Tag: Bombay

Epic Rant

And so it begins…the epic rant that I’ve been avoiding ranting on about. Forgive me for this one but it needs to happen. Ever fiber of my being has tried to convince myself that I was ‘bigger than that’; it was trivial and it didn’t matter so much, that I’d get over it. The last part may be true– I will eventually get over it. But when my chest swells with anger at the very thought of it, I can’t deny it bothers me. What I’m talking about here is a bad haircut.

Hair does something for a woman that other things can’t. I could continue on about the femininity that is attached to hair and how we can often literally get so wrapped up in the stylistic variants and pleasure we woman get from our hair. But that’s not what this post is for. I’m here to rant about the awful haircut that was Shiva’s. I mention his name because if anyone does read this and needs a haircut in Bombay, stay far, far away from his clippers.

By now, I’ve made my rounds at beauty parlors across Juhu to Bandra. There are two I bounce between depending on what services I need. I haven’t gotten a haircut since September, before the big fat Russian/Turkish wedding. My hair didn’t grow out as expected and so I made a mental note to not return there when I was next in need of a cut. My hair grew unruly and difficult to manage. The humidity of Bombay (along with the hard water I supposed and pollution perhaps?) hasn’t exactly worked in my curly girl favor. I’ve come to adjust to life in Bombay but my hair was putting up a very clear fight.

After inquiring about a good hairstylist whom knew how to deal with curly hair I made the quick decision to follow my acupuncturists recommendation of a South Indian hair stylist named Shiva. I’m not South Indian but my hair is comparable to South Indian hair in all its thick and curliness so this seemed promising. “But don’t expect much, he’s very simple. Very good but very simple.” Perfect, I thought. A no frills award winning recommended stylist. “My acupuncturist would never lead me astray!” I thought. I trust her. I decided 5 months ago to trust her and it’s worked in my favor so this seemed no different. I made an appointment for the next day. When I walked in for the cut, I felt uneasy. ‘She wasn’t kidding’. It was beyond no-frills–the salon was dingy, at best. It was located in the posh area of Juhu and I had done my research online about the stylist. Google told me he’s done up most of Bollywood but I had to see it for myself. A part of me screamed ‘get the hell out of there, stat.’ But a bigger part of me said  ‘she warned me I would react this way. Just let it happen, Sonali.

Now to the scene of the crime—I explained to Shiva what I was looking for and he lazily agreed to deliver. I mentioned my nervous nature especially when getting a haircut. I know, I know, I need a hobby or a life, probably both. But again, forget the superficiality of it all and let me rant on. He proceeded to razor cut my hair, which I didn’t know till it was happening. It was all very surreal. I felt slices of hair disappear and before I knew it he handed me a bouquet of my hair, as if it he were being gentlemanly and my hair were a bundle of beautiful roses. I wasn’t able to process that moment until later. Just let it happen, it will come out nice. As the cut continued he had his staff hand me several magazines opening them up to the pages where he was pictured with celebrities and receiving awards. I could feel the anger and confusion building inside. WTF?!?! Is this man insane? I had my hair blown out and I reached towards the back of head. It felt thin, empty and flat. He was in no way interested in understanding how my curls fell or. He was an award-winning, competitive stylist who was also a sham. I came to learn later on that when a salon becomes a chain, many times stylists purposefully cut hair uneven or incorrectly in order to make its clients keep coming back to them. It didn’t make sense to me at first but eventually I came to see it worked; they would manipulate their client into believing their hair was one way or should be a certain way, and would continue to do this until their client actually believed it. Plus people are obsessed with straightening their hair. Curly hair is therefore not appreciated as much and so its rare to find someone who can cut it properly.  Sad but true. For Shiva, he was more interested in showing me his publicity and signs of recognition via beauty magazines.

I was so angry for so long. I told my acupuncturist about it and she suggested I pay him a visit again, that he would fix it. Fix it?! Hell no. I’m never going back there. I was so upset by it all that my anger even showed up in my Acugraph (this is a graph reading acupuncturists do to check your energy levels or chi). I couldn’t seem to get over the fact that I let this fool of man cut my hair and even worse that I cared about it so damn much. Morale of the story: listen to that inner voice when it tells you run far, far away from something. Also, live with your decisions, whatever they may be.

I’m not as angry as I was before. Hair grows back. Life goes on. We must keep moving forward. When you’re in a new city and don’t know better, you’re often reliant on someone else’s recommendation for your needs. No amount of online research could have told me Shiva’s sucked. Maybe bad haircuts are just a part of life. If one were to see my hair now they would like it wasn’t a big deal at all, it’s not as bad as I describe. The perfectionist in me smiles and says, ‘It’s not always going to work out in your favor, now.” All I know is that no matter how much I mature in life, I still feel as though a bad haircut will always certainly put me in a terrible horrible mood. END OF RANT.

Sincerely, 6 Months.

February 16th?! And so I ask, where has time gone? Where oh WHERE did January go? Time is flying by—I’ve been here exactly 6 months to the date. This is the longest I’ve stayed in India since my Pune days, circa 2008.

M has returned to the bitter cold weather of the tri-state. I hear from friends and family that this winter has been particularly awful; snowstorm after snowstorm with huge bursts of chilling wind and freezing rain. Sounds like a mess. A mess I am happy to not be a part of. Although Bombay has its flaws, the weather during this season is extremely pleasant, more so than any other part of India. It’s not humid nor is it too cold. The nights are breezy and the days are still warm enough to forget its mid Feb. There are quite a few people from the States visiting Bombay this time of year, many of whom I’ve met up with for a casual evening out. It’s nice because it lessens the pangs of any lingering homesickness I may feel. Lessens but doesn’t do away with. I came down with a hell of a cold a few weeks back—runny nose, congestion, facial tenderness, the works. I was so incredibly homesick. It came out of nowhere! Perhaps it’s the need for comfort in times of sickness that I become more apt to just let all types of emotions take over me. Homesickness doesn’t happen too often because India has sincerely become a second home to me—I’ve been traveling back and fourth for 6 years—and so it’s become second nature to dive right back into the ‘Indian ways’ once I arrive at CSI airport. I indulged myself in some good old-fashioned comfort foods and chatted with friends from home. Balance, it’s all about maintaining that balance.

I remember my arrival to Bombay airport this time around on August 16th and having the distinct feeling of “So…this is the new normal. Interesting.” The foul smells and broken streets no longer assaulted my senses. It wasn’t because the conditions improved at all but because I got used to it. A voice inside screamed, “This was never supposed to happen!!!” Balu picked Dad and I up from the airport that night and we arrived at a hotel, per usual. Everything we did our first full day out felt so very normal. I hated the familiarity of it all. I wanted to cling onto the idea of India as something else: a place that was removed from home, a foreign land. India as ‘the place I went to heal’ or ‘the land of spirituality and all things eastern’. [SHORT INSERT: I went to a party at Palladium Hotels’ EXO Lounge last month with a friend and I met a woman who worked at the Canadian Consulate. She did not hold back in the least in telling me how much she despised Bombay. She’d worked for the Consulate for many years and lived all over the place, she says. Rio was b yffar her favorite. But Bombay was not a happy match for her. Her job at the consulate is to help foreigners adjust to life in Bombay. What does that entail, you ask? “You know, most people come here to find themselves, seek out spirituality, all that.” I laughed because it was funny and because it was true. I was that person, I told myself. Her man-friend who also worked as a Consulate advisor for a country far more interesting than Canada later entered and I in turn exited to find my friend. END OF INSERT].

I didn’t want the feeling of everything being easy-breezy, plain, almost boring. The India I held onto and always brought back with me to America was becoming something of the past and New India was steadily approaching. This New India (or New Bombay, rather) where I would live and work just didn’t feel as special. It felt serious and dull. It wasn’t only the environment that felt routine to me but I found myself becoming inherently ‘more Indian’. Street beggars tapping at my car window no longer fazed me. I would stare straight ahead and disengage. I treated people differently than I did before; I always on the defense. I began to question everything and everyone around me. Part of my journey in carving out a space for myself here in Bombay clearly came with a large side of paranoia. Eventually I came to recognize it as such and stopped the craziness. I allowed myself to be comfortable with being comfortable here. I guess its safe to say I really started living in Bombay once I let that happen.

Made in India

Re: blog post about my terrible, awful, no good, very bad day? Well, the good finally came and I cashed it in, literally. I begrudgingly went shopping with M yesterday to a store in Santa Cruz West called Raas. My physical therapist at Nanavati suggested I check it out after telling her about fatal ending of my old churidars (fire in a fabric store…read ‘Burn Bollywood Burn’). We walked in and I immediately picked up a yellow number. I perused all the racks, handing M each outfit I liked to model. It must have been one of those ‘lucky’ shopping days because everything we found, we loved. The workers were so friendly, the place was clean and best yet, they FED US. The manager ordered us Swastik sandwiches (famous pressed toast sandwiches–say a lightly pressed panini–with tons of spices inside). I needed small repairs done on my necklaces from NY and Raas led us in the right direction. Magic I tell you! It was one of two extremely successful shopping days here in Bombay.

I went to the changing room to throw on an outfit I thought my sister might like. As I was changing, my eye caught the inside label of my *American Eagle* shirt, ‘Made in India.’ I couldn’t help but cringe because I spent 40 USD on that sucker, which I could have easily gotten ‘Made in India‘ for 5 USD. Note to American Eagle: stick by your brand name! Make your damn clothes in America.

After all the saris-suits-salwar talk, my head was spinning. A day of total materialism. I needed some food for thought. I decided to strike up a conversation with Balu the driver about Guru’s in India. Friday morning, M and I will be going to meet a Guru; there are signs plastered all over Chembur’s roadways, probably the whole of Bombay, promoting this event. I asked Balu if he had a Guru. He adamantly denied this and went on to say that he believed it was all BS. M, Balu and I all put our two cents in about the Guru topics; I shared my all-too-familiar story (amongst my friends in NY, at least) about the Naga Baba in Rishikesh. When I went to meet Naga Baba, (a naked guru-type-healer-of-sorts) he was immediately offended I didn’t touch his feet upon arrival (this is seen as a sign of respect in India). He then argued that because I was female, I was not allowed to touch him. I told him about my medical condition. He sensed an accent and asked where I was born.

His response: ‘American? Hahahahahah. No help for you. You come from land of the monsters. You are monster’ –loosely but accurately translated

I shared this and other details about my naked scary man-guru experience in Rishikesh with Balu. We all enjoyed a good laugh, Balu at my young attempts to tell the story in Hindi, M that I agreed to see an old naked man, and me of my ridiculous life.

It was smooth sailing home, the streets were empty for kilometers. I forgot to mention Bombay was on strike yesterday. Yes, that’s right, on strike. I asked Sapna, our housemaid, how she came to work since she travels only by autorikshaw or footpath. She said the autos were running, no problem at all. Huh? But Bombay is on strike! Apparently Bombay-ites are as lackadaisical about going on strike as they are about being punctual. It was kind of amazing. Still, despite the attempted strike we got to experience the rare pleasure of driving sans traffic. I loved the open road. Inside, I wished Bombay was always ‘on strike’.