The concept of spaces governs part of what constitutes one’s identity in the contemporary world. The intangible zones that one passes through in the course of his or her daily pertaining to one’s private and public life make up a major part of what the modern society has so surreptitiously been divided into. It takes effort to realise that the spaces we encounter in modern society are gendered. In spite of the fact that the divides that women and men encounter everyday are so starkly visible and affect persons of all age groups. Even in an urban and supposedly more independent scenario, the divide only makes its presence more clearly felt.

This is embarrasing. Just as I was making waves with my exceptional storytelling skills, I had to be stung by the old bug. Blogging about blogging. But I will console myself by reminding myself that everyone does this once in a while. Also, my modest observations here are fuelled by a certain amount of frustration with the need to define my medium, my blog, my pajama. Also as a response to Vinu’s post. Even though it is not a straight answer, here goes…

Rohan Mishra decided he liked ice cream a lot. He thought he probably liked ice cream more than he liked mummy and felt ashamed of himself. So he put the ice cream away.

He had spent the last two days practicing his English and now knew three words. One was Banana. The other two were too hard to pronounce (but he knew them). He had been using his spare time to say Banana whenever he could. One could never practice enough.

It was a hot Saturday afternoon. The mummies were chatting and the daddies were watching cricket. 15-month-old Rohan Mishra (Golu) was lying on his back in the middle of a giant (by his standards) bed and was expressing his dissatisfaction with the general quality of life somewhat loudly. In time, his limited lung capacity wore out and he stopped for breath.

“This is most embarrasing,” he said to himself. “I can’t walk yet. As if that’s not enough, I get no respect. You would think they would pay some attention to my bawling, but no. Can things get worse?”

“I’ve noticed this thing about people who try and change the world. The world turns around and changes them right back.” — Batman in JLA Super Special, Gotham Comics, 2003

One little doubt I have about sting operations or anything else of their nature is the original inspiration. Was Operation Duryodhan the brainchild of people who were approached by those corrupt mortals we always manage to choose as our representatives in the Parliament? Or was it the engineers of sting operations who came up with the idea of paying them to ask questions in the House? Perhaps they thought bringing out the fallibility of human nature every now and then is a healthy thing to do?

The Mumbai bloggers meet up happened on Tuesday at last. These are all the bloggers who attended (lazy is my middle name). And here is a full report written by someone who was there too. Also this.

Will try and write something longer later.

And whoa! I am a Desi Critic!