we find ourselves enslaved by ourselves, by our freedom, by our solitude. We have compromised our emotional sanity and stability for sexual endeavors, our bodies for experimentation. We are all looking into a mirror, shattered, diffracting light in one thousand directions.

There are so many faces in New York City. Brown ones, sallow ones, baby ones, poor ones, dead ones. Everyone's eyes are empty, vacuous, soulless. We all look exactly the same--tired, impatient, and wet from all the rain.

Liberate us from the wakeful world. Scream about sleep.

When Debauchery Became Legal

2009-11-11T09:41:00.007-05:00

I turned 21 last week. I can gamble, drink, and create memorable nights I won't ever remember (probably for good reason). But now, after the initial excitement of being a legal alcoholic, I just feel old, sleepy, and in want of an old Disney movie.

In the last 5 or 6 years, I have experienced a slow liberation from legal enslavement. When I turned 17, all I wanted to do was drive (I failed my test and started driving one year late); when I turned 18, all I wanted to do was vote (I didn't register till I was 19); when I turned 19, all I wanted to do was buy cigarettes (I don't smoke). When I turned 21, I felt as though a great weight had been lifted: no more dressing older, no more passing back IDs, no more overly-priced cover charges for being under 21.

No more fear.

But it is this fear that keeps us young, that keeps our hearts racing, that keeps us alive. I was afraid to turn 20, to leave the decade that allowed me to make mistakes and eat burritos for breakfast with no effect. But 21 may be worse. It is too easy. There is nothing to chase. There is nothing to remark. There is nothing extraordinary about a legal adult paying $1 to see a concert in Webster Hall when all her friends paid $20, or about a legal adult dancing on furniture with her underage best friends. In fact, debauchery becomes debauchery when you turn 21. Before that, it is all fun and games.

Now, I am just awaiting my 25th, when I will finally be able to legally rent a car in Jersey (which I won't drive).

Freshman Fifteen

2009-10-09T14:10:00.002-04:00

I didn’t understand the phrase “you are what you eat,” until freshman year of college when my physical appearance could be likened to late night cold sesame noodles, Friday night partying, and overdoses of Rockstars and Red Bull. I gained about 10 pounds in three months. After winter break, my best friend and I decided to go on a health kick and use the six months we had before summer started to get ready for the beach. Of course, we came across crippling injuries, once-in-a-lifetime parties in Brooklyn, and the opening of a Pinkberry two blocks away from campus. The months flew by in about five minutes, and before we realized, we were discussing the proposition of losing eight pounds in three weeks.

We shrugged off inner beauty. “What does that even mean?” my friend would ask on many occasions, as she would woefully gulp down boiled vegetables and milk for dinner. “It’s bullshit Dr. Phil made up to sell books,” I would respond in between mouthfuls of cold spinach. We would then sit sullenly in the corner of the study lounge, giving dirty looks to our suitemate whose diet consisted mainly of donuts and Ramen and wine, and still looked scarily thin, underweight even.
My parents are very good at telling the truth after the fact. When I was 17, I wanted to donate my hair to Locks of Love. The hairdresser cut off too much. I looked like a boy. My mother said she loved it. A year later, when my hair grew out, she confessed to crying herself to sleep the night I got my haircut. When I would visit home during breaks, my parents would tease me about eating too much ice cream, but then tell me that I finally looked beautiful, that I was too bony before. My father would say that it was nice to see me looking a wholesome, healthy woman finally, instead of underweight. Indian people love to see a little “meat on the bones.” I am vegetarian. For some reason, their telling me that I looked ugly before and now looked curvaceous and lovely didn’t quite appeal to my confidence. But, still, they did try.

My friend constantly tried to find the nutritional value in our unhealthy habits. “Saag paneer is not bad—it’s cheese and spinach.” “Granola is not that fatty.” “Milk chocolate has, well, milk.” I am still waiting for the day when she will tell me that it is okay to indulge in Poptarts because the inside tastes like strawberries. Then she smiles at me and we both look into the distance, at a time when we will be running through some beach and our bellies won’t jiggle, even if we end up fainting from lack of food. “Anorexia is unhealthy, but Bulimia is not that bad of an idea, right?” “Well, apparently you go to rehab for that, so you’re better off trying to contract Salmonella.”
In June of that summer, there was a scare in the Northeast about tomatoes having Salmonella. We began putting ketchup on everything. There was still some hope left.

A Small World

2009-09-27T01:23:00.007-04:00

Being an immigrant has its benefits. Hipsters feign interest in my life, I don't have to worry about being President, and I got free munchkins and coffee at Dunkin Donuts today.

I usually get coffee from the cart, but today I was in the mood for something commercial, especially with a 10% student discount. I ordered a small coffee with skim milk. The Indian teller grinned. "No sugar?" I nodded, motioning with my index finger and thumb that I wanted only a little bit.

He rang up my order. "Oh, I'm so sorry I forgot to tell you I was a student." I fumbled around my wallet for my Fordham ID. "Oh, you are a shtudent?" He looked me straight in the eye, and then grinned again. "Wow. Oh, Rucha Desai. You are Indian?" He looked shocked. Somehow, while the entire world can see that I am Indian, from my prominently Indian features and dark skin, Indians themselves, especially Gujaratis, always fail to acknowledge me as one of them.

"Where are you from?"

I almost answered Jersey, hoe, but recovered. "Gujarat."

"Oh! Me too! Shame shtate. From where?"

"I'm from Ahmedhabad."

"Oh! I am too from Ahmedhabad. I am here two months."

And then I genuinely got excited. We were from the same hood. I asked him if he knew my grandfather, Dolar Vasavada, a well-known advocate or judge or politician (no one in my family, including my grandfather himself, is sure).

"What? I am not understanding."

"Dolar Vasavada. Do you know him?"

He continued to look quizzically at me while I continued to chant my grandfather's name. The Indian cashier next to him shook his head and smiled at me, as though we were both in on some joke, as though he too found ridiculous this scene in which a small pseudo Indian looking girl was ceremoniously repeating an foreign sounding name to a dark, grinning, seemingly deaf man against a backdrop of donuts and muffins. For a moment, I thought I had found solace in him.

"She shaid do you know her grandfather? He is Basubhai." The moment was gone. I was alone.

"No. Dolar Vasavada. Vasavada. He is an advocate."

"Oh! Vashavada! No. I don't know him. Do you know how to speak Gujarati?"

I wanted to respond in Gujarati. In fact, during the entire dialogue (my yelling, his not hearing me), I wanted to just relay the message in Gujarati; for some reason, when I most needed to use the language, it completely escaped me. I could think of all these filmy Bollywood lines, lots of Hindi responses to his questions, but not a single word of Gujarati.

"Yes, but not well." He looked disappointed. And then he attempted more conversation.

"I am going to Ahmedhabad for a wedding."

"Oh! When?"

"In Ahmedhabad."

"No, when?"

"In India!" I could have easily resolved this miscommunication by saying "kyare?" but the word eluded me.

"No, I am saying when?"

And then the other cashier once again provided his version of help--"She is saying who!"

"Oh, it is my sister."

"NO! When is the wedding?" And then it clicked. "Tueshday."

I smiled. "I am going in November." He looked surprised. "Your wedding!"

Once we clarified that I was not getting married, that I was a Nager Brahmin, a title I have never truly understood but emphasized with great passion in Dunkin Donuts, and that I live with a Goan roommate, not my parents, he finally handed me my coffee.

The other cashier, who during this entire exchange neglected his own customers as he watched us, stopped me before I could pay. "She's your friend. No paying." And then he handed me two free munchkins. "Okay, you are a friend."

My eyes were brimming with tears of joy, of relief, of gratitude. Free country, free friends, free food. God Bless America.

all hail Asher Roth, because I love college

2009-09-06T16:59:00.008-04:00

I have been spontaneously combusting the last week and a half. I am almost done with college, and so close to my future that I can feel my hairs burning in its flames. The fabulous life I envisioned for myself is now tangible, and now all I want to do is ride the subway forever, without pause, with no destination, until I can fall asleep.

The GirlTalk concert was essentially a sweaty, energetic mass of students, high on life and drugs and mixed music. Everyone was friends that night, dancing with strangers, stepping on friends' feet, the gays grinding on the straights (and with each other), sharing perspiration. We sang along with Beyonce and Kanye on the radio on the way back, the Ram Van shaking and groaning as it bore 11 vigorously dancing Lincoln Center kids. And then we shared stories of the night at the Flame, sitting amongst various other groups still drenched from the same concert.

Last night was another indescribably random and seemingly uneventful night, though peppered with a stranger screaming "cambodian breast milk" from a moving car, a newfound romance and pretend birthday party at Blockheads, and a small verbal dispute on the subway which ended in a stranger calling my best friend a terrorist. Oh yes, and I was again mistaken to be 18. I went to bed about an hour before dawn, and when I woke up I could think of nothing but scrambled eggs.

When I graduate, I will be finished. As young as I will still be (and appear to be), I will not be able to dance on chairs and tables (and then proceed to fall off) with my best friends, or eat diner food past dinner time, or even go to trashy dive bars and trashy comedy clubs and trashy tourist spots without being considered trashy. I hand in my cap and gown, and receive a diploma, which then obliges me to learn foreign notions of moderation, cholesterol, inside voices, and utility bills.

So I am going to be Peter Pan for Halloween. This year, 15F1 is Neverland. I am going to wear green tights and a feather in my cap until I have to trade it in for a black cap with a tassel, when I will go out for after-work drinks and buy my sister birthday presents from my own money and talk to my parents about the FICA tax.

Until then, I am going to act as young as I look. And eat diner food every night.

I went through puberty, I swear!

2009-08-23T23:06:00.005-04:00

My friend resorted to using her fake ID to get me into The Ugly Truth.

The movie is rated R. I left my wallet at home, without identification of any sorts as I was neither driving, drinking, gambling, or flying, and forgot that a Katherine Heigl romantic comedy would require anything more than a movie pass.

I should carry my identification at all times, though. The lady manning the weight room asked my age. I first nodded at my pass, which has my birth date, and then almost said 18, just because I was nervous. "I'm 20." The lady laughed and said, "OK, well as long as you are above 13, because you know, if you are younger than 13 you can't use the weight room."

Initially, upon AMC's rejection, I thought my friend, Emily, could fill the role as my necessary adult companion. But seeing as she was only 20, and the age to accompany minors into R-rated films is the same as the age to walk into any bar in the States, we resorted to begging. "Please, she really is 20, I promise!" "Yea, seriously, what are we supposed to do?" "I mean, I know she looks 16, but she's old enough to watch this!"

As it does in bars and casinos and border control, begging backfired. We stepped out of the line. After much contemplation, much deliberation, we managed to devise a plan to manipulate the system. Apparently, there were additional ID checks passed the ticket check, in front of the R-rated theaters. We decided to buy tickets to see Julie and Julia and then walk into the theater showing our sweet and not so innocent comedy. If at all we were to meet a bouncer, one of those bald, black, muscular guys employed to fend off underage teenagers, she would use her fake ID and I would be the minor accompanying her.

We managed to sneak into the theater unscathed. The film was perfectly crass, funny, and inappropriate for anyone under 15. I conceded to the theater's seemingly arbitrary policy of ID'ing; if I really were the age I looked, then this movie may have turned me into a child porn star, or confused me in the least.

When I do turn 21 (in 3 months, not 6 years), I will gamble, drink, and accompany some underage fresh mind into an R-rated comedy.

But until then, I will see all the PG-13 movies I can, and hope for the best.

life happens, so give lap dances.

2009-08-19T10:45:00.004-04:00

Manu and I watched 500 Days of Summer last night. It's the story about a boy who loves a girl, a girl who doesn't believe in destiny and miracles and true love. The film simply unravels, like life.

I don't know how many true love stories are left. Youth seems everlasting, as do short skirts, free tequila shots, and cologne doused with pheremones. But before we can run to CVS to buy anti-aging cream, the short skirt works well as a bib, the shots are neither free nor do they sit well, and the cologne smells like pepper spray. In 500 Days, the girl does not end up with the boy. There is no cathartic rain scene, no traffic jam through which he must wade to get to her, no kiss in front of hundreds of tourists at the Empire State Building. They fall apart. He falls apart. And life just happens.

Love is real, but everyone always runs from it, while pretending to be running towards it. Nice guys are out, guys with good hair are in. Girls who are strung out are boring, while girls who run from you always seem to have the longest legs. Loneliness is said to be underrated, but everyone is scared to be alone. The math just doesn't seem to always work out: one girl + one boy =/= love. Instead one girl and one boy create a sense of imbalance, until this renowned "one" comes along.

In efforts to pursue this famed and destined love of my life, I give lap dances in the subway cars. En route to grab lunch at Yaffa Cafe with my cousin, I lost my balance in the L train. I couldn't help it; life just happened, and before I knew it, I landed squarely into the lap of the hobo sitting next to me. He grunted, slightly shocked at receiving this kind of attention. Love feels good. Even if it is a figment of our imagination, or the consistency we crave when we are lonely, love is good stuff. It comes in all shapes and sizes--my mother's worn hands, my father's scrambled eggs, my sister's undying loyalty. It can look like a football player, a windswept brunette, a musician, or even a random girl you meet in the L train who moves the relationship along quickly, from sitting close to you to sitting right on top of you.

Let life happen. Free lap dances may be involved.

Hello, stranger.

2009-08-14T10:08:00.003-04:00

Hello. My name is Rucha. And I am addicted to [insert one of the following: nutella, lost cases, fitness, sales, Craisins, gay marriage, winning].

It is nice to meet you, and your soon to be exposed addictions to [insert one of the following: pain, your boyfriend, the future, Clairol's Born Blonde, the Hills]. Let's be friends. Don't tell me your flaws, and I won't tell you mine. Let's pretend that the smooth hazelnutty tickle of nutella on my tongue doesn't haunt my dreams, shattering any I had of looking like Penelope Cruz. Let's pretend that you don't keep leaf through bridal magazines before you are old enough to drink. Let's pretend that I don't run after what is lost, and you don't obsess over what you have found. Let me win, and I will let you lose.

fat or cheap?

2009-08-12T11:41:00.003-04:00

I have always liked grocery shopping. I like food, I like the serenity of buying my own food, and I like thoughts of future meals with said food.

Yesterday, the tranquility with which I food shop was shattered. Dripping chlorinated water onto the white marble of Ridgewood's Stop & Shop, I was holding a loaf Stop & Shop's whole wheat and Freihofer's whole grain bread. I heard no other sounds except the repetitive beep of scanners at the other end of the store.

"You know, you can't just count the calories; it's the carbs that really get you. You need to count the carbs."

A large, bald, middle aged black man was stooped above me, smiling knowingly. I was silent for a few minutes, trying to transition to reality, yet blinded by his dazzling white teeth. Still in shock, I just laughed. "Yea, see, you wouldn't realize but really, you should be counting the carbs." I laughed in response again. He then said his good byes and walked away.

Five minutes later, when I managed to re-plunge myself into the nooks and crannies of generic and branded breads, I was suddenly confronted with a bald and black floating head. "And sorry about startling you before." Again, I laughed in response. He smiled and walked away.

And a day has not gone by when I regret not telling him that I was not counting calories, but the price to weight ratio. I wanted cheap bread.

Burrito Box, USA

2009-08-07T16:35:00.008-04:00

I came back to New York for Burrito Box.

I started giggling uncontrollably when I got out of Port Authority last night. After having seen cities that earned superlative titles in beauty or cleanliness or liberal drug policy, my city offered the sense of familiarity and home that no other city could offer. London did elicit a sense of comfort, but I felt lost amidst the hush that fell upon the city after midnight, unsettled by the drivers on the lefthand side of the road, and perpetually hungry for Mexican food.

The theater district was as obnoxious and crude as usual, swamped with foreigners ("Y'all hungry? There's an Applebees.") With an expertise only the damn Yankees can hope to possess, I maneuvered through the crowds, and finally made it to Fordham, all the while talking to my mother on the phone as an excuse for my freakishly large grin.

Fordham ResLife decided to stop issuing guest passes for the next week, so I was initially supposed to be carted in as luggage. As if to celebrate my homecoming, McMahon Hall was also shutting off electricity and water the following morning (today), and all residents, and their illegal guests, were to evacuate the building by 8 am.

And then, more embracing than Fordham ResLife or a tourist enamored of Times Square, was seeing my friends. Bianca and I shrieked when we saw each other, our tuneless and incredulous yells piercing the harmony of the warm night. We decided we still loved each other and despite all the adventures we had apart, we still had the rest of our lives to live together.

We went to the art event in Chelsea that Amy had helped to produce, the Slideluck Potshow. Amy looked like a quintessential extra in Sex and the City, "immaculately polished" but with the spirit of a New Yorker. We heaped our plates with hummus and salsa and pita chips, and then got some fresh air on the balcony, from which we could see the entire city illuminated, and on which Bianca stole 8 beef franks. (She doesn't like hot dogs).

Leslie's cacaphonous voice over the loud speaker the next morning warned us of the exodus, and half asleep, half wishing we had our own Zion with no arbitrary McMahon oppression and free flowing milk and honey (and pinkberry), we filed mechanically out of the building.

We took refuge in the Flame, for about two hours, until a party of 15 trendy Koreans and 2 white men, one middle aged and the other a teenager like the Koreans, sat down for brunch right next to us. Failing to figure out the thread connecting everyone at that table, we got our 10% student discount and walked to the Hudson. We sat on the deck admiring the eclectic furniture, randomly placed among a 7-foot tall watering can, several yellow ceramic vases, and a short bed in the center of everything. Tourists staying at the hotel began posing with the watering can, at which point we left to pick up burritos for Manu and me to eat later. It was the first Mexican place in which I had set foot in over two months. Without pause, I ordered the burritos, with brown rice, brown tortillas, and no sour cream; it was a sense of control I had not felt in London, sifting through the various fried fish and meat dishes to get to a remotely flavorful and ambiguous vegetarian dish.

I held those burritos in my hand for the rest of the day, as I finished errands and met my friend Daniyal downtown on Macdougal St., where I got Mamoun's for my parents. He drove me home, and the entire ride I could think of nothing but the I heart NY plastic bag I had been holding for the past 4 hours. Manu had hardly opened the front door before I ran into the kitchen. She spread out the burritos and salsas, while I washed my hands.

And then I took the first bite. It was my first bite of New York City, my first bite of home, my first bite of a black bean burrito doused in salsa fresca and a hot sauce that burned my chapped lips. It was my first bite of America, a taste pure and simple, a taste of freedom, just like the pilgrims sought.

There were probably tacos at Plymouth Rock.

underage swimmers

2009-08-04T15:53:00.005-04:00

I didn't visit a coffee shop in Amsterdam. I bought a koffie americano and some chocolate with hempseed.

But Manu and I did go to the Y today, where we were interrogated and emotionally violated during the lap swim.

Like the coffee shops in Amsterdam, the YMCA adult lap swim is 18+. With just my [not-so]-smooth skills, which usually delay my passage at airport security, Manu and I would not have stood a chance getting past the desk. Fortunately, there had been a major accident, and paramedics had flooded the place, so that we slipped past unnoticed.

After being kicked out of the Mother & Girls locker rooms for being too old, and then a scramble for the showers in the women's locker rooms, Manu and I thought we had finally crossed all hurdles when we plunged into the blue pool. About 30 laps into the swim, however, the young blonde lifeguard walked over to us. He had been watching us for the last half hour, so I fixed my oversized bathing suit (I was wearing one I found around the house), which was inflating in the water, batted my eyelashes, and smiled.

"Are you both over 18?"

And my entire life (well, this entire summer) flashed before my eyes. The Indian promoter in London who essentially ID'd me on the street (despite my not wanting to go to his club); the American girl on the flight to London who thought I was a junior in high school; the children's ticket I could buy at the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam. Now, I was being asked to leave the YMCA adult swim.

"I'm 20."

He stared blankly at me. "Well, it's just that you don't look 20; you look under 18." And then he looked at my sister, who stared blankly back at him instead of lying or admitting to be an underage swimmer. He must have decided she was okay, or got flustered with her silent response, so he turned back to me. "The teen swim is in the other pool. This is the adult swim for those over 18."

"Okay, well I'm 20."

He continued to stare at me.

"It's just that, you don't look it."

"I get that all the time. No worries." I pulled my goggles forward, dismissing his doubts entirely, and yet he stood firmly above us.

"You know, I'm only asking because people get angry at me if I don't ask. Because if you're under 18, you need to be in the other pool."

I kicked off the wall, and then turned back to him, mid-stroke. "Okay, whatever, that's cool."

And then he continued to watch us from the bench, as if our juvenile strokes could reveal our true ages, and an innate immaturity characterizing those under 18, like me.

home

2009-08-03T14:46:00.001-04:00

I am home. After 7 weeks of Europe, of beautiful towns and beautiful people and beautiful age, I can finally use the possesive in conversation: my comforter, my bananas, my cell phone, my unlimited supply of ketchup. I was fortunate to have my family with me the last 2 weeks of the trip, and family and friends who hosted us unconditionally, but sometimes even your own people cannot compare to free bathrooms and grocery stores that stay open past 6 o'clock.

make love (to hobos) not war

2009-08-03T14:32:00.000-04:00

I got flowers and a kiss from a toothless homeless woman in Brussels. She serenaded me in her cracked voice, telling me how beautiful I was in French, before she proceeded to hand out more dead roses and kisses to my mother and sister.

My father handed her a few euros so she would leave, but when she saw that he was the only one giving her money, she suddenly turned on me, livid. "Mais, je t'ai donné quatre roses!" I shrugged. "Desoléé." She then walked out of my life, taking with her all but one of the browning and limp roses she had graciously given me only five minutes earlier.

Though I hadn't shown her much affection, I had grown quite fond of her, and almost started missing her smudged, oily face. As we wandered around Brussels, we ended up running into her twice; each time she was in a passionate argument with someone, and we walked past unnoticed. We drove back to Amsterdam, with the one limp flower she had left for us, never to see her again.

famous people

2009-08-03T09:16:00.000-04:00

After Amsterdam, our families drove through Germany, to a villa in Nothweiler, in the Alsace. It was a beautiful 3 apartment cottage, set against the backdrop of dark greenery and bright stars and an inflatable pool. And sometimes, we went to France just for dinner.

We lived very close to Wissembourg, a sleepy French town with little conspicuous personality but a lot of flammenkuchen (tarte flambé). So, one night, too tired to venture out to Strasbourg, we drove across the border, and without much realization, we were in another country.

I was half expecting European paparazzi to be on our trail. "Desai's now seen in France"..."Desai's last seen in their inflatable pool in Germany."

The ease with which we traversed borders rendered the concept of political borders comical. We were hungry, and didn't pause to consider the fact that we were in an entirely new country.

"Desai's last seen stuffing their faces on their northern Europe tour."

not all wanderers are aimless (but bikers are)

2009-08-01T13:42:00.001-04:00

I started believing in God on my second day in Amsterdam.

Consumed by a familiar sense of restlessness, I left everyone in the house and decided to re-learn how to ride a bike. I borrowed a bicycle that was slightly large for me, making it difficult to maneuver and, more importantly, brake, but I decided to circle the block anyways.

Feeling confident of my newfound (re-discovered) abilities, I decided to be adventurous and circled the next block, as well. In less than 5 minutes, I was hoplessly lost. I almost ran over an old man, and the wind almost knocked me into a parked car. The streets mirrored each other, and each Dutch house was unfortunately as charming as the next. I rode around their area for what seemed like hours, and finally, when I saw "BOEKIJLAAN" for the 5th time, I started praying.

I chanted a Buddhist chant I had learned as a child, one which held little meaning for me, but which I would automatically recite whenever I was scared or nervous. I wondered how long it would be until my parents would send out a search party, whether I should keep riding around the Dutch version of "the Lawns" or stay in one spot until someone would come for me. I needed saving.

I finally got off the bicycle, and started walking slowly along the sidewalk, almost in tears, scared of the perfectly square houses and the amalgamation of consonants on the street signs and the little blonde children riding on scooters.

And just when I had lost all hope, I heard a soft voice behind me. "Are you alright?"

It was the boy from whom I had borrowed the bicycle. He was my father's friend's son, though at that moment I saw him as some divine reincarnation.

I began gushing, and he simply smiled and led the way home--which was about two feet away from where I had given up in despair.

Everyone was waiting for me at home, laughing at me as I trudged into the dining room.

"I got lost."

"We know." And my mother continued singing in the kitchen, my sister started taking photographs of my embarassed face, and my aunt handed me potato chips. Subsumed by the immediacy of the moment, my religious convictions were dispeled. I rubbed the bleeding spots on the back of my ankles struck by the pedals, while I waited for dinner.

Manushi Comes to Town

2009-07-22T19:21:00.001-04:00

The best addition to London has been Manu.

While I looked almost haggard and aged (20 year olds cannot endure the London rains, or heat waves as a matter of fact), my sister walked out of the plane looking fresh and young and happy. I forgot she was jetlagged and complained of my exhaustion (a culmination of one month of not sleeping--see next entry for more info) the entire day.

Always the good sport, she dragged herself, without having slept 24 hours, through the inevitable, tourist sights of the city (the ones people always hate but must see to "earn bragging rights at home," as my father says) via a city tour on a double decker bus. It started raining while we were on top, the information was distributed quite fast, and the one thing I could discern was, "and they have maintained Harry Potter's platform 12 and three quarters at the King Cross station." After heaving and then correcting the tour guide, we jumped off the bus, and we went on a quest to find some crepes.

We finally found the perfect banana and nutella crepe at a small restaurant near my university hostel, and after watching the swans like little old women in Kensington Gardens, we headed back to my aunt's house, for some hot food and more importantly, some bed.

Bed didn't last too long. We needed to binge London in 3 days, so we were off again, this time to catch a cruise to Greenwich. We stood on the center of the world, admired the quaint streets of the town, and managed to get a free train ride back to London (no idea how).

We tasted the best falafel in the world at Borogh Market. After filling ourselves up with free samples and a very large, fudgy brownie, we decided to split the lebanese wrap, only to realize the biggest mistake of our lives. We tried to share, but wanted to rip each others throats out for the delicious sandwich. After it was finished, we stared into the sun, letting the wind blow vestiges of the garlic and lemon smell, and physical fragments of the falafel, into our faces.

We ended up paying more for 2 lemonades at the next cafe we went to, only because Manu had to use the bathroom and the only public toilet in sight was closed. It took the waitress about 30 minutes to get our bill, but we enjoyed our view of St. Paul's and this mysterious English boy with a suit case who sat on the curb for over half an hour.

After shopping and hoping to catch a glimpse of some bloody street fight in Oxford Circus, we headed back to E. Croydon. In Victoria, I actually ran into a friend from Ridgewood who I hardly see back in the States, but found in one of the many train stations in London.

Again, we came back to a delicious meal, and then slept like drunk babies the entire night--

until my alarm clock sounded the start of another hurried blur through London.

We left early so that we stroll across (run) Abbey Road before seeing the obligatory Changing of the Guard. Of course, our camera malfunctioned as soon as Manu crossed the road. I told her to cross back about 3 times, before coming to terms with the fact that either the batteries were faulty, the camera was defective, or, like all my friends joke, I genuinely have a cursed hand when it comes to cameras. We were then late for Changing of the Guard, and were even more delayed by the hundreds of avid cricket fans coming to Lord's for the Ashes tournament.

I found new batteries by a convenience store by Buckingham Palace, and we decided we would head to Abbey Road again. We visited Embankment first, went on the London Eye and raced through a huge meal at Wagamama (so quickly the waiter hesitated to take our plates away), thinking we had no time. We went back to St. John's Wood, this time without a stampede of national fans, and took our pictures and raced back to E. Croydon, just in time to head out.

Once we were finally seated onboard the train, in the first class compartment which was cheaper than standard on Sundays, we sighed, leaving behind us the fast paced and tiring life of touring London. Our aunt had joked that if we don't stay alert we might end up in Scotland.

2 hours later, I happened to glance on the screen and saw that our stop was next. I nudged my sister, though I was still not fully comprehending, and said nonchalantly, "I think this is us." She looked at me, and blinked. Then with a start, the both of us crammed all of our belongings into the backpacks, and rushed out of the train and onto the platform.

The train sped away from us, leaving my sister and I out of breath, our bones aching with exhaustion and the weight of all the candy bars I collected from the cafeteria.

Shit Happens

2009-07-22T18:33:00.000-04:00

Between bouts of extreme fatigue and arbitrary wireless connection, not to mention some much appreciated home cooked dinners from my aunts, I have not been able to write.

So I am now going to shed light on past adventures, like an old man.

Oprah, and others who subscribe to the notion of destiny and fate, believe everything to happen for a reason. Regardless of reasoning and an invisible logic to the universe, things do happen.

Arbitrary torrential rains destroy new shoes, the stereotypically bad food in England still causes people to gain weight, and wild umbrellas crash down on innocent Americans at dinner. Shit happens.

We all wanted to go somewhere nice for our last evening together. We wanted to eat by the water, and though I knew the area, I did not remember the quality of the restaurant, but expecting something classy, we all wore something nice.

And we ended up at one of the same pub style restaurants, though outside, that had consumed our money in exchange for greasy, generic food for the last month. After some bickering, we finally decided to make do with the limited options at this place in Gabriel's Wharf. Except for a few dishes, most people found their food satisfying, and all was well with dinner until time came to pay the check.

The bill was not the problem. But while we were collecting and counting money, one of our friends suddenly gasped, and, with no warning but a soft whistling sound, a large red and white umbrella came flying out of the air, landing on one of our party's heads.

We were stunned. Only the drunken laughs from the other tables brought us back to the reality of a very large and unstable umbrella resting on our table, wet with spilled drinks and covered in shards of glass. The boy who almost had a concussion went for a smoke, not wanting to cause a public display. Seeing no waitress in sight who could have witnessed and possible apologized, I went inside and let the waitress know what "the loud band" (as she had called it) was.

She didn't understand.

She sent the manager, who smiled at our wet pants, saw that no one was bleeding, and said, "things happen. what can I do?" After some kids started yelling about liability and responsibility and appeals for a discount, the manager took the service charge off, which is optional anyways.

"It's not their fault! We don't mind paying the service! It's the principle of the thing! This is bullshit!"

To which he suddenly took offense. "This is certainly not bulllshit. What can I do? You're outside. It happens."

We tried to justify the bad experience with the quality food, but couldn't muster up the courage to make such a brazen lie. Instead we wandered to the next pub, and drowned our sorrows in--oh no, there was no drowning of any sort, because, like all places in London except for McDonald's, this place closed at 11. So as soon as we got there, we essentially made one quick, hurried, emotional toast, and strolled out.

We took more pictures in the Tube station than we did above ground. We took candid ones, posed ones. We got on the Tube and took more, a documentation of all the events on a Tube ride, including sneezing and the possible elbow in your face. When we got back, the last leg of the group, my favorite people in London, all came and sat in my room. Three of us managed to squeeze onto the matchbox sized bed, and the other at my desk, farting.

I finally got to bed by dawn. The sun rose (excessively early, as usual), only to remind us that the small pocket of time we had shared in London became forever engrained in our memories, and nothing else.

There were tears at departure. We promised to meet in the States. We knew we would always have London, but we hoped we could have some of the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, and New Jersey, too.