Tag: family

December

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

There are some months that are not my favourites. October fills me with dread. But the month of December always makes me feel good. Since childhood, it played a very big part of my life. My best friend, Virginia, was Catholic, and I remember the Xmas tree in her house used to be really beautiful. White and full-leafed. It was placed by a window and I remember the morning sun making it glow. I remember asking my aunt, for a tree when I was around 4. I got it and the decorating of it was a family time. 

Over time, December became linked to new beginnings. A new year soon followed. The month itself brought a lot of hope and cheer – especially because i had so many references to it in the movies my family watched. I did my schooling in a convent school. So the theology presented itself easily to me, and I remember being wowed by the story of the kindness of St Theresa. She was the patron saint of my school. Lovely stories that included the quote, “what matters in life is not great deeds, but great love.” That surely left an impression on my mind. 

The school’s church was one of the best buildings I had seen as a child. A high vaulted ceiling. Walls on either side made from stained-glass. An altar that had one of the most beautiful images of Christ. I remember feeling at peace when I visited there. I thought, surely God lived in a place like this. As I grew into my atheism, I still held a place of reverence for that church. There are some places which indubitably speak of the nature of god – and what light should fill one’s being. That was one such place. 

December makes me think of those things. It makes me think of the bright lights of Hill Road, the entire month through. Stars, ornaments, garlands, gleaming at me from every stall and store. Christmas trees standing in regal splendour amidst scenes of the nativity. All of this being said, December has nothing to do with religion for me. It represents a time when things are soft and lambert. Where people generally tend to become light-hearted and festive.

I also particularly remember the winters of December, when the woollies would come out. It became the time for some warm cuddling with my favourite people. The sunsets also become spectacular in December, you know?

Slowly, family time of decorating the tree extended onto friends. As I grew up, the decorating of the tree became a tradition in the household. People would gather at my home to put up the tree, and everyone brought in some ornament or the other. Most of the ornaments now on the tree are brought by someone, and that becomes a story by itself. There are some ornaments that are decades old.

Every year, I make a visit to Hill Road. It’s the place of my childhood. Where I used to visit with my family, so many of whom have passed on. Their loss is bitterly felt and as I roam the streets of my childhood, I remember them. But those streets have changed. Skyscrapers have replaced one-storeyed bungalows and small buildings. The parks are teeming with people. They seem overpowered by the surrounding streets ballooning with luxury sedans and SUVs. But a trip to hill road over one of the Advents is just unmissable. 

I pick up ornaments each year. Pretty ones, bells, stars, fairies, santas, tassels, angel hair, crystal snowflakes and on and on. Everyone I have loved has come on a trip like this with me. That just is tradition, and it makes you a part of my clan. Christmas then isn’t just a festival for me. It’s an amalgamation of all those times I have spent with people I have loved. Who left me or passed on, but the memories linger and become crystallised as ornaments on all those trees I have had since I was a child. It’s not essentially about the birth of Christ, but everything He stands for, compassion, brotherhood, honesty, belief and love. He stood against racism, sexism, oppression and injustice. 

December isn’t just a month for me. It’s the settling down after a tumultuous year of life. Christmas isn’t just a day. It’s the link to cumulative memory and a catalyst to making another happy one. Many may not understand this, even those who love me a lot. But that is alright. I guess that’s what Christmas brings to me, a reminder that all that happened was both good and bad and neither lived on. Because there will always be another Christmas next year. 

Home Away From Home

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

When my buas were alive, I had homes outside of my own to go to. My bedroom just got painted over and the last time that happened, I had stayed in Munni Pua’s (my elder bua) house for a fortnight. She took care of me like the parent she was to everyone she knew – I shall admit that I was beloved by both my aunts. They replaced the need of a father figure, which I never had.

I would just have to tell them I need a place to stay and they would open up the doors to their homes and let me stay for however long I wanted to. If I needed a piece of furniture stored temporarily, Goodie Pua (my younger bua, who was really the man of the family as I grew up) would tell me, “send it over to mine, I have ample place to keep it.” And when I would visit her home, the same piece of furniture would be placed in her home as if it belonged there beautifully.

I miss them. Not only because I feel like a great part of my life was shaped by their presence, but because I miss their love and affection. I could joke with them, be chastised by them, love them and be loved by them. I had family! I had someone, in my extended family, I could count upon to help me at any given time. Right about now, I feel quite alone and secluded. That is the price of age and death, I suppose.

All mentors and guides have to fall away sometime, in order for one to find strength and solutions from one’s own self. But I am human, after all, and when I see my best friend having two homes, my lovers having two homes, it sometimes hits me that I now just have one, and my whole world resides in it. It is not a very great comfort and at times, of late, I miss having a larger family.

My greatest fear, let me tell you, is dying alone. With no familial support or person who cares sitting by my bed as I breathe my last. It’s not death that scares me then, it is just the thought of having no one saying they love me in my last moments. I was there as the older generation grew older and needed help in their final moments. I wonder who will be around when it is time for me to get help.

I have seen my family contract – with people falling away to death or distance. The people I loved the most have passed on and now I am left with a handful of people that I can truly count upon.

Life has shown me that I need to be aware of mortality and it is the greatest leveller in this world. I do not regret anything – I am merely sitting here, thinking, of the losses that I have garnered since the age of 19 and wondering upon the pros and cons of having a large extended family. Perhaps this is why the human race wants to procreate and see their offspring procreate some more. But that would seem to be a selfish reason to have children.

Of course, I am also a believer of bonds that are not linked by blood. It is not necessary that I have to be born into a family to call it mine. I can create my own family… and over the years, I tried to assimilate a tribe of my own. Mostly through the route of friendship, I have developed a kinship with many – but as I look back on the most recent experience of mine, no one really called me to their home and said, “stay here until your house gets painted.” That makes me think more and miss my aunts most.

I am not a believer in an after life, but I shall safely say, they have left an indelible impact on my life on this earth, and they are terribly missed, and remembered every day through the calls of my heart.

Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I knew I’d like the movie. Because I am an Alia fan. Because I love family dramas. Because I enjoy Karan Johar’s direction and vision. I loved Ae Dil Hai Mushkil. And I wasn’t surprised that I ended up loving this movie, too.

Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani has all the masala and the twists for a Bollywood movie. And it feels like a hit without a single macho punch being pulled anywhere on screen. It also hit close to home for very personal reasons. There are simply too many similarities right now between my life and various episodes in the film. I think that’s important for a good movie. And that’s why I loved it – because I connected with it.

The story is simple. An intelligent, self-made, independent, educated woman falls in love with a rich, loud, narcissistic, lovable, carefree man. Families realise the disparity and the lovers decide to test themselves in each other’s spaces for a few months.

Spoiler alert.

In the midst of it all, you throw in a septuagenarian romance that actually brings the couple together in the first place and then links them further. Then there is the antagonist: a matriarch who governs with an iron hand (already done in Ram Leela with far greater flair) but this doesn’t include physical but emotional and mental violence. There is a house governed by ambition and a quest for material prosperity. The other house is governed by emancipation and a quest for intellectual betterment and acceptance.

The movie doesn’t just tackle the romance and the odds of the hero and heroine. But interlinked within the families, each character struggles to find a voice or realises that the voice they were using could be biased at best and cruel at worst, as well.

The film has both Pride and Prejudice. It’s a subtle encapsulation of how people look down upon people, how we form prejudices based on past experiences and why it is important to realise our own trauma and make peace with due apologies. Every person in the movie is flawed. And growth happens with the realisation of these flaws and seeking to better one’s self through mature, self-affirming decisions.

The only abrupt change that seemed jarring was the write-off they gave Dhanlakshmi, Jaya’s character. But in a way, it was for the best, because it was in keeping with her character that the change wasn’t radical or real, but implied off-screen.

Dharmendra and Jaya Bachchan are brilliantly cast in characters just made for them. Shabana Azmi steals the screen when she is on it, as the woman who experienced true love for a few days that lasted a lifetime. She battled abuse and raises a son who is different from the typical idea of what a man should be and do, in India. This is brave (uncannily) and well-handled by Karan. The scene where Alia’s father is ridiculed speaks to every boy who grows up being different, in a patriarchal society. To exemplify this, Ranveer’s Rocky wears an outfit that’s vomit green as he laughs with the crowd. I noticed it, Karan.

The monologue Rocky gives addressing the ridicule Rani’s father faced, after a Kathak performance, is worth an honourable mention. It speaks of the need to understand not just what is considered woke in the modern day world but also the dangers of cancel culture that circles around it. For those who say that never happens to men who are into classical dance, you truly either live in a different world or choose to ignore the problems that are very much around in this world.

Rani’s character excels in her confrontation with Rocky’s father. It reminded me of the confrontation Reena Roy has with Lalita Pawar, in Sau Din Saas Ke. But there, there is the confrontation between two women. That happens with Jaya Bachchan and Alia, too. But what is actually different is Rani, a woman, standing in all her glory, dressed in Red at a Durga Puja and confronting a patriarch. The scene resonates because she stands there with no trace of fear. It is a juxtaposition to the scene where Rocky laughs at her father for being who he is. She stands with the frustration of all liberal mentality that reaches a crescendo at that point. It teeters on violence. The dangers of that happening is almost as bad as the despotic power that Dhanlakshmi holds over her entire family. Almost. But not quite.

The costumes were extensions of the characters. Rani was mostly dressed in the most beautiful sarees, since Sridevi’s performance in English Vinglish. Red being her colour and the implication of red being the colour of true love and passion, given it being the colour of the most sensitive character, of Rocky’s grandfather, essayed by Dharmendra. It is perhaps the colour that flares out when poetry is ousted by industry. Rocky thus wears a riot of colours, because he has it all in him and Ranveer can carry off all of them because he knows he can. He tends to wear black and white, when he is with his family. Do notice that.

I don’t know if I am the only one who felt so, but Alia looked a tad uncomfortable in the love scenes with Ranveer. If she is in love with the man, there can’t be a discomfort in the intimacy. In some shots, she just seems to be pulling away rather than pulling in. For the character of Rani to fall in love with the character of Rocky, there can be no chance of a lack of physical chemistry. And by the interval, the love has to have cemented enough to be there in their eyes. Ranveer has it, Alia loses out here. The character of Jaya Bachchan too for all her superiority complex just allows her husband and his lover to meet up? For a woman who walks out of a Durga Aarti, how does she sit by in discomfort when her husband obviously is being intimate with another woman? I found this a bit jarring.

There are a multitude of old song covers. Mostly from a favourite film of mine, Hum Dono. And the songs set to the OST of the movie are not particularly engaging but they work for the tempo of the movie. My favourite is actually not the title song but Ve Kamleya. (Must throw in an aside here: the movie begins with a dance number, which I quite liked, but it’s not the song that is worth a mention – I grinned when I saw all the nepo-babies make cameo appearances in the song. Tongue-in-cheek there, Mr Johar.)

All in all, I end with my personal opinion that Karan Johar has created a wonderful movie. He has applied himself once again to creating a family drama for the modern world and he has succeeded. Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani is exemplary for the fact that it speaks of breaking away from issues that do not truly matter and finds shaky ground in a world that is itself trying to find a place for each person’s uniqueness.