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."

Expectations From My Potential Husband

Dear Mom, Dad & Others trying to find a husband for me,

First of all, I appreciate that you'll have never forced me to do anything I didn't want to do and even now are not forcing me to marry. Thank you for giving me the choice of when to marry & who to marry. Now having said that, I feel that you'll need to get a better idea of what I want in my future husband since you'll are starting to look for guy for me.

Bengali. Call me traditional but I want to marry into a Bengali family. In India marriage isn't the union of a man and a woman; it's the joining of a woman with the man's parents, his extended family, his colony/neighborhood, his social circle, his pets, his community, etc. EVERYBODY has a say in a woman's marriage, household and parenting. Yes, I'm judgmental and stereotype often which is why what I say next will make me sound a little racist. In this context, I feel the Bengali community is comparatively more progressive than most other Indian communities. Gender equality is better here than in other communities. For example, my friend who is from one such regressive community and is married to a man from the same community says that she's not allowed into a room if her father-in-law is seated there. Things like that don't happen in the Bengali (urban) community. Even if I have to deal with these as a daughter-in-law it's okay but I certainly don't want to raise my children in an environment where it's propagated that women are lesser beings and should conform to implicit rules and that men are God's gift to this world. So yeah, don't even bother looking outside this community (except maybe Malayali, Christian & Maharshtrian communities).  

Smoking. My pet peeve is smoking. I will decline the most lucrative match just on this one simple habit. I don't get the concept of smoking despite knowing that it's harmful. I view it as sort of a weakness; a weakness that's going to cost you your life as well as your family's. What happens to my family when he dies early due to a lung disease caused by smoking? Isn't that a bit selfish of him? Knowingly endangering my family is not something I want to do if I have a choice. So no, I will not marry a man who smokes.

Physical appearance. If this were a love marriage, this would be secondary. But thanks to my non-existent social life, I have to go down the route of arranged marriage. In this situation, physical appearance is the first thing that's going to attract me. And yes Baba, I need to be attracted to this person. I'm not saying that he has to look like Matt Boman or has to have a gym fanatic's body (this is actually quite a turn-off). He should look young, fit, presentable, and at least be of the average male height. Here's a filter that you can apply for this point- Formal Attire. I am a big fan of men in well-fitted formal wear. Not crap that men buy off department store racks without properly altering them. So when you get a proposal for me, make sure you get me a photograph of this man in formal attire. How he looks in formal wear is the make-or-break point for me!

Sports. This is absolutely crucial. The man I marry has to have a sports background. I can never eloquently put the reasons for this in words so all I will say is that it is absolutely crucial. I come from a family with a rich history in sports; not the gully cricket type but actual, national & Olympic level sports. I myself was a sportsperson and I want that for my children too. Playing sports teaches a person more than just the game; it teaches significant life skills at an early age and gives you such lovely memories. I am a believer in the psychology theory which states that there's a strong influence of genes in your personality. My brother and I are naturally good at sports because of our genes hence it was relatively easier for us to build a sports career than it was for somebody who's natural talent is not sports.

Business background. This is not mandatory but it would be a good to have. The reason being that I'm going to be a businesswoman. I'm going to have my own business and it's going to require a lot of my time and effort. For somebody who's not from the business background, he's never going to understand what makes me wake up in the morning and take so many risks and responsibilities outside my house, or the underlying vision in my passion. And not just the man but more importantly, his family needs to understand this. Only a family from the business background will understand my career choices.

This is of course not the exhaustive list of things I will look for in a potential husband. There are tons of other things that a crucial like humor, compatibility, chivalry, life's goals, etc. But these listed above are the first set of things I will look for, based on which I will decide to take the conversation further. So here, this should make it easier for all of us :)

Yours truly,

Your daughter & friend. 

 

Week 5 #52weekchallenge

Have not been able to do this challenge regularly since there's way too much going on with me lately. But hope to get this rolling again. For week 5 I only got around to doing a cooking project and this week I cooked Korean Style Chicken Legs! 

Korean Style Chicken Legs

My mum wasn't in town when I made this so I didn't get any constructive feedback. However, my brother devoured three chicken legs in five minutes flat! And because he's such a picky eater I take this as extremely positive feedback. On the flip side, I think he may have been very hungry by the time I served him dinner.

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

Har Har Mahadev!

Late last month Amish Tripathi released his last book in the Shiva Trilogy- The Oath of the Vayuputras - and a whole bunch of book lovers in my office went into a frenzy. I didn't quite understand it & quite frankly I was agitated that I didn't know about this famous book when everybody else did! I then looked it up online & decided that I want to read it too. I'm immensely fond of mythology so I took to the book immediately, yet grudgingly so since I knew it was only fiction. But some parts of the book either brought tears to my eyes, or answered an impending question in my head, or left me a tad bit wiser. Sorry Paulo Coelho, your books didn't impact me as much!

Here's an excerpt of the trilogy that I liked most and brought tears to my eyes:

A resounding roar arose from the Suryavanshis. They were led by the Mahadev. The God of Gods. The Chandravanshis did not stand a chance.

"But I am not the only one!" 

 A shocked silence descended on the Surayavanshis. What did the Mahadev mean? He is not the only one? Do the Chandravanshis have a god too?

 "I am not the only one! For I see a hundred thousand Mahadevs in front of me! I see a hundred thousand men willing to battle evil! I see a hundred thousand men capable of destroying evil!"

 The stunned Suryavanshis gaped at their Neelkanth as the import of his words permeated their minds. They dared not ask the question: Are we gods?

   Shiva had the answer: "Har Ek Hai Mahadev!" 

The Meluhans stood astounded. Every single one a Mahadev?  

"Har Har Mahadev?" bellowed Shiva. 

The Meluhans roared. All of us are Mahadevs! 

Pure primal energy coursed through the veins of each Suryanvanshi. They were gods! It didn't matter that the Chndravanshis outnumbered them ten to one. They were gods! Even if the evil Chandravanshis outnumbered them a thousand to one, victory was assured. They were gods! 

"Har Har Mahadev!" cried the Suryavanshi army.

This excerpt had such a profound effect on me and I felt empowered! It was as if I was in that army and I was being spoken to. I still have no idea why this touched me so. Maybe it's a a piece of knowledge that will be used later.

Another beautiful line in The Secret of the Nagas that touched me was:

There is a god in every single one of us. And there is evil in every single one of us. The true battle between good and evil is fought within.

And somewhere later in the book it is said because there's both good an evil in us it takes strength to choose the good. The weak would choose evil. To me this meant that when I have to make a choice, I have to be brutal on my self and choose what's good for most that are involved otherwise I'm weak and that's something I can't live with.

For those who are looking for self-realization and like reading, do read these books. Well written, addictive and helpful. May have the answers to your questions.

Sunayana Sen