தமிழ் nee enna anaai???!!!

Though Tamil is my native language I never learnt the Tamil Grammar. I did study in Tamil Nadu but I studied in a central government run school where Tamil was not one of the subjects I had to learn. So I never learnt Tamil properly. I only know the basics of the language like the letters and stuff which my grandmother taught me when I was little. I learnt it because my brother did (anything he can do I can do too dammit!!!) so I was never really that into it. I read Tamil like a 5 year old (I guess I should give myself some credit and say 6 year old) and write like a 2 year old (yes a 2 year old!!! I can hardly write three or four words. But I can write my name quite well which I am rather proud of). Most of my friends from college make fun of me because I don’t know to read and write Tamil in spite of it being my mother tongue. But my pronunciations are very good (even if I say so myself) I ridicule some of my friends (who have studied the language the entire time of their schooling) to the point that they are afraid to talk in front of me (sometimes though I do have trouble with those who can read, write and speak Tamil very well. Not fair!!!). I had this one friend who writes poems in Tamil (poems man can you believe it?) but his pronunciations suck. I can’t appreciate poems so when he shows his poems to me I criticized his Tamil to avoid false compliments (and have some fun at his expense of course).  When he writes the words, his spellings are correct but when pronounces it, it is all wrong. He wasn’t even able to understand that he was wrong when I pointed it out to him (I win ha!). That is the state of the language.

Tamil is the first language to be given the classical status in India. It is one of the most ancient languages and also a language that is developed on its own and not derived from any other languages. For all the arguments, fights, revolts, sacrifices to make sure Hindi is not forced on Tamil people or to include Tamil language as one of the official languages of India (anti-Hindi agitations) or to remove the influence of Sanskrit in Tamil (Pure Tamil movements), the quality of the language has been deteriorating recently (Why the prejudice against Hindi, Sanskrit and not English? That is something I guess I will never understand).

Tamils are a proud bunch of people who take pride in their language and heritage (afore mentioned agitations and movements are proof enough). Every lead actor from the Tamil film industry in at least one of their movies has to praise the greatness of the language to gain popularity. And every time someone makes a great dialogue delivery about the language the crowd goes crazy. But, the beauty of language is praised in the ugliest way since not many people can speak the language properly. The Tamil people celebrate Bharathiyar (Tamil poet) as ‘mahakavi (great poet)’. Bharathiyar finds Tamil as a language that sounds most beautiful to him. He is known for his love for the language and of course his poems. If he were to be still alive (thank goodness he is not), he would definitely either commit suicide or go on a mass murder rampage if he hears the quality of spoken Tamil now!

I was watching the movie ‘Aayirathil Oruvan’ recently. It is about the Chola and Pandyan dynasties. The starting of the movie, there is a brief introduction on the Chola and the Pandyan dynasties. The introduction is by far the worst Tamil I have heard in the entertainment business. It made cringe when I listened to the narrator butcher the language. Except for one none of the lead actors was able to speak the language properly. The depressing part is that two of them play the descendants of the two dynasties. The Chola and the Pandyan Empire play a vital role in the history of Tamil Nadu and the south India. The Chola Empire has seen some of the greatest works in Tamil literature. It was truly distressing to watch a movie that was based on two of the four Dravidian Tamil Dynasties to have such bad delivery of the language known as the ‘Senthamizh’. Another disturbing issue is the use of non-Tamil singers to sing for playback in movies. Listening to Hindi singers sing Tamil is like eating dry bread without butter when French bread with cheese is sitting right next to it (if I want to listen to Hindi songs I can listen to Hindi songs why Hindify Tamil songs? And what happened to the whole anti-Hindi thing?). And the actress lord save the actresses with their dubbing being horrible and the lip movement being unsynchronized (don’t know why everybody is bent on slow torture! What did I ever do to them?).

Few who are supposed to speak proper Tamil are debaters (‘pattimandram’), news readers, politicians etc. The Tamil spoken by these people are called ‘thooya Tamil’. Two of them have started speaking the butchered Tamil (since a large population of politicians is still ancient). It is difficult to listen to even news readers read aloud horrible Tamil. Soon enough there will be a time when even politicians start talking garbage Tamil (Bharathiyar is so lucky, Thiruvalluvar too). What is point in all the agitations, revolts and fights against other languages when the language one is fighting for is becoming dead because of oneself?  Shouldn’t we improve ourselves before calling the kettle black? If not for the present at least for the future things need to be done something should be done to stop the quality of the language from decline (or not it’s not it’s the end of the world is it?).

Now that doesn’t mean I am going to turn into a new leaf and start learning to read and write Tamil properly. It means that I am one of few who does call the kettle black and I am super lazy and no longer have the sibling rivalry motivation. And hey I am doing good (really?) by writing this blog (not that there are any readers).

Films causing Eve Teasing??!!!

I used to like this actor in the Tamil film industry, the so called Kollywood. Actor Vijay is known as the ‘illayathalapathi (young commander or leader)’. He looks like the typical Tamil boy next door and one thing about him that stands out is that from the start of his film career, he has neither gained weight nor lost any. Most of his films are crap. I guess I could say I just like couple of his movies yet I liked the actor. His movies are like any typical Tamil movie. The movies where the hero and heroine start with ‘modhal (fight or arguments)’ and ends with ‘kadhal (love)’ with the heroine insulted beyond reparation and yet falls hopelessly and utterly in love with the hero because he insulted her and of course the ultimate villain whom he overpowers single handedly and the usual family drama with some songs. These movies are called ‘masala movies’ in Tamil. Like I said, although his movies are tedious, I liked the actor solely because of his looks because I think the guy lacks talent in every other way as an actor.

I was watching a programme on TV where they show some of the scenes from latest movies like a teaser you know. The scene was from a movie ‘Sivakasi’, Vijay’s movie. At the time, the movie was released, the scene was being played a lot. In the scene, the heroine is dressed in revealing clothes when compared to the Indian standard of what is considered descent clothes. She is wearing jeans shorts, a camisole kinda blouse with a jacket which was transparent. She is with her father in the streets and one of the guys in the street misbehaves with her and she makes a scene. Our great hero now makes his entry. He finds the guy and rubs the guy’s hand with our heroines hand and says, “Now that you have touched her, are you satisfied?” and sends the guy away. And then the hero turns to the heroine and starts criticizing her way of dressing. He uses rather crude words to describe her clothes. And then he goes on to say that if she dresses that way, then she is bound to be harassed. All this happens in the middle of the road of course, and there are like fifty people watching. The heroine’s father is quite and she is visibly angered. The scene usually ends at this point in the show. I haven’t watched the movie and neither am I planning to watch it. But I later found out that after the incident, the heroine starts dressing conservatively and the usual hero heroine stupid love starts.

A hero I liked made me despise him after I watched this scene. There are three things about the scene that make my blood boil. First, the guy who caused the whole scenario is left to go without being properly reprimanded and what’s more his actions are actually defended (him being hero and all should see justice is served properly). Second, the girl is who is the victim here is actually being insulted in a vulgar language that makes you cringe. Third, men who do engage in such activities claim they are right and use movies like this to justify their behaviour. These kinds of scenes are just a drop in an ocean. If he is really a hero or is really an ‘illayathalapathi’ should he be ready to do such roles? What’s even more saddening is the actress’ willingness to act in such a degrading scene. Their justification being, “somebody else will take up the role if I refuse to do it. So what’s the point in me letting go of a job?”

A lot of girls and young women everyday face this kind of situation in real life where guys grope in public, crowded places like the bus, bus stops, railway stations and even crowded temples!! When I go to a temple that is quite crowded, I actually pray that I don’t get groped. I make sure somebody from my family is in front of me and behind me while we wait in the crowd for darshan. That’s how paranoid girls are because of this. India got its freedom sixty three years ago and yet girls don’t have the freedom to even dress the way they want. A few years ago, there was this incident where a dress code was imposed on women. This dress code was for all the girls in not only work place or school or college but in the entire city. My memory on the entire issue is hazy so I don’t know exactly what caused it and what happened later on. Should women who are the prey really be held responsible for such behaviour? Do the men who actually perpetrate such things not responsible?

India is considered the home of Hinduism. The only religion which has both male and female god and who are both equally revered and considered powerful. With such a history should the women victim be subjected to such prejudice? Girls face the fear of being a target in every aspect of their life. The most astonishing part of it is that not even a middle aged woman is safe from this! Girls are ashamed of it and find it difficult to fight it. Very few can actually stand up for themselves. One of the reasons is the whole thing happens so quickly that the victim can’t even identify the person! One of the ways to maybe make the men who indulge in such lewd activities is to make them taste their own medicine! Maybe then they could realize how disgusting the whole thing. But doing such things will be even more disgusting for women I am sure. But I guess more than the whole eve teasing situation, what irritates me is their reasons for their doing. But I guess no amount of law can stop this until victims themselves take things in their own hands and kick some asses like in the movies. Of course this wouldn’t be a one man show like the movies. :)

First Blog, Women, Men!!!

For a long time I have wondered why do people write blogs? I thought I would never write one but here I am writing my first blog ever! I am one of the kind of lazy people who are proud of being lazy so I knew for a fact that I wouldn't write one. Now don't ask me why I am writing mine cuz I am not really sure about it. For a while now I have been reading a lot of stuff and I ended up thinking so many things and I wanted to do something about them. I guess one more reason could be because it’s been a while since I wrote essays on random because the last time I studied English was half a decade ago. I like the language but have been more interested in talking than writing. So I am also testing my writing skills and sharpening my thoughts. So I guess I should start with the subject that can almost instantly gets me riled up. Battle of sexes! :D

The other day I was for some reason reading an article on Wikipedia on Srinivasa Ramanujam the maths genius from India. For me reading articles on Wikipedia  is like how human thought process works. You know how when you are contemplating on a certain thought and that leads to another thought and that in turn leads to yet another thought and it continues and end up with a thought that leaves you thinking what in the world made me think of this. So that’s how I ended up reading a blog by a guy who had written about the discussion him and his friends on how tamil Brahmin girls these days are sexually liberated and look for non-brahmin boys because they find them macho and some more stuff. I find girls going after non-brahmin macho men ludicrous because being macho has nothing to do with the religion. Anyway after reading the blog I continued to read the comments on the blog entry and of course this caused some exchange of insults between boys and girls about the usual why is it right for boys and why is not right for girls and the whole gender equality issue! Among the comments, I found two of the them very amusing. I think at this spot I should point out that I am a “tamil Brahmin girl”! So you can very well guess how it’s going to be. :)

One of the comments was by this guy who took all the trouble to find a huge (when I say huge, I mean huge, like really huge) list of Brahmin female actresses in the Indian film industries and claims that all these actresses sleep with non-brahmin for fame, money and popularity! Now I don’t know by his claim if he really proves that Brahmin girls are really sexually liberated and sleep around for fame and money but if his claims are true then the allegations that women sleep around for fame and money is not restricted to Brahmin women. But then, does that mean women get ahead in their film career by only providing sexual favours? Does that mean men get ahead by sheer hard work? Or does that mean men don’t need to do such things while women need to? So just because some women do it does that mean the whole community has to take the blame? 

The second comment was by a guy who found Brahmin girls arrogant and disloyal because of a personal experience and went on to say about how he had some trouble and that he shared with three of his girl friends (I am assuming friends who are girls here :D) among whom two were non-brahmin and one was Brahmin and how the other two girls were sympathetic and the Brahmin girl started distancing herself from him. Here again he judged the entire Brahmin girls to be arrogant and disloyal. At least the first guy's comment generalized his belief after a huge list, but this guy's opinions are from one personal experience!

It is a common knowledge in maths that a theorem holds true if only proven. You can never prove any statement true without proper derivation. Even million examples proving the statements true are never enough for generalizing if just one exception is found. I know maths and life are not the same. But for every statement there are always exceptions. I have always wondered why a whole community or society or gender in this case judged on few instances. There was this video on youtube about how people from America are stupid and don’t know anything beyond their world. In the video a guy goes around asking questions (the questions I must admit were on world affairs that most people would know about) and the people who were questioned gave some really dumb answers. But does this mean whole of America is stupid? Does that mean the country, the guy who questioned was from is more aware of the world affairs than America? Who knows what percentage of the population was questioned and who knows what percentage of the population that did answer right but was not featured on the video. Who knows how what percentage of population from his country is stupid to give dumb answers. I guess we will never know about that.

One more thing that has always baffled is men’s claim that they can never understand women. I could be wrong here but to my knowledge I haven’t heard women say that we don’t understand men as much men have. But what I want to know is, does anybody understand anybody at all? I was talking to an acquaintance of mine to whom I asked the same question and he said that that’s true but he understands his father sometimes but never his mother. In my case I have never been able to understand my father or mother. I have so many times been surprised by some of the reactions which are completely different from what I had expected. Maybe it could be different when it comes to parent child relation since my mother is mostly right about me. But then again we live with our parents, siblings for a good portion of our lives and when one can’t ever claim that she or he can completely understand how her or his parents or siblings think. So is it really possible to understand a complete stranger of the opposite sex in few days or few months? Is reading books going to help understand another person? What do psychiatrist really understand about their clients? At times I have really wondered if I understand myself. Again we will never know the answer.

I think I have been a wondering a lot today (he he). I don't know if it is alright for me to mention another blog here but I have done it and if I have offended the person if he somehow comes to read this I am sorry :).