A protagonist named Hero who is totally inept at good ton and basically the 18th C version of a pick-me: an ingenue who is loved by the boys, not so much the girls. This is a marry first, fall in love later story. Also, enjoyed Isabella The Incomparable and how she dealt with a cad. She deserves her own story, methinks. There is some disturbing stuff: Sheringham boxing Hero’s ears for example, though he has also had his boxed.
The Enchanted April, Isabella von Arnim
Sold as an Englishwomen on holiday in Italy, what isn’t immediately apparent is that they don’t know each other. They are all looking to escape something, in the case of two of them, marriages that are unhappy in different ways, but in the case of all, from patriarchal norms and the pressure to be “good women”. A really enjoyable read that makes some important points even as it descends into farce towards the end.
Coming Home, Rosamund Pilcher
Judith is one of those plucky Enid Blyton-esque boarding school heroines; this can be read as a ‘what happens to Daryl after she leaves Malory Towers’ story meets Downston Abbey. Judith is left behind by her family because it is not considered the thing for a teenage girl to be living in the colonies. She befriends a girl from a very posh family who takes her under their wings. This is a comin of age novel but also a war novel. If I have one quibble, it’s that Judith is so unfailingly good and right.
Creation Lake, Rachel Kushner
A very weird and philosophical novel about a woman who infiltrates a commune in France to goad them into committing an act of terror. What is being described is not implausible and yet despite her venality, I found myself rooting for the protagonist Sadie, perhaps because she sees through other people’s bullshit and has few illusions about herself being a good person either. The idea of the spy who does not spy on another country but on the country’s own citizens at the behest of Big Business is so now. It’s also a study in how easy people are to manipulate and how even idealistic groups fall into the same hierarchies as mainstream society. Fair warning: there’s a good big about Neanderthals.
Murder Most Foul, Guy Jenkin
Think Shakespeare in Love with a murder mystery thrown in. The mystery is – what else? – the murder of Christopher Marlowe, then considered the finest playwright of the age. We often forget that Shakespeare lived during the 16th century version of our pandemic and how terribly poor so many people – including those involved in the theatre profession – were in England’s Golden Age.
Boss was away for a week, and I was put in charge which I hate. This time was better than the last since he organised the week for me. However, there’s still a shit-ton of work to do and decisions to be made. Decisions my (least) favourite thing. 12 hours days. Joy (not).
At the end of which, I had dental surgery to remove the bone graft (that hadn’t taken in bone that had been eaten away by abscess that I left in my upper gum for too long) and put in a screw with some more cow bone or summat. I’ve been in the dentist chair since I was eight for something painful or other – cavities, root canal, impacted molars, tooth gone bad – and I’m honestly over it but suspect there’s more to come boo.
The second half of the month was dedicated to the kids exams, which we all survived without entirely losing our minds, although Mimi developed a cold. I was on the verge of not sending her for the first exam, but she said she would power through (much in contrast to her brother when a similar situation arose during the unit tests for him). She later told me she was inspired by a friend who was sick during the history exam, went out to puke, came back and finished the exam. I told her to call us if she felt sick and we’d come pick her up, exam be damned, though I appreciated her pushing herself to go ahead with it.
Towards the end of the month, there was a massive fire at a public housing estate in Hong Kong. When I went to bed on the night of November 26, the death toll was 13 and President Xi Jinping had sent his condolences. When I woke up, the toll had hit 65, and the fire was still raging. What started in one tower, spread to seven. Today, the toll stands at 159.
The buildings had been under renovation and immediately suspicion fell on the scaffolding and the netting used to cover it. The use of scaffolding and such netting is ubiquitous in Hong Kong but they are supposed to be fire-retardant. When government investigators went in, they initially said it turns out the netting was fire-retardant. But later, it was found that the contractor had replaced some netting during a typhoon and strategically replaced it with cheaper, less retardant material. Also, Styrofoam had been used to cover the windows, which acted as an accelerant.
What mystified me is not that one tower caught fire, and at speed, though that is unusual enough in Hong Kong. It’s that seven towers caught fire and people were trapped in all of them. It turns out the fire alarms didn’t work, and because of the covered windows people didn’t realise what was going on. Many elderly live in such estates and they may have been napping when it all happened. That the fire alarms didn’t work is shocking to me, because when we lived in Hong Kong, there was fire alarm testing more than once a year. It was quite annoying actually. So did this estate never test the alarms?
There are reports that they were turned off so the fire doors could be kept open to let the workers involved in the renovation use them unimpeded. And that complaints about workers smoking on the site had gone unheeded.
Meanwhile, our building in India has fire extinguishers on every floor, and fire sensors, but we’ve never had a fire alarm test to my knowledge and I have no idea if the sprinklers will work. The extinguishers do because once when there was a fire near our building our security guards took the extinguishers from 20 floors and put it out themselves. Apparently, they didn’t want to wait for the fire brigade. And we did have a fire drill once, and some dude gave a talk (which I missed because I was going for book club. priorities), so there’s that.
In Hong Kong, there are questions being raised about government oversight. The Labour Department did 16 inspections of the site since June and issued warnings (including, but not just, for fire safety), but the netting they tested seemed fine and that is all they’re allowed to do. It may emerge that government departments looked the other way with regard to the netting. But I have my doubts. This kind of low level corruption isn’t widespread in Hong Kong.
Moreover, the government is quite proactive. When the flat below us complained of a leak from our bathroom, the government actually got involved, sent someone to test for the source of the leak, and insisted our landlord fix the leak, which involved a major renovation, and they had to redo it when their initial fix didn’t work. All this Omicron Covid wave.
However, there is a limit to how much the government can monitor, and like governments everywhere, there are manpower restrictions to keep costs under control. Now, of course, things might change and they might step up inspections and might be less tolerant to pressure from the big contractors.
This pressure includes the pressure to keep bamboo scaffolding. In the aftermath of the fire, when questions were raised (again – because this has become a matter of some debate in recent years), many people defended the scaffolding, pointing out that it wasn’t the cause. Actually, we don’t know what the cause is.
Some months ago, I had looked into this after someone pointed out that Hong Kong should stop sentimentalising the use of bamboo scaffolding – it’s seen as part of the city’s cultural heritage – because it poses fire safety and other risks. The mainland has already moved on to metal. I found that there is indeed a risk, although the government has tried it’s best to improve safety standards. The problem is also that the old masters are retiring and there aren’t enough skilled workers for this kind of job, even though efforts are being made to bring in young blood. The government itself has moved to 50-per cent metal scaffolding for its projects. But apart from its cultural attractions, bamboo scaffolding is cheaper, and that is why the business sector at least wants it. So in a weird turn, big business and grassroot activist interest cohere here.
That said, the government is so skittish about any criticism. They sense that the opposition will use the fire to stir up dissent – which to be fair there seem to be some signs of – and so have arrested people for inciting hatred against the government, a vague offence under the national security laws. Western media hasn’t helped with its speculation about how the fire is the result of lack of democracy (when sorry no). Clearly there is now low tolerance of criticism that the government deems too much but I don’t think democracy would have helped prevent this or provided greater responsiveness in the aftermath.
Nearly 160 deaths might not seem like a lot, but in Hong Kong it’s unheard of. A few years ago, there was a fire in an old tenement, and seven people died. The city was shocked and there was a lot of reflection on what could be done better. The rules are pretty strict. So that a fire of the scale of November’s could happen means standards are slipping.
At a personal level for me, it makes me feel even more insecure. If this could happen in Hong Kong, I shudder to think of our safety here. A few days ago, I walked past an electric pole where I could see a small spark and a buzzing sound. A driver sat under it in his auto oblivious (not to the sound, he could surely hear that, but to the danger). Today, I drove past a small fire near an electric pole on the side of the road.
A few days after the Hong Kong fire, I realised I had some gold jewelry in my cupboard, and went to the bank and put it in a locker. But when I asked the bank staff if the locker room was fire resistant, they had no idea. All they could tell me was that they had insurance. V told me to sell all the gold and buy a fund. There’s an idea.
And just like that, we’re in the last month of the year.
It’s been a while since I binge-watched anything, and while this series (Peacock/Jio in India) has had a lot of buzz, I went into it not quite knowing what to expect.
Before this I had watched The Beast in Me (Netflix) and while I saw that through (which is saying something for me these days), I found it a bit too much (including Claire Danes’ chin quiver in moments of high emotion). It felt to me like the TV version of those books that are (duh) written for TV with twist after twist as the pace picks up and the characters not exactly behaving in a way that makes sense (even with substance abuse and trauma accounted for).
So I surprised myself by watching All Her Fault in one sitting up to 2.30am, which anyone who knows me will understand is totally out of character. Caveat: I did have a nap, and felt too well rested to go to bed at the usual time of 9.30pm – I know, but this is who I am now – which meant that I hit the midpoint of the series and then it was too grippy to stop and I because I am on leave for Nene’s exams – I know! and yes I do this still – I had the prospect of a nap the next day. But you can probably also tell from all this that I have uncharacteristically also not lost my shit – yet – despite the boy losing his biology textbook just before the exam starts (thank you Amazon for next-day delivery).
All Her Fault is a mother’s worst nightmare in many ways. A woman shows up at a house to pick up her son from a playdate, only to be told by its elderly resident that the family she thought lived there, don’t (apparently this was inspired by an experience the writer of the novel the series is based on went through). How could this be? A chill would run down the spine of any mother who has been through the playdate routine, because apart from the horror of something terrible happening to your child but also because of how such a scenario is not at all implausible.
[spoiler alert: stop reading now if you haven’t watched the series etc]
When a mom from your child’s school texts you to set up a playdate: 1. Would you stop to consider if it is really a mom from the school contacting you? 2. Would you let your child go on a playdate if you haven’t personally met the parents and know them well? 3. Would you let your child go on a playdate if you haven’t been to the house in question?
All this also changes with age, and we tend to let our guard down as the child grows older, but actually, should we? Before this series, it had never occurred to me to cross-check if the “mom” in question was actually who she said she was. Twice in the past year, I have been texted by people I don’t know, whose kids’ names I have never heard my son mention. In one case, even he wasn’t sure who the kid was (this tells you something about him. he’s terrible with adults but v.popular among kids).
In the second more recent case, Nene did know the kid but he was from another school. I had never met the parents. The birthday party was quite a distance from our house. We ended up sending him by Uber himself. To that mom’s credit, she posted updates on each kids’ arrival and departure on the chat group in addition to the photos of the kids at the party. When Nene left (V went to pick him up), she let me know when he left the party area and texted me privately to confirm that he had been safely picked up. (even though she didn’t know me from Adam) These are 15 years old, and this is a level of being kept in the loop I have not seen for a while.
I myself used to err on this level of communication, but seeing as most parents don’t, had stopped (urged by Nene who found me trying and embarrassing). For sleepovers, the kids seem to arrange it among themselves and just get permission from their own parents. But once when we picked up Nene from a friend’s house, his mum pointedly told me she had been a bit concerned because she had never met us and wasn’t sure that Nene had actually got permission to stay over. I took her point and since then I make it a point to be in contact with the parents if my kids are staying over, except for one friend of Mimi’s whose house she is a regular at who lives down the road and whose family I now know fairly well (I hope).
Anyway, back to the series, most except the most paranoid mums who has ever arranged the playdate would realise this could have happened to her. How many of us cross-check phone numbers with the school list? How many schools provide such lists?
And yet, of course the mother Marissa (Sarah Snook of Succession) is overcome with guilt. And of course she is blamed. Even though or because she works outside the home and is struggling and typically the husband helps, but it is she who carries the load. Ditto for the mum Jenny (Dakota Fanning) who hired the nanny who it turns out was involved. These two women gravitate to each other – as they did on the first meeting – and if I have one quibble it is how saintly Jenny is in her support. She always does the right thing, despite the high costs, and always knows the right thing to say.
These women’s first bond is forged over their struggles as people trying to build careers whose husbands are not stepping up to the plate. If the series is an exposure of, as one put it, the word mother has become synonymous with guilt, it is also an indictment of fathers.
We see a spectrum of fathers: the patronising dad who has to be cajoled into babysitting his own child, the dad who is great at the fun stuff but none of the drudgery, the completely absent husband of the presumably non-divorced stay-at-home mom, the dad looking to profit from his child. There is only one example of a great dad: who shares the load despite a demanding job (even though that means sometimes bribing his kid with candy – with his little guilt this is done though) and who takes pleasure in his demanding child.
There are several moments during the series where a woman gets blamed, or where she is either condescended to or told she is amazing as a sop in an attempt to preserve the status quo. In the end, the series interrogates the idea of goodness (kind of like the novel/play/ film Wicked) and the complicated layers behind extreme goodness.
My kids go to an international school, where many children go on to higher education overseas. In the interest of supporting them, the school has these sessions with an educational counsellor, which parents are allowed to attend. Only they are during the workday, so it’s tricky.
This time there was an online option, so I decided to juggle my schedule and tune in. I thought I was attending a session on subject choice, but it turns out, this was on gheraoing the kids into beefing up their portfolio of extracurriculars, aka, building a profile.
Apparently, kids need to distinguish themselves to get into (the best?) universities (in the US?). I get that kids who have some talent or skill that sets them apart will have an edge. But this race for everyone to have an edge seems exhausting.
The kids were being pressed on whether they are doing community service or even blogging (I mean, apart from me and 3 other people do people even blog anymore? Does anyone under the age of 20 know that blogs still exist?).
I get that the intention is in the service of the smaller good of getting into some Ivy League college but the idea of encouraging children to do community service to tick a box on their college applications strikes me as sad.
It made me hanker for the good ol’ days when it was enough to do one’s 10th reasonably well, and aspire for the local big name college. Now people are thinking Harvard and Yale or something. Like ok, these children are very privileged. But also, why? Why aged 15 do they have to compete not just academically but like entire-personality-wise.
Meanwhile, in the Indian curriculum, my nephew who is in the 12th has prelims and then mock exams and then the actual board exam and then a flew of entrance exams. Like, one more prep exam before the real thing which doesn’t even count except in case of a tie-breaker for the actual stream one wants to get into.
Ironically, this is the age when most kids are grappling with their bodies getting ahead of them, their emotions being a mess and god knows what else. My son has literally turned into a zombie who perks up occasionally to take part in every school sports team (but apparently sports is not of great interest to colleges unless it’s state or national lever) with a side interest in a girl in another school; .
A classic, very French coming-of-age tale. A teenager is on summer holiday with her father and her father’s mistress when an old friend of her mother’s come to stay bringing with her the prospect of a more settled life. The teenager has ambivalent feelings about this. A nice read because it didn’t drag on.
Everybody in My Famile Has Killed Someone, Benjamin Stevenson
One of those clever mysteries that all the rage today along with mysteries that are obviously written for TV (I’m ok with the former, can’t stand the latter). It worked because the characters were actually interesting, it was well written and the mytery was pretty good.
The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
Such beautiful writing. It covers the entire life of a woman from her dramatic birth to her marriage, late career and death, taking in bits of the lives and perspectives of people who touch her life.
I got this from Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan’s newsletter (among a lot of great reccos every month) which you can subscribe to through her substack I think.
Mother Mary Comes To Me, Arundhati Roy
This is the It Book of the recent months, and was our book club pick. I found it … interesting. Despite myself, I enjoy Roy’s writing. I found her slightly irritating as a public figure, but reading this book… my god, what a life she has lived, what a childhood she has endured, what a mother she had. Mary Roy, her illustruous but (let’s face it) batshit crazy mother, is a way to think through all our mothers and our mothering. I guess no matter what most of us do we can console ourselves that we are not as terrible as Mary Roy (even if we probably won’t go on to found a school and have legions of adoring protegees, as well as a world famous daughter).
There was the epic trip to Bali with the college gang.
There was the birthday which was nice but also more hectic than I would have liked. Had dosa in the morning. Met friend from Hong Kong and her husband for lunch. Had session with my therapist (would have preferred not to, but I live in fear of losing my slot). Had dinner with V and the kids at the mall at the closest thing to Hong Kong food we have found (though in the few months since we were last there, it has become less Hong Kong and more Indian). The thing I dearly missed was a nap.
V and the kids went to Mahabalipuram for the Diwali break. The kids wanted somewhere with a beach and this was the closest to drive to. They stayed at the Taj Fisherman’s cove and had a lovely time. V thinks this can be our weekend beach spot since the kids and I are clearly water babies.
I was tempted to go but I had just come back on one trip, work was crazy with lots of people on leave and I wouldn’t be off a single day. In the end, I’m glad I stayed back.
Normally, when I’m home alone, I try to meet people and do things I wouldn’t when they’re there. But most people were out of town and my work days were long. I decided to just stay at home, do chores and vegetate with Slow Horses, a series I tried on the flight back from Bali and got quickly hooked onto.
I brought in Diwali with a scotch and a cigarette on my balcony watching the fireworks which were still few enough to be enjoyable. The next few days were awful in terms of the sheer excess of noise, and the detritus of fireworks in the street.
There was a power struggle at the top of the organisation I work for. To my surprise, editorial (seems to have) won over business. I hope this gives us all some breathing room and a break from the relentless pennypinching. But I’m not completely optimistic.
I drove down to MinCats and was feeling all good about my driving skills when veered towards the pavement to park, (apparently) hit the side of the pavement with the front tyre, which burst. MinCat, bless her, kept calm and drove me first to one and then another puncture shop where we beseeched a guy to come with us to change the tyre which he did. Honestly, all this makes me want to just give up driving but MinCat gave me a stern talking to that I must persist.
Mimi decided to shave her legs. She told me after the fact. She said she thought I’d be fine with it based on conversations we’ve had earlier.
My position on this is that body hair removal is conformity with patriarchal norms. However, refusing to remove body hair might be too much of a battle for teen girls to fight. It’s not a battle I’m willing to either. I’ve accepted this is a stupid norm I conform to because I’m not able to shake the conditioning. I did not encourage Mimi to do any form of depilation. I explained to her the patriarchal undertones, but I also told her that if she wanted to, I’d support her choice.
I’m proud of her for resisting for so long. She has been shaving her underarms and removing her upper lip hair. But her legs have remained gloriously hairy. Unlike us, they have track pants for school, so there’s no everyday pressure. She wore a dress to school for some event and the shaving happened the day after so I suspect there must have been some comment though she insists there wasn’t.
She asked me if I was unhappy with her for not telling me beforehand and I said I only would have liked to give her some tips. She said she watched a YouTube video. Oh well.
Mimi and a couple of her friends wanted to come over for Halloween and go trick or treating in our building. I felt 13 was a bit old for this, but I asked the building organiser and she said it was fine. I think girls just want to dress up. Boys (e.g. Nene) just want the candy. It wasn’t the best day for me because it was book club day but I couldn’t resist Mimi’s enthusiasm. Since my kid was joining, I felt obliged to render assistance and walked down several flights of stairs in the four towers of my building doing my best to prevent the children from running riot. Still, it was kind of cute overall and Mimi and her pals had fun, even if I was severely knackered by the end of it, and thanks to Amazon’s inept delivery have landed up with a whole lot of candy that arrived too late.
Ten years ago, while I was doing the PhD, I told my college friends who were going on about a reunion that I would be flying to Indonesia for a conference, and why not meet in Bali? Everyone agreed, tickets and accommodation were booked, and then just before people were set to fly out, a volcano erupted and flights were cancelled one by one.
Five years ago, we got our act together again, and settled on Cebu. Everything was booked, and then the pandemic struck.
It says something about the tenacity of some of us that we decided to try again this year. We’re all older, many of us with children, with pretty full schedules. Deciding on the date took rounds of negotiations and back and forth till the last minute. Booking the villa another round of back and forth.
I found myself in the awkward position of having to remind people to be mindful about costs. I began to wonder if I had signed up for something that would prove too expensive.
(These were not concerns we faced when planning previous trips, when we were younger, or maybe I was in the privileged camp then and didn’t notice. But we were definitely more go with the flow then).
There is a direct Indigo flight from Bangalore to Bali, and indirect routes on Malaysian and Singapore Airlines. I chose the latter, though more expensive, for the better timings, and I’m glad I did. That airline’s reputation is well deserved.
From the moment we stepped into the cab, it was non-stop chat. Those of use who arrived at a similar time dropped off our bags at the villa and went straight to lunch at some famous joint for ribs, Naughty Nuri’s, which was pretty yummy if not out of this world. There we had a laughter-fuelled conversation which included – probably to the bemusement of those at nearby tables – how sex is going in our marriages.
In the cab back, we decided on room arrangements. The main organiser had already bagged the single room, which I guess is her due. The two besties had decided they were rooming together. That left four of us. It was decided the two from Australia would room together because they’re on similar time zones. That left me with a friend I’m pretty close to, so we were fine with that. We took the upstairs room which turned out to be a good decision in terms of lack of noise.
Honestly, I haven’t shared a bed with someone whose not in my family for a while and I had reservations about it. But we rubbed along quite nicely. I didn’t even need to request a second quilt. (With V I always do, because he hogs the quilt.) I had been quite disconnected from this friend for a while, and we both had gripes about the cost of the holiday, so it was both good to catch up and rant about some common beefs.
A surprising thing is how much time was spent in the pool. I wasn’t sure, with a beach nearby and no kids in tow, whether a pool was actually needed. I am a water baby myself, but a small pool didn’t seem really satisfying. But for those more experienced in these matters than me, sitting in a pool with a drink and chatting is a thing – and it was. I was out-pooled also in terms of time spent. I realised that when in a pool, I need to actually swim a bit.
The first evening we went to a very happening restobar (I think) called Motel Mexicola, where the music took us back to Goan weddings and our college days. The food was pretty good too. Some of us came back and early and went to bed, only my roomie and I ended up chatting till the others returned and then we went down and chatted with the others some more, waking up the one poor thing who had wanted to sleep but whose room was right in the thick of things.
After a lazy morning, the next day, some of us headed to Ku De Ta beach club, which is nice, but not amazing? I wanted to do it because I was skipping the more expensive beach club Sunday’s in Uluwatu the next day. A friend and I went into the ocean, though the tide was low and it was very rough. We ended up chatting while being batted around and then had an enormous coconut.
On Day 3, some went to Sunday’s, one of us was sick and my roomie and I went shopping. Seminyak has a number of nice streets with cool shops. I just scoped out gifts for the kids. Roomie bought a ring. The plan was that we would join the others for the second part of the day – a visit to Uluwatu temple and a Kecak Fire Dance performance, but the sick friend wasn’t up to it, and roomie, who had been to the temple, decided to stay back with her. The other group then encouraged me to come to Sunday’s for a bit because anyway they had a paid spot that wasn’t being used.
We had hired a driver for the day, who I had a really lovely chat with on the 1.5 hour drive to Sunday’s: Bali’s Hindu culture and the roadside temples, Bali politics, Hong Kong politics, his kids’ education in an international school, the importance of speaking English were all discussed.
I have to admit Sunday’s was stunning. Though the group that got there in the morning said that it was blazing hot at first, and it seems like they overshot the F&B cover charge and ended up paying out of pocket, so it’s probably a good thing I avoided it. The beach is white sands and crystal clear waters, the most beautiful I’ve ever been in. I got a nice half an hour in the water and scarfed down some leftover snacks.
We left later than planned and it began pouring as we were leaving, with some suggesting we skip the fire dance because it’s open air. I was quite keen on the dance though, and the rain stopped by the time we got there. We were late for the 6.30pm show we had booked and got pushed to the 7.30. There is an enormous crush getting to the amphitheatre, and the commentary is entirely in Bahasa. It’s basically a retelling of Ramayana though, so I had the gist and explained it to the others. I personally enjoyed it, though some of us were not amazed, especially since there was too little fire elements.
For dinner, we went to Made’s Warung Seminyak which proved to be an excellent choice for Indoensian food.
Our last day was to be a spa day. Some of us were booked into De Nyuh, for a 3-hour treatment that included an express facial, massage and scrub all for the princely sum of Rs 2,500. The treatment itself was lovely. If I have one complaint it’s that while they told me they didn’t have separate rooms, they had said there would be curtains between all of us. Instead one friend and I were in the same space without even a curtain which meant that we had to change in front of each other.
We proceeded to go shopping and get lunch. I as per usual couldn’t make up my mind, the kids finally said they didn’t really want t-shirts, I caught up with the other two who proceeded to buy stuff. This is good for the Indonesian economy, but it’s also interesting to watch people shop. Like this instinct of, this is so beautiful, I must have it. Though very few things are must have. Oh well. I’ve been there, done that. There were a lot of pretty things in these shops. I did not buy any of them which makes me feel a bit out of body.
That evening we had the most fun playing some singing game and doing a reenactment of the Kecak Ramayana for those who weren’t there. Also, a sip and paint where we painted each other to v.cute results. More singing, drinking and chatting. In which I discovered an inordinate number of us are Sound of Music fans.
And then it was time to leave. I had a morning flight out, some others left in the evening, and others the next day.
I came away astonished that seven women whose bond was essentially forged in college and who had not been together for years could still get on literally like a house on fire. Our laughter was so loud I pity the people in the villa next door.
It’s been over 20 years since we graduated from college, and we are not the same people we were then. We are (mostly) fatter, perimenopausal, grumpier, not all on the same page about money. But (largely) the ease of conversation and sense of fun is still there.
Look it was not all rainbows and sunshine. Some of us are closer to some of us than others. There are a couple of people I don’t think I could have an in-depth conversation with. On the last day, I had a strange friction with a friend I am very close too. It marred what would have been a perfect trip.
But overall, I came away with mostly good memories and bonds rekindled.
I had a 4-hour layover on the way back at Changi Airport and I was able to more fully appreciate its charms which included a butterfly garden, toilets equipped with a bidet function and a food court with cheung fun. Bali Airport too is quite nice in terms of layout and the quality of shops and food on offer. I feel like Goa should look and learn.
I came home feeling that maybe I should go back to Bali with the fam. And make more of an effort to keep alive some of the friendships this trip refuelled.
The first year we moved back to Bangalore, my SIL hosted an Onam lunch. I took Mimi to a birthday party, the first she was invited to, that morning and we got lost on the way back. I missed the sadya nad ended up eating the samosas I had sent from our neighbourhood place for tea.
This time, Mimi fell sick but V stayed home with her and Nene and I went. I was a tad ambivalent because while I wanted to eat the sadya, I’m not a fan of the large parties my SIL hosts, involving both sides of her family, anymore. However, I ended up having an interesting conversation, even though the sadya disappointed.
The next weekend was an Onam celebration in our building. The kids’ unit tests started that week so I didn’t go down. But they had hired drummers whose call I couldn’t resist. They reminded me of the percussion groups that accompanied lion dances in Hong Kong. I have a theory that the din has a cleansing effect, dissipating bad energy. As I stood in the balcony watching the drummers, I hoped that their energy would drive away the negative feelings that had enveloped us since Cosmo died.
The kids started their unit tests. Because Dusshera is earlier than usual this year, so are their tests which means they have less to study, but also less time to prepare. Both kids had been out of it sick for a week each, and I had been busy with work thanks to the later finish several days, so I felt we weren’t as prepared as we should have been. But somehow, it seemed to go ok. Perhaps it was because Nene had one exam a day and is actually doing some stuff himself. Unfortunately, V got Nene to for football practice one morning, against my protests, and he ended up falling sick. He had to miss one test.
Me: Mimi, why do condensation take place when clouds reach a mountain and rise
Mimi: Because they’re all about that base?
The World Athletics Championships started that week, and I was able to catch much of it. It was to be sprinting icon Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce’s swan song, after she ended up pulling out of the Olympics. At 38, it is crazy that she is still performing at this level, and clearly still has the drive to win.
Another of my favourites, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, who seemed to break the world record in the 400m hurdles every time she ran, had decided to switch to the 400m flat. Her target was the US record, which she broke in the semi-final, and then ran a tight race in the final, pushed to the end by Marileidy Paulino, to finish at the second-fastest time in history.
But the person I’ve recently been fangirling on is Melissa Jefferson-Wooden. At the Tokyo Olympics, she seemed to play third fiddle to her training partners Sha’Carri Richardson and Twanisha Terry, though she ended up winning a 100m bronze. She was the girl with the overiszed Minnie Mouse bow in her hair. She has had a blistering season this year, and was stunning to watch as she took the the 100m and 200m.
And finally, there’s pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis who is another one who breaks a world record seemingly every time he competes. This time it took three tries, but with all his fellow competitors cheering him on, he cleared 6.30m. Craziness!
Work thankfully slowed down, because I shifted to what used to be the crazy part of the job but is now the more relaxed part of the job, right when I needed it, which goes to show that the universe doesn’t always fuck one over. So I ended up at least having some breathing room.
At the end of September, we did our trip too Ooty. Both Nene and I came back with sore throats and I fully expect a crazy October.
We did a short trip to Ooty at the start of the Dussehra break. I was really looking forward to it because I was sick of work and because I was also sick of our Cosmo-less flat.
The drive there, which included a stint through the Bandipur forest, was very pleasant, though longer than one would think it takes to drive to Ooty (7 hours with a stop for a late breakfast). We stopped at McDonald’s where I discovered that the sausage egg mcmuffin is available for breakfast: alas, it is chicken and not as delicious as the pork one overseas (but probably healthier, as less salty).
My hopes of getting away from thoughts of Cosmo were thwarted though, because sitting in the car with nothing to do, I found myself thinking of him more than ever. I have not been able to listen to Spotify since he died, because while I can listen to random radio music, my selection of music, that actually makes me feel, was not something I could bear to risk. However, the radio began to get spotty after a point, and I ended up putting on my playlist, and with it came the sadness and the loss.
Anyhoo.
Initially, V was looking at a property a bit away from Ooty in a forest, but I pointed out that the kids had never been to Ooty proper, and given that we had only one full day, we’d end up neither doing the resort nor the town justice. So we ended up staying at Willow Hill by Nature Resorts, which we all ended up loving.
The rooms – there are only nine on the property – were lovely, all woody (which I don’t usually like, but it worked here) and cabinesque. V and I were in Fir on the third floor, which has a lovely view of the valley, and the kids were in Oakwood on the ground floor which overlooks a small garden. The ground floor room is smaller, and the shower doesn’t have a panel that closes fully, so the kids ended up wetting the entire toilet, which is my only quibble. The rooms had lovely The Indian Apothecary products, which I now want.
The complementary breakfast was great, only the sambhar and chutney were really spicy, even for a spice lover like me. We ended up having a really delicious lunch there on the first day.
We did a short stroll around Charring Cross that evening, and bought some chocolate as gifts. To be honest, Ooty chocolate is not to my taste, though we later went to Moddy’s in Coonoor (there is also an Ooty branch) and the chocolate there is better. The kids were shocked by how cold it was and bought gloves. The town is very crowded and the shops pretty much cater to that crowd.
We had dinner at The Periodic Table, a fine dining restaurant. Although I chose it, I was a bit shocked by the prices. The kids loved their food, but my pork chops were a tad chewy. There’s a fancy supermarket in the complex, and a gift shop that was unfortunately closed.
The next day the plan was to take the toy train to Coonoor. Since we had some time to kill in the morning, we drove to the lake, only the kids didn’t want to go boating – Mimi didn’t want to risk her Adidas sambas getting wet – and they weren’t interested in riding a horse. So we then tried to drive to these huts by the Toda tribal people, but ended up getting into a really small lane and being forced to drive all the way down by an auto that suddenly turned up behind us.
Not to be deterred, we then tried to drive to some viewpoint, by which time I was fed up of the perilous roads, and literally yelled at V to turn back when we were nearly there. He ended up parking and we walked a short way to the viewpoint, which was nice-ish. Only we didn’t have time to stay there because we had a train to catch.
The train is smaller than I remembered and the kids weren’t too impressed by the view. Then again, I was on the seat with the best view. In Coonoor, we had a pizza lunch at Open Kitchen – Nene was very impressed with his burger, we were all less so with the loo, which had a few insects floating in the pot – and then we tried to find a shop called Red Earth. Instead, we landed up a shop called Honey Bee where I bought some tea, and then to Moddy’s where we bought chocolate.
Honestly, the trip to Coonoor was not a great success, though it does seem a more chilled-out town than Ooty. On the train back, we didn’t have seats together. I was alone in a section with family with a very rambunctious toddler. But I plugged in my earphones and ended up having a quite a sublime experience gazing out at the view.
After a rest, for dinner we went to Shinkows, the town’s iconic Chinese restaurant. It’s quite old school looking. The soup I ordered was not amazing, but we were pleasantly surprised by the rest. Nothing looked like we imagined it, but it was all delectable. The kids scarffed it down like it was manna from heaven.
The next day, we only had time for breakfast before driving home. The road we took into Ooty was closed, and we ended up taking a longer, but less windy, road back. When we got into Bangalore, we realised we were going to pass Ikea and the kids started clamouring to stop there. Unfortunately, we got stuck in the mother of all jams, and ended up not only not going to Ikea but also delaying ourselves by an hour.
So that was Ooty. A lovely trip, marred by a massive row V and I got into on our first evening, when he woke up groggy from a nap and laid into me for sitting on his t-shirt and I, sick of his OTT criticism, gave him an ultimatum. Ooty was where V had first proposed to me, and 20 years later, I feel like we’ve come full circle.
The author loses her father around the same time she finds the love of her life. She writes a memoir about this cognitive dissonance. I was interested in the grief part mainly.
The Party, Elizabeth Day
Started out promising. Something happened at the party of a rich dude. It’s antecedents go back to the friendship that began between two boys in boarding school. Not a bad read but got tired of the obsession at the heart of it, and the mystery of what actually happened at the party turned out to be so-so.
Not That Kind of Girl, Lena Dunham
The kind of memoir I’d have loved in the 30s. First section is about dating and sex (which I’m not super interested in) but in the raw Dunham style which makes it more interesting. By the end, I really enjoyed the insight into her crazy mind. Especially the bits about her relationship with her sister and therapy.
Inspector Imanishi Investivates, Seicho Matsumoto
I’ve never been that into Japanese culture, but this gave me a real hankering for Tokyo. Some connections were a bit too coincidental, but the mystery is quite wide ranging so it works. Although it’s not stated explicitly, there’s something there about the position of women: all these women, so supportive of the men in their lives, from Imanishi’s wife to women associated with the artistic group that is breaking down traditional norms in art, but not in their personal lives, clearly.
Inner City Blues, Paula Woods
The novel opens during the riots that followed the beating of Rodney King. Charlotte Justice, a black woman detective, is in a patrol bus and saves a black doctor from being beaten by her white fellow policemen. Nearby, the body of a notorious gangster – who Justice has a personal connection to – is found. It’s a pretty good story but by the end the names of all the people and plotlines had got confused in my head.
How to Build A Girl, Caitlin Moran
A bildungsroman about a teenager in a poor northern town who literally builds her personality from scratch into a music critic. Lots of inspiration here even though said girl is 16 and I’m 45: that you can decide what to be, study, put in the work and become that person. My only peeve was that so much of the coming of age is about sex, but that, for a teenager, rings true.
for whom the bell tolls 
