“For exercise”
Monthly Archive for June, 2008
I have had a fascination for Iran ever since I read V.S. Naipaul’s excellent, “Among the Believers: An Islamic Journey” and watched the Iranian Film Festival at Siri Fort Auditorium a few years back.
One of the most gripping documentaries I’ve ever watched is on Iran too, called, “Inside Iran with Rageh Omaar” (available for free and legal online viewing)
So I was naturally drawn to Ms. Azadeh Moaveni’s cutely titled, “Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America and American in Iran” Don’t let the title fool you. Its not Chick-Lit. Lipstick Jihad is about a second generation Iranian-American’s personal journey back to Iran. Moaveni moves to Iran as a journalist, and for no less a magazine than Time. While in Iran, Moaveni has close access to the people in power and is consequently able to speak with authority and clarity on the happenings in the country circa 1997-2005. These were the years when (figurehead) President Khatami tried (and failed) to make his country kinder, gentler and freer. Lipstick Jihad is also an intimate story of Moaveni’s relatives, family and friends in Tehran and America.
Living in Iran can be difficult given all the restrictions on fraternizing between the sexes, the lack of a free and fair democracy and the suffocating rule of the clergy. It can be doubly difficult if you don’t have a Y chromosome. Moaveni describes all these problems on a personal level. How she as a woman found the chador suffocating. How she experienced thuggish behavior and vigilantism. How she found it so tough to reconcile her secular worldview with that of the clergy. How she realized the failures of revolution and the hollowness of its slogans. Lipstick Jihad is not abstract whining or a political treatise. Its all about events and incidents, many of them small, but those experienced first hand. How seemingly small incidents are looked at and analyzed for their true import is simply brilliant throughout the book.
But its not all depressing fare. Moaveni has some keen observations on how Iranians continue to cope, subvert and even flourish in oppressive conditions. And in the process cook a snook at the regime. Moaveni is a proud Iranian and while she has some bitter things to say about her country, one does come away with a nuanced appreciation of Iranian culture. And cuisine 
.
Normally this genre of “identity”, “exile” and “immigration” literature can quickly get tiresome but Moaveni’s book was good. Read it if you like understanding subversion, disillusionment, broken dreams, outdated ideologies, totalitarian states and scary bureaucracies.
Sidharth’s Rating: 3.5/5.0
India is still not ready for some westernized concepts. For instance “Handmade Cosmetics.” This photo was taken at the City Select Shopping Mall in South Delhi.
When I think handmade cosmetics I think of dirty hands preparing and packing creams of unknown origin. Handmade cosmetics, my Indian sensibilities inform me, is probably going to give you acne.
I want machine made cosmetics . (Please don’t post inane comments like Sidharth you use cosmetics!? You know what I mean).
“Handmade Cosmetics” communicates personal touch and service in the Western world but communicates personal filth in India.
This idea is not crossover ready. Yet.
The Vodafone guys are known for their really smart commercials. But they are not very good at customer service even though their pug claims “Happy to Help.” I found myself waiting for over an hour in line so that I could change my Mumbai number to a Delhi number only to be told that it was not possible and I had to get a fresh connection.
While waiting in line I got my portrait made. I don’t think this is a regular thing and was on occation of father’s day.
The portrait’s not very flattering. I look like someone out of Amar Chitra Katha. When I complained the guy said, “Please look from far away. It will look good.” It still looks horrible. Even from far away. What do you think?
A moving story. Really.
“FLOPPY
MY DOG HAS GOT LOST ON 19th APRIL
ANYONE BRINGING HER BACK
ALIVE AND WELL WILL BE
REWARDED
RS. 5000 ON THE SPOT.”
“This is Floppy. She got lost near the New Delhi Railway Station, on the Ajmeri Gate side when I was taking her to Kolkata.
Floppy is female, has a glossy coat, a curly tail and has blue-black patches on her tongue. Height is about 2 feet. No collar.
Floppy was my sister’s dog and was very attached to her. My sister died of Cancer a week back so I was taking Floppy back to my home. If you find her please call [Numbers blurred to protect identity]”
Please collar your dogs to prevent such heartbreak (!). I found this poster in Khan Market a few days back…so many miles away from Ajmeri Gate. Very sad 
Book Review: The Reluctant Fundamentalist
The Reluctant Fundamentalist is about the collapse of the world of Changez, a Pakistani Princeton graduate in the backdrop of 9/11. Changez has everything: a prestigious job, a Princeton degree and the prospect of a relationship with a hauntingly beautiful Erica.
But then Changez’s picture perfect life comes apart. Piece by Piece. However, it comes apart due to conscious choices made by Changez and not the evilness of the system (his company, his CEO Jim, Erica and her mother are supportive post-9/11 for the most part). Changez’s descent into chaos is scary. It almost happens in slow motion: he knows things are going really wrong; but he doesn’t fix himself because his decisions make sense at that point in time. Pretty soon, he’s so far away from “normal” that he can’t go back to his day job as a financial valuator.
The story is structured as a monologue between Changez and a nameless American at a restaurant in Lahore. Changez reminisces about how he goes from being part of “America” to someone outside it, embittered at its hypocrisy and unfairness. How much this hypocrisy and unfairness of America is really relevant to Changez’s own life and how much is it a convenient (self)-explanation for his self destruction is a very interesting aspect of the book. Changez must really ask himself if a conflict in distant Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan or the odd post-9/11 racist abuse was enough to imperil everything. He never does.
At the end of it, for me, The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a warning about the often not too deep urge to let go of it all and self-destruct inherent in all of us. Its is also a warning about how seemingly small influences, over a period of time, can send you over the edge. Erica is a girl worth pursuing, worth falling in love with and worth pining for. But Erica is so troubled, that she passes that seed of trouble to Changez. Once the seed is planted, it can only grow, and it does until it envelopes him. Erica leaves his life in excruciating slow motion: repeatedly enticing him and then leaving him until he is totally damaged from within. And then it becomes so simple for him to get lost in minor slights to his religion, culture and civilization. A sense of injustice, embitterment and anger, are in retrospect, predictable traps for an emotionally raw Changez. Changez, given to planning his life with precision thus far, ends his connection with America very abruptly. The thought process and events that lead to this “breaking point” was the most interesting aspect of the book for me.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a compact but fertile book. There are other threads and interpretations but I’ve chosen what impacted me the most: the breakdown of the self. In the end, Changez seems to salvage his life by moving back to Pakistan as a lecturer. But does he really salvage it? Is he living fully in an imaginary world with his beloved Erica? Or are there other things he might be up to?
Sidharth’s Rating 4.0/5.0