Two of a kind – MO and MS !

Have been reading about two women in detail the past week – Michelle Obama and M S Subbalakshmi . For the uninitiated, the latter is the doyen of Carnatic Classical Music. The former obviously needs no introduction.
How similar are the lives of two strikingly different people – the same elements of standing by your husband , the white house vs Kalki Gardens, Radha (for MS) vs Michelle’s daughters. The audacity (of hope, resilience and sheer courage) that binds both Sadaivam and Obama.
The courage to make a difference. The sheer indifference of not expecting anything in their newly found lives, by being there but not being affected. In making a difference to lives around them – the African-Amercian for Michelle/ Obama and the lives of other musicians around her for MS/Sadasivam.
Perhaps there is another thread here. The willingness to give in when required, be flexible when asked for, yet not compromising on personal principles, values.
To both these ladies, the attire is only a vehicle, a pathway to success. Its not the entireity. Values are. Bhakti is. Soul stirring incidents – be it Madurai or Chicago . Bo – the Portuguese breed dog is as much an icon as MS Blue – a colour of the silk sari that no south Indian lady would be seen without in her silk collection.

Be it garden parties at Kalki Gardens or kids’ sleep overs at the White House, both these women seem to be comfortable in their own skins, having not given into the radicality of the situation, but accepted it as it were. And polishing them with their inherent tenacity, silent female power and with no hesitation to take on a new creed – be it music or being the wife of the first Afro- American president.
To more such power !!

V Day musings !

Hell no! its May, not February .. and this note is not about Valentine day .. but about the other “V”… . Before ur dirty mind starts playing around, its about “Voting Day” ha ha…quite a dampener. Huh??

Hubby and I woke up early on V day and quite enthused to vote( me exercising my first ever franchise in decades !! ) only to find the ‘help desk’ tables set up throughout the city were either ill managed or better still, managed by Dadas (read goons) of the respective politicial party . .Talk about criminals in broad daylight.

Also strange to note was the fact that in spite of holding a Voters ID card (which anyways, was the official passport to vote), you still needed to get a slip telling you which of the voter centres u belonged to , and more importantly, the so called Electoral officers simply refusing to help u on this as well !! The cops looked on haplessly as hubby threatened to talk to the media which hadn’t published any of these ‘steps-to vote” in any of the “jaago re” kind of campaigns. Perhaps it was literally the ‘middle finger’ attitude to all voters- new, old, young, freshers. They couldn’t care any less, what with the bandobast giving them the creeps – and paid measly too . Perhaps we should have carried vada pavs and cutting chai – would that have made a difference.

Anyways, after endless trips to various tables, electoral help desks and friendly (yes, some of them) and of course breakfast (hey, we were hungry man !!), we finally stand in a queue and await our turn for about 45 minutes . And yours truly was all excited to cast the first vote ever in a lifetime – and all excited with slip in hand, et all…

Oops !! The divine intervened once more. We were in the wrong room , as the electoral officer smugly informed us. That just added to the the ambience of the corporation school with its yellowed walls, peeling craft work (perhaps, many years ago), wooden benches thrown(not stored/piled) in a corner as she (the divine goddess – the electoral officer) informed me (I think ‘shooed us away’ would be a better word) outside.

That’s it. I said and marched home towards the car. Hubby dear by this time was wooing me back to the polling officer for one last march. He perhaps didn’t even woo this much while we were dating, I mused. With a tinkle in his eye, he said (begged) “ Ok. One last chance.”

There wasn’t much to lose now, I thought. Except for 4 precious hours on a longggggggggggggg weekend that could be spent lazing around in bed J

We finally got the ‘shady looking classroom’ in the corporation school-cum-voting centre. And came out even bewildered when I couldn’t find the “nobody” button on the EVM. Damn ! How do I know who is good? I don’t even remember whom I voted when I finally came out of the ‘web’

Finally. Does it matter ? I don’t think so. The results will be out in 48 hours. And the media is still predicting a hung government.

Perhaps everyone else I know had an experience like me. They just couldn’t decide. For whatever reasons. And that’s precisely the reason for horse trading which has since commenced and probably also ended.

Its really Jaago re – an awakening of the rude shock for the 714 million odd electorate count in India. Damn the Kashmir issue. The Sri Lankan Issue. Or Rahul Gandhi. Or Saffronism. Or the Mumbai blasts. What matters is that 200 odd seats in the Indian Assembly. By hook or crook :)

Nobody cares for the common man. Perhaps RK Lakshman was right almost 60 years ago – and therefore reduced him to a caricature. A puppet in the eyes of the power-traders.