The Deep Cut

A pparently, some of my best pieces of writing are the ones where I write about my attempts at staying in shape and keeping up with personal health. For over a year now, much thanks to my never-changing eating habits and the fatty nature of Estadounidense food (not American food, because 'This' ) I've begun ballooning. It's almost like the fat trapped inside Anant Ambani's body is transiently entering in my body, without my permission. Technically, that'll be an  'invasion' but they're rich people, so who's to listen? Look what Russia did to Crimea (shakes head). I was so pumped up before November, last year. "Must. Lose. Weight." had become my slogan. I had stood naked in front of the mirror (despite early near-fatal shocks, I've conditioned my eyes to stand the view) a number of times, narrowing down the parts of the body that I need to cut down or build up. Some parts didn't need to be touched at all - they worked just f

I have always been severely judged in the way that I talk. "What is that, a colonial hangover?" I've been asked. When I moved from a city in northern India to the eastern part of the country, my first reaction was "Wow! I can't have spoken secrets now. Everyone here speaks Bengali!" - which blew my mind. I suddenly found myself relatable to the kids in the neighborhood. They spoke the same language, confided secrets in similar tongues in to their mother's ears and listened to similar reprimands from their fathers, just like the 10 year-old me. I made friends - who quickly became my closest friends - perhaps because I connected with them more personally, our mother tongue being the common factor here. Soon I developed a childhood crush on this girl who, among other common friends back then, was the only one who spoke Bengali and we used to go out skating in the evenings, hide together for hide'n seek and row together on imaginary lifeb