When did extremes become acceptable and moderation disappear off the menu? Do we need to either walk on egg shells or fight to death?

There are two type of social media debates/disagreements (this could translate to real life as well). One is knives out, abusive language and you deserve to die kind. The other one is when a superior, sanctimonious approach is taken to the debate. You are clearly the inferior being, you have no idea what you’re talking about, so I will tell you what is what and thereafter shun you. The third kind should exist but doesn’t, which means you don’t debate or rather disagree at all. You agree to everything, are diplomatic, do not voice your real opinion, don’t respond and leave the space as fast as possible. You normally adopt the third stance, because you are a nice guy or gal, you don’t want to hurt the other person’s feelings, and why bother anyway, what’s the big deal, is this debate worth getting your fingers sticky or your hands dirty?

But is healthy, educated debate necessary? Should contrary opinions be voiced at all?

Yes, because that’s how change and innovations come about, fresh ideas flourish and the creative process unfolds. We might see the world one way, another person may question our understanding of it, and by the assertion of their belief, we may gain some worthwhile insight.

What spurs such a debate though?

Is it an echo chamber where the same thoughts bounce off different walls to come back untouched and untampered with?

Is it a place where you cannot voice your opinion if it’s in disharmony and conflicts with someone else’s or the popular opinion?

Or is it where conflicting thoughts are exchanged regularly leading to reflection that perhaps there are different viewpoints in the world and two sides to a coin?

Should we police people’s thoughts and views? Yes, you could, but what fun would that be? Wouldn’t that make for a very boring world where we decide exactly what is to be said?

Of course, I like people who love me for and regardless of what I do or write, but I should also like people who disagree with me because they teach me something from their view point. I might not understand it at the time, but I could come back with a calmer head and learn for the future. I could take it as a chance to improve and look at my understanding of an issue in a different way. On the other hand, if I have serious doubts about the merit of their opinion and would rather ignore it, I still don’t have a right to hush them.

I stress the mode of disagreement MUST be polite. No personal attacks. If you can maintain that, then disagreeing isn’t a wholly shocking idea. I can disagree with you and you can do the same. However, we should remember one thing as civilised, educated beings; we are disagreeing on an idea, theory, piece of work and opinion. I am not objecting to your right to live or your right to continue doing whatever it is I have an opinion about. By all means, carry on, not that my opinion will stop you, but please don’t take offence to my voice. I am just using it, maybe because I have one?

Furthermore, if I disagree with your ideas and actions or am unimpressed by your work and dare to voice it, you haven’t become my mortal enemy, I haven’t taken to hating you, I haven’t declared open war on you or dishonoured you – so please step back with that pistol. No need to fire it just yet or demand satisfaction at dawn. Contrary to what you may assume, I do still respect and love you as a delightful human being.

There is an idea that friends ‘support’ each other, which is great – I’m all for it. But our friends should not be expected to be mere yes-men or sycophants. In fact, if our friends disagree with us, it’s not an insult to our person no matter what inflated opinion we have of ourselves. It may actually benefit us to be surrounded with opinions that clash with our own.

This may be an unpopular opinion, but being a nice and good person doesn’t mean nodding your head vigorously at everything around you, smiling and hearting everything, conforming to a set, established pattern or agreeing with whatever the experts or pundits have applauded. Sometimes, going against the grain or tide, questioning, objecting, may lead to a new discovery, some small change, some revolution, who knows?

And hey, you can disagree with this opinion piece, because I’m not an expert, am I? But even if I was -if I was a certified, award winning, opinion giver on the subject, stamped by some supreme body of knowledge in the field, guess what, you’re still allowed to disagree with me. Shocking, isn’t it?

*Spoiler Alert: This review contains spoilers.*

Available online for free.

It’s a short story of only 6000 words but I had to stop many times in my reading of it. I had to come back to it when I felt less angry at the injustice the narrator is facing. At the point in the story where her husband, John remarks:

“Bless her little heart!” said he with a big hug, “she shall be as sick as she pleases!” I had to stop and take a deep calm breath. Each line is meant to disturb and attack. Each line has a meaning beyond its obvious meaning.

The nameless narrator is surrounded by people she trusts, her husband John and her sister in law, Jeanie are kind and caring. They want her to rest, recline, not see her baby, not write and not give in to her fancies. So controlling is their care, that it becomes more suffocating than the disconcerting yellow wallpaper in her room.

With nothing to occupy her mind, she tries to unravel the mystery of its pattern. She sees a woman like herself confined within the paper, trying to escape but the restrictive, confusing pattern is too much for her. In the end, the wallpaper is a way out for the narrator. She frees herself and many like her by tearing it apart and shattering the bars of containment.

Here the bars hold back the freedom of choice, free will and thought. She tries to conform to patriarchy’s expectations of her, to act normal, hide her true feelings but she knows that she must creep out, and free others like her to creep out as well. But they must still ‘creep’ about or they might be caught and thrown right back into the pattern designed to keep them confined.

A powerful, feministic piece of literature, this story is not a happy read but a very relevant one. It is open to a lot of interpretations and relatability across different forms of subjugation and suppression across race, gender and class.

Because of its Booker prize short listed status, I really wanted to love this novel as great literature and gush over it. Before I read it, I planned a 5 star rating but I am here in all honesty at a 1 star. It may just not be my style of book/writing or it may be that the Booker prize short listing set a high bar and I was left hanging. I’m also wondering if maybe the Booker prize novels are not my type of books at all which is disturbing as I would like to appreciate what they are appreciating.

There are three words on the cover of my copy of ‘Burnt Sugar’ that I picked up at my local Waterstones by Fatima Bhutto, ‘Taut, unsettling, ferocious.’ I humbly disagree on all three.

It didn’t have that tension or tightly wound friction. It felt like a slow burn. Like watching a long wick of a candle catch fire and finally get to the part where it melts the wax only to fizzle out. It had a string of events with shifting time-lines, incidents and facts thrown together to make a stew of it all but nothing really gelled together. Maybe burnt sugar may have done the trick? Her take on topics such as PPD, living with overbearing in-laws, Hindu Muslim riots, abandonment, examination of Alzheimer’s disease, care-giver fatigue, re-inventing memories, are all interesting and intelligent reflections but I doubt they worked in her novel format.

It was meant to be unsettling because it depicted a troubled relationship between a mother and daughter but I felt short-changed on that aspect. It felt more like the diary of a daughter writing down all her grievances against her mother. What would have been interesting, as the blurb promised and failed to deliver was this first line: Tara remembers the past one way, Antara quite the other. However, we don’t get Tara’s viewpoint. We never explore that angle. It is just Antara and her narration of what she sees, feels and deals with in her daily grind.

Throughout the novel, I was keeping my eyes peeled for what grave ills the MC-Antara suffers as a result of her mother’s big neglect and selfishness and find out it’s nothing that hooks a great deal of sympathy out of me. This is the reason why I never warm up to her or feel invested in her story. Something that’s portrayed as a big deal in the novel is that adult Antara slept with the same man as her mother, and also at one point fancies sleeping with her biological father. Now other than it being something unsavoury about Antara’s character, it didn’t evoke a big gasp from me.

It lays out graphic details of body odours, bloody snots that are wiped on clothes, eating snots, excretions, piss and even talking about sex in a way that put me off it completely, and I’m just wondering here what purpose does all this serve?

The narrator, Antara, is clinical, cold, brutal, doesn’t love or like anyone around her, and doesn’t even feel human at times. The problem with depicting her that way is that no one cares about her in the end. We don’t develop feelings of sympathy for her.

I struggled to find a plot. It could be a character driven novel which is great but then I was not emotionally invested in the characters either. It felt a combination of everything India is associated with like Ashrams, Babas, Kali Matas, Hindu-Muslim riots, overbearing in laws, but I am sure there is much more to the vast country. At the end this didn’t work for me in a novel format. I loved some snippets of her observations or reflections in the novel. Doshi is wise, logical and analytical with topics she has attempted in the novel but she could have written a scholarly article on them instead and I would have lapped it up.

**SPOILER ALERT**

This review contains spoilers but most of it is already mentioned on the book’s blurb.

‘Before the coffee gets cold’ by Toshikazu Kawaguchi.

If you were allowed just one chance to go back in time what would you change, and more importantly, who would you want to meet?

In a hundred-year-old, basement café in Tokyo from the Edo time, there is a chair that can take you time travelling. But there are an array of tedious rules you need to follow which dims the café’s appeal as a tourist attraction. You need to be seated in a particular chair, you cannot leave that chair or the café, you can only meet someone who has been in the cafe before, and you need to come back before your (bitter) coffee gets cold. So far, so clear?

The plot plays out like a theatre play which was the author, Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s original intention. The set-up is like a low-cost stage and the actions of the characters a harmonious dance of pouring and drinking coffee, zipping in and out with a clang-dong of the front door and awkward dialogues and actions. A collection of four acts or stories unfold within this contained set-up.

Whether it’s Fumiko desperate to meet her lover who has just left her, Kohtake receiving a letter from her husband, Hirai trying to have one last meeting with her sister or Kei wanting to meet her future daughter every story pieces the puzzle of that chair together and slowly builds up to an emotional, teary climax with an ever-increasing crescendo. At the start of the novel, I had a sceptical eyebrow raised and by the last sentence, I am left reaching for the tissue box to wipe my tears away. The story is wise, poignant and yet has a heart-warming simplicity to it. The author’s style is fast-paced and matter of fact, so the emotional moments sneak up at you unexpectedly.

Get a good cup of coffee and start reading. This was a rare find but I’m so glad I stumbled on it in my local book shop. Oh, and read your chosen, marked parts before your coffee gets cold or you never know what might happen.

I was sitting minding my own business in a family dinner gathering, and an older family relative took it upon herself to tell me what was what. Now, if it was about a gaping lack in my decorum or manners, I would put my hands up and accept her mission to slay me, but this wasn’t about that. She had an opinion about everything that I happened to be doing wrong in my life, according to her view of what my life should be like. She went on to express it loudly, repeatedly and persistently in front of the twenty people gathered there. She did come up with snide, humorous one liners which were quite innovative, to give the devil it’s due.

In Pakistan, there is an unsaid rule of compliance to our elders, especially if you’re female. It comes in the package of being a well brought up lady. Since, we live in a culture that teaches the young to obey the old blindly and replying back is like a sin, I humbly kept my mouth shut. By the end of the evening, I was dashing out to the parapet to wail into the lonely night.

Now, some people may say that having acquired a number of years under her belt like medals in a war, she had the right to bring her unsolicited wisdom to the table. I should have taken it in my stead. After all, as women we do have to go through life dealing with all sorts of unpleasant things, like period cramps. But this got me so down that I succumbed to one of those anonymous posts on a Facebook group. I laid out my sorrow for unknown ladies to buck me up and it worked, as I was too embarrassed to share it with my family. The problem is as nice girls we have been taught to never be associated with a tongue and a strong opinion. You don’t like something, go cry in the shower or the online equivalent of it – an anonymous post.

As I didn’t fall pregnant after two seconds of being married to my husband, I am not sure how many times I was asked quite gruffly when I would have a baby by random older women qualifying as ‘aunties’ as they were known in some vague capacity to the family. In weddings, on the street, in parties, in a cinema and a roller coaster ride (true story). This never failed to make me miserable and I would hide the mist in my eyes behind an over bright smile, hoping my kajal remains intact.

Now really, it is time to stand up to the attack of the ‘taunties’ *(not my term) i.e. aunties who taunt, in your life. You don’t like something they say, tell them right then, albeit politely. Seems like an obvious thing to do, but sadly for many Pakistani girls it remains an uphill struggle to obtain a voice and express their feelings. Respect is a return gift, irrespective of age. For those mothers lucky to have baby girls, teach them to speak their mind before telling them to shut up. Being outspoken is not equal to being rude. Mic drop.

Image by Rudy and Peter Skitterians from Pixabay 

A pink moon is shining down on us. Yes, you got that right. Pink moon. But see, it’s fiction. Anything can happen in fiction, right? It doesn’t have to be a lived and breathed experience. Apparently not for some people who think it’s all about reality and real life experiences twisted into fiction to hide *insert gasp here* dark secrets and true identities. No, sorry to burst that bubble.

I released a poem called, tourist eyes on my Facebook account a while back with the clear heading -FICTION. And then flowed the sombre sympathies from friends. Family was too busy hiding their faces in embarrassment. I mean who announces the end of their marriage so blatantly on a social platform. Does she have any sense of decorum? I got some toned down public messages of sympathy and then an outpour of no holds barred queries in my inbox. I got tired of replying and just ignored the rest of my messages. Let them assume I’ve split up from my husband, whom, just to clarify I am very much still partnered up with.

I am writing a novel where a crime takes place and I’m now curious if people will automatically assume it’s happened to me. I am also curious as to what readers think of this notion. Do they think a story teller cannot cook up made up characters out of thin air by the power of their imagination and then weave a purely fictional tale? If I write a character similar to myself, is it automatically me? I admit that I’ve made this error myself. Before I started this long and tedious journey of writing for no apparent reason or reward; I asked an author if the protagonist was like him. Now, I understand how he must have done a roll of the eyes and emitted a long suffering sigh at my assumption.

To argue both sides of the coin, nothing can be purely fictional. We see things happen around us and it automatically translates to our written word. We see a shocking piece of crime flash on the news and it impacts us to the extent that it forms a subconscious layer in our soul. We might take those bitter or good memories, consciously or subconsciously, and draft it into a tale. But that is the reservoir of the writer. The treasure trove where those items are stored. The magic room where memories of everything we have ever seen or heard or lived are kept safe. We may use this storeroom to embellish our fictional piece. If we were to create a character for example, we might take the gravelly voice of a fruit vendor, the eyes of a ware wolf and the irritating habit of saying shushhhh from your mother’s bossy second cousin. You put all these together to make the character whole. The character is still not real but he isn’t all fake either.

It’s still the writer’s creation. That must be appreciated or at least understood. It is not about me, my husband, my friends and my neighbours. A piece of fiction is fictional, folks. Don’t over think it.

Image from google, not my credit.

I was never a baby person. I would look upon these crying yet cute specimens of pro-creation when I came upon them occasionally with a polite smile and an aloof nod. Babies didn’t like me much either. They started bawling upon contact. When I got married, children were meant to follow like a checklist item. I couldn’t live my marital life in peace until I popped one out. Constant nagging, questioning and prayers followed me wherever I went. Thus, I embarked happily on the mission to birth one. Afterall, how difficult could it be?

Gob smacked

When I was pregnant, I thought labour was the difficult part. Motherhood is something else. It is one of those things that you need to experience to understand. Like sky diving or citing a ghost. I had an easy pregnancy. I didn’t even have morning sickness. Sure, labour was like being trampled over by a truck at high speed but afterwards was something else. I still don’t have a word for it because I was meant to use the word ‘elated’. But elated was not my word to start with. Gob smacked came close.

The big switch

As a new mum you are expected to immediately switch into the doting role of a mother hen fussing over her chicklets. Many times it takes a long while to bring yourself into that mode. It’s not like a switch being turned on. For some women, it might be but others may require some time to come to terms with how much life has changed for them. It was a progressive trend of love and adoration for me. Each day that passed I fell more in love with my baby. My mother pointed this out recently that I’m kissing her all the time. I didn’t even notice.

Guilt in a loop

I see vlogs of super mummies (they call themselves that), with shiny makeup and even shinier meal ideas for their little ones. They even make funny face shapes with fruit on their overnight oats before presenting it to their darlings. My little one on the other hand doesn’t consider oats a food group. I suspect she thinks it’s play dough. There is always judgement thrown at a mother. It could be well meaning but condescending advice or downright disapproval. There is a constant comparison with other babies. Hence, the constant nagging guilt that you aren’t doing enough.

Carry on, Jeeves

It doesn’t matter if I’m popping an extra strength vitamin every day to lug my baby around. I don’t have the strength to charge through the day with a toothy grin and a super mum cape. Most of this lethargy lies in my brain. For most of my life I’ve had to just look after myself. Now, I have a headstrong toddler who controls me. She controls my actions, my phone, my sleep, whom I talk to and when. She dials my father and mother randomly for which I take credit. She also dials every forgotten contact on my phone for which I am quick to pin the blame on her. It’s a constant battle of wills with her and she wins hands down each time.

No break, No sick leave, No rest

There was a video of people being interviewed for a fake job with the duties of a mother. It was called ‘Director of Operations’. Most interviewees laughed at the ‘inhumane’ and ‘insane’ nature of the role. It’s known to be the toughest job in the world. It’s all true but you still do it. And you feel a sense of achievement and love unlike anything you have ever done. You carry on despite lack of sleep, cramps and sickness because your baby takes precedence over everything.

Couple goals

Sometimes, I look back at all the romantic travel and dinner pictures with my husband and wonder if we are the same couple. After the baby, couple time is replaced mostly with shift duty. Couple goals takes a backseat. We don’t have enough time to engage in a two minute dialogue forget anything else. In those occasions where we try and demonstrate physical affection our baby comes flapping her hands in disapproval to shoo us away from each other. One day, she will grow up and understand the concept of romance so we’ll be allowed to have some. Until then, we just have to sneak it in when she’s sleeping, if we have any energy left.

Forever love (read worry)

Once you become a mother, there is no escape from the constant worry of making sure your baby is safe, happy, healthy and is living the best life they can. This worry is all encompassing and doesn’t ever go away. Even when your baby is no longer dependent on you and might herself be a mother of a baby. Your happiness and health is directly related to her. My mother would constantly worry about me and I would tell her not to. Now, I see myself doing it and my mother tells me off about it. It’s a never ending cycle.

Writing Woes

Being a writer and a mum? There is a covert assumption thrown at me that to write I may be ignoring my priority-my baby. But here’s the thing; I ‘steal’ this time for myself. I sneak it in when she naps or when she sleeps at night. It’s my one act of redemption to claim some ‘me time’. It keeps me sane, grounded and happy. It doesn’t tire me out, in fact it refreshes me and makes me a happier person. Afterall, a happy mum leads to a happy baby.

Being a mother is part of who I am. It’s not everything I am or can be in life.

Image by Sasin Tipchai from Pixabay