Overcoming fear

I still remember the paranoia in the girl’s eyes when I took her swimming that year. She just refused to get into the water no matter the cajoling in combination with the threats of dire consequences made by Hitler Mom. She was six and the story was the same every summer since we had moved to Bangalore.

The club in the complex, we lived in, had a lovely pool and had facilities for coaching in the summer. I would register her for lessons and she would parrot every excuse in the book, to not attend classes. When she did attend class, she would have the coaches tearing their hair out; she would dig her heels in and refuse to get into the water. Given the large number of children they had to coach, they invariably ignored her and gave me "the look". I was at my wit’s end. Swimming was a skill I wanted her to master for the joy of weaving through water is quite unparalleled. Life is going to take her through the rough and tumble and swimming would be one of the greatest stress busters with zero need for the chemical anti-depressants.

The situation took a 180 degree turn when we landed in Nigeria and were introduced to Coach Tough!! She agreed to take her under her wing and coach her. The initial days were tough and the story seemed to repeat itself. But Coach Tough did justice to her name. And then there came a time when she swam the entire length of an Olympic sized pool, determination writ large on her face, never once flinching when she crossed into the deep end. Watching a nine year old overcoming her fear and being confident of her strength was overwhelming to say the least. My Mommy heart cannot thank Coach Tough enough.

Post her triumph over her fear, Aarzoo Elizabeth Kaveri Sen, aged 9,that year, wrote this piece......and made me proud and confident that she has it in her to turn the lemons into lemonade!! Here it is unedited; and I better duck for cover before Ms. Intensely Private bares her teeth and claws at me for sharing this.

Photo: Coach Tough and her wards

Our Friend Water

To all the people who are scared of swimming, deep waters, going to the beach or for who are afraid of water. Here is a story about me being afraid of swimming. I always would feel scared of going to the pool. I had these bad thoughts that would scare me like drowning, getting hurt, etc. No matter how much my coaches, my parents and relatives tried, nothing worked. I started having even more of these scary thoughts after my coaches said they were going to push me in the pool. I didn’t like the coaches. When my dad started working in Lagos, Nigeria, my Mom made me sign up for swimming lessons in Lagos with Coach Tough. When I went to sign up, I saw her and we spoke. I told her my problem and she told me not to worry etc. The club has two pools. One was 10 ft and the other was 9 ft. But they started from 3 ft and the other started from 3.5 ft. Day by day, when I learnt swimming, I realized I had overcome my fear. But still I was a little scared of the deep end, but I overcame that. My Mom always said, “You will never drown. Water is our friend.” Then she explained buoyancy etc. This was because of my Coach Tuff I overcame my fear. I love her v.v.v.v.v.v.v.v.v.v. much!!! She won a lot of awards in International Swimming competitions. She had swum for Nigeria. Everybody should know that water is our friend. You will never drown. ( I don’t know, depends!)

Letter to my Harasser - Noorjahan Akbar

Sipping my morning tea and dreaming/planning my day, I came across this post shared by my dear friend Suchismita Mazumdar (http://suchismita-wwwsuchsimita.blogspot.com/). And there, out of the windows, flew my best laid plans for the day. I was swamped with memories of my "street fighter" avataar which had my friends and mother worried sick for me.

Noorjahan Akbar, says it like it is, not just for herself or the women in her country but for all those of us who are fighting the patriarchal mindset. This is responsible for that certain extra tension we carry around our personal space when we are out in public; and some of us unfortunately carry it all the time, even in the confines of our homes. This then translates to a kind of awkward body posture and movements when you negotiate the space and yes those ugly predators are quick on the scent of a supposedly easy "game". All this is very much at the subconscious level, atleast for me and I never quite realized it until I landed in Lagos, Nigeria!! Currently, this place is home too and my experience here has been the total opposite. Just to give an example, Lekki Market here is quite the treasure trove of a place to visit and quite crowded but not once did I have to do a weird pelvic movement or move my buttocks or my breasts out of the way and catch my breath and thank my stars for having just missed a grope. And now reading Ms. Akbar's letter made me wonder if it is a sub-continental behaviour of the Asian variety!

While in travel mode, whether in India or abroad, my radar goes into serious overdrive. If any airline got a whiff of that extra baggage, they would make a killing! But it is a legacy of my father's boot camp training and a combination of my own survival instincts and I guess I also picked up a few pointers from my canine siblings (they have been most kind with sniffer and instinct training). As a kid using public transport to school and later on, to college, I became quite adept at using the safety pins and instruments from my geometry box. And when I could, I would use my nails, fists and knees too. Then, there was this one time, I was returning home from college and in the not very crowded bus, had my butt pinched. I was so furious and disgusted that I actually told this guy who pinched me, that he had to pay me for the service. It was quite the shocker for everyone around and the guy was shamed enough to get off when the driver braked. I went home, put soap on my tongue and gargled and promptly threw up........

Noorjahan, I stand with you, as defiant and now over to you:







A Letter to My Harasser

By: Noorjahan Akbar - Afghanistan Correspondent for Safe World for Women

Hello sir,

I do not know your name, but you passed by me a week after Eid-ul-Fetr in the Bazaar in Kabul. You might remember me. I was the young woman wearing a white scarf and a long red embroidered tunic with dark pants. I was standing by a vegetable stand and bargaining the price of fresh mint when you passed me and nonchalantly pinched my bottom. I turned red. The old man who was selling vegetables noticed but didn’t say anything. He probably sees this every day. This had happened to me more than once, but this time I felt more embarrassed because the old man noticed.

I ran after you and grasped your wrist. Scared and sweating I started yelling. “Why did you do that? How dare you? Do you do this at home to your family members too?” and you started yelling back louder, “you crazy woman! I haven’t done anything. You are not worth doing anything to.”

I was still ashamed to tell people what you had done. You probably remember how everyone was watching us. Other women advised me to keep calm that this would only ruin my reputation, but I wasn’t going to give up now. I started yelling. Soon the police arrived and took us both to the station.

A tall man in uniform asked me what had happened. I told him. You opened your mouth and the police officer yelled, “You, shut up!” Next thing I knew he was beating you. You were on the floor and he was kicking you with his gigantic shoes. Sweat was dripping off his thick eyebrows. He must have been as angry as I was.

I didn’t see you again, but the friend who was walking with you followed me all the way home. He told me, “what is the big deal?! It is not like he f***ked you.” But I was too tired for a second fight that day.

You and your friend probably both claim to be Muslims. You probably even pray at the mosque every Friday or more often. You probably tell your wives that they should not get out of the house because the world out there is filled with horrible men who will disgrace them. You probably even believe that you had a right to touching my bottom because you think a “good” woman would never be out on the streets without a man. Your sisters are “good.” They stay at home when you pressure them to. If I were a “good woman” I would do the same. These streets belong to men.

I am writing this letter to tell you that I never intended for you to get beaten and humiliated, but I am not sorry for speaking out. I am writing to tell you that I know what you are up to. You want to threaten me, scare me, and keep me shut at home where I will learn to tend to many children and cook food for your kind and be submissive to a man that might someday marry me. You want me to be terrified of the world outside and not find my way and my place in it. You want me to believe that the only safe and “decent” place for me is in the kitchen and the bedroom. But I am writing you to tell you that I am not buying that ever again. Not you, not the Taliban, not this government, not my brother or mother, nor anybody else can convince me that I am less than a man, that I cannot protect myself, that I cannot be what I want to, and that the best life for me is in a “safe” kitchen where a man or a mother-in-law has control over my every move. I am not buying that. Not ever again.

I will come out of the home every day and walk bravely down the streets of my city, not because I need to, but because I can and neither your harassment or sexual assault nor an oppressive government will ever be able to take that ability from me again.

With Defiance,

A Woman You Harassed

Note: The letter was taken from http://www.asafeworldforwomen.org/about/safe-world-blogs/noorjahan-akbar/3319-kabul-harasser.html

Photo courtesy: Alex Motiuk

A Buddha Lesson For Me

I think I am turning into a borderline Facebook addict. Well, it’s just me. Sitting on the fence is an old habit. Can be pushed either way, but will take my sweet Mother Mary time and thankfully I am not yet a total addict. Anyway, I seem to find a lot of gems on the networking site and this is one such. Thanks to friends and acquaintances I am able to share words of wisdom. This is a beautiful story and really hits the home run especially for an impulsive person like me. Lucky me, I have my own Buddhas in my life who keep me grounded and calm.

Once Buddha was travelling with a few of his followers. While they were passing a lake, Buddha told one of his disciples, "I am thirsty. Do get me some water from the lake."

The disciple walked up to the lake. At that moment, a bullock cart started crossing through the lake. As a result, the water became very muddy and turbid. The disciple thought, "How can I give this muddy water to Buddha to drink?"

So he came back and told Buddha, "The water in there is very muddy. I don't think it is fit to drink."

After about half an hour, again Buddha asked the same disciple to go back to the lake.

The disciple went back, and found that the water was still muddy. He returned and informed Buddha about the same.

After sometime, again Buddha asked the same disciple to go back.

This time, the disciple found the mud had settled down, and the water was clean and clear. So he collected some water in a pot and brought it to Buddha.

Buddha looked at the water, and then he looked up at the disciple and said," See what you did to make the water clean. You let it be, and the mud settled down on its own -- and you have clear water.

Your mind is like that too ! When it is disturbed, just let it be. Give it a little time. It will settle down on its own. You don't have to put in any effort to calm it down. It will happen. It is effortless." Having 'Peace of Mind' is not a strenuous job; it is an effortless process!

Picture Courtesy: Google images (600 × 446 - Budha Painting - Budha Fine Art Print. Budha Painting by Pc fineartamerica.com)

Children Have Rules Too....For Us

It was the Parent Teacher Meeting at Tamanna’s school. When she turned two and a half, she followed big sister Aarzoo into the portals of Little Feat Montessori. Insha-Allah, she should be there till it is time for her to move to Grade I.

I met her Teacher, Ms. Paromita, who has nothing but praise for her wards. And when one has had both sisters under one’s wing as a teacher, comparisons are bound to arise, much as Ms. Paromita hates it. Heretofore, she always maintained that the two girls were very different in temperament and attitude. But this time, her report was entirely the opposite.

“Tamanna, is so like Aarzoo!! It’s not funny,” she exclaimed. “Remember, how Aarzoo used to be such a perfectionist and had to cross her t’s and dot her i’s?” I nodded, recollecting the times when I had gone to fetch Aarzoo from school and was made to wait because she had not completed her work to her satisfaction and insisted on doing so.

“Tamanna is just the same. I am amazed,” said Ms. Paromita.

“Well, don’t blame me”, I replied. “It’s their Bengali genes that are responsible. They get it from their father. Next time Parag is in town, I will send him to school and you can give him a piece of your mind”.

“I am guilty of that too”, said Ms. Paromita, who is a Bengali herself, laughing.

We had a good laugh.

“I am very laid back, I assure you,” I said and was pleasantly surprised at the work that the brat had churned out that term. Owe it big time to her teacher and her school.

Waiting to meet Ms. Munira Akhtar, the Principal, I came across this eye-opener message on the notice board.

Unspoken Words From The Heart Of A Child

My hands are small; please don’t expect perfection whenever I make a bed, draw a picture or throw a ball
My legs are short; please slow down so that I can keep up with you

My eyes have not seen the world as yours have; please let me explore safely. Don’t restrict me unnecessarily.

Housework will always be there. I am only little for a short time, please take time to explain things to me about this wonderful world and do so willingly.

My feelings are tender; please be sensitive to my needs. Don’t nag me all day long. (You wouldn’t want to be nagged for your inquisitiveness – would you?) Treat me as you would like to be treated

I am a special gift from God; please treasure me as God intended you to do, holding me accountable for my actions, giving me guideline to live by and disciplining me in a loving manner.

I need your encouragement to grow. Please go easy on the criticism; remember you can criticize the things I do, without criticizing me

Please give me the freedom to make decisions concerning myself. Permit me to fail, so that I can learn from my mistakes. Then someday I will be prepared to make the kinds of decisions that life requires of me.

Please don’t do things over for me. Somehow that makes me feel that my efforts didn’t quite measure up to your expectations. I know it’s hard but please don’t try to compare me to my brother or sister.



I realized then how important it was to keep going back to school. Those walls are teachers of the immortal kind!

Psalms from my Bible

This forward has probably gone round the world and still continues its jet setting as I write. The originator of this was a person of Indian origin, our very own desi Jitendra Singh. He has no idea of who I am, but if I were to draw parallels from the family tree then I would say that he is a friend four times removed; that is to say he is a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend!! Phew……but thanks a ton Jitendra for taking the effort.

Anyway, lucky to have him in the pyramid of friends because I have been able to read through some lines which are profound in their very simplicity.

ANNA QUINDLEN

Anna Quindlen was a first rate New York Times reporter who left at her prime to pursue her life as a writer. A few years ago she was invited to speak at the commencement at Villanova University. But given her views on abortion, some people threatened to demonstrate against her. She declined to speak, since she thought the students did not deserve protest demonstrations for their graduation ceremony. But when some students wrote her for the text of the speech, she did e-mail it out and it became an internet legend of sorts.

THE COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS

"It's a great honor for me to be the third member of my family to receive an honorary doctorate from this great university. It's an honor to follow my great-uncle Jim, who was a gifted physician, and my Uncle Jack, who is a remarkable businessman. Both of them could have told you something important about their professions, about medicine or commerce. I have no specialized field of interest or expertise, which puts me at a disadvantage, talking to you today.

I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. The second is only part of the first. Don't ever forget what a friend once wrote Senator Paul Tsongas when the senator decided not to run for reelection because he'd been diagnosed with cancer: "No man ever said on his deathbed I wish I had spent more time in the office." Don't ever forget the words my father sent me on a postcard last year: "If you win the rat race, you're still a rat." Or what John Lennon wrote before he was gunned down in the driveway of the Dakota: "Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."

You walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree; there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living. But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life. Your particular life. Your entire life. Not just your life at a desk, or your life on a bus, or in a car, or at the computer. Not just the life of your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank account, but your soul.

People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is a cold comfort on a winter night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've gotten back the test results and they're not so good.

Here is my resume:

• I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my profession stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the center of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh.
• I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh.
• I am a good friend to my friends, and they to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cutout. But I call them on the phone, and I meet them for lunch. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh.

I would be rotten, or at best mediocre at my job, if those other things were not true. You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are.

So here's what I wanted to tell you today: get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger paycheck, the larger house. Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast?

Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze over Seaside Heights, a life in which you stop and watch how a red tailed hawk circles over the water gap or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a Cheerio with her thumb and first finger.

Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Each time you look at your diploma, remember that you are still a student, learning how to best treasure your connection to others. Pick up the phone. Send an E-mail. Write a letter. Kiss your Mom. Hug your Dad.

Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. It is so easy to waste our lives: our days, our hours, our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the color of our kids eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again.

It is so easy to exist instead of live. I learned to live many years ago. Something really, really bad happened to me, something that changed my life in ways that, if I had my druthers, it would never have been changed at all. And what I learned from it is what, today, seems to be the hardest lesson of all. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get.

I learned to look at all the good in the world and to try to give some of it back because I believed in it completely and utterly. And I tried to do that, in part, by telling others what I had learned. By telling them this:

Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in the backyard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of life as a terminal illness because if you do you will live it with joy and passion as it ought to be lived.

Well, you can learn all those things, out there, if you get a real life, a full life, a professional life, yes, but another life, too, a life of love and laughs and a connection to other human beings. Just keep your eyes and ears open. Here you could learn in the classroom. There the classroom is everywhere. The exam comes at the very end. No man ever said on his deathbed I wish I had spent more time at the office.

I found one of my best teachers on the boardwalk at Coney Island maybe 15 years ago. It was December, and I was doing a story about how the homeless survive in the winter months. He and I sat on the edge of the wooden supports, dangling our feet over the side, and he told me about his schedule, panhandling the boulevard when the summer crowds were gone, sleeping in a church when the temperature went below freezing, hiding from the police amidst the Tilt a Whirl and the Cyclone and some of the other seasonal rides. But he told me that most of the time he stayed on the boardwalk, facing the water, just the way we were sitting now even when it got cold and he had to wear his newspapers after he read them. And I asked him why. Why didn't he go to one of the shelters? Why didn't
he check himself into the hospital for detox? And he just stared out at the ocean and said, "Look at the view, young lady. Look at the view."

And every day, in some little way, I try to do what he said. I try to look at the view. And that's the last thing I have to tell you today, words of wisdom from a man with not a dime in his pocket, no place to go, nowhere to be. Look at the view. You'll never be disappointed."
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I find a lot of people are making it easier for me by handing me adequate props for use in my role as a mother. And also as mentor, teacher and friend. Thanks to friends even a hundred times removed, I am able to collect the Psalms for my own personal little Bible!! Take for example the video of Kate Bornstein speaking at the 40th reunion of the Class of 69, at Brown University. It was posted by Anita Mathew, friend (and co-actor from The Roosters) on her profile on a social networking site and I copied it onto my profile as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcKLBi00EHE

Hope someday my children would care enough to read from my Bible of Life as well!!

Erma Bombeck

Erma Louise Bombeck – Rest in Peace. I am a huge fan. Do not possess the same felicity and verve with words that you did, but this is my tribute to you.

She had me well and truly hooked, booked and cooked from the time I read her book – “Motherhood – the World’s Second Oldest Profession”. Arguments about the veracity of the title abound; considering that one could easily claim Motherhood as being almost as old as life itself. But hey, also considering that the title of the Oldest Profession had already been taken or rather thrust upon a certain group, we would not want to get into silly little technicalities now, would we?

Anyway, I have been a huge fan of her writing. I confess that for a short fuse like me, it has been her writing that has kept me from bursting arteries and veins and what have you in my role as “Mommy”!! I have been able to maintain a sense of humour in some of the most trying situations with the kids, thanks to those words she cared to pen down. There has been many a moment that hairbrush did not connect to bottoms, when it should have and my brood may want to confer sainthood on her. They owe it to her that I was able to see “funny side up”.

“At Wit’s End” is a book of hers that I am keen to read. The irony is that I have it in my personal collection but have never been able to lay my hands on it simply because it is constantly in circulation!! And yours truly has been stupidly generous enough; not just with urging people to read but giving them the copy as well!

A few years ago, this piece was forwarded to me by a friend. I had not deleted the mail and chanced upon it recently. I realized that I just had to share it. I could not give better advice to my children or to those that I love or to the world at large. As for me, I am trying hard to follow the lessons Erma learnt instead of reinventing the wheel.


IF I HAD MY LIFE TO LIVE OVER - by Erma Bombeck
(Written after she found out she was dying from cancer.)

I would have gone to bed when I was sick instead of pretending the
earth would go into a holding pattern if I weren't there for the day.

I would have burned the pink candle sculpted like a rose before it
melted in storage.

I would have talked less and listened more.

I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was
stained, or the sofa faded.

I would have eaten the popcorn in the 'good' living room and
worried much less about the dirt when someone wanted to light a fire in the
fireplace.

I would have taken the time to listen to my grandfather ramble
about his youth.

I would have shared more of the responsibility carried by my
husband.

I would have sat on the lawn with my children and not worried about
grass stains.

I would have cried and laughed less while watching television and
more while watching life.

I would never have bought anything just because it was practical,
wouldn't show soil, or was guaranteed to last a lifetime.

Instead of wishing away nine months of pregnancy, I'd have
cherished every moment and realized that the wonderment growing inside me
was the only chance in life to assist God in a miracle.

When my kids kissed me impetuously, I would never have said, Later,
now go get washed up for dinner."

There would have been more "I love you's." More "I'm sorry's."

But mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every
minute...look at it and really see it ... live it... and never give it
back.

Stop sweating the small stuff.

Don't worry about who doesn't like you, who has more, or who's doing what.
Instead, let's cherish the relationships we have with those who do love us.

Let's think about what God HAS blessed us with.
And what we are doing each day to promote ourselves mentally, physically, emotionally, as well as spiritually.

Life is too short to let it pass you by.
We only have one shot at this and then it's gone.

I hope you all have a blessed day.