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Main roti kyu rehti hu?

Creations of a weird girl, Quarantined

I can make a decent cup of tea. And that’s the only think I can make in a kitchen. I am not exaggerating. I have tried and failed gloriously time and again. I like to think some people are not meant for kitchen chores. And by chores I don’t just mean cooking. It includes a multitude of side activities that go into preparing a dish. If I had my way, I’d make cooking an adventure sport and get it included in the list of 57 official Olympic Games. I am not kidding. Let me put this into perspective to you.

Have you ever tried to make a simple round roti? The amount of multitasking involved in this minor task is mind boggling. Having all the tools and ingredients ready is a mammoth task in itself. Keeping track of whether I have flipped the previous chhapati and getting the next one ready in time is a pain in the ass. And don’t even get me started on the burns I endure during the process. The result is a pappad-like-roti, jisko dekh kar main roti rehti hu. Leave alone a round roti, I am incapable of making even an edible roti.

Why an adventure sport you ask? Have you seen anything being deep fried? All that extremely hot oil ready to just bounce out of the vessel and fall on your uncovered arm. Or worse, your pretty face. Maybe you’ve seen tadka being made (tempering for those unfamiliar with tadka)? That big red chillies going off like a fire cracker in hot bubbling oil in a space vessel. It pops off sometimes, you know. The seeds of the chilli may just land up in your eyeball. I know that’s horrifying but you know it’s true. There is a possibility of it happening and you cannot deny that.

Another case in point, I got burnt by a cheese slice once. Yes, a cheese slice. You might be wondering how that is even possible. But, yours truly managed even this impossible seeming feat. Once I even managed to touch a freaking hot pan and burn myself when I wasn’t even working with it. I was making sandwiches. Till this date I haven’t figured out how I managed this one. Finally to sum up, I once burnt not one, but two entire pappads. Like the entire thing. They were gone. Completely. I annihilated their existence.

So yes, cooking should be the 58th Olympic sporting event. You might disagree, but my burnt roti strongly concurs with that notion.

AIR FM! AIR FM! A I R FM!

Creations of a weird girl, Quarantined

The absolute worst (and when I say worst, I really do mean the most soul crushing, unbearable) consequence of this lockdown has been the constant abuse on my poor ears. It is never ending. It is absolute and pure irritation. It is exhausting. It is the only thing that makes me helpless. There is no escape. It is my parents love for old songs.

My parents have acquired numerous devices to ensure these old songs never end. NEVER! They employ a brigade of devices (not limiting to) twos transistor, a bluetooth speaker, their mobile phones and special pen drives with songs by Mohammad Rafi, Kishore Kumar, a television and whatnot. It was with extreme efforts and pleas and cries that my elder sister and I were able to dissuade them from buying the Carvaan, the Echo and some weird Lenovo AI. All they want to do is say, “Alexa, please play Raina Beeti Jaye,” aka the saddest, oldest songs there are. Their love for old songs is infinite. Every single morning, old songs be it in the form of bhajaans or even plain Bollywood melodies are played out loud in my home. Without fail. Their morning is incomplete without them. Vividbharti and AIR have a special place in their heart and we dare not question this ritual. It is sacred. The only problem is it interrupts with our messed-up sleep schedule. We once spent an entire day switching the transistor on and off. We lost the battle on account of not willing to be homeless. They will choose old songs over their children. They won’t admit, but trust me they secretly do.

You still don’t believe me? Let me tell you a sweet little anecdote. One fateful night, being thoroughly fed up with this constant onslaught of sadness, I hid the adapter to the transistor and went to sleep thinking I won’t be disturbed in the morning. And guess what? I wasn’t. I was surprised because I had expected them to create a ruckus as soon as they would have discovered the missing adapter. But no. I woke up to find that the replacement was already in the game, without missing a beat. Or rather blaring those sad old beats. That was the day I accepted my complete defeat. No force of nature can stop these depressing tunes. Trust me, I have tried.

Now you may come at me and state that old is good. Those songs were much better than the garbage today’s rappers dish out. I agree. To some extent. Do you think I haven’t had long tiring debates about this with my parents? But to be honest, Honey Singh and Drake have severely weakened my case. Nonetheless, one cannot ignore some serious issues with old songs as well. Like how all these start off with the exact same tune, no matter if it’s a happy one or a sad one. Like there is negligible variation in the music. And the music itself just makes one feel so very sad and sleepy. There is no life in them. It’s just an endless tirade of sad, sad and guess what – sad.

Moving onto more serious issues, these songs are casually racist, sexist and all the -ists one shouldn’t be. Granted some of today’s songs are no different but then why does my parent’s generation live under the belief that old songs are sweet and have no ugliness. I can name several old songs that casually discuss staring at girls, following them, commenting on their clothes, their face colour, their life. Or songs like Bade Miyaan Diwane which elaborate on the steps young men need to follow in order to impress girls. Boys reading this, you’re gonna listen to this song immediately after reading this, aren’t you? Touché.

And not all old songs are bad. I agree. Some are timeless classics that melt your heart and make you believe in the power of innocent love. They transport you to a different world, a simpler one. The soft melody keeps twirling in your mind and keeps you dazed for hours on end. More importantly, one always falls back on the old tunes during a game of Antakshari. Whether you accept the fact or not, it is true. And for me, waking up to these tunes is the thing that I miss the most in my melody-less hostel room now. Every single day.

P.S. Let me know if you sang the title in your head 🙂

The Only 6 cm I Care About

Creations of a weird girl, Quarantined

This post is for the three people out there who think I have a small face. More along the lines of, “Itna sa toh muh hai tumhara.” To clarify, I have a round face. Completely round. Yes, you can draw an outline using a compass and it’ll still not be as round as my face. The five extra chins I’ve added help me maintain its roundness. Recently, I was also told that my face probably has a radius of just 6 centimetres. Seriously? 6 centimetres? That’s it? Thank heavens, they didn’t say a diameter of 6 centimetres. God thought that all the symmetry he/she forgot to take care of while making my crooked fat fingers, can be made up for in my perfectly round face. And then God was like, “No more curves for her,” and then proceeded to make me flat footed. The only other curves I have are in my hair. Curly af. You might even say, my circular face is an indicator of my (rapidly fading) interest in mathematics. I sincerely hope that’s the sole reason why people have said I look like a person who studies mathematics. If that’s not the reason, please tell me the correct one. If you’re wondering whether I measured to check if my face actually has a radius of 6 centimetres, yes I did. No, I won’t tell you my findings.