I was on the way to the airport to fly back home after a short break. I walked down the railway platform, luggage in tow, intent on finding a reasonably empty compartment. I finally found it: a carriage so forlorn that rolling tumbleweed wouldn’t have been out of place. I chose a nondescript seat in the middle, tucked away from any possible incoming passengers with their clumsy bags and noisy toddlers. As the last couple of minutes to departure arrived, I experienced a frisson of excitement that I’d gotten away with it! I might actually make the half-hour journey in relative peace and quiet. But the very next moment, a large family of seven clambered in: four adults and three children between them. As luck would have it, they decided to take up the seats next to me, ignoring the countless seats ahead and behind us. Oh, I’d known deep inside it was too good to last. The children cried and laughed. Noisily ripped open bags of chips. Slurped and spilt drinks. Whined about each other to parents who were desperate to believe that their holiday hadn’t ended yet and so wholeheartedly ignored them. Amidst it all I sat with my head in my hands muttering to myself.

As we arrived at the airport, I almost leaped out of the train in my eagerness to escape the madding crowd. After a couple of hours of immigration procedures, aimless shopping and needless snacking, I found myself waiting to board. I fled to the farthest corner, away from all children in sight. I couldn’t have been safer. But once again my powers of attraction seemed to swell and I watched horror-stricken as another family with (another) three children walked all the way down to my little nook and settled themselves in around me. I sadly put my book away because really, I had no hope. As the little menaces hit each other on the head with Barbies and argued about their favorite cartoon characters, they kept stepping on my toes and getting plastic hair in my mouth. I was starting to get very, very tired.

The call to board couldn’t have come at a better time. Another minute and Malibu Barbie would have been an amputee. Once again, I raced down the corridors to get away from the walls that were threatening to close in on me. (Really.) I was looking forward to finally getting to my seat on the plane because I’d been told the seat next to me was going to be empty (ah, those little joys). A quick look around and no sign of danger. All was finally as it should be.

For once in my life, I didn’t wait for the beverage cart or the food trolleys to come rolling by. I was so exhausted that I immediately fell into a stupor, sprawled luxuriously across two economy-class seats. Until sometime in the middle of the night when a terrible howling jolted me back to the world of the living. It sounded like some terrible calamity had befallen someone up in row 33. I craned my neck to look. There was no calamity. Just a little boy intent on giving his vocal cords a good work-out at 2 am local time. Flight attendants kept coming by to check if he could be pacified. Two passengers offered to help the mother calm the boy. I saw the mother give up in despair. I heard a man ask a steward if he could give the boy some sleeping pills. (I kid you not. And here you were thinking I was nasty!)

And that’s when I had my epiphany: I am always going to be plagued by the little people. If I’d been someone who adores children, there would probably never be any around me.  But as it stands, the powers that be up there have decided what my cross in life is going to be.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve had the perfect manicure ruined by a careless turn or a negligent move. Sometimes, I am just resigned to the possibility that I may never once make it home without some mishap that will bring to naught the entire process of having secured a coveted appointment, set aside all other activities for said appointment, suffered nail salon staff’s incompetence in silence (sometimes) and sat patiently through more than an hour of filing, buffing and drying. Not to mention the ever-rising price of a manicure.

Over many, many visits to the manicurist, I’ve found that a few careful measures can still protect your freshly painted nails to a good extent. There are no guarantees, but I give you the following tips to come out of it all as unscathed as possible:

1. It is imperative that you book your appointment well in advance. Never have your nails done late at night. They will almost always have bed sheet smudges in the morning.

2. In case you’ve decided to have a manicure and pedicure together, you must confirm that you will have the treatments simultaneously. The danger otherwise lies in the fact that if the pedicure starts earlier, your toenails will most likely dry off faster than your fingernails, tempting you to walk away with a not-yet dry manicure. Remember, toenails always seem to dry faster and don’t smudge as easily.

3. For the woman going in for a pedicure, remember to plan ahead so you are wearing or carrying flip-flops.

4. Carry as little as possible with you. Avoid carrying a handbag lest you be tempted to dip your hands in to grab something. Just your wallet or purse would suffice.

5. Leave your house keys on the dashboard so you won’t have to go searching for them in your bag later. Car keys are impossible to avoid; you will need to carry them with you.

6. Don’t wear sunglasses. I know that might be a lot to ask of some women, but ladies, the rewards are great. If you do wear sunglasses, you would naturally try to put them back on after your manicure, which brings your nails into contact with…hair! If there’s anything more frustrating than a simple smudge, it is hair tracks running through your red polish.

7. Dark colors take much longer to dry than light or sheer ones. So if you are in a hurry, opt for Pretty in Pink rather than Berry Naughty.

8. Always pay for the service before you start your treatment. That way, you won’t have to fumble for credit cards and cash afterwards.

9. Sit absolutely still. Put away your magazines as soon as the technician starts to apply the varnish.

10. Never skip the drying station. Even if you are in a rush, factor in a drying-time of at least 15 minutes. Don’t read- you will have to turn a page at some point and it’s just not worth it.

11. Keep your hands and feet where you can see them. Avoid waving them about or touching your nails to see if they’re dry yet.

12. Your mani-pedi is your responsibility and no one else’s. So be careful, very careful around hyperactive children and absent-minded salesmen. Everyone is a potential disaster waiting to happen.

13. Don’t schedule any other appointment for the day. No grocery-shopping, trip to the mall or coffee with friends. Go straight home and sit tight. Don’t attempt to do the dishes or open any jars.

Good luck, ladies!

When we were children, my sister and I hated each other most vehemently. We were two very different individuals (we still are, for that matter): she, a younger sibling (supposedly) struggling to step out of the elder one’s shadow and I, an arrogant fourteen-year old trying to keep an irritating sister from encroaching on my territory. She thought I was narcissistic beyond belief (probably right, but she encouraged it in the first place, being an adulating sibling and all), and I thought she was untidy and didn’t know her rightful place in the hierarchy of things. We could never see eye to eye. I believe my mother went through some trying days.

One of the few times we ever joined forces was when we had people, especially people with children, visiting. These ‘people’ were usually in the form of very annoying relatives who came around occasionally to pry, interfere and offer unsolicited advice. They were also a threat to the fine equilibrium that we maintained in a household of (some still growing) women. The last thing we needed was some old crone putting thoughts in our easily swayed mother’s head that we were running wild or not dressing appropriately for our age. My sister and I hated most adults for being such gossips. Looking back, I wonder if there is a lesson to be gleaned from this?

In the process of making themselves at home, the same people would invade our room, sleep in our beds, throw their belongings about the house and create a general air of chaos that I, in my developing days of OCD, found abhorrent and disturbing. To top it, their children would wreak further havoc on our home, bouncing on sofas, pulling out books, fingering knick-knacks and snooping around like bloodhounds, eager to sniff something out.

My sister and I would draw up a battle plan the day before the intended arrival of the enemy. Plotting into the wee hours, we would decide who would be in charge of each defense. Inevitably she would be consigned to staving off the little punks. I can’t remember if she had a particular aptitude for dealing with them, but she did have more patience than me. That closed the matter. Her task entailed trailing them wherever they went to keep them out of mischief (this was not for their good) and playing pranks on them to get them into trouble with their parents. I laugh out loud every time I think of the time we buried a four-year old’s slippers foot-deep in fresh manure. The shrieks of that mother as she discovered this horror while we secretly watched chortling away still ring clear in my ears today!

Meanwhile, I having earned the reputation of being aloof and unsociable could more easily set off repudiating any counsel or admonishment that the adults may throw our way. I would tell them to their face that it was none of their business what the length of our shorts was and how my social graces were not their responsibility. My rudeness was looked upon with sadness and I was deemed a lost cause. But it did the job: we were les enfants terrible and they wanted little to do with us (most of the time anyway).

Over many visits such as these, we fine-tuned our strategies to develop a resilient sibling-machine to counter our enemies out in the adult world. Formulating our little plans and playing our little games helped us hang on to our childhoods just a little longer. Deep inside, I think we knew that. We didn’t want to be grown-ups. Sometimes, I still don’t.

As much as I miss him when he’s away, I also savour the me-time I get alone at home. (I suspect that he feels the same way, the only difference being I don’t look forward to leaving my bed unmade, dirty socks and underwear on the floor and a week’s worth of dishes piled high in the sink. But that’s a story for another day.)

I think that I enjoy the solitude more than anything else. I woke up very early this morning at a quarter to six. Barring exam-fever days many years ago, that is a feat I have achieved only a few times in my life. In the glow of a rising sun, I completed today’s blog post while listening to my Buddhist Chants CD. I walked about the house watering all my (new) plants -I had to throw away the dying old- whispering calm, happy thoughts to them (in the hope that they will survive this time round). After I completed these tasks, I still had time left over to go around taking candid shots of my home (having just discovered Instagram). I may have struck a silly sight if you’d seen me: standing on sofas and hanging precariously over coffee tables. But I was truly living in the moment, with not a thought for anything else for the better part of an hour. I left for work feeling relaxed and happy.

I look forward to returning home to a neat and tidy house: dishes already washed and put away, bed made, toilet seats down, cushions in place and not a stray newspaper or magazine in sight. I will warm up my dinner and probably over-indulge in front of the TV. Oh, the TV. That’s right. I’ll have full and complete control over the remote, free to watch anything I choose without having to tolerate rolled eyes or hear my favourite programs and characters trivialized and insulted. Yes, Grey’s Anatomy and The Tudors will vie for my undivided attention tonight!

It’s only when I crawl into an empty bed at night that I’ll suddenly feel very alone. I know our cozy bed will suddenly seem too big for one and the silence I loved in the morning is going to seem very loud at the midnight hour.

Dirty laundry and unpacked luggage will surely abound but I’m glad he’s back home tomorrow!

Ever thought about the fact that a visit to the salon is fraught with many a pitfall? If I had a dollar for every grooming product I’ve ever been talked into buying in my life, I would be a rich woman indeed. (Well, I could treat myself to a fancy lunch at the very least!)

Owing to bad hair genes, I am not one to mess with my hair too much. It is reasonably straight and minds it’s own business for the most part, asking for no more than a wash every other day. A haircut every couple of months and a color or highlight not more than twice a year is the most I do for it.  Although my bathroom and dressing table have been invaded by bottles of all manner of gooey colored solutions and sprays (that belong to my husband), I’ve never been tempted to try out a single one. I think it’s a combination of ignorance (of the miracles they are capable of) and laziness (to put in any more effort than I absolutely have to. I take enough time dressing up and doing makeup without having to worry about my hair as well).

So it is really beyond me why I would fall for the hair stylists’ sales pitch every time. Over the years, they’ve managed to sell me shampoos, conditioners, anti-frizz serums, shine serums, volumizing mousses and hairsprays- none of which I have ever used more than once. These products are relegated to the back of dresser drawers and bathroom cabinets until I can throw them away (slightly) guilt-free a few years later.

It all starts with the hair stylist (often self-professed ‘creative stylist’- and I’m not sure if being creative with someone’s hair is necessarily a good thing-) examining your hair at length with a twist here and there, all the while hmmmm-ing with brow deeply furrowed. I sit quietly under swathes of sheet like a nervous student in a principal’s room. At some point we come to an agreement on exactly what we’re going to unleash on my unsuspecting mop of hair. (Actually, it’s really just me doing all the subservient agreeing and him the frenzied unleashing.)

He proceeds to chop and snip away for the next ten minutes and I delve deep into my trashy magazine. Until he decides to look up at me in the mirror and pronounce sadly, “Your hair is very, very dry. See (he thrusts a lock of hair in front of my face)!”

I was prepared for something like this. I say triumphantly, “But my hair is greasy, not dry!” (Ha! caught you out, didn’t I!)

“Aaaah…you have a greasy scalp, but the hair is dry. Very dry,” he reiterates and clucks morosely.

“Oh.” I’m not sure I have any defense for this.

“You must take better care of your hair. See how lifeless it is?” the stylist admonishes me. I look at my hair and indeed, it does look drab and dull.

“See that woman there? Look at how shiny and healthy her hair is!” he whispers. He’s right. That woman does have lovely red tresses I would die for.

My countenance suddenly takes a turn for the humble. ”What do I do?” I almost wail beseechingly to him.

“Don’t worry, we can fix it. I’ll give you a couple of excellent products you can use,” he says confidently. I breathe a sigh of relief and thank myself for having chosen this considerate stylist who has diagnosed my hair and is going to give me some stuff to take away with me. Money well-spent.

I thank him profusely, tell him I love my new cut and am going to send all my friends here! I’ll even recommend him on Facebook.

At the cash counter, his assistant hands me a bag full of lovely bottles in various pastel shades. I thank her and ask how much.

“Three hundred dollars, please.”

My eyes bulge and I start to sweat. “Three hundred dollars?” I gulp. “Can I see the bill please?”

I skim over the numbers that are now swaying in front of my eyes, and ask faintly, “You charge for the hair products?”

“Ha ha! Madam is too funny!” the assistant laughs fondly.

I don’t think to politely but firmly refuse to buy them. I feel obliged and am terrified of seeming tight-fisted at this fancy salon.

Madam pays the bill in full and walks out (visibly more hunched over than when she walked in) with the purchases that she will go bury in her closet, never to be looked at again for fear of reliving that nightmare.

Make any sense? Or do I just sound like Meredith Gray soliloquizing?

OK, I’ll just carry on in the faith that you’re still going along with me on this surmise. Decisions are never easy. Whether it means choosing the chocolate chip ice cream over the cranberry cheesecake one or moving to another country, they are all still choices to be made. I would have said that some choices are more important than others, but that would be wrong. Certainly, some decisions are more life-changing then others, but their importance is relative to the decision-maker. A connoisseur of food might actually worry more about a call between chives and parsley in his eggs than popping the question to his girlfriend. It’s just people and what makes them tick.

Most of the significant decisions that I’ve had to take over the years (and I don’t mean ice cream and the like) have all been the regular ones that everyone takes like a rite of passage. Which college to go to? What to major in? Look for a job or keep studying? This job or that? Should I get married to this person? Should I change careers? Do I leave or stay? As I said, the usual niggling questions that keep you up till the wee hours weighing it all.

As good ol’ Murphy’s Law would have it, these crucial decisions one has to make are usually borne on the wings of tight deadlines. If it can get any more complicated than it already is, it will. You think it’s just something people say in passing but I have really wished (and meant with all my being) that I could see into the future-just a year, even- to see if I did the right thing. Because the choices we make in life put us on an inexorable-and sometimes opportune- path of people and events that we look back on as our Life.

But when I think about real do-or-die choices that some people make every day in their lives- people like doctors, paramedics, firemen, aide volunteers and war journalists- I am humbled and brought low. Those are not decisions I would have the courage to make or live with. I sure wouldn’t want to have to decide to save a child over the mother, or offer to take food and water to starving people in war-ravaged territory. Go hungry to feed my family. These are real decisions taken by real people every day.

Suddenly my terrible decisions-to-make seem so much easier and lighter on the shoulders.

So I suspect with no little trepidation that I have miles to go before I sleep, and there will be a tough calls to make all along the way. Should I have two children or five while the going is good? Should I send them to boarding school? Should I buy a house? Should I take the lucrative job offer that will leave me with less time with the family? Should I take a sabbatical? Should I send my parents away to a retirement home? (I hope they’re not reading this.)

I hope and pray that these are indeed the only kind of tough decisions I will have to make in my lifetime.

Last weekend I was at the races for some frock-filled fun and festivities. If you had asked me who the main contenders were or how many races were being run, I would have stared back at you dubiously (but radiant smile still firmly in place). On second thought, strike that because for the first time ever I made sure I read a few pamphlets to ensure I wasn’t just a total ignoramus in a funny hat. However, I can safely say that I would have known more about current color trends and shoe styles than about horses with strange names. (Who calls their horse Beaten Up anyway? Didn’t they read The Secret?)

So why do I go to the races when I am clearly not a racing aficionado? Why, for the glamour of it all, dahling!

Yes, there is something quintessentially feminine about the opportunity such events afford to women. Whether it’s prom night or the Oscars, (most) women love to live out their Cinderella fantasies to the hilt. That would mean meticulously planning and buying the various components of their outfit weeks and even months (I’ve done a full year) in advance, dissecting said outfit to death with anyone willing to lend a ear, booking manicures and hair appointments, staging dress rehearsals and organizing logistics (this is where a pumpkin and magic wand would come in handy). The consummation of all this effort is a few hours of preening in painful shoes and a dozen photos on your camera (not necessarily any good). But would we do it again? Absolutely!

So back to my weekend. The venue was an absolute explosion of color and fashion: reds and yellows, color-block and print, feathers and flowers. Elaborate art pieces of hats milled about among more humble fascinators. I like to think of it as the translation of style according to every woman. Some determinedly better than others. Fashion doesn’t equal class, you see. So you also had visible panty lines competing with (worryingly) no panties at all. And someone obviously forgot to send out the memo about cleavages. A scattering of women’s outfits left very little to my imagination and I wonder what they did for the imagination of the men folk. There’s just no accounting for taste.

But for all that, there were some classy ladies around. Sophisticated dresses, elegant hats, just the right bit of accessorizing and perfect deportment. I always come back thinking I’m going to do better next time around. I suppose it’s good for one to have higher standards to aspire to. (Though I still think the fashion competitions are all rigged!)

Of course, on any occasion company is everything and I’m glad to say that I had stellar company that day. The kind that doesn’t drive you to the bottle (champagne though it may have been) to numb the pain of incessant chatter. The kind you can stuff your face silly with after hours of strutting on an empty stomach. And the kind to whom you can admit that you’re knackered and want to call it a day without feeling uncool or middle-aged.

I raise my glass.

It really is a miracle of the human physiology that the minute you get a whiff of a familiar smell, you can be instantly transported to some nostalgic moment of your life. It’s déjà vu of the olfactory kind. In a way, it’s also a God-given gift for us to relive the days of our youth and remember the glory days.

I’ve always kept a bottle of Givenchy Insense Ultramarine handy because every time I take a sniff, warm college memories come flooding in of a time when I was still dating my husband-to-be. He had just started his first real job and often used to wear that perfume. It is reminiscent of motorbike rides, movie theatres, stolen moments, and late-night calls. Gifts exchanged and dreams shared. It takes me back in time in a way that my big bag of old love letters will never do.

Other brands of perfume that I have used over the years remind me of specific events: a New Year’s Eve party when we played Pictionary, a loved one’s visit, our first holiday abroad. It sometimes feels like each of those memories has been carefully bottled up and stored away for me to summon at will on a wistful day.

And then the aroma of caramel and cashew flavors from my mother’s signature cake is a secret doorway into my childhood days: ones when a carefree five-year-old me would lie sprawled across the kitchen table with a finger popping in and out of the batter bowl. So much that I once put my finger in while the beater was still running and came close to losing a pinky. A nightmare for a young stay-at-home mother then, but the kind of story we fondly reminisce about over slices of the same cake a few decades later.

When we unpack our thirty-something year-old Christmas tree in my parents’ home, the musty smell of tinsel, bauble packaging and pine needles evoke the spirit of Christmases long ago. A magical time when there were gifts galore and Santa was as real as my father (and indeed he was my father, I learnt many years later). It used to be my happiest time of the year.

Bits of potpourri that I still keep from an old wedding gift bring back memories of the cozy home where we all – my parents, sister and I- last lived together before my wedding. I feel a strange pining for those days. Anne Frankish days that I had loathed with all my being then, but at which I now look back with fond remembrance and added maturity.

Neurologists say that these smell-triggered memories are often reshaped by our minds to be a rosier version of the real event. Some experiences are not necessarily pleasant at the time, but they are reconstructed in our minds to seem better than they were as they represent a period of our lives lost to us forever. We want to believe that they were good times.

I’m not sure about the science behind it all. But I am thankful for this strange quirk of nature because when I am old and wizened, I will still have my memories if nothing else. (Unless I have Alzheimer’s, in which case I will be a senile woman wondering why I’m walking around with a bottle of Givenchy Insense Ultramarine. I’m counting on you lot to remind me.)

I never realized the extent of influence a teacher can have on a child until recently, when I happened to look back on my own childhood and long-forgotten hurts suddenly seemed to surface. Thankfully, I wasn’t abused or anything like that, so I don’t have any real scars to speak of. But I can’t help but think of some of the teachers in my life that had no right to be there. If I were to meet them today, I would give them a mouthful for their callousness, their insensitivity and their shocking lack of sincerity for the noble profession they took up.

Surprisingly, it’s always the early years that come to you with such clarity. At about nine years of age, math became my stumbling block and I battled with it all through my school years. (It was only in high school that I finally ‘understood’ it and started actually enjoying it. Incidentally, in college I scored a full hundred in my final math paper- my crowning moment and probably the culmination of my life’s struggle with the subject.) But each of my early math teachers was progressively worse than the other. There was the fourth grade teacher who told my parents that I asked too many questions. She couldn’t understand why I couldn’t be like the others and just get it.  My sixth grade math teacher was evil personified. Her son was in the same class and we would watch as she blatantly favoured him over us all. She held a grudge (and showed it) against anyone who was better than her little snookums.  And then there was the monster of an eight grade teacher who gave us lines to write and sent us out if we didn’t do our homework or couldn’t recall our theorems and axioms. Never mind thinking to ask if we had got our inverse proportion basics right first. I suspect that if it hadn’t been for kindly friends, I would still be in eight grade today. Which begs the question: what exactly were my teachers for?

I think I’ve mentioned this before : the teacher who openly made fun of my ponytails in class. For some reason, she stands out in my mind the most because you really have to be pretty despicable to ridicule a child, especially a pre-adolescent one. She said very seriously (to a class of twenty-odd children) that I shouldn’t have my hair up that way because it made me look silly (or something to that effect). I was mortified (and took to hating my mother even more vehemently after that).

And the icing on the cake was when I was leaving my school and friends in the ninth grade. My friends had a little class party organized for me and I was thrilled to be getting one. Until our class teacher got to know about it and made them call it off for no specific reason. Of course, we knew. I had been in her good books at one time and had fallen out of favour towards the end. Still, it was a really mean thing to do and I often think about it.

The fact that I still remember these things goes to prove how much emotional baggage we unknowingly carry around with us. They may not be traumatic incidents but they are still poignant moments in a child’s life.

Teachers ought to be asked to take an educator’s version of the Hippocratic Oath before they are let loose on innocent and gullible children. But I expect that these days, educational institutions are more careful in their selection of teaching staff than they were in my day.

If I knew where some of those old teachers live today, I’d probably drive by and throw rotten eggs at their houses. Thank goodness I don’t. Not yet anyway.

It’s that time of year again. A time for new beginnings. When I must be thankful for all the blessings of the past year, when I get long-forgotten limbs waxed and facials done, and when I try to clear out all the emotional clutter in my head. Yes, I know it’s not New Year’s Eve yet. I was talking about my birthday, of course!

Funnily enough (or not), I feel strangely ambivalent towards the whole ‘event’. Some people like having big celebratory parties year on year and others pamper themselves silly. I would have counted myself one among the crowd in earlier years. But this year, I am determined to have a quiet and sober birthday. One glass of champagne, maybe a slice of cake and a quiet dinner with my husband. It has nothing to do with growing a year older. I swear. Or at least my conscious self has no great qualms about it. But I suspect that my subconscious mind may have a different take on it. That would explain my new-found stoicism about birthdays.

I’m not embarrassed to say it. Maybe I am getting old and boring. Could this indeed be the onset of the dreaded middle-age years? Frankly, I’m not too concerned. It’s past midnight now, and I can’t wait for my head to hit the pillow. The mind knows the body, after all.

Or maybe I don’t want to feel disappointed with my birthday and I’m just setting my expectations really low. (Trust me to explore every possible psychological angle.) I think there’s way too much pressure for us to have ‘fun’ on our birthdays and prove (mostly to ourselves) that we had a special day. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying the day should it so unfold in all its birthday splendor. However, one shouldn’t have to feel obliged to create the perfect birthday fantasy for oneself and feel disgruntled if it doesn’t happen. That’s all I’m saying.

I’m probably depressing the hell out of those cheerful, half-glass-full types out there. Sorry to rain on your parade.

Maybe I might get my mojo back next year. Or tomorrow when I get my presents. In which case, ignore my ramblings on this subject.