Midnight Fairy Tales – Part 2 (Reader’s story)

Guest post by Bakhtawar

I checked the tank, it had sufficient to take me home but not more. I said I’m sorry. I asked her where she was headed, she replied home and was scared

being alone at this time of the night. The city didn’t have a good reputation for safety of women. I enquired that her home was around 35kms from the

dhaba, the cellphone battery had been long empty .It was impossible for her to go home from there. I didn’t want to leave her on the mercy of a taxi. I

offered my apartment as a bivouac for the night and asked her to leave early in the morning when the petrol pumps would open up. Initially she was

reluctant, but later succumbed to my mot juste insistence after a heated debate with the stall owner about the possibility of reprobates with amatory

desires coming to the dhaba at night. I put on the helmet while she sat on my ride. Bakhtawar was at its best that night, it knew this would go a long way.

GRRUM GRRUM, Bakhtawar now carrying both of us sailed through. Bakhtawar’s resplendent black body, the shining steel rims sparkling in the moonlight and

the grumps, It was a ride to remember forever.

I reached home, parked my ride and went inside the frowsy room first to put everything on the table and the bed hastily into the cupboard. I called her and

in she came. She looked around for sometime and then took a chair besides the study table.

“So, what would you have”, I asked

“Nothing, thank you.”

“What about a coffee?”

“No, I don’t feel like having anything…”

“Okay, I’ll make some coffee for both of us, drink it whenever you want. :) ”

“Okay… :) ”

By the time I came back, she was reading a book. She was reading Gogol. I said”He’s one writer who had real wits. You don’t get to see that kind of humor

these days”. She smiled and said she’d never read him before. That made me flaunt all my literary pursuits,

“Have you read Pushkin?”

“No.”

“Umm…Khaled Hosseini?”

“Yeah…that one…about the doctor right?”

“Yes yes, did you like it?”

“It was good, it made me cry as well”

“Hmm…”

I wanted to keep the conversation going, wanted to talk to her.

Praise the Lord for those 3 cups of coffee each, we talked all night. From books, music, films to school, college, love and sex. She had the cute female

perspective on everything while I had the crude, boyish one. By morning we had established a bond between us, like we had known each other for years before

this. Time went on, and it was time for her to leave. After refueling her car, I asked “when are you planning your next trip here with an empty tank?”

“Haha, you want me to get stuck and scared again??” replied Nazneen.

“Well, I don’t mind if it turns out exactly like last night.”

“I’ll be seeing you”, she kissed me on the cheeks (my guerdon), and then left. I kept looking at her car till she disappeared after the next crossing.

“Holy….Cow”, I forgot to take her number and give her mine. I felt so disappointed and restless at such a big loss. The only option I have now is to wait

for Nazneen to arrive at my doorstep one day and so I’m waiting. It’s been two days now and she’s made a writer out of me already. Phew!

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Midnight Fairy Tales – Part 1 (Reader’s story)

Guest post by Bakhtawar

Two nights ago, after having a drink or two at a soiree at my friends place, I and Bakhtawar were returning home. It must have been around 1 in the night when I decided to explore the city in the silence of the night. The road I was moving on had been so irritating some hours back, now it was calling for lone riders to talk to it.

Grrrrrrr, the soft, polite and yet strong cadence of Bakhtawar sailing through the chilly winter night breeze made me feel like a king. It was as if each road was waiting to greet me, calling me to be on it. The roads on which millions travelled each day with their happiness, sorrows, ambitions, curse, pride and despair were indeed the garbage dumps of anger and frustration. Engrossed in these thoughts, I kept sailing past high rise apartments and buildings, restaurants, taverns, schools, offices, markets, each telling me a new story until I was stopped for verification at a police check post. “kahan se aa rahe ho?” was what I was asked.

I replied “ghar se, bike par yuhin dilli raat ko dekhne nikla hun”.

Photo by driver Photographer

“Chalo, license aur gaari ke kagaz nikalo”.

I lied where I had come from considering the fact that telling him that I had returned from my friends place would inevitably let them conclude that I had drinks.

After around 5 minutes of frisking and checking legal documents I was allowed to go by the short fat middle aged man. The funny thing about the man was the small rectangular belt buckle he wore. It faced the floor perfectly courtesy the mammoth load it had to bear around the man’s gigantic tummy. I said “shukriya” as I left

Going past a prominent college in the city I recalled preparing to get into it, it was a dream, not because of the moolah I would earn after passing out but because of the ‘chicks’ and parties that were synonymous with the college. I remembered my college days, those parties which lasted forever sans girls! Out in the distance I saw a small food stall (dhaba), realizing my strong urge for a hot cup of tea in the chilly night I parked my ride, lit a navy cut and ordered tea.

Echoes of old Hindi songs played in the background from the radio in the stall, the stall owner hymned along making my tea while I smoked, looking around the place full of trees and flowers. Tea was served and it was wonderful having something hot in the chill. As there was no one else in the dhaba, I started a conversation with the stall owner asking about the place and the reason he had kept his stall open till then. He replied that he had been a taxi driver for 5 years and realizing the necessity of tea stalls for tired taxi drivers to beat the chill at night, had started this stall 2 years back. The conversation went on for around 10 more minutes until a white car stopped at the dhaba. To my great surprise a woman came out of it.

The stall owner looked in awe, she was well dressed. She wore a beautiful grey long jacket, had put on light make up. She had long hair. I could make out she was scared. She came to the stall owner and said “bhaiya, meri gaadi ka petrol khatam ho gaya hai, aapke paas thoda petrol pada hai”, “saare petrol pump band ho gaye hain”. The stall owner replied “nahin madam, aap inse (pointing towards me) pooch lijiye”. She turned to me, I hushed “eee mmm I’m not sure, umm.. I’ll check”.

Boy was she beautiful.

(to be continued)

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Dating in India – Is it finally happening?

“Yeah that’s right. Don’t let your parents arrange your marriage. Don’t let your auntie/cousin create your matrimonial profile. How on earth am I supposed to get married if I happen to have not been lucky enough to just run into my soul mate accidentally??”

My vehement advocacy of freedom of choosing one’s life partner has landed me in trouble not once, not twice, but several times. To be frank, I kinda don’t mind.

But this was serious. My follower-cum-friend T wanted a real solution to a real problem: What about those who don’t “accidentally” find someone to fall in love with?

“Well, that’s why we have dating.” I offer, as we sip coffee together on a sunny Saturday afternoon. Separated by a few thousand miles. Typing away fiercely.

“Which doesn’t exist in India. Let’s be honest.”

Dating … What?

Well…er…right. Indians do marry for love. But these matches are usually based on people “accidentally” finding each other through work/school/mutual friends and relatives. No nonsense, goal-driven dating is still rare.

“But what about online dating?”

“You try it. The profiles are mostly either fake or of sickos looking for new ways to get off.”

“You’re right. I would probably not go out on a “date” with a guy I didn’t already know and/or like,” I was thinking aloud. “You can’t really trust people you don’t know.”

“See?” I could almost see the look of huffed triumph on T’s face.

The conversation stuck with me. Indian girls are simply put off by online dating. Strange men are usually seen as sources of potential danger in our culture, and for good reason. So what are the options of the young, urban(ized), upwardly mobile singles who’re bored of matrimonial websites and are ready to write the Indian Dating Story?

I did my research. I was surprised to find how many Indian dating portals and apps exist. While each was unique in its own cool ways, none of these apps answered my basic question: Am I sure I’m not wasting my time?

In other words, how sure am I of the quality of the member community?

One of the apps which stood out is called Woo – A cool mobile meeting platform for interesting, young, progressive singles.

Keeping it real

So what’s Woo’s answer to my question? And why is it special?

The answer is simple – a flat rejection of my sign up request. And it’s special because it irked me and wowed me at the same time.

What characterizes Woo is its commitment to keeping things real – creating opportunities for you to find a person you can actually go out on a date with. The platform intends to actively discourage “casual” flirting and thrill-seeking by people not looking for a serious relationship. For starters, when you try to sign up it screens your Facebook profile to check if you’re married or in a relationship, and politely declines to have you on board if you are. Woo rejects a substantial proportion of the sign up requests that it gets. It calls itself a “curated community” of real singles, looking for a real connection.

But being single on Facebook isn’t your sure-fire ticket on to Woo-land.

Woo auto-creates your profile photo album from Facebook.

Woo pulls in what you do for a living from Linkedin.

It even auto-populates your interests (in the form of pages you subscribe to) from Facebook.

That’s how real your Woo avatar would be once you’re past the sign up stage.

This approach isn’t free of its glitches though. I, like most of you, subscribe to many pages on Facebook, without giving a lot of thought to it. Like humour pages, friend’s photography pages etc. Woo picks two pages out of those under “interests” and shows it to one’s matches, which may not at all be representative of one’s actual interests. (In my case “Neha G Photography” showed up as one of these two. What the ….?)

However, the bottom line remains – no faking customizing of interests in order to attract people you like. No “enhanced” profile pictures for dating purposes. No padded up resume. Just the real you. That’s all you get to bring on to Woo.

Liar liar…

Between you and me – the rejection didn’t feel great. That ensured I was all the more curious to find out what exactly Woo offered me in return for demanding such high standards of authenticity.

Here’s what I did. I signed up through the Facebook profile of a single friend. :D

First surprise after you’re past the profile creation stage – it’s telling you to turn on your GPS.

My GPS?? I almost checked again to make sure I was not on Google Maps.

This was wow. This was truly unique. In keeping with Woo’s commitment to “keeping it real”, it gives you match suggestions of people only in the same city as you – people you can date in the real world. True to its principle of accepting nothing but the truth, Woo doesn’t trust you with disclosing your true location. It would rather believe your GPS.

Woo sometimes takes this mistrust of its users to a pesky level. For example, you can’t write what you want about yourself in the “About me” section. Users are allowed only to pick from a list of pre-defined adjectives which describe them, such as “wanderer”, “music maven” etc. Trolling-proof as they may be, standardized interests for everyone with no scope for expressing oneself freely takes a whole lot of the fun out of a dating app.

The final move

When it comes to match suggestions, Woo takes into account your mutual friends on Facebook, which increases credibility. If you like someone and are too shy to just kick it off by sending them a message, you can even ask mutual friends to introduce you.

You can open up a chat only if the attraction is mutual, i.e. if you confirm that you like someone and they return the favour. That takes care of spam. As a further measure against spamming, Woo also lets you “hide” your profile from being displayed publicly, if you want use the app to chat only with your existing matches.

You can continue to chat on Woo’s plush red-and-wood themed IM platform till you’re comfortable to take things to real life. (Oh btw, Woo’s Indianized humour emoticons are the coolest I’ve EVER used. And that includes Facebook. And Whatsapp.)

So if you’re a young adult, out there looking for a real relationship, Woo might just be your perfect start. If you’re a woman, with the whole suite of security tools from anti-stalking to anti-spam features, this is also one of the safest it’s going to get on a dating app.

Real matches. The real you. A real connection.

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post.

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“Prostitution in The Name of An Arranged Marriage.” Deepika’s Story

Below is a heart-rending life story from one of our readers, Deepika. I thank her on behalf of all of you for sharing it with us.


I had an arranged marriage five years ago. We had a nine-month long period of courtship.

Falling in love

It bears mentioning here that through most of my twenties, I’d been in a relationship with my best friend from college.

The relationship was great in every other respect, except that my “boyfriend” and I could not agree on issues of children and our careers.

He expected me to put my career on hold and become the standard IT spouse. I wanted children, he didn’t. No room for negotiations.

Long story short, we broke up months before our wedding. I was heart-broken. I had never considered a future without him. He’d been an integral part of my life since college.

Falling out

I felt as I was missing a limb after we broke up. Did I mention that we belonged to different communities and castes?

It had taken us three years to get my parents’ approval. Yet, here we were, unable to get past the issue of children.

“What kind of man doesn’t want children?” My parents exclaimed in utter bewilderment.

Anyway, we broke up and I moved back to live with my parents. I couldn’t bear living alone; I was completely devastated. I had lost my best friend and not just a boyfriend.

Long story short, I took two years to recover emotionally, and at 29, I was past my shelf life. I created profiles on the matrimonial websites, hoping to meet someone I’d begin to like.

I met men in their 30s who were either looking for a quick fling or men who just wanted to get married. Anyone would do.

After a couple of years of countless dead-ends, I was getting desperate. My clock was ticking loudly and I had always wanted kids.

An arranged marriage?

At the age of 32, I was looking squarely at a childless future. My parents suggested the arranged marriage route.

Photo by Mr. Seb

I had always been against arranged marriages. I have two aunts who had terrible, abusive arranged marriages. I didn’t want to end up like them. Yet I wanted children, and there wasn’t enough time to build a slow, gradual relationship.

It was out of my desperation that I agreed to meet a prospect. He was extremely well-educated, with a PhD in engineering from a top British university. He was very successful professionally and came from a similar socio-economic background.

Apparently.

After checking for “hygiene” factors, we decided to get married. While I wasn’t attracted to him sexually, I hoped to develop some kind of affection for him over time.

The arranged marriages around me lacked passion. But they seemed to have a time-tested, easy bond of familiarity around them. Much like you and your favourite, worn-out cotton pajamas.

Before marriage, I’d once asked him why he was always on edge, tightly wound up and fiercely on his guard. He’d told me he suffered from social anxiety, that it took him some time to let his guard down. He was shy, he told me. “Give me time,” he said.

Is that what it looks like?

Reality struck the day after our wedding day. The measured, soft-spoken man I had married morphed into a critical, severely controlling, chronically suspicious, angry and hostile stranger.

Nothing I did pleased him. Every action, gesture or word was criticised harshly.

I also discovered that his closeness to his mother and sister bordered on the abnormal.

Our marriage didn’t have two people in it, it had four people. “You’re not married only to me,” he said, “You’re married to my family”. I asked him, “Does it mean that all of us should have sex with each other?” The absurdity of it made no sense.

Every intimate detail of our marriage, including our failure to consummate the marriage, was discussed with his mother and sister.

A bit of friendly motherhood advice

My mother-in-law called my mother and said to her, “Your daughter won’t sleep with my son. Haven’t you taught her the duties of a wife?”

In that family, sex between husband and wife was reduced to an entitlement, a privilege, a right.

Sex was something you did, in darkness, silently, quickly, without affection, without regard for each other, without emotion. Prostitution in the name of marriage.

Photo by Johan B. Lindega

That was my marriage. An impersonal transaction based on power and privilege. No warmth. No empathy.

No humanity.

A joyless, loveless, humourless meeting of bodies, but not of hearts or minds.

Oh no, all arranged marriages are not like that.

In conclusion

Long story short (OK, not so short). My only advice to young women is: DO NOT marry a man for his education, bank balance or family background. You will wake up every day next to this person.

For two years, I’d wake up next to my ex-husband and want to weep.

I’d married a PhD, a man who made a tidy sum, but who had no empathy, no capacity to feel joy or love. I’d married an emotional void. A repressed man who could feel no emotion but anger.

Compatibility is elusive, but critical to the success of a marriage. That shared laugh, that quick squeeze of the hand, that familiarity, trust and understanding is extremely important.

Be careful who you marry.

It’s the biggest decision of your life.

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How to feel loved

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Loving and being loved adds richness to our lives. When people feel close to others they are happier and even healthier. Love helps us feel important, understood, and secure. But each kind of love has its own different feel. The kind of love we feel for a parent is different from our love for a baby brother or best friend. And the kind of love we feel in romantic relationships is its own unique type of love.

Our ability to feel romantic love develops during our teens. Teens all over the world notice passionate feelings of attraction. Even in cultures where people are not allowed to act on or express these feelings, they’re still there. It’s a natural part of growing up to develop romantic feelings and sexual attractions to others. These new feelings can be exciting — or even confusing at first.

Love has three main qualities: Attraction, closeness and commitment.

These three qualities of love can be combined in different ways to make different kinds of relationships. Attraction without closeness is more like a crush or infatuation. Romantic love is when attraction and closeness are combined. For people falling in love for the first time, it can be hard to tell the difference between the intense, new feelings of physical attraction and the deeper closeness that goes with being in love.The third ingredient in a love relationship, commitment, is about wanting and deciding to stay together as a couple in the future — despite any changes and challenges that life brings.

In our late teens, though, relationships are less about going out to have fun and fitting in. Closeness, sharing, and confiding become more important to both guys and girls. By the time they reach their twenties, most girls and guys value support, closeness, and communication, as well as passion. This is the time when people start thinking about finding someone they can commit to in the long run — a love that will last.

When people first experience falling in love, it often starts as attraction. Sexual feelings can also be a part of this attraction. Sometimes, though, a couple loses the closeness. For adults, relationships can sometimes turn into what experts call “empty love.” This means that the closeness and attraction they once felt is gone, and they stay together only out of commitment.

Next time when you meet someone special, take time and think for yourself, what really matters. And ask yourself questions… If all answers stop at that one person, I tell you you surely are in love. Ponder yourself in the magical pool of love.

Enjoy Yourself, Celebrate each moment… You ll find you are in love with yourself and how to feel loved?

Loving You

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Top 6 foods to initiate love

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Eat to Love

We all eat to survive ,and we survive to eat. But have you ever thought of eating food for love? Yes . There are some foods that boost your energy, get your heart pumping and enhance your circulation, sending blood coursing to the parts that really matter! Apart from their hard work in the passion department, these foods have a whole range of other health benefits, so there’s no excuse not to give them a try.

Chocolate

Chocolate is classic seduction food. The Aztec emperor Montezuma was said to drink 50 glasses of honey-

sweetened chocolate a day in the name of virility. And no one can deny chocolate’s romantic associations.Chocolates are equally good in bed. Chocolate contains compounds which prolong the Amandie’s effect in the brain. So possibly there could be something in the idea of chocolate acting a little like a drug…

Red wine

For a healthy sex life, you need a healthy heart and circulatory system. You need healthy blood flowing strongly, all around the body, and especially to those more intimate regions! In moderation, wine has been shown to be good for the heart and circulation. Red wine in particular contains high levels of a plant compound called restorative, which can reduce your risk of heart problems. And a glass or two of wine can help you to relax and put you in a floating cloud.

Salmon

The omega-3 fatty acids in salmon make the blood less sticky, helping blood to flow smoothly. You can also get your omega-3s from other oily fish like mackerel, trout, sardines and fresh tuna – eat them twice a week to keep your arteries well-oiled. And if you’re vegetarian, try flax seeds, or a vegetarian omega-3 supplement.

Chillies

Chillies make you hot, hot, hot! The chemical that makes your mouth burn is called capsaicin, and when your face flushes after eating a vindaloos, that’s the blood vessels expanding thanks to the chilli effect. And it’s not just the blood vessels in your face that get the boost – more blood flow elsewhere enhances sexual arousal.

Coffee

The caffeine kick you get from a cup of coffee not only gives you a buzz and gets your blood pumping, it also boosts your metabolism and could also enhance endurance by releasing fat stores for energy, giving you the stamina to last all night. Its worth asking for a cup of coffee after dinner with your partner….

Oysters

Oysters are a supreme source of zinc, which is needed to make testosterone. Testosterone is best known as the ‘male hormone’, but women produce it too, and this hormone is involved in sex drive for both sexes. But many people just don’t find oysters sexy.

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How to know a girl likes you

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You know one thing girls always wait for your bold proposal. They only gives some signs from them if they have a crush on you, we should realize and make a first move from you. So now I should help you to get some signs to how to know a girl likes you.

How to know a girl likes you?

First sign is staring

The first sign of whether a girls likes you is staring. If a girl have an interest on you, she will surely make or steals a star.

You will be a great personality to her

She will always give great values for your concepts and attitude. Gives a special interest to know your plans and ideas. She always loves to discuss on your aspects and your future plans.

Notice her response when you in front

If she become nervous or express a bright face you can take it has a positive thing. If she is with her friends then there will be a sudden reaction between them. This gives that their will be a discussion on you and her among them.

Ignorance makes her jealous

When you ignore her by talking to some other girls you can notice a jealous on her and also she makes a bit mad on you. If you mention her that you are attracted to some other girl, then he will refuse and stop talking to you. This is the best sign for how to know a girl likes you.

She always reminds about her status

She will always make clear about her status that she is single. She will try to mention you that she is ready to date with a guy or she need a partner. She will always ask you to join with her.

Submit complains to you

She will share all the troubles and problems she faces to you. Give complains to you about her close related one. Especially about parents who always scold her.

Try to make a touch on you

She makes excuses to touch you and feel your sensation. She will try to hold your hands, in situations which is made by her.

She try to know your past love

She always know about whether you are engaged or details about your exes. She try maximum to disclose from you.

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