Seat up! Seat down! Seat around around and around!

Ok. I am a girl. For clarification. No no.. Not invoking Britney Spears. Lets dive in!


As far back as i can remember, i have always left my seat up. What seat? Toilet seat of course. I, as a rule sit on the ceramic part of the potty and not on the plastic. Is that too much information? Well this article is about toilet etiquette.

My backside will weep blood if sit on the plastic for long, and as all my friends/family will vouch, i do take my time in the potty. Not because i have irregular bowels, that too, but often because i read in the potty. :) So if i sit on the plastic for as long as i do, the elliptical shape of the seat will forever be etched on my backside. Now that is not a good prospect. I don't really remember when is started doing that, and i never really paid attention to it, until one Friends episode made me think. Sometime in the later part of the series, don't really remember which season accurately, Rachel asks Joey to put the seat down after finishing his business.   When i saw that episode i thought "Hy, Whats that about toilet seat?" and i figured she (Rachel) was talking about the exterior rim.

Flash forward to 2009.

My roommate during my master's in the US, one day randomly pointed out
"Mri, you do it like a man"
"Excuse me"
"You leave the seat up, like a man"
(See, we have separate toilets, 2 people, 2 bedrooms, 2 toilets. Her's attached, mine not. I was brushing my teeth when she walked by and decided to make this super astonishing statement.After that day, i never leave my toilet door open. Ever. )
"What man?"
"Mri, usually when men use the toilet, they sit on the ceramic, and leave the toilet seat up after"
"Oh?... Oh!" Now i get what rachel meant.
"So, you don't sit on the ceramic?"
"Nope" and she walked off, leaving me in a very pensive mood.

Since then, i have made it  a point to ask my friends/family at random times if they sit on the ceramic, and at all times the reply was "nope". So does that mean i am the only one  that "Does it like a man". Who decided what etiquette men and women must follow when they poo?No one ever told me that I as a girl should sit on the plastic. Do parents teach their children that? I obviously cannot be alone on this issue right?

After all the huffing and puffing and little cursing, i am  just glad that i was able to get it out of my system. Here is where one use the phrase, "The end justifies the means" and it would be just so perfect.


P.s: These days though i am very glad i sit on the ceramic. Imagine while using a public toilet, I will sit on the cleaner part after wiping it with tissue of course and the rest? Yada yada. Even thinking about it makes me go eewwww...Ahahaha.

India a superpower? : The joke is on us!!!

Holy Cow!2020!! 

If you have been closely following the "India's rise and rise" hogwash that politicians, corporates, foreigners and others have been feeding you, then you will be familiar with the concept of "India a superpower". Now i am a believer of the said statement. I truly believe that we as as nation, economically will become a superpower, sooner than later, political impotency notwithstanding. But, is economic development alone enough? Will eradicating poverty make us superior  or atleast on par with the western world? As the title goes, the joke is on us.

What makes a nation super? Economic freedom yes, freedom of expression? religious freedom? (mind you, i am not using the world tolerance here. Tolerance is a bucketload of crap) Adherence to law? Equality of the genders,of the sexes? What else? 

Now, our economic freedom has been on the rise for the last 2 decades. We have "everything" here, from  branded, expensive labels to chicken from kentucky and if i am to believe the government, soon walmart and tesco. As a person who has availed the services of both Walmart and Tesco whilst living abroad, i will be happy.But looks like some of our politicians are not. Oh well!Anyway getting back to the topic, these days, I am angry. Very. pretty much at everything in this country. Angry with the congress for their scams. Angry with the BJP for disrupting the parliament and wasting tax payers money. Angry with the spineless PM, with the useless opposition. Corporation, here in chennai for the garbage and the potholes and i could go on. But really, the things make me despair are much simpler. Not the government that will falter but it is the people. The very same people, who on one hand will ensure that this country raises and on the flip side will never really allow it to become great. Why you ask? I will list. :) i like making lists. 

1. Callousness: We as a nation, don't care about anything or anyone. If we did, do you honestly believe that our country would be so dirty? That we will just spit on the road? Throw the garbage on the streets? Skip traffic lights? Question the government when they bring in "wear helmet laws"Allow people to die on the roads? Oh we don't care. We don't care for the rules laid down, because we know, no-one will question us if we break them. Even by chance, someone dares to object, we beat them. bully them. Rules are meant to be broken. That should be our national motto. Not sathyameva jayate. Because, truth never ever triumphs. The one with the loudest voice, dirtiest manners, extremely poor bladder control always wins. And that is half the urban population. 


2. Misogyny:  Oh we are pathetic! Extremely pathetic.  Eve-Teasing: Blame the women. Rape: Blame the women. Oh if you are thinking only men blame the women you are wrong. This is a nation where the National council for Women blames the women if she gets teased, raped, or gets beaten up by moral police. Why? I have no answer. The only thing i have is about thousand explicits to hurl at the women of this nation. Nobody can empower you. Only YOU can empower you. I want to scream  at  every stupid, 2-bit NCW women who are apparently fighting for "the cause". Stand up, ladies of this nation. Take charge. Don't teach your daughters to cover themselves. Teach your son's not to look at a girl as an object. But sadly. In India: Misogyny is defined as when men and women hate women. Oh the shame of this nation. 

3. Religious Mis-understanding: Now as a practitioner of one faith how many of us have tried to understand another faith? We blindly teach our children to hate everyone else, and then beat our chest and say: My religion preaches tolerance and peace. Puh-Leez!!! Am i wrong? Lack of understanding(not tolerance) cultivates hatred. Stupidity cultivates hatred. Ah! how right Katju was when he said "90% of all indians are stupid"! Oh! how right he is. We are stupid. All it takes for us to go brow-beating and bash-pissing is when someone says, Hy some(Insert religion here) beat up someone of (insert another religion here).We don't verify if it really was a religion-hate filled crime, Nooo. It could have been mugging. It could have been that one guy lost his balance and fell on the other. But noooo.. We will War-cry, take sticks and start rampaging like a elephant in heat! No one can save us from that. 

4. 90% stupid people:  I will keep this simple. Blind following. Be it film star, Bollywwod/Hollywood even when they make ill-informed remarks(note: Oprah ) we listen. Politicians/Councillors spout utter rubbish we listen. In India all one needs to incite people is a mega-phone . Take it. Holler. People will throng,Nod their heads. Blindly follow and indulge in irrational mob behavior. Some biriyani and daaru on the side will help your cause. The indian public is not clever. It's just plain stupid. Remember hutch dog? Where you go it follows. Ya? The dog was cute. We are not. 

5. Netizens: Now, you might wonder. I should have included this with the one above. But indian netizens deserve special mention. They take the crown. If you read Rediff, Firstpost or any other online publications that allow comments, you know what i am talking about. Indian netizens are the worst in the world. They are ill informed, uncouth and abusive. Hiding behind a proxy name, our generally emasculated men/women turn into viagra-munching, whey-protein drinking mentally retarded assholes(Capes not withstanding). If you are against Kejirawal/Anna then you are a congress bootlicker. If you are against Baba ramdev then you are a pakistani. If your english is better than the average user than you will suffer the same fate as Raja Sen of rediif.com ( I am a big fan though). If you are against Baba Ramdev do not air it on twitter. Else suffer the same lashing as Madhu Trehan got. (Man, that women has balls.) What does that really say about us? We are spineless, Gutless, Amoral lunatics who is only capable of berating someone under a proxy. India as a nation is emasculated. Oh! i heard that the average male indian penis is 3.5cm. Belgium/Congo=8cm. So when size matters so much, You should just STFP. Oh wait a minute. Will that explain 99% of india's problem? Poor dimensions!( read length and girth) 

There are many more issues. Sexual minorities, Kamasutra, Honor protecting/Honor killing and all that i will tackle in the 2nd part of this write up. For now, One piece( A Manga/Japanese comics) is begging for attention. Will go.