Oh these little gendered boxes into which we must all fit!

(Started writing this some time in March 2008)

For a long time I have held the opinion that men are also creatures oppressed by society.

What made me realise this again was an incident that occurred involving my car and me. Basically, it wouldn't start. Even though I have been driving for about 6 years now, and know where the hawa-paani goes, I get stuck when something out of the ordinary happens. I was quite close to home, so our driver came and tried to figure stuff out for me, and was soon joined in by other men eager to help. I was feeling quite silly just standing around helplessly in the parking lot.

As a woman, if I don't know much about cars, I know I will not be mocked. I feel quite comfortable asking for help and admitting my limitations. I have to admit, that a woman can play the "bhaiya, dekho gaadi start hi nahi ho rahi" (The "Look, my car wont start" plea) card. They don't expect us to know anyway. So they have mixed feelings of superiority, sympathy and wanting to be the knight in shining armour to save the damsel in distress.

What would have happened if a man had been driving? If stuck, I doubt he would be able to ask for help as easily as I could. He would of course be crumbling under the pressure of the expectation of having to know. He would fear becoming the subject of other men's jokes- "Arre yeh bhi nahi pata? Aur saala gaadi chalata hai!

I felt bad, and I sighed for women and men. Women and men who are members, perpetrators and victims of a society where expectations of one's capability are frequently based on one's gender.

Two days later, someone sent me a ".pps" entitled "Boutros Boutros Ghali's Thoughts on Women"

Some seem poignant enough to be shared here now

"For every strong woman tired of faking weakness, there is a weak man tired of faking strength. For every woman tired of being labeled 'emotional', there is a man who has been denied the right to cry. For every sportswoman whose femininity is questioned, there is a man forced to compete in order to give testimony of his virility. For every woman who has not had access to a dignified salary, there is a man forced to bear the economic responsibility for another human being. For every woman who steps forward towards her freedom, there is a man who rediscovers his road to liberty."

I don't know if BBG really thought these thoughts, but it doesn't matter. At least not for this post.

In a dissertation submitted a few years ago, I volunteered the suggestion that the solution to societal problems pertaining to gender lies in a mythological construct- Ardhinareshwara. A symbol of a God who is half male and half female. In the language of Carl Jung, someone who combines the Anima and Animus in perfect balance. Gender stereotypes that lie at the bottom of nearly all oppressive attitudes and practices against men and women will dissipate if one recognises as one's ideal, the attainment of an inner self that is 'human' rather than 'man' or 'woman'. Isn't that obviously a more wholesome ideal to aspire towards, than shutting off your 'masculine' or 'feminine' side?

I dislike using these terms. I recognise that using gendered terms to signify a certain way of being automatically assumes the very categorisation based on gender that I am trying to place the blame on for many of society's problems. As I discussed at a conference on Carl Jung with my good friend Comfort, I had a problem with his use of the words Anima and Animus to mean the unconscious feminine parts in the male and the unconscious masculine parts in the female respectively. Of course, I understand that Jung used the words he did, and I am using the words that I am, partly for linguistic convenience, and partly in recognition of the fact that society is organised a certain way, and in order to move forward from that way to a better one, one must begin by communicating in the language of the present. I am merely highlighting the gendered nature of our constructions by asking - Who decided that these parts were feminine or masculine? Let it be known that I do resent the fact that certain traits are considered 'masculine' or 'feminine'.

For women, this coming together of so called masculine or feminine traits may involve, among other things, admitting their interest in football (and having a discussion about it where one's views are taken seriously rather than assumed to be the result of a crush on a good-looking footballer!), curiosity to learn how a car works, or greater freedom to follow their chosen career path. For men, it might lead to being able to admit they have no interest in sports or don't know how to fix a broken car engine using their (pardon the metaphor) big, manly tool.

I don't think it is fair that women have the option of staying home and not working after marriage, for example, where the very idea that a man should want to do so is regarded with shock and horror. Most people dislike working, but do it because they have to. Why is it okay for women to relinquish economic responsibility for themselves, but god forbid a man should do the same ? It is sad that one has to work to survive, that much is true. But given that the state of affairs is such, given that everyone must work to survive, why are women excluded more easily from this "everyone" than men are?

Nor do I appreciate the fact that a woman has to know how to cook, while a man can get by on takeaways for years without having to hear "Tsk tsk, you should learn how to cook!", or be received with shock and surprise when they admit they enjoy cooking. Do men not eat or enjoy home cooked meals? Or do women have fragile digestive systems that can't stomach takeaways? As an example I offer myself. I never cooked for the first 24 years of my life. Then I moved to a foreign country and picked up the ladle and pan. Not because of any externally imposed expectations. My actions were motivated wholly by self preservation and interest because a. I am a vegetarian and b. I love Indian food and neither of these two things are available in sufficient amount and/or variety in my new country of residence.

People's decisions about their own and others' lives should be based on what is best for an individual, rather than for a man or woman. Different rules mean different attitudes and assumptions about what a man or woman can do/should do/ should not do/ is good at/ is fit for/ or deserves. And that, in my humble opinion, is something we can all do without, non?

Oh how glorious the day shall be, when we no longer say or hear the words "Be a man!" or "Don't do that, it's not womanly!"

The latter brings to my mind a situation in which this phrase is most often used- adopting a certain posture while seated. Agreed that it may look unattractive when a woman sits slouched in her seat with her legs splayed apart. But believe me, the sight of a man doing the same doesn't really set hearts racing either.

Wanted - An entertaining exercise that stretches the limits of what you thought you could withstand

Despite the fact that the question of why someone in their right mind would want to showcase Salman Khan's dancing is beyond my limits of comprehension, I have to say that Wanted was bizarre, entertaining and all in all quite hilarious. Not because of subtle humour or clever, witty dialogues but because if you watch an ageing SK gyrate to songs like "Your papa says you love me, mama says you love me, so love me baby love me", falling off your seat clutching your aching stomach while your eyebrows threaten to shoot up over your head in absolute shock is a natural consequence.

My partner in crime and I went to watch it just for the heck of it. We read this review, which ignited enough curiosity in us. Plus, when something is described as being extremely unpleasant, I have an uncontrollable urge to experience it. It can't just be bad though. It has to be extremely so. Ask my friends from my graduation and post graduation days and they will confirm it, for many a bad milkshake/ song/ book etc have been thrust upon them by yours truly with the words "You have to drink/listen to/ read this just to experience how bad it is". Call me crazy but it broadens your life experience and I stand by it.

Wanted was one such experiment, and it was worth it.

While I realise that I cannot do justice to the entire film, let me share with my readers what I considered to be some of the highlights.

The story isn't bad. Which is to say that there is one, and that in itself was a pleasant surprise. Is it far fetched? Of course! But few Hindi films aren't so I am prepared to excuse that.

Salman Khan is physically fit, slimmer than he has been in the last decade, and quite old. You can use as much concealer as you like my friend, but no one can hide those bags under your eyes. You could go shopping and bring back 1 Kgs. of alu-pyaaz in each of them. He can't dance, could never really act and can still give a ventriloquist a run for his money. I don't know how he manages to deliver his dialogues without the slightest parting of the lips!

Ayesha Takia is, well...You know the type of roles Katrina Kaif plays in action packed films starring Akshay Kumar? Where all that is required of her is to be dolled-up and stand around? Furniture type, if you will. Ayesha Takia's role in Wanted is similar, except she ends up being a melodramatic item of furniture. Like a sofa that occasionally displays signs of psychosis. Seriously, while I do not wish to trivialise the conflict that one may be fraught with when one falls in love with a contract killer (you know, the whole should-I-love-you-or-should-I-hate-you and I-can't-decide-if-you're-good-or-bad type of conflict), it has to be said that in case of Ayesha's character it ends up looking more like a case of Dissociative Identity Disorder.

All credit for this chaos must go to the dialogue/script writer however. There are times in the movie when Salman Khan and Ayesha Takia are interacting, and one wonders if they are even talking about the same thing.

As for her appearance, I have always thought that her facial features are too childlike when compared with the rest of her. The filmmaker probably had a similar idea, as he has made full use of both her innocent expression and her large breasts alternating between references to her "fit body" and tight clothing one the one hand, and a naive young girl in mean, mad Mumbai who has to grapple with lecherous policemen and lovestruck landlords while falling for a scoundrel like Salman on the other.

Speaking of lecherous, I think Mahesh Manjrekar is quite good as the sleazy cop. Some men on screen might make your skin crawl and make you want to kick them in the balls, but that just means they're great actors! I swear there were times in the movie where Mahesh made me cringe.

The camerawork reminded me of Crank combined with Hindi television soap operas. There are freezes, fast forwarded clips, and the dizzying camera angles that are much loved by Indian soap directors where there are repetitive shots in quick succession of the same person turning around, or when they zoom in to a person's face again and again to indicate heightened emotion. This is usually accompanied by some kind of tree-swishing-in-a-violent-storm music.

The song and dance, sigh! Oh the brutal murder of lyrics, rhythm and choreography with one fatal blow! Apparently there was a trailer for this movie which suggests that Salman does everything (killing, stabbing, swearing, loving, eating, drinking etc etc) casually, except dancing. You may regard that as a compliment till you see the music videos. That's when you realise that he takes dancing seriously because indeed, it is what he needs to work on the most. He reminded me of a guy I saw at the IIT Bombay festival a few years ago. That guy came forward in front of a room full of people to sing "Wonderwall". He blew it. C-O-M-P-L-E-T-E-L-Y ! But I applauded him for his courage anyway.

There was one good thing about Salman's dancing however. I am always sympathetic to the extras who never get the credit they deserve (and this is not just in Bollywood. Have you watched the video of Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal"? Do the extras not dance as well as MJ himself?!!). Watching the dancing in this movie, one can't help but admire the extras. Salman makes them look terrific!

There ARE a few good dialogues, and I mean four or five. The villains look convincingly villainous, except for an item girl aspiring for the status of "Behen" (which I have to say, doesn't sound nearly as underworld-ly as "Bhai") called Shayana who has very unattractive legs.

All in all, the movie ends up making you laugh because it is so inexplicably bizarre. I enjoyed watching it, more so than Dil Bole Hadippa. Let us now carry out some reflection to try and analyse why this was the case.

Dil Bole Hadippa had the misfortune of combining the issue of women's representation in sports at a regional or national level with the usual romantic elements typical of a Yash Chopra production. It was in a sense like Chak De India minus the good performances, good dialogues, subtlety and seriousness but with the Yashraj attempts at light comedy and romance thrown in. Even if we forget about, among other misrepresentations, Rani's garish clothes (not commonly seen in Amritsar), the movie fails to fulfill either criteria. The Indo-Pak tournament cornily called "Aman Cup" or Shahid and Rani's love story don't really warm the cockles of your heart. Nor does Rani's transformation in the end from a (reasonably convincing!) cute Sikh man to a foundation and eyeshadow covered beauty drive home the point of women trying to make it in the man's world that professional cricket still largely is. It failed in my opinion because it was ambitiously trying to achieve too much.

In contrast, my friends, Wanted doesn't seem to have any such ambitions. In fact, one is compelled to conclude that the movie doesn't have much of a point at all. It just is.

What really cracked me up throughout the film was the image of members of the British Board of Film Certification, and possibly Sir Quentin Thomas (President of the BBFC) having to sit through this film, probably more than once, in order to determine what classification it should get.

One flew over the Cuckoo's nest, but I flew over London's best

And I spied with my little eye...

...Bridges on the river Thames...

A panorama of a mega-city ....

And two very wide-set eyes...

Psychotherapists are people too

I want to set the record straight and say a few things in defense of the much misunderstood profession of psychotherapy. Namely, what a psychotherapist is and is not.

What he/she is: A person who is trained to develop a capacity for undying humanness and patience in order to be able to offer a wounded other the chance to pick up the pieces of their fragmented lives within the context of an interpersonal relationship.

What he/she is not: A person who should be expected to put up with utter incompetence and disrespectful behaviour with a smile. They are trained to be patient and understanding with their clients. Not with lying, careless staff members of an organisation who have no regard for another's time. It is unfair and unwise to expect them to have tolerance for all kinds of nonsense, just because they do so with the delicate psychological selves that their clients bring before them.

If that were the case, if psychotherapists really had to take an oath of unconditional patience and understanding, then no psychotherapist would ever participate in socio-political movements to better the state of mankind, to state one example. They would be too busy being a doormat for people to walk all over, you see.

A psychotherapist has as much as of a right as the next person does to be opinionated, or get pissed off and raise their voice against incompetent staff members, government departments, or violations in human rights. Their skill lies in remaining neutral in a certain context about certain things. To illustrate with an example, just because a therapist may vociferously condemn wife beating as an act, does not mean their capacity to offer help to a wife beater, should he seek it, will be adversely affected. In fact, it demonstrates their capacity to differentiate between something that warrants a certain judgement from them and that which does not.

Just because they are meant to be patient people, does not mean they will take every damn thing that is thrown their way lying down.

And while we are on the subject, if a psychotherapist expresses disappointment at your gross incompetence in carrying out your professional duties, don't illustrate your sheer lack of discernment by equating that with disappointments experienced within the context of a therapeutic relationship between a client and his or her therapist.

Therapists and counsellors are trained to be patient with clients because of the special nature of the relationship. It is unlike any other dyad, where one has to be mindful of the many reasons why clients may disappoint the therapist or vice versa. Many of those reasons stem directly from the vulnerabilities for which therapists are there to help.

So please, next time you call a therapists' therapeutic skills to question because they didn't pat you on the back and say "aww baby, it's okay" after you made an error that could very easily have been avoided had you paid a little more attention, think about what I have said.

And don't ever, EVER, make the mistake of comparing yourself to one of their clients after behaving in the above-mentioned manner. If you do, don't be startled when they put you in your place in no uncertain terms. You asked for it.

Good advertising

A Domino's pizza outlet takes advantage of it's proximity to La Sagrada Familia, a church in Barcelona which has been under construction since 1882 and is not expected to be completed till after 2026, to highlight it's main selling points- great pizzas and great timing.

Someone hung an earring on a lamp post

Location:

Barcelona, Spain

Venice, Italy