Monday, November 27, 2006

Pune waalo

I am getting a free trip to Pune and would like to make the best out of it. Planning to catch up with some friends, one among them is R, my childhood friend. Langotiya yaars (any generous soul may kindly translate this) like her make me feel so old. She said that she is teaching at MIT, handling second semester MBA students, and has to wear saree to the institute. Not only that, she is the rector for the girls’ hostel. Imagine, girls above 20 calling you ‘Ma’am’?

Have not met her for almost 5 yrs now and I am really looking forward to it. Hope she doesn’t rub her oldness to me and I come back still feeling young and not thinking about my date of manufacture.

Having said that, I read this book called ‘The woman who gave birth to her mother’ by Kim Chernin. Well, women are a complex lot and therefore, we have subjects like ‘women studies’ to confuse people more. This is one of those books. There are about 11 case studies. This is not a bestseller material or a book that stays with you but gives a lot of insight to the relationship between women, mother and daughter specially. These women come and share their stories with the author on how their childhood shaped them to be the woman and the mother that they are today. The stories explore the elements of idealism, guilt, blame, forgiveness and finally of letting go in the mother-daughter relationship.

Parallels can be drawn as our childhood sometimes, shapes our mindset on many things. But it needn’t be mother-daughter all the time. The author also talks about role reversals when the daughter starts to care for the ageing mom.

I was just thinking about my mom when I read this and what I can remember is that, me and sis often, got either yellow or blue dresses until we found the joy of standing in front of the mirror or reached our teens so to say, and started selecting our own dresses. Sometimes, it used to be the same pattern. If I would wear blue, sis would wear the yellow version and vice-versa. I used to pick up sis’ old clothes sometimes. Imagine growing up to wear the yellow or the blue version of what you wore last year!

No, mom is not related to Hitler and she is not boring. She is very proud of me though all she wants me to do is buy gold.

Coming back, to the topic, I’ll be in Pune this Friday.

23 comments:

sadsadas said...

Drop in to Mumbai also.Perhaps, we can plan to meet.;)

Arunima said...

would have loved to but my schedules are really tight. I am hoping, at least I can meet up with some of my friends in Pune.

sanguine said...

the book sounds interstin ..i want to read it .. and have a nice trip

Anonymous said...

make sure u r not seen by others with R less u want yrself to be ma'amed....

KKK

Dreamcatcher said...

What is it with moms and gold fixations? I mean, if you have to buy jewellery why not silver?

Anonymous said...

This is probably offtopic but I do happen to like the seething underbelly of your blog.

./w

Arunima said...

@kkk: oh yes, she has booked a flat for me far away from her institute. I think she wishes the same that I be not seen with her
:-)

@Dreamcatcher: It is not only about jewellery. Gold, be it biscuit or cake or any form makes most moms feel that the daughter is getting one step closer to marriage I suppose. I have losing them one after the other though.

manuscrypts said...

sounds like a 'coming soon to a city near you' :)

Anonymous said...

Eat bakarwadi...

Arunima said...

@kishore: Bakarwadi kaun si chidiya ka naam hain?

APUGONNAB said...

Books on women studies are quite insightful.. wil get my hands on this one too..

Hope you have a good time @ Pune!!

Anonymous said...

Tho thum chidiya bhi kaate ho? kya kya chidiya kayi hai thum ne?
Bakarwadi is a Maharashtra special snack.. Try karo, tastes lovely...

Nautilus said...

"I used to pick up sis’ old clothes sometimes. Imagine growing up to wear the yellow or the blue version of what you wore last year!"

And I thought I was the only one who had to go through this ordeal year after year... :-)

Samba said...

There is another reason why there are women studies. It's about supply and demand. We tend to study and analyze things that are scarce and that are unpredictable. Like money for instance! Women are similar. We, the men, need them and we are clueless about how they behave. We do know that they tend to be irrational. But irrationality can come in many shapes sizes and colors!

Are men any better? I'm not sure. But we are like used cars. Call us up and express your willingness to take us for a drive, and we know enough about respecting customers not to refuse!

anumita said...

So how was the Pune trip?

divya said...

enjoy the trip..

Anonymous said...

Bakarwadi chidiya tha ya aur kuch ?? Baba Rajnish ka ashram to nahin!!!! That guy has many ashrams and tons of followers here..

Mungeri

austere said...

Hope you had a good trip!

that girl in pink said...

how was pune?
that book sounds interesting...

Anonymous said...

hope it was fab.

Shobana Jayaraman Srikumar said...

hope the trip was fab.

sanguine said...

vapas nahi aa rahe ho kya ?

update to pliss ..

Dilip Mutum said...

I feel young even though my students call me "Sir" and even though I have 2 kids. It's all in the head.

yeah! my mum loves gold too. I guess it's a Manipuri thing. Hehehe