The Big Indian Talk On Sex Between Me & My Daughter

As you grow and understand the world a little better, I think all of us have those fleeting thoughts about what kind of parents we want to be. The first thought on this subject usually is "I will not do that to my child", and then in your twenties it becomes, "This is something I want to do with my child". I want to be a mother some day and this is something I've known for sometime now and occasionally I allow myself to indulge in thoughts about how I want to raise my children. One of these thoughts is about the all important conversation around sex.

As an Indian girl I've received the talk on "Why I shouldn't get pregnant before marriage", as I'm sure many Indian girls have. (It bothers me that my brother has never received the version for boys, i.e., "Why you should not get a girl pregnant before marriage".) It's a warped way of talking about sex in India. You know they don't say it outright so this is a way around having to actually say "sex". Anyway, the reason I shouldn't get pregnant before my marriage, as per my mother is, because what will my dad tell people? What will be our social standing then? My dad will be so devastated that he may just end his life. I'm sure these reasons are important to them and it may stem from some past primary and/or secondary experiences. Now I will in turn tell my daughter (I hope I'm lucky enough to have one) that she shouldn't be an unmarried mother. But my method will be slightly different. 

Here's a conversation I hope to have with my daughter one day when she's 18 years old:

"As difficult as it is to think of you as an adult, I have to accept the fact that you are independent and can make sound decisions on your own now. Including decisions about sex. However, as someone who wishes the best for you and is wiser than you, I want to give you some advice.

Be safe. First and foremost, be safe. Your safety is not something you should ever compromise. Not even if you're madly in love with him/her. Health is your everything. Do not ever think otherwise.

Make sure you know why you're doing it with this person. The first time is special. Not so much because it's with someone you love; it rarely is. It's special because this is the first time you're letting someone get so so very close to you and it's intimidating to share this intimate moment with someone. Some girls regret how their first time went while some don't. Make sure you are in the latter group. I don't want you to feel like you have to do it to please someone else. Do it only because you want to. I don't want you to feel pressured into doing anything sexual that you're not comfortable with. Stand up to the person and say NO. It's okay to say NO to the person you think you love. Just be aware of yourself, your desires, your reservations, and your feelings for the other person. 

Don't get pregnant while you're still figuring out life. You're not emotionally there yet to raise a child. Being a mother is difficult. It's beautiful but comes with immense responsibility. You will be responsible for another human being's safety, education, health, character, existence. At this point in your life, you yourself have not fully taken responsibility of yourself. You're financially not in a position to support someone else and having kids is expensive. You have to be financially secure to feel that you can raise a child well. When you're in college or have just graduated, you're earnings are minimum. You can't do justice to yourself or your child. Soon you'll find yourself working multiple jobs just to put food on the table and a roof over your heads. As if being a mother wasn't exhausting enough. Some women who become mothers while they are teenagers go through a phase when they wonder what would have happened if they didn't get pregnant and pursued their career instead. I NEVER want you to wonder about an alternate scenario where you aren't a mother. Take time to build your career; you need it. And you will see that by showing your kids your passion for your career you are teaching them a valuable life lesson. Your grandparents worked very hard for a very long time to go from having nothing to having a lot just so that that my brother and I would feel empowered to dream big. Ensure that you give your child the best of yourself. And you can do that only when you become the best that you can be. 

The other thing about getting pregnant at a young age is the horrible decision you have to make between giving birth and abortion. I think a part of me will die if my daughter had to decide between life and death for her child. 

So that's why I don't want you to get pregnant while you're still so young.

Live life to the fullest and in a way that you will not regret later. At every point ask yourself if this is something you absolutely want to do and if you will be happier after that. Be safe and remember that your parents will always be by your side when you need us. Unless you murdered someone."

Week 3 #52weekchallenge

Wondering what happened to week 2? Yeah, that week was just fail. Too much was happening that week for me to get this stuff done. Anyhow, week 3 though was awesome! I got all the stuff done in good time and I'm quite satisfied with how it all turned out. Here's what I did last week:

1. DIY Project

Canvas art - Dancer

Not that I'm a good artist, but I had an empty canvas lying around for a while & thought I'd put it to some use. Of course I cheated ;) This is not a free hand painting. I got an image off the web, stenciled it onto the canvas and filled it in with paint and glitter. This particular image is of a kathak dancer and the gold glitter on her feet are her Ghungroos.

2. Cooking Project

Shutki Maach

This is my favorite dish! It's otherwise known as dry fish and it's a speciality in Tripura (North-East India) where my maternal grandma's from. Not many people like it so it isn't easily available nor are there recipes or videos online to learn it on my own. For this dish I took my mum's help but the next time I cook it, I want to experiment with some additions to the recipe.

3. Short Story

'Awakening in a dream'

 

He touched her with tenderness yet with urgency. On that single bed in a small room, their bodies met each other with heightened excitement. In that darkness, they gave into blindness and placed their entire trust in their sense of touch. With one arm on the back of his head and the other arm guiding him, she was holding him like she didn’t want to let go. And he was lost in the moment, with urgency and excitement starting to spiral out of control.

As I awoke from the dream, I realized without any emotion that the girl in bed with my man wasn’t me.

____________

2 days later

Namitha had once told me that distance isn’t about the location; it’s about the heart. For the past couple of days I felt like he’s been pulling away from me. He and I have been fighting for a couple of days now over small, annoying, insignificant things. “Maybe we should break-up”, I said. Without a second thought, he agreed.

5 days later

“I feel we should give it another shot” I said. Relationships do take time and effort after all.

“I’m sorry I can’t”, he replied. And here I thought he would jump at the second chance. What a stupid heart I have.

I asked him “Why?”

After some hesitation he said, “I’m with someone else now.”

“Who?”

“The girl from your dream.”

Sunayana Sen

Week 1 #52weekchallenge

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I'm taking up a challenge I found on the Internet- 52 weeks of the year. As a part of the challenge, I will be doing three things every week:- a DIY project, cooking/preparing a dish and writing a short story. And in week 1 here's what I accomplished:

1. DIY Project

DIY Pen Stand

2. Cooking Project

Herb Coated Mushrooms with Cheese Sauce

3. Short story - WIP 

Failed on this one this week :(

Sunayana Sen

52 weeks

Happy New Year folks! 

We survived the apocolypse a year ago and made #hashtags a way to converse last year. Most importantly, we got the word 'selfie' into Oxford dictionary!

And now we start a new year by making typical resolutions and it seems as though the universal resolution for the year is 'Go to gym'. I'm going to be Grumpy Cat here and tell you one word- NO. That didn't happen last year, the year before that and all the years before that. And it's never going to happen in the near future. Booyah!

Nevertheless, best of luck to you guys!

As for me, this year I decided not to make any resolutions but instead follow a challenge on the internet. 52 weeks. In these 52 weeks of the year, I've challenged myself to do 52 DIY projects, cook/prepare 52 dishes and write 52 stories. And if I can complete this challenge, at the end of the year I will treat myself to a lavish holiday in whichever country I feel like travelling to. 

Without all the grumpiness, here's wishing you and myself a successful year ahead!   

Sunayana Sen

"A man's errors are his portals of discovery." James Joyce

I had expected my life to be relatively smooth like the blue line in this graph. However, the red line with the spikes and drops is more like how my life was in the past year.

In my previous blog post I invited all my readers to watch this discovery through a series of blog posts and I'm going to do this in three parts. Let's start with the event that set off an avalanche of changes.

When I left college I promised myself that the next relationship I would be in would be my final, my forever after so I would have to choose very carefully and be absolutely sure before I got into it. Yeah, so it didn't happen that way. On May 16th, by the pool at Novotel after work he asked me, "Sunayana, will you go out with me? Please say yes or I will jump into this ditch!" And I said yes. What made me say yes? He's bengalee, he's good looking (Apparently, only his girlfriends think so), he doesn't smoke, he's hard working and he likes me; everything I wanted in my life partner. Besides, how can I say that some guy will be my forever after if I don't give it a try? I'm not going to fall in love in just one day; I'm going to have to spend some time building a relationship. So I said yes. What did I learn at this point? Don't be too rigid. Give it a shot, take that risk.

Days went by and we said our I love you's. His first gift to me was a beautiful pair of silver earrings which I NEVER took off. It made me feel complete. His next gift- a traditional gold ring from his hometown. Needless to say, I NEVER took it off. I introduced him to my parents and Baba's first words were, "I'm very happy you chose a bengalee boy." I got him home, Ma cooked for him, parents chatted with him, his parents asked about me everyday, kept asking him sharp questions to see whether he really loved me, he introduced me to his didi, he asked me if I would marry him; basically all was good. What did I learn at this point? I learned that I have a lot of love to give and I can be somebody's rock through thick and thin. And you know what, I loved that feeling.

Then five months later he told me he kissed another girl.

When I was learning how to swim my coach would take off my tube and fling me into the water and I would frantically kick my arms and legs just to stay at the surface. Know that feeling? Yeah that was what I felt when I heard this. It took me seven days of a roller coaster ride of emotions to finally be happy for him that he found someone who could make him smile. It was the start of Durga Puja then and I vividly remember standing in front of the new idol and praying for the first time in many years (I was an atheist for a few years). I started believing in God that day. I said, "If she is who makes him smile, I'm happy for him. His smile brings me peace and I always want to see him smile." And that's a prayer I've said everyday since. The next day he came back to me. I weighed everything and made a conscious decision to give it another shot. This point onward began my self-discovery.

So he came back from his vacation, we got back together, mutual friends gave him loads of shit about what he did and I remained his rock. Did I forbid him from talking to this girl? No. People told me that was my biggest mistake. At that point it didn't seem like it. At this point also it doesn't seem like it. I did the right thing. Why?

"Try not to be a man of success, but a man of value."
Albert Einstein 

So I have to tell you about this girl for you to understand why. This girl is known to be a dumb s**t. She slept with/made out with a couple other colleagues and others and is known to be "too dumb to even make fun of". She had two friends in this city both of whom are my colleagues and they abandoned her. Not only abandoned, but proactively cold-shouldered her too. My entire work circle (her only social circle at this point) was being a bitch to her. She had no friends. She wasn't getting a job either. Everywhere she tried, she got rejected. She's jobless. (Yet she had the time & heart to go partying everyday) He was the only friend she had. Oh and she lives four buildings away from mine. Now what did I think of her? Until this point I hadn't heard anything about her from him other than "she's pretty". The only thing I thought about her was that she has very low respect for herself and others. I strongly believe that someone who would agree to be the other woman, kiss another woman's man knowing that he's taken and entertains a man's infidelity has zero self respect. And this goes for men too. But other than this, I didn't judge her to be a "dumb s**t". I also believe that there are some people who you connect with who you show your genuine self to and there are others who see only a part of you and judge you. I thought maybe he was the friend she connected with. Now one thing this experience taught me is that genuine friendship can be your oxygen. I didn't want to take away her only friend from her. Not even the devil deserves to be friendless. He was also helping her find a job by refining her CV and going over some concepts and I didn't want to take away that either. She needed help (which I offered also; I offered to be her friend too) and he was helping her (Eventually she got a job to which a friend said to him, "Your girlfriend is finally socially acceptable").

So yes, I let him be her friend. Also because I didn't know what insecurity felt like and I don't like dictating people's actions. And if he really understood his actions, I wouldn't need to tell him what to do. But then we couldn't sustain our relationship and we finally moved away from each other and I left the country. And that was the best decision I made that year. The Singapore trip was a trip that changed everything. That deserves a different post altogether.

What did I learn at this point? I learnt what fear feels like. I learnt that I have immense tolerance. And what I have more than anything is Faith. Even through all the episode with that girl, I kept praying to God that he should finally come around, that he should find that strength in him to stop making the same mistakes and put his foot down when he starts feeling weak. I kept asking myself if I made an error in judging his character and my instincts say no. And I trust my instincts more that anything in this world.

I came back a month later and found out he was dating her. Yes it was a struggle everyday to walk into office and see him and not talk to him. He was my talk-to-person for career related things and on many occasions I almost walked up to him to talk about his views on what I did. Since I came back I had two breakdowns but slowly I got a grip on myself. And this is when I learnt that I'm a strong girl, much stronger than I give myself credit for. Believing in Karma also helps. A few guys happened during this time and this was my testing period. I didn't follow the path of rebound and have flings with any guy who came to me. I'm proud that I kept my values intact and stayed true to myself. My biggest win in this.Believing in Karma helps here too! Our mutual friend recently told me when she was moving to Delhi that he should apologize to me. No he shouldn't. One should apologize only when they believe they have gone against their values and when their conscience says they have been wrong. Otherwise, it doesn't mean a thing. And what did he do? Just what every regular guy does. I'm the one who should apologize to me. After all, I was the one who let this happen to me.

Anyway, till date, barring a couple of occasions, I have never spoken ill of her. Even today when I go to the temple every morning and after my dance classes, I pray that he's happy with whoever he is and most importantly, he be the best he can be at all times. If being with her makes him so, then so be it. If not, it's time you gave him that strength. So closing this post with something I read and say to myself every time I hear or think about him and her and one of my most important lessons-

माँ हिम्स्यत सर्व भूटानी: never commit violence to anyone | The Bhagavad Gita

Sunayana Sen

“It takes only one person to change your life...you”

Earlier last week I completed the first year of my career. Now I'm one year old in the corporate world! I still remember 25th April 2011 clearly, right from the moment I got into the cab to the moment I came back home and narrated to Ma the wonderful first day that I had. And what a day it was! Heck, what a year its been! This one year is by far the best year I've had. Do I wish to repeat this year? No. Do I wish to re-do it differently? No.

On my Faceversary my colleague asked me "Define this one year in one word and take everything into account". My answer? "Self-discovery".  I invite you to join this discovery as I recap this year and learn about life in this series of blogs.

They welcomed us with bouquets! This is my batch & some older employees on 25th April 2011 

“It takes only one person to change your life...you” -Ruth Casey

Sunayana Sen 

Who were you? Who will you be?

Reincarnation best describes the concept where the soul or spirit, after the death of the body, is believed to return to live in a new human body, or, in some traditions, either as a human being, animal or plant. - Wikipedia

Have you ever thought of what/who you were in you past life/lives? Have you ever thought if the concept exists? For most of my life I believed there was only one dimension on Earth. There didn't exist any heaven or hell; there was only now for each of us, no past life or future life. But then I read 'Many Lives, Many Masters' by Dr. Brian Weiss. My uncle introduced me to this book. While he was narrating the gist of the story, there was this crazed look in his eyes & he seemed lost in the narration. And he's a doctor. He's been a general physician for more than 35 yrs now & he was excited by a book on past life & rebirth. Now I was curious. So I borrowed the book & started reading.

Dr. Weiss is a highly educated doctor & like the rest of the medical community was trained to think logically at every point. Existence of past life was not possible. Catherine walked into this office then with over 30 phobias. She had so many phobias that she was leading a miserable life. None of the conventional treatments were helping so Dr. Weiss tried using hypnosis & regression. Phobias that we live with are almost always caused by some trauma we've experienced earlier. Hypnosis & regression techniques are used to go back in memories and address the traumas. Some of her anxiety was cured after she relived some traumas but most still remained. So they went further back in time & in the process they stumbled upon the existence of past lives. Apparently she's lived more than 80 times in the physical form. If she had an unnatural death, the cause of her death became the phobia in her current life. And so on & so forth the book goes. But the most exciting thing I got out of the book was the concept of (what I'd like to call) 'Inner circle'. 

Sometimes some people walk into your life & stay forever. Most leave. Some feel like they've been around & will be around forever. Some feel like a passing cloud. He says that those people who are in your most inner circle will always be in this circle in every lifetime. Your daughter from two lifetimes ago may be that niece you're close to in your current lifetime, or your husband from a past life is your best friend in your current lifetime. The people who impact your life the most are those people who’ve been with you always, through life, death & in between. He also said that the nature of the relationship carries forward. If you’ve been having a rocky relationship with a close person, you will have a rocky relationship with that person even in future lives unless you break that chain. Maybe this explains my relationship with my ex-best friend? Maybe this explains my relationship with some of those people who have a profound effect on my life but aren’t around me. Does it also mean that now since I’m aware of this I should work on all those rocky relationships so that in my future lifetimes I have lesser grief? Intriguing thought.

Have I started believing in rebirth & reincarnation? I’m still unsure. Unless I undergo the same experience as Catherine did, I may never be.    

Sunayana Sen

Pants on fire

Today I became a part of the Emergency Response Team in my office & was trained on the basics of fire safety & safety in general. It feels awesome to be an ERT member & have the responsibility of saving lives! It's also quite scary. Our trainer talked about (and emphasized) how unsafe our environment is & anything can cause a fire. Did you know that anything around you can cause a fire? He showed us & talked about the many cases of fire where people lost their life due to lack of common sense & presence of mind. And jumping from a burning building is a strict no. The Carlton building fire, 9/11 & Tucson Hotel fire are some cases to highlight people's immediate reaction of jumping out of burning buildings. I wanted to talk about what I learned today & hopefully you will learn somethings too.

The first thing on my agenda now is to identify the most hazardous places in my house & office. before that, what is fire? What are the three key things required for a fire? 

Oxygen, Heat, Fuel

Only if all these are present will there be a fire. Absence of any of these can't sustain fire. So this is the basic thing to keep in mind when we're in a fire situation. And fuel isn't just diesel or petrol; it's your carpet, your doors, papers, wires, anything. It's important to be aware of what around you can be fuel. So now, I will identify that area at home that all these three elements in abundance. 

Did you know there are three classes of fire?

1. A- Solid- fuel is wood, paper, cotton, textiles; anything that burns and gives ash
2. B- Liquid- fuel is 
   petrol, diesel, kerosene, paint, oils
3. C- Gas- fuel is 
   LPG, Acetylene, hydrogen, methane
4. D- Metal- fuel is 
   sodium, potassium, magnesium, lithium
    
5. E- Electrical- transformer, welding m/c, generators, panel boards

For each of these classes there are different types of extinguishers too:

• Water (for solid fire)
• Foam (for Cooling + blanketing)
• Dry chemical powder- mono ammonium phosphate powder (for blanketing)
• Carbon di oxide (for blanketing)

If you notice on fire extinguishers there are alphabets written indicating the class of fire it's for. Usually most of them are A, B & C/B & C. They come in different sizes, weight, nozzles & designs. Buy the one that's easiest to handle for you. Also keep in mind that extinguishers need regular maintenance otherwise they might not serve your purpose. 

So what do you do in fire emergencies? Remember this:

F- Find the fire

I- Inform the security/supervisor/fire brigade

R- Respond to the situation & try putting off the fire using the extinguisher

E- Evacuate everybody from the floor

Things to remember in these situations:

• Who should you evacuate first- Physically challenged & Pregnant women (keep their  Mobile/intercom numbers handy always)
• After the alarm siren wait for communication 
• The longest you should wait for communication is 30-40 seconds
• DO NOT give details of the emergency to people. It will only cause more panic. Just mention there's an emergency & they have to evacuate immediately.
• If there's media outside, don't let employees go close to them. It will cause unnecessary drama.
• Divert people to separate exits- evacuation will be faster
• If anybody catches fire, throw a blanket on them from behind & throw water. Water will stop the heat from reaching the tissues & bones and will prevent 3rd degree burns. Do not remove the blanket immediately; It will cause skin to peel off. But do uncover the head so they can breathe. If there's a pool around, just push them in. 

So yeah, this is what I learnt today. We also practiced using the extinguishers. There were 4 types & I got to try two of them- the most difficult one & the most heaviest one. I did great with the heavy one; don't ask what happened with the other :| 

Be safe!

Here's a video we watched today about seatbelt safety. Really liked it so thought I would share it.

Sunayana Sen

Maple Leaves

Early in 2011 we got news that my elder cousin sister was to get married in August in North America. So the four of us pulled up our socks, packed our bags & got ready to head to the country of maple leaves & ice hockey- CANADA! 

Having been to the U.S before, I didn't expect Canada to be anything different. But I was wrong. There are lots of differences between these two sister countries & if I were forced to live in one of them, I would choose Canada. Attitude, ambience, environment, people & governance were some of the big differences for me.

1. Canada is a lot more laid-back than U.S is which is my favorite difference. U.S seems like it's on this never-ending, single participant race to nowhere, and if they pause for just a second the whole world will come crashing down. To live my life in that environment is a curse. But Canada seems very secure in their position as though being #1 is not everything. 
2. It's green. It's so green! Apparently, for every burial the family has to plant a tree/seed. Every house has a lawn that if not maintained, you can be evicted. The downtown area also is quite green. The walkways, roads, footpaths, etc., all have plants hanging from the lamp-posts or shop doors and foliages. 
3. The ambience of the place is so victorian. The fact that Canada was a British & French colony is evident in their cobblestone roads, historic architecture, naming of streets, trams & occasional vintage cars. I love it!    
4. In Davenport, U.S.A, people are overly-friendly. Now that I think of it, it's kind of nauseating. In Mississauga, Canada, people aren't overly-friendly at all. They go about minding their business with the occasional nod of their head & greetings. In downtown Toronto you're invisible. I quite like that.   
5. I never thought I'd ever say this of a country's governance, but I'm impressed with the Canadian governance. It's neither as paranoid as Republic of China nor is crazy like Kenya, Nigeria, etc. Did you know that education for kids of Canadian citizens is free until high school? And it takes just ~3 yrs to become a Canadian citizen. Healthcare is free; No conditions applied. You can afford to buy a house in 5 yrs. And not just any random, one BHK; you can buy a proper independent house in the residential areas. But how does the government afford all this? Your tax is 30% of your income. Big amount which leaves a small margin for disposable income. But then everything is taken of by the state. And apparently the people are fearful of the 'Tax-Men' which is why Canada has a low tax default rate. Taxes are really high here. Even shopping's a bitch due to the high taxes. *

Although we had plans to visit Montreal & Quebec City, we only visited Toronto & Niagara Falls. Oh, and since I'm talking about my travels I've got to mention that I didn't find anything particularly glamorous or picturesque about Niagara falls. Sorry, I just didn't.

These were my major travel takeaways from Canada. Beautiful place, rich history, numerous things-to-do. Do visit it once. 

Sunayana Sen

*Facts not researched. Just word-of-mouth from Canadians.