Mars v/s Venus

"All men are bastards."

This is a line on the back of a book I bought recently. My roomie read this one line and pleaded wid me to let her read it first. Justification - shud have a nice healthy dose of male bashing. Twist in the tale - the book was recommended and paid for by one of my guy friends.

Welcome to one of the oldest dog-bones of debates...men v/s women...Mars v/s Venus...

So is it true what most women think of men?
Are men really bastards/schmucks/jerks/psychos/hypocrites etc..? Or are they grossly misunderstood by the female species?
And are women really clingy/needy/overtly sentimental/impractical/dumb/irrational etc?

Well...I'm a girl...but most of my closest relationships have been with guys...mebbe it has sumthing to do wid the fact dat I was a tomboy for the first 13 years of my life...cud also have sumthin to do wid da fact dat I idolised my bro to da point of wanting to be jus like him...(no..this ain't a "boys dont cry" side track)....well watever da reason is...I seem to have the rare gift of being able to understand the male psyche a lil bit better than most of gal pals...so if men are from mars and women are from venus then I am the interpreter who can translate martianese to venusese and vice-versa...

And from all the translation I've done so far I’ve learnt a few things bout both the species...here's a few of those lil lessons...not all...coz I dont wanna lose da exclusivity ;)

Men:-

1. All men are not bastards. There are quite a few who are normal.(normal as per Venus standards)

2. Some men suffer from incurable bouts of mad-eyedness. This is especially obvious when they are standing in front of you and are supposedly talking to you but their eyes seem to be talking to some other part of your anatomy.

3. Men counter a variety of emotions wid anger and a display of indifference.
I'm hungry...growl!!!
I am bored...growl!!!
I hate my job...GROWWWL!!!!
I'm sad..."GRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWL!!!!
Its not like that...She's jus ok.... (shrug of the shoulders and a "watever" expression which actually means he digs her)
Ya..i guess we are... (thoughtful nod of the head when asked if he's serious bout a chick)

4. Men are capable of deep and sincere love. They might look...but they won’t stray. They are also capable of strong and long-lasting friendships.

5. Men are very serious about their careers. Money is not just materials for them. It is the key to a happy and fulfilled life for them. Money = comfort = good matrimonial choice = contended spouse = marital bliss = happy family = good retired life.

Women:-

1. Women have been treated badly by the male dominated society for so many years. They just want to catch up and make up for all that lost time. They were considered inferior for so long that just being equal doesn’t settle the score. They have to better.

2. Women are born to love. Its part of the package. There is no such thing as an unloving woman. She may not always love a human but there will always be one living thing in her life she will love above all.

3. Women work better than men. Men might work harder but women always work smarter. Part of the perks of have to deal with the "Can she do it?" syndrome.

4. Women need words. They need to be told that they’re needed and wanted. They need to be told that they matter. You could splurge the treasury of an entire nation on a gift but it’s the hand written card that will stay in her memories forever.

5. A woman can have only best friend at a time. She might claim to have a gang of buddies but her best friend will always be one person. That person might change over time but there will never be multiple best friends. (”my best friend from school/ junior college /graduate school / so-and-so town /abc club circle” and so on…)

So read and learn my martain buddies and my fellow Venusites…coz lets face it…we don’t really wanna live w/o the other species do we? I know I don’t…and I’m glad for the Martians in my life!!

A new year dawns...

On a high after the xmas party we decided to go out on new year's eve too..and we planned and plotted and enquired bout every event in a 100 mile radius...and true to the female race we planned and co-ordinated everythin from our outfits to our accessories to our modes of transport....

Meanwhile i was caught in no-man's land as there were 3 different groups for me to party wid...each wid a different venue in mind...some wanted a nice quiet new years eve...my office gang wanted to go all out on a pigging n binging spree...n my roomies wanted a decent crowd party venue...being da born diplomat dat i am...i managed to coerce/convince all of them to land up at the same venue...

After hagglin over the cover charges and wat all it wud cover we were finally there...wid a gang of around 9 ppl....all of dem different strokes...i knew we were in for some interesting events...

After gulping down the free booze and the free starters the dance gods beckoned us...and we danced to watever shit was being belted out in the name of in-house DJ music...it was den dat we noticed de huge gang of boys in the booth next to ours....one of dem in particular was sloshed and had decided it was his mission in life to come and crash our dance circle...he tried every trick in the book from accidentally dancing his way towards us...to tryin to wish us happy new year by shouting "Happy new year...i love u!!!"....his hapless and slightly less sloshed cronies tried to retrain him by forming a human chain round him and convincing him to dance in the centre....

But the best stunt he pulled was wen he decided to re-tie his shoe laces....now call me orthodox but i have always tawt that wen u tie ur shoe laces ur feet are supposed to be on the ground and ur head in the air....but no...dis guy who was probably a yoga instructor for desperate housewives tawt it wud be cool to balance his head on our couch wid his feet hoisted in the air as he tied his laces....all our male friends/protectors and his cronies were poised to prevent him from doing anything beyond that...as soon as he was done he was unceremoniously pushed back into his own circle of friends and was not seen again...

As the clock struck 12..there were cheers of "Happy new year!!!" everywhere....this however was quickly sidelined by another group next to ours where some chick was doling out free new year "love tokens"....

We continued appeasing the dance gods till 4 in the morning....and den finally we left for home...but our adventure was not over yet...

As soon as i reached home, i was informed dat we were heading to Marine drive to watch the sunrise....the first sunrise of the New year..i was excitedly told...now i am not a morning person...i've seen my fair share of sunsets....but the last sunrise i saw was wen i was a kid..i was on someone's shoulder and had blinked my eyes open...seen the sun and promptly dozed off again..so i politely told my roomies to stuff it and lemme sleep...but somehow they managed to blackmail me into agreeing to this comic caper...i blame the booze for this...can make a nice sensible morning grump turn into a morning lover...

So off we went wid two other pals..who were lured by promises of Maggi noodles...and we went dutifully to the station and took a train and landed up at marine drive after an hour long journey...thrilled by our spontaneous adventure so far..we clicked snaps to commemorate our heralding the first dawn of the new year....

As we waited with bated breath to be a part of the beauty of nature in all its glory we watched the sky lightening from deep black to blue and to grey...we even some some hint of pink clouds over the horizon...but no sun was in sight yet...we waited and waited till it hit us....we were facing west...and the sun is known to rise in the east....the glorious sunrise we wanted to witness had taken place behind us...somewhere in the east....

After having the laugh of our lives..we made our way back home...making blood oaths to keep our lil morning glory incident a secret...we reached home around 8 in the morning and slept till 2 in the afternoon...dats wen Shams entered our room wid the newspaper in hand...w/o a word she held out the front page and handed it to us....There was a beautiful pic of the sunrise....at the worli seaface...taken from the Bandra Linkway..which was half an hour from our place. We looked at each other in silence for a few seconds and burst into uncontrollable giggles...The new year had dawned....and it was special.

Twas da season of miracles...

This is not so much a new year tribute as it is a record of the craziness that was my xmas-new year time....But a lil history first...

I live wid/share a 1BHK wid 3 other gals...we're literally a poster for India United coz we are from North(Sups), South(Shams), East(Smrits) n West(me!!!)....n apart from me n Smrits...the other two are the gharelu main-madeera-nahi-peeti-ji kinds...Until one fine day it turns out that there was a revolution and Sups who'd recently undergone some kinda spiritual transformation talked Shams into "tryin new things" and "living life now"...."who knows if we'll ever a get a chance to try such things later in life"......So of course the most obvious n fun way for us to spend xmas was to go to some place that had booze...xmas miracle number 1.

And off we went on XMAS eve ...in search of a nice lounge/pub (coz a bar is too tacky)...n we drank till like 15 mins before midnite..wen we suddenly struck by the dance bug...but since no one else except sum wierdos were "dancing"...we decided to speed off home n dance away in the privacy of our flat....

So we raced off into the nite tryin to make it home b4 midnite...n we did in spite of our doubtful driving skills...xmas miracle number 2.

once safely home we switched on da TV to the first item number we cud find...think it was a southie number...n let loose...our dance moves cud put rajnikant to shame...its one of the funniest things to see normal ppl dance in ganpati mode....we played every item number from the ages of cinema history....and finally fell asleep exhausted....w/o getting kicked outta our flat for all da racket we made...xmas miracle number 3.