Shaadi & The City: Sari So Sloppy

I'm not entirely positive how I've spent 24 years without mastering the art of wearing a sari. With a grandmother who ran a fabric-printing factory, a mother who could probably fold a wicked set of chiffon pleats blindfolded, and a father who's always asserted the fact that Indian women look the classiest when wearing one, I can only think of one reason why I've shirked the six yards of cloth: pure, unadulterated fear.

Thanks to my awkward set of motor skills--something that can be confirmed by my kindergarten report card--I had visions of getting lost inside the intricate folds of the thing, being pricked to death by the numerous safety pins I would foolishly use to fasten it, only to look like a frat boy in a toga three times his size. In short, I'm a lost cause.

On a recent family trip to Mumbai, my mother seemed to think otherwise. Unbenownst to me, I was signed up for a series of sari draping workshops (an effort to raise my newly-wed cred, perhaps?) and cheerily told that I would be starting ASAP. In the past, I'd managed to talk myself out of other "fun" classes I was almost hijacked into taking including but not limited to vegetable carving and napkin folding. I wish I was kidding, believe me I do. But this time, I was out of excuses. You'd be surprised to know what 98 degree weather does to your strategic reasoning. I also reluctantly realized this skill seemed far more relevant and applicable than, say, the ones needed to transform the head of a pineapple into a delicate swan. After all, on the few occasions that I had managed to pull off a sari, courtesy of friends who patiently put me in one, I quite liked the floaty and ultra-feminine feel of it. And as my pragmatic little sister pointed out, I didn't want to end up scrounging around for help every time I decided to wear one.

Which is how I found myself in the home of Mrs. Sushila Bhatia, a few days into my Indian holiday. Sushila Aunty, a petite sixty-something with a tight smile and pair of egg-shaped glasses that gave her a sort of owlish vibe, was optimistic. "Beta, we'll have you draping this thing in your sleep," she proclaimed, in a murky combination of English and Gujarati. And so began my set of five classes in the sweltering heat of her Breach Candy apartment. My classroom was an empty bedroom, bordered by foggy, full length mirrors, containing nothing but a tiny tape recorder that blared the Gayatri Mantra on repeat.

Mornings with Sushila Aunty began with her verbally outlining a series of instructions involved in draping various different sari styles after which she would peer at me expectantly. In return, I would offer a clumsier, choppier rendition of the steps. Most classes ended with the sari, defiantly tumbling down into a massive heap around my ankles and me finding inconspicuous ways to cover up my exposed gut.

The whole thing reminded me of a cross between the military and finishing school. Occasionally, with her hands planted on the hips of her pastel nightgown (ironically enough, I never saw Sushila Aunty in a sari), she would throw in a tip or two about the most optimal place to fasten a safety pin and how to bend down "gracefully." If my pallu happened to be especially neatly placed, I'd be treated to morsels of gossip from the Mumbai wedding scene--on the side, Sushila Aunty is also a bridal consultant.

Soon enough, she accepted the fact that I was not going to be one of her star studded pupils, experts in swathing themselves virtually anywhere--moving vehicles, rooms without electricity, minuscule airplane bathrooms, etc. I was merely a perseverant individual who was determined to keep the style statement from going extinct [For a slightly chauvinistic but well-written take on this, see here) My pleats will always be a little off center and my safety pin wobblier than the rest, but I'm relieved to announce that my fear of the sari is now a thing of the past.

Don't even think about napkin folding though.

Shaadi and The City: Get Married Away

Last week, somewhere between discussing the diameters of dandiya sticks and and determining whether sandwich dhoklas qualify as "garba friendly" appetizers, I confirmed that wedding planning was officially taking over my life. With the first semester of grad school done with and d-day looming, exactly three months away, I am dealing with the fact that the bulk of my summer months won't be spent frolicking around The City, lounging in Central Park and taking a seminar on the Politics of Power at my university. And honestly, I'm okay with that. In fact, just for yucks, I'm letting some of that notoriously liberal New School philosophy permeate my life a little, and trying to look at the build-up to my wedding from the point of view of an--yes, really--ethnographer.

Formally, ethnography is defined as "the fundamental research method of cultural anthropolgy". Yawn. To dissect that a little, it's an anthropological approach that emphasizes the importance of being a part of the community you study, so rather than merely "observing", one (i.e. me) is actually immersed in the daily on-goings of the group.

So excuse me if the next few entries seem series-like, but to paraphrase the adage, you're supposed to write what you know, and what I know right now is the big, fat, syrupy world of Indian weddings: mandaps, malai koftas and mehndi. Whether I choose to look at it as a million-dollar industry, an age-old tradition or something in between, come August 16, I'll be participating in my (gulp) very own one. If you're reading this, consider yourself invited ;)

The Airport Chronicles (II) : Stand By Me

Now, now, before you go thinking this is going to be some slushy tribute to the vocal calisthenics of Ben E. King, let me clarify by saying that this story, like most of the adventures I am involved in, begins in an airport.

Technically I suppose it begins on a rooftop in Brooklyn the previous night, where a group of starry-eyed international affairs majors engaged in a jubilant end-of-the-semester soiree complete with tealights, an impromptu trumpet solo and vino.

Knowing full well that I had an early morning flight to Detroit the next day, in honor of my little sister's college graduation, I kept the Rioja consumption to a minimum--no easy feat, especially when there's a book-swap-dance-a-thon involved--but succeeded, or so I thought as I huffed up my fourth floor walk-up at 2 am.

With my bag packed, alarm set and graduation card sealed (yea, Neesh!) I collapsed into bed, only to wake up five minutes before take-off. A myriad of emphatic four letter words swam through my murky brain and I was confronted with the image of my father, dejectedly shaking his head--after years of carefully constructed pre-travel checklists and religiously getting to the airport at least 80 minutes prior to departure is this what I had to show for myself? As I hauled ass to La Guardia, well aware of the fact that NW flight 542 was now en route--as a matter of fact, according to my calculations, somebody was probably getting snapped at for failing to put their damn tray table up--I tried to take comfort in the fact that for someone who had been flying since she was 40 days old, I had a decent track record : this was the first flight I had ever missed.

So what's protocol, I thought to myself, as I marched over to the Northwest counter, determined to get to Detroit on the next flight available. "Sorry," said Gregg, the agent whom I would get to know super well throughout the course of the day. "It's graduation weekend honey, everyone's going to Detroit. You're on stand by."

I parked myself at Gate #9, eliciting a combination of sympathetic smiles and suspicious glances from gate agents, passengers and airport janitors. "Well, well, well. If it isn't 'Terminal: The Sequel," they must have thought to themselves. I drank overpriced coffee. I made whiny phone calls. I began to wish they would get rid of the "no deodorant on board" rule. I struck up conversation with strangers and tried bartering my dog-eared copy of People magazine for their confirmed seats. No dice.

And then, at approximately 6 pm, exactly 9 hours after my scheduled departure time, (at this point Gregg had offered me a job at the terminal), I was graced with the magic words. "Havier, A-yar-ty?" crackled the gate agent. There's nothing like hearing your--severely butchered--name over the microphone , especially after you've spent an entire day watching really bad CNN, crumpled up on a plastic bench that has stripped your butt of all feeling. As I leapt towards the boarding door, I passed by an applauding Gregg. "You're out of here, finally!" he exclaimed. And that I was.

The Architecture of Resilience

I recently plowed through Naomi Klein's "Shock Doctrine" for yet another class assignment (yay, grad school. I have no social life but hey, whatever, the Barnes & Nobles people love me).

Klein's portrayals of societies, entangled in the aftermath of disaster, transported me to my own experience with a large-scale catastrophe. The year was 1995 and I was in the fifth grade, my thoughts teetering between an impending math project and my project partner whom I had a not-so-camouflaged crush on, as I made my bed that January evening. Hours later, my family and I were jolted awake by a guttural roar from the ground beneath us, and a series of shakes that has to this day, left me terrified of even the slightest bit of turbulence when I am aboard an airplane. We had just been acquainted with an earthquake that measured 7.2 on the Richter scale, a tectonic beast that would claim the lives of approximately 6,400. In 20 seconds, The Great Hanshin Earthquake, as it would soon be referred to by journalists, eager to get knee-deep in the world's disaster du jour, had destroyed my hometown of Kobe, Japan.

Though the week that followed remains hazy, each day blurred by the next, what I remember about the airy parking lot where we sought refuge (along with dozens of other families, sleeping in their cars for at least 5 days) was an unflinching sense of resilience. It came in the form of the orderly lines for food and water, with virtually no one cutting in. It was also apparent in the steely determination exhibited by the adults as they made brief but strategic trips to our disheveled homes, combing the debris for essentials, fully aware that violent aftershocks were only minutes away.

Much like the individuals whom Klein portrays as the vehicles of "movements that do not seek to start from scratch but rather from scrap, from the rubble that is all around," (Klein 466), the inhabitants of my city seemed to be experts in the architecture of resilience. The Japanese psyche has often been singled out for its ability to reflect something called a typhoon mentality, "a fatalistic acceptance of nature's awesome might and a great capacity to dig themselves out after such catastrophes" (Murase 142), largely attributed to the nation's physical susceptibility to geological disasters.

Approximately 2 months after the quake, however, the city government proposed a rebuilding method, valiantly titled, "The Phoenix Plan." It was an effort to "wipe the parcel clean" (Oakes 4), something that would certainly—according to Klein, at least—be cause for alarm. The government's wish list included a Super Convention Center and plenty of high-rises with well-stocked shopping plazas in their basements (Oakes 4). To quote the governor of Hyogo Prefecture, the state-level government for which Kobe is the capital, Phoenix was not only designed to "restore the region to its pre-quake condition but also to solve underlying problems faced by Japan, such as an increasingly aging population, the need for an open economy, and the concentration of problems associated with increased urbanization around the world" (Oakes 4). Such rhetoric is heavily contaminated with disaster capitalism and eerily reminiscent to that of the Sri Lankan government's, post-tsunami, as it attempted to "fulfill its destiny as a playground for the plutonomy set" (Klein 393).

Today, over a decade after the quake, the larger Kobe area is home to its own version of the American theme park, Universal Studios. Malls, gargantuan for Japanese standards, are sprouting up in the outskirts. On the flip side, there are more inspiring stories, found in spots including the Nada ward of the city, where 220 houses were charred as a result of quake-related fires. Nada's residents held a series of land readjustment meetings, through which they agreed to "give up a certain percentage of their own land to create wider roads," (Okazaki 1) a prime example of civil society in action. Whether such goals were specifically outlined in the phoenix's agenda remains unclear. For the moment, the relationship between Kobe's municipal government, driven by opportunistic impulses and its residents, discovering a growing sense of community, is as unpredictable as the fault lines that rest under the city.

Apple Bottom Jeans & Goats With The Furrrr: Cashmere Confidential

A recent assignment in my "Global Flows" class at The New School forced me to trace the production cycle of one of my favorite articles of clothing: a feathery, salmon-toned cashmere, the perfect pick-me-up on a blustery winter morning. It was a Uniqlo* purchase, or steal, as I like to think of it, for a measly 3,900 yen. For something that claims to be 100 percent cashmere, I'd say its a pretty sweet deal.

Or is it?

As I was catapulted from Uniqlo's rows of Pantone colored turtlenecks to the deteriorating grasslands of China, I came across some pretty frightening stuff. While the company takes full advantage of China's cashmere-producing goat herds, it's actually tainting the skies over--gasp--North America. If you don't believe me, you should at least believe Evan Osnos of the Chicago Tribune on his freaky expose of "the connection between cheap sweaters, Asia's prairies and America's air [capturing how] ordinary shifts in the global economy are triggering extraordinary change."

I'll give you a slightly truncated version of Osnos' alarming discovery. As Uniqlo touts its cheap cashmere, these unfortunate goats are forced to graze away at the already dwindling grasslands, contributing to some of the worst and most far-reaching dust storms China--and the world--have ever seen.

In the mean time, Uniqlo continues to produce syrupy promotional placards such as this one, which sat next to a stack of sweaters at its Menlo Park branch in NJ.

"Uniqlo's cashmere is the crown jewel of fabrics everywhere. To make you happy three Mongolian goats have given up their wool to make your sweater. It is soft, warm and also lightweight. It is the only cashmere that is not expensive like other cashmeres. This will bring good feelings to everyone."

Talk about pulling the (unjustly produced) wool over your eyes...

*Uniqlo=Japan's neatly folded answer to The Gap

The Airport Chronicles (I): My Suitcase Went To Belize And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt...

After a recent suitcase no-show at Houston's Bush International Airport (mind you I was there for a shaadi and instead of showing off my three meticulously chosen outfits, I flounced around in a friend's--Satvi, bless your soul--sari for the majority of the occasions), I consulted the foolishly christened baggage "help" desk. After enduring a week-long gauntlet of comatose agents, "please hold, ma'am's" and spelling and re-spelling my last name, we finally discovered that my bag had been mistagged and sent off to Belize. It enjoyed 5 days at a local warehouse before making its way back to La Guardia. Judging from the broken zipper, I think it had a fabulous time.

What frustrates me the most about this past week is not so much that my bag got mislabeled but that practically everyone I spoke to at Continental Airlines seemed to exhibit the I.Q. and compassion of a banana slug. One especially bright agent constantly confused Belize with Brazil, while another refused to acknowledge the fact that my bag had arrived in La Guardia until she decided to scroll down on her computer and followed up with a sheepish, "oops, I was just kidding." Not once was I apologized to for a mistake that was entirely the airlines' fault, and on multiple occasions I was bluntly informed that my bag would never return. FYI, the actual chances of a suitcase being permanently lost in airport oblivion is actually .005%.

I'll spare you from any diatribe-ish words on how I'll never fly Continental Airlines again (Though I really wouldn't. Ever. Again.) but the moral of the story? CHECK YOUR BAG TAGS, PEOPLE! 'Cause in the big bad delay and incompetence-driven world of airlines, no one can be trusted.

Maid in Japan

So I originally drafted this a few months ago for Kansai Scene, an Osaka-based travel and culture mag, and it's finally made its way to print. It's a one-pager on "Maid Cafes" in Japan, aka, seedy establishments where the questionably young waitresses prance around in French maid outfits that are about three sizes too small for them. Creeped out or intrigued? Give the piece a read, either way.