A Girl Like Me: Good read... esp when u have nothing else to do and no where to go... it beautifully paints the insecurities of shifting cultures... Ann aka Annie aka Ani is forced to shift from Minnesota to Gurgoan, India.. first she finds it hard and almost decides that she doesn't want to mingle in.. but wen she actually accepts and comes to terms with India, she goes thru an array of events that's too much to handle for her... Clashes with Career-oriented single mother, not able to accept dear Momma's guy friend, a new sort-of-sibling taking her place as a daughter, memories of gone Father and much more... this book doesn't provide u solutions.. this just shows wat kids go thru wen parents are busy seeking their destiny...
i sort of pictured myself as Ani... as a daughter of a ever-transfering-never-settling-bank-staff-father life saw me changing my base every 2-3 yrs.. but i actually used that as an advantage.. i can easily blend, make friends and good-byes are not so hard for me.. i have learnt and absorbed more cultures/tradition that i am complete mish-mash, celebrating every festival in India and mixing up atleast 3 cultures and believes.. i can understand most of the Languages and speak in quite few of them... May be because mom and pop wr always there to assure me.. May be...
Ladies Coupe: re-read this book after almost six months... eventhough i dont accept everything in this Fab book, i still hold this close to my heart... Here we see a single woman, Aki aka Akila aka Akilandeswari discovering herself, hmm atleast trying to discover... 45 yrs old Aki wakes up one morning and suddenly is flooded by the desire to find herself... takes a one-way ticket to Kanyakumari inspite of her younger sister's protests... she had till now sacrificed her happiness for her family, supporting her mother,2 younger brothers and a younger sister... Right from supporting her brothers' education to marrying off her sister to letting her stay with her even after marriage to digesting the sarcastic remarks of her sister, Aki goes thru just too much...
She meets 5 other women in the train and listens to their stories... We have a Janaki, who feels insecure with her husband's Love, a Margaret, who teaches her cruel-paedophilic-arrogant husband by destroying his self esteem, a young girl Sheela, who can see thru people's inner self, a Prabha devi, who oscillates btw being docile, adventourous and ultimately settles for a mix of both after finding her wings..erm fins in water, and then we have a Marikolundhu suffering coz of several twists, turns and innumerable surprises life threw for her...
the book ends with Aki reaching out for her old love...
What disturbed me was not one thing... some how i couldn't bring myself to accept Marikolundhu, first raped by her employer's relative, she later on indulges to please both her employer and her husband in bed... i couldn't accept Janaki's want of a Man to protect her, be it a father, husband or son...
but yeah... i pray for the guts and brains of Margaret.. i want to be like her.. non-violently, teaching a great lesson to her husband and not caring a damn about what others think about her.. thats will be me...
Lets better not talk about the MnB's and u wud have already watched Casino Royale on the Silver screen..
i am presently reading Amitava Ghosh's "The Hunry Tide"... other books lined up are The Last Lecture, the Leadership Techniques of Queen Elizabeth, The White Tiger and another book by an indian author the name of which escapes me now...
Rest in next,
D Rat
No comments:
Post a Comment