23/01/2016
"A week in Kerala! Bliss!" gushes the Project Lead while approving my leave. "Don’t forget to get us banana chips and cozy-code halwa!" Chirpy colleague cranes her neck from across the cubicle. "It’s Ko-zhi-kode! Not cozy-code! Say 'zha' and I will get you beef fry, not just chips!," I yell back. She tries and gives up, settling for chips.
A week away from the breakneck speed of the Maximum City. Leaving behind the madness, the pollution, the crowd, the traffic, and all the million end-of-season sales in the malls. Hope I get quality time at home with family. (Hope the TV conks off!) Hope the get-together with school friends go as planned. Hope I get to watch a Lalettan movie in the new multiplex. Hope I get to eat some meat. Hope it rains.
Hope the men don’t stare.
But they will.
I would pay to avoid that.
The infamous, undisciplined spectator of Malayalee land: the starenger. He is everywhere. His unswerving stare makes you squirm in your seat at a restaurant, in the bus, in the park, outside your home. He will judge you like the reality show judge and make an expression that says “Sangati pora.” If you meet his stare, he will grin and continue to stare. If you make an angry face, he will stop staring. No, I am kidding, he won’t. If you walk up to him, he will nonchalantly ask, "What happened SISTER?"
Ask a staring Malayalee why he is staring at a woman, his answer goes from the logical to the defensive to the sheer smarty-pants (smarty-mund, in this case). "Because I have eyes". Cannot beat his logic, can we? You can try "If you have eyes, I have sandals." Good luck. Another reply would be "I wasn’t looking at you. I was looking at the coconut tree/cat/movie poster next to you." And he safely retreats. Or "Chumma!" (no kiss this, but an innocuous "simply"), he shrugs. Whatever it is, the encounter only makes you end up feeling that ten minutes of your life were wasted, valuable moments you could have spent relishing a thattu dosa.
Some say men are men and men will stare. Maybe these are those malayalee men who have no idea of socially acceptable behaviors. Maybe they don’t understand staring is rude and is an invasion to privacy. Yeah, even in public, we are entitled to our privacy. Maybe they are aesthetes invoking their muses. Maybe their eyes are the latest in wearable tech: portable scanners, anyone? Maybe someone needs to put across the message simply: "Guys, it’s ok to stare for ten seconds if you are looking at a delicious dish of porotta and beef chilly, not at a woman."
As I jostle through the crowded streets of Mumbai, utterly unflustered about my safety, I wish for a Kerala where no one cares to stare, where everyone collects their pay cheques without asking how much you earn, where every childless couple is not offered free advice on fertility treatments, where I can feel free and happy. And get a true sense of belonging in God’s own country.
(Photos: Roger's Eye <(r)> via Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA noahg. via Foter.com / CC BY)