Indian aunties Demystified !!!

You may run you may hide but you cannot escape them .I dedicate this post to “ The great Indian aunties” . Despite the sex ratio in our nation being skewed  the female population between the age group 40-60 has managed to carve a niche for themselves and I personally feel they are worth a few words of description by the masketeer.

Unlike in the west where the word auntie is used to refer to sister of your father or mother,in India  the word “auntie” is a phenomenon more of a  syndrome,that finds its root causes  in a plethora of  parasites that are of diverse nature.

The gossip aunty :They constitute the major chunk of the auntie population . Being a woman ,I can very well understand the irrestible desire of a woman to jibber jabber  anywhere,anytime to any  extent. But with age this desire takes control of their mind and speech leading to catastrophic misunderstandings ,notions and fights.

Parasite: It feeds itself by poking its nose into other people’s already messed up lives. After consumption of its fodder rather than assimilating it ,the metabolism recycles it back with added  spice salt and pepper  .

Symptoms:  Sharma auntie will burst into pieces if she does not immediately discuss about raheja auntie’s daughter’s new bf with verma auntie. Nor can raheja ignore the skirmishes between verma auntie and her daughter in law ,subsequently calling for a  round table conference in the kitty party on that issue.

Breeding grounds: The parasite has its presence felt everywhere no specific place. It just has to stumble upon any estrogen secreting species and it starts functiong!!!!

 The greedy  aunty:  Nakshtra and kazana  and the likes of it capitalize on such aunties as they are diamonds best buddies. The desire for diamonds and gold manifests itself into a desire for money and property too.The dream of each of these aunties would be to swim in the pool of gold coins owned by uncle scrooge in ducktales.

Parasite: The parasite gets orgasmic at the sight of  wealth in any tangible form. The parasite is also very good with maths as all it takes is one look at a woman ,a man or a house to approximately asses the assets owned by them.

Symptoms: Reddy auntie negotiating the amount of gold  she expects her future daughter in law to be drenched in . Iyer auntie giving off sarees as return gifts with the price tag on it. Mrs.Singh nagging her husband to buy the 21 inches LCD seeing  Mrs.Kaul having decorated her hall with that big babby .

Breeding grounds: Weddings and parties

 The commander-in-chief aunty: Women in general are driven by the sadistic pleasure to dominate others (specially other fellow women). This vicious desire has its roots so deeply entrenched that even our epic holds testimony to it,where Kunti bewitches her sons into obeying  whatever she says intentionally or accidentally ,thereby  making them the first and last propagators of polyandry. This innate desire takes shape once women reach auntiehood.   

Parasite: This parasite uses  instruments like love, emotional  blackmail at times brute and force to sustain its livelihood . The parasite’s male progeny plays an instrumental role in providing fodder to the parasite. The newely married brides face the biggest onslaught from this parasite.

Symptoms: Sen auntie  sitting on the front seat in the car along with her married son accompanied by her husband and daughter in law thrown in the rear seat(if she’d have her way may be in the dicki too) .

Breeding grounds: These parasites are very smart ,they don't surface outside that easily. They  germinate due to years of insecure feeling ,self obsession and power addiction .

Noisy aunty: Last but not the least  this group is the lot  that can stop the rotation of the earth, bring the traffic to a standstill ,scare the shits out of you with their high pitched shouting and shrieking. It stems from the fact that once upon  a time beautiful soft spoken chiks transform into impatient aunties after marriage , attending to the unending requirements of the family. 

Parasite: They are irritating causing momentary rise in B.P and pulse rate accompanied with a slight damage to your ear drums , but are comparatively less hazardous than  the above mentioned parasites.

Symptoms: Aunties arguing over a seat in the ladies compartment , bargaining frantically in a sabji mandi, two kaam walis fighting over the procurement of a household . Your doomsday will dawn on you the moment you accidentally step on the feet of these aunties in a crowded bus and all you can do is pray the almighty while waiting to be thrown out through that window below the demonically inscribed word "Ladise only"(R.I.P English). 

Breeding grounds: You get to see them predominantly in railway stations ,buses,fish markets and  sabji mandis.

No offence to any auntie out there the Masketeer has utmost respect to this clan ,its just that Maskteer finds this tribe very intriguing and hilarious ……………..

My chumma to all d aunties of India love u :)

Where do i belong....... ?

Having traveled ,studied and lived across the length and breadth of the nation like a gypsy there are times when I feel that there is no place that I can call mine . I cherish every moment of my stay in that particular place but I am amused at  how  every time I manage to move to a different place with a sense of detachment, I guess all bankers’ children are hardwired like that. 

Chennai (AH(after hinduja) to 1999) : This is where it all started ,the place gave birth to the Masketeer in the scorching heat during the mid summers(duh!!! wat an unpleasant beginning !!!! ). My family was usually referred to as “andha telungu karanga”(those telugu ppl)  in the neighborhood. Tamil was the first non mother tongue that was found playing on my tongue, which was later only to be discouraged by a convent school named ‘rosary Matriculation’ .  Mass prayers ,singing hymns along with the nuns during Christmas celebrations had become an integral part of my living .   Dressed in a chic short blue color uniform I would go talking to everyone(even with my family at times and my mother’s amused expression at that !!!)  in my broken English, but made sure that I never really lost grounds with Tamil by regularly watching tamil songs and dancing tapanguttu( a local folk dance form in T.N) to it.

Neyveli (2000-2002): You must be wondering what big difference this place would have made ,as it was just another place in the same state. Neyveli is a different world in itself ,truly diverse in its culture with only plantations and greenery everywhere accompanied by a rare sight of human habitation sparsely spread here and there. My class constituted of children from both the Aryan and the Dravidian race and this is where I came across hindi being spoken (trust me it sounded very different from the hindi I learnt from the text books !!!) “tum kya kar rahen ho balak” changed to “saale kya kar rahan h bey” My close knit gang had telugu ,malyali Bengali and rajasthani speaking kids. Yet again it was  English that I had to speak but thanks to vadivel ,vivek(tamil cinema’s famous comedians) they made sure I never really distance myself from tamil.  

Delhi (2002-2012): Ohk I totally agree with what neil Armstrong once said “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind “.  One small step to a place 2000 miles away created a gaint leap in my life and persona. The heart of the nation played the major role in shaping me into what I am today. I was put in a DAV school dominated by the elite class  Punjabis. “Silent night holy night” was replaced by “om bhur bhuva swaha” .I was mocked at practically every attempt to speak the local lingo, as at the age of 13 it is language that creates the barrier and I had to break it. It was one of those most distressing years of my life ( 12^th grade being the most !!!) ,friendless and at times bullied ,once or twice I volunteered to play hide and seek with my class girls only to find myself hiding in my hideout for the entire lunch break and the girls would apologize sarcastically saying that they forgot to search for me . I felt like a tropical forest orangutan stuck in the land of polar bears . The year passed I picked up the local hindi  lingo that had a huge Punjabi touch to it, socialized and I finally met the right people made friends worth a lifetime  , went hanging around in every nuke and corner galli of the city. The place made me bold ,confident, induced a modern outlook(no I never had a boyfriend ,never went to a pub,never wore a backless or a micro mini…. Its so disappointing the non delhities have this cliché notion about delhi girls) .It made me modern enough to stand for the idea that homosexuals and  transgenders  deserve their equal share of rights in this society plagued with preconceived notions. I had come to love this city ,the culture (except for a few aspects about which I will right sometime in the future). I had truly become the proverbial “Dilli ke dilwaale”

Warangal (2012-current ): Finally I got an opportunity to be in the state which everyone said was supposed to be my home ,Andhra Pradesh the land of gongura(a type of pickle) eating ,telugu speaking gultis (a slang referring to telugu ppl just like bongs and mallus). No matter where I went I was proud  to be a gulti and was all praises about my fellow telugudians ,but to my surprise I felt foreigner even to this place. I was way too outgoing for the otherwise docile ,shy chudidhar cladded clan . Right from the guard bhaiyya to the mess bahiyaa everyone spoke to me in hindi despite my repeated attempts at conveying the fact that I was well versed with telugu(I guess they never were really convinced  with that idea listening to my telugu) . My classmates tried their level best to make me feel at home and I have pretty well adapted myself to it ,but there are times when I feel I was not one amongst them ,those never ending discussions on telugu cinema ,comedy and punch dialogues sound like greek and latin to me. Nevertheless by the time I leave this place I am sure I would blend myself in the shadows of this culture.

Bangalore (current shuttling between Warangal and Bangalore): This place is more of a holidaying spot for me so I can’t really give an unbiased and transparent feedback about how the traffic, public transport etc etc treats you on a day to day basis. But there is one striking thing about this wonderful place ,not for a moment I felt alienated here. Hinduja is bangalore personified!!! . Just like me the place was so cosmopolitan in nature.Standing on MG road for 20 mins will give you the privilege to hear at least 80% of the languages   spoken in our nation. It is inhabited by  people from as far as the north east to the ones from the backwaters of kerala,predominantly the youth.

When I reflect back on those nomadic years that I spent all this while, it all sums up to the fact that in people’s eyes I belong nowhere but my  perspective on this is that I can appreciate the flavor and feel the pulse of places which are such a contrast to each other ,thereby making me feel that “I belong everywhere “

eppho ..... u made me do it

First of all sorry Pallavi Sharma,Pulak Jain,Aparna Anand for revealing the insanely silly name of our 'GANG'. But i want the world to know that u guys are capable of making me do anything knowingly or unknowingly . Ok so here it goes boredom was in its fullest glory in my life i had no clue where my life was heading, aimlessly trying to assimilate FIR and IIR filters ,trying to modulate myself in accordance to the amplitude of boredom (sorry for letting ECE speak my mind yet again ... you will have to get used to this). Well this was like any other usual temporary phase that i keep going through every now and then  and as always i  speed dialed  to my agony aunts .............But my beloved fatsos  seem to have been held up in the turbulence of their own agonies. Repeated calls and messages all in vain phewww. Did'nt know how to make my presence felt for the indifferent eppho .For a wild moment even contemplated the idea of getting married and then immediately seek a divorce ,robbing Britney spears of the fame of  having celebrated the shortest marriage . Nevertheless my lappy came to my rescue, headed straight like a hypnotized zombie to the blogger option dangling under the 'MORE' sub menu   and gave birth to the 'MASKETEER'. Thank you guys had u picked up my calls replied to my messages and entertained my rantings this would'nt have happened . After reading this post i am sure  tears of joys would trickle down those fat cheeks of yours . Koi baat nhn aatu potho eppho . cheers !!!

The Masketeer................

This blogger is a repressed soul battling the wild beast inside . This blog is the mask http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mask:_The_Animated_Series(reference to the cartoon deprived antics) that unleashes the hyperactive beast within. Armed with this mask here i enter the 'DEN' as a more confident,assertive,humongously  cynical 'Masketter' with a wild sense of humor  .