Woah-men's Day

2011-03-08



I open my eyes and check my phone to see if the Pulitzer prize committee found my fictional piece of fiction.

They haven’t.



But what a lot of people have found is the cheek to update their Blackberry and Facebook status to ‘happy women’s day’. I inwardly make a list of people who wish everybody on everything and are the reason why freedom of expression has become a drug around.



Just then, the cleaning lady enters my room, making sure to tell me how glad she is to find me awake. Jesus, I think to myself, can’t I enjoy my days of freedom and tea without the bitter taste of guilt? It’s international women’s day, I tell her, to celebrate the liberation of women. Just then she lifts her hand up, the very one she uses to clean 5 more houses is heavily bandaged. I don’t need to ask her what happened.



After continuously denying help being offered to her, she then tells me a story of how a woman, who had just moved into her area, was beaten to death by her husband. He loved her too much, she says while my eyes pop out of my head, couldn’t see her talking to anybody, not even working. Has this been reported I say? To which she smiles and says yes, the police came.



Just then she hears a cry from the cucine…it’s time for her to indulge tea and tête-à-tête.



I find Google all set in fourth gear, using bright colours we see at too-much-money weddings… they obviously won’t use the morbid hues of blues and greys and black- from PMS meets gothika, they would have heard it all. With artwork that you see on top of t-shirts adorned by phoreners in Paharganj or the hands of a bride-to-be, why would they think of putting someone close to… Bandit Queen?!



When I talk like this people me if I went to a girls’ college to study feminism. Right… as if the ancient forefathers and didn’t-want-to-be mothers had not had enough. So feminists became equivalent to cotton fibred women holding placards who haven’t had an orgasm in years-and the phenomenon of feminism was raped and what was left were stereotypes and bra burning.



To answer them, I did go to a girls’ college, I studied feminism amongst other things and still managed to wax my legs. Which brings us to the flipside of a “feminist” is a woman cashes in on the punani power. A friend of a friend, much like Barney from How I met your mother told me his philosophy.



According to him, it doesn’t matter if you have an MBA or a degree in Greek literature, as long as you know how to use the power of the vagina.



Here are two scenarios. Enter work like a scared and tamed damsel who doesn’t know how to use mascara and you’d probably end up wagging your pony along with the scut work you’re assigned.



And when you do manage to have the time to powder your face along with a skill set you already had, out come the sharks who think everything you do right, is a fluke.



Thus, the punani power a perfect blend of those women who have enough brains to wear red lipstick while presenting points that needed strategic relationship building. Use wisely, he says, and you shall conquer, coz it’s a world with messed up standards.



I can of one woman who might agree. No, not the minister who wanted to curb the broadcast of FTV in the 1990’s due to its evil effects on an eleven year old wanker. She makes the small percentage of women who went to parliament and questioned reservation for women in Parliament.



The one who would agree with me was the one who used her wits and promised men that it’ll all be okay- that when women become a part of the legislature, they wouldn’t bite their heads off for passing each bill. After all, many of the important positions, including the PM’s string pulling is vehemently done by a woman.



At 5’o clock my friend realises the whole day has gone by without wishing me ‘Happy Women’s Day.’ This somehow brings her how she hasn’t been promoted- she went from being an office hottie to the potty when she got hitched. And then she was considered to have ‘other’ priorities than work because she recently popped a baby.



Imagine the cheek of a good looking and capable software engineer to be thin, get married, get fat, have a baby, lose baby weight and think she had proved herself enough.



It’s almost as ironic who’d remember to follow John Galliano’s controversial career and still know what the repo rate is.



Just when I think of how I get to have a career and a choice not to marry at 22, I get a call from a friend saying he needs a help in sales. ‘You’re very persuasive’ he says and then adds ‘but also the fact that you have a sexy voice would do half the job.’



Humph.