Sanatombi - A Princess Like No Other

I come from a small state called Manipur surrounded by lush green hills...all the more reason why whenever I see hills, reminds me of home. My mother tongue is Manipuri which I speak fluently although my writing and reading skills have considerably slowed as I have disengaged myself from writing and reading except going through headlines of local newspapers. Now that I stay a thousand miles away from home, I feel all the more reason to upgrade myself on all that information which I have ignored for so long.

In an attempt to explore my Manipur, I recently started digging up literatures related to Manipur and my best friend knowing my fixation, gifted me a book which I have wanted to read for so long “Bor Saheb Ongi Sanatombi” – the story of a Manipuri princess who fell in love with a British political agent in the British era written by renown author M. K. Binodini. 

Its the first time I have read a Manipuri novel. I have heard a lot about this book. Although I struggled to read at the very onset, I gradually gained pace as I got hold of the plots and characters. I could imagine the princely state of Manipur in all its glory as described by the author and its gradual descend as she lost her independence in the hands of the mighty English army. 

“Sanatombi” was a princess who chose to live life in her own terms, who had the courage to question every unfair rule imposed on her unlike other princesses who consented every word of the king; a princess who demanded equal rights like her brother and remained unconvinced that being a girl, she ought to live her life in a way dictated by the society. Perhaps her defiant nature made her special, worthy of a story that will stand the sands of times and cherished by generations to come. The story of a princess who believed that love is more about sacrifice and not merely just about getting married, a love which spontaneously redefined every form of relationship she had. A princess torn apart between her love for her country and her love for this man who had come to conquer her land, a man who was apparently her enemy but who had made her understand love like no one else had.

Even today, Manipuri society is an orthodox patriarchal society and till date a married woman have no right to fall in love again. Even if a woman lost her husband at a young age or if she got separated from her husband, she has to severe all ties with men that will fulfil her physical and emotional needs for fear of her character and modesty being questioned by the society.

Imagine the Manipur of those times, who made love impossible between a Brahmin and a non-Brahmin, a royalty and a commoner and yet even under these threatening conditions, love did happened and love bore the pangs of separation and embraced death silently. Sanatombi saw it all and marvelled these mystical forms of love that made her Maisna decide never to marry again after she realised that her beloved had died. Even after her first marriage, Sanatombi failed to feel such consuming and unfathomable love. Thus, when a married woman like Sanatombi fell in love with a “foreigner”...the speculations and inhibitions she felt was only intelligible. And it was a love she never felt before...a love that brought forth her best and worst times.

Since childhood, Sanatombi was a little rebel and stood against prejudiced rules.  May be this was the reason why her defiant self let her hair down and felt the winds in her hair as she rode her horse proudly alongside her beloved dressed in man’s attire unlike married woman of those times who are supposed to tie their hair in a bun let alone dress like a man. And sure, no one ever looked as beautiful and enticing as her. Such was the charm and solemnity of this princess!!

A few months after her beloved left her with a promise to return for her again, she fell sick and could never really fight back to be herself again. As her frail body lie on her death bed, her mind filled with a thousand memories, in a state of trance, she could constantly hear the faint sound of horse galloping away...sound of her beloved fading away, her life, every step leaving her behind.....just like her father became a blur memory, just like her brother galloped away. And thus, she rested in the protective arms and undying love of her “Sanakhyamashi”. 

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I have heard so much about this book and in an instant, I agreed to all that has ever been written about this book. I have always felt a sense of emptiness after reading a good book. Sanatombi and her love will forever haunt my mind.

Read it to know your roots and history.

Read it to understand love in a better way.

Read it to realise that it takes someone who stood odds to create a fascinating story. 

Crossroads once again

Well, today had been a rough day so I intend to write some not-so-nice things here in my space. People keep seeking advice on which institute to choose for PhD which made me realise why in the first place I joined PhD. Honestly, I had no idea what I was doing. I had a scholarship in hand – UGC JRF – I was proud and thought Chalo, at atleast I have a place where I can keep my feet. I was clueless what I would do after my Masters and sure, I was passionate about teaching and plus, I thought PhD will be less boring if my besties were with me….and sure it was. So, thus, I joined PhD.

You might think why all the fuss among these PhDians…the weirdness, the frustrating posts shared in social networking sites, the annoying remarks, the never ending complaints etc. But hear me out friends, its very frustrating indeed. Somewhere in the late twenties a confused mind enrolls in PhD. Lucky if he is an in-service candidate and lucky if she is married. But for someone like me who is neither of the two and who volunteered to be in these quicksand for atleast 3 years…life becomes slowly messy. Suddenly, I began living my life at the mercy of someone else. On lucky days, I might be praised for my work and on bad days I had to wait and wait and wait…there is always a meeting, some random staff from office will come along and I will have to disappear in the background or I will have to listen to the endless tales of family drama. There were times when I wanted to vanish into thin air or shout my heart out and say “Excuse me, I am still here”. But reality check, I have nothing more that I can do rather than nod my head foolishly and come back to my room only to lock myself up and put on music to the max and clear my mind.

Ah, interestingly, the pretigious UGC declares thousands of students every year to be qualified for JRF which means you get a scholarship of 16K for 1^st and 2^nd year and 18K for 3^rd year. I tell you, every kid who clears the exam shouts with joy, feels proud and keeps everyone updated in facebook. Soon, they realise that the scholarship is on a yearly basis and nobody gives a heck if you are getting it on time or not or hell, if you are even getting…Ok, fine if you give us on a yearly basis than so be it but we have to shed tears and sweat to get it. Every year my friends and I have to go to UGC office at Bahadur Shah zafar Marg (No auto wala knows the place) at Delhi and talk with that annoying and heartless lady and present our case only to chase us away. Then we come back to our University and request our college to kindly sanction our money. And believe me, there is always a problem…if not from our college, it is the Dean PGS or Comptroller office or UGC. It’s a shame how our system works. Especially how they never understand the plight of students. We stay so far away from home and trust me, I never want a dime of their sympathy but I want what is rightfully mine. For moving a file from one table to another in the same room, it takes atleast 3-4 day. What can you expect from an office with starts at 9.30, ends at 5pm with 2 tea-breaks of atleast 30 minutes and an hour lunch break and Gosh, how can they miss the regular dose of gossip and knowing who’s who of the office? Thus, our scholarship is stuck and I have a feeling that it will be stuck for more than a month or so…..the money is in the account of the University and the interest only is enough to financially assist two/three students. And here, we are running around every office asking the progress of paper work which seems to be moving at a snail’s pace. Arrrghhhh!!

And again, there are regular calls from not-so close people (I don’t even wanna say friends) announcing how lucky they are to have a boyfriend who is a doctor/assistant professor/whatever, how rich he is, on how much they are lucky with an anecdote in the end saying don’t worry dear you will also find someone. I just wanna slam my phone and shout shut up, enjoy your perfect sad little diplomatic life and just don’t make me feel bad about myself. But of course, I have to hear the end of it and make an excuse to hang up and for the next few hours nothings gonna make me feel better.

I know my life isnt perfect like many of them and on days like today I have to work harder to feel better but the truth is at the end of the day, I realise how different I am and somehow I feel good that I became the person I am…passionate, impatient, short-tempered, sentimental, someone who follows the heart blah blah….. I am lucky I have parents who always back me up when I feel down and who I can turn to whenever I want. I have people around me willing to walk extra miles for me, remind me what a wonderful person I am although I know at times they are just flattering.  I have to be strong that’s all it matters now coz when you hit rock bottom there’s nothing else you can go except upwards and I know that’s where I am headed!!

Hello Meh.....!!

Here I am writing again in my blog after exactly 2 months. I just hope my friends have not forgotten about my blog. Last couple of months had been busy with all the traveling, pressure mounting up high, my tolerance and patience sinking to the lowest possible level as I come to the end of my Ph.D. And, now, now….I have submitted my thesis and still clueless about whats next…though I have a few things in mind. It’s a shame that I always claim that I express best when I write…yet I spend so less time in writing. Blame my lazy bones for that. Now, that a part of my headache is over, I intend to write more…anything….there is so much to write about.

This is the last few days I am staying here and I kinda feel sad as I am all geared up to say “goodbye” to all the good and bad stuffs. They keep teasing me that I am gonna be a “Dr.” and sometimes I don’t like it coz I am not there yet….atleast not now. For now, I just wanna get back home, have all those heartfelt conversations with my Mom discussing my love life late at night, wake up with the sound of my Dad nagging me to get up, catch up with my siblings and grandparents, listen to the sound of crickets at night, enjoy the serenity of the nights and of course complain about all the things that is going wrong there. Its been 10 years I walked out of home and now its time for me to go back to the place I belong…I don’t know how long I will stay there and for now let me just not worry about it. I feel more humbled now than ever and I know there’s so much more to learn…so many people to meet…so many food to taste...so many places to visit. Its just the beginning and I still have miles to go before I sleep.

NEW YEAR at Hostel rocks!!

So I survived 2013 and welcomed the New Year with loud giggles, loud music, dancing like a duck and laughing away like crazy…it’s the best coz half of the girls in our hostel have gone home, at least we are hoping they are at home <wink><wink>. I didn’t count how many of the girls were there…..may be there were about 15 of us. We pretended as though we were unleashing the wild child inside each one of us by shouting out loud, yelling whenever our junior a wannabe DJ who has the best collection of all the dance hits changed songs, pretending to be drunk by passing around Sprite bottle, clinging disposable glasses and shouting “Cheers” (hahaha….can’t help laughing). Some innovative fella then started switching the tube light “ON” and “OFF” swiftly so that it will have the effect of disco light….and you wont believe, it sure looked like one until one of the girls shouted out “Tube light fuse ho jayega. STOP IT”. And then the disco light stopped and the music grew louder and the girls even wild. Somebody then reminded that it’s only a few seconds into the NEW YEAR, then we all ran out of the room to the corridor and lawn of our hostel, began the countdown and shouted “HAPPY NEW YEAR”, airkissed each other, hugged, jumped around while still shouting. Then, realized that the merciless cold night is far too harsh to endure and rushed to the party spot again.

And when we cut the New Year cake, one of the over-charged girls started smearing cakes (Oh, I hate that part) and everyone ran away from the spot. The victim who was in the closest proximity had cream all over her face and somebody announced “Bathroom mein pani nahi aa raha hai, lets NOT smear cakes”. So began the search for water to wash away the cream. The rest of us kept dancing and laughing at all the silliness and thus, we entered the NEW YEAR together.

Its been a decade since I lived in hostel and this is the last few months of my stay here…Perhaps this is the part I am gonna miss the most. I have had the most learning experience in the midst of girls who have come far away from home. I don’t know where I will be this time around next year and I don’t wanna worry about it now. But as I leave behind these magical days of my life, I know something even more extraordinary awaits me. Family, Love, Friendship, Loyalty, Laughter, Faith…I have it all. What can I ask more? Perhaps 2014 will be about my career and career only. I hope to make my life useful to the many people I will meet in the coming years (fingers crossed).

With a silent prayer of gratitude for blessing my life abundantly, I begin this NEW YEAR and hope that 2014 will be full of pleasant surprises and abundant opportunities to put the little knowledge and experience of my life to better use.

Wish you a HAPPY NEW YEAR. Have a smooth sail. Cheers!! :)

Pearls of wisdom I learned during my PhD

Just sharing with you guys some of the many lessons I learnt during my PhD....add more if you have any....

1.      Better call your guide before you go to meet him/her. Have an appointment, fix a time according to her convinience coz chances are that even if you did call her beforehand you might have to wait and you will be left guessing and asking everyone else where she is. Imagine you get up early, get dressed, planned everything and realized she’s on leave or she’s taking class the entire morning session, or that she has to attend meeting the whole day. You will feel shitty, right?

2.      Use a notebook for your entire research. It is easier for you to refer later. That way you save precious time and your poor brain isn’t left confused and guessing as to where you have jotted down some important lines.

3.      Do NOT get addicted to any kind of game or social networking sites. I am addicted to candy crush and I am paying the price.

4.      Do not forge the results. If the result is non-significant, so be it. Field works are meant to be done at field and not at the comfort of your room. Get out, apply sunscreen, keep your pepper spray ready and go out and rock the field. We really need cool, smart and inspiring youths in the field. I know of people who filled the questionnaire in the room, data analysis done by boyfriend, slides prepared by fiancé and research paper written by the guides and published in journals. Kinda makes me lose faith in published works.

5.      Keep your patience and temper in check.

6.      Do not be disheartened if you have burnt the midnight oil and you put forth all your work with so much expectations and it is being dismissed with the wave of a hand.

7.      Working with excel is fun, do your data analysis yourself, learn the right way of doing things and above all go for multitasking.

8.      Ignore the rivalry, the hypocriticism, cynicism. Don’t let negative energy influence you.

9.      The guide is ALWAYS right…you are lucky if you get someone who is flexible.

10.  Try to push your way through in the most polite manner.

11.  Respect is earned and not forced.

12.  Always carry a book or have a game installed in your phone so that you have something to indulge in while waiting….coz cumulatively counted i think the time you spent in waiting is a zillion times more that time spent discussing your research.

13.  If your parents, boyfriend/girlfriend or friends are visiting find a valid reason for you not showing up…..one of the many times where lying actually works if your guide cant understand your predicament.

14.  The better the conference, the better the food.

15.  Conference is not just about food or visiting new place and making a fool of yourself like many of us. It can be a good learning experience.

16.  Not submitting your PhD thesis just coz you have no idea what you gonna do after your PhD and surviving on your scholarship is a huge gamble.

17.  Nothing sails smoother during PhD than having a group of friends who are helpful, smart and equally clueless about the future as you are.

18. Guys are intimidated by girls who are pursuing PhD.... So even if I always claim that intelligent girls are enormously sexy, if you are pursuing PhD and still single..lets face it...not every random guy is gonna ask you out before thinking twice. He is a keeper if he stands by you even if you are spilling over your frustration to him or yelling at him for no fault of his. Marry him girl coz you're never gonna find someone like him again. Just like Marilyn Monroe says...if he can't handle you at your worst, he sure as hell don't deserve you at your best. ;)

27 wishes

And yet again I celebrated my birthday…and now I am 27 and still counting. Yeah, I am getting older or should I say “wiser” in the most diminutive way? May be I have reached a point in my life where I ought to lie my age (hahaha)!! 27 years of life with not so much an achievement that I can flaunt off…yet proud of the person I have grown to be. I have always considered birthday celebrations to be overrated but not anymore. Atleast not when I have friends who send me flowers every year on my “born” day and this time around I even had surprise deliveries that made my heart miss a beat, and loved ones walking extra miles just to make me feel precious. I know I may not be rich enough to go for a shopping spree without even having a glance at the price tag, but when it comes to love and friendship; I know I have enough that can last a lifetime. What more can I ask for? With friends who wake up at midnight by setting alarm and wishing me in their sleepy voices, dancing like ducks at the beat of “Pappu can’t dance, saala”, cutting the cake twice, ricksaw rides searching for a picnic spot and having reached the spot…gobbling everything that can be eaten, our “Thor” taking us out for movie Thor 2, gifting me the book I have always wanted to have….I have more than a hundred reasons to indeed feel precious and loved. And for my friend, who left us for his heavenly abode, I truly missed you and I wish peace be with you wherever you are.

They told me to make a wish and I did…and may be it is these blessings that I had wished for. I don’t know where I will be in my next birthday but as long as I have these wonderful people in my life “loneliness” will hardly be a part of me. So before I hit the 30 mark, I wish to seize the opportunity to exhibit all the confidence and skill that I have, do my bit for my people and the society and keep doing some more, have that library which I so long have wanted, make my love life less complicated (sigh), laugh some more, forgive and forget, check my patience and temper which seems even more augmented with age….and the list goes on.

I say "thank you" with the best smile you gave me. What am I without you??  :) 

My third gender friends!! :)

I recently read a newspaper article about a transgender who opened a boutique at Madurai. She stated that she wanted to lead a noble life by running her own textile store. She had MBA degree yet she has been denied job opportunities owing to her gender. She was the first of her kind to set off for such a venture. I think such inspiring news should be made headlines everyday instead of publishing news of celebrities and their overrated lifestyles.

In our country, the mere sight of transgender sets off disgusting sighs and having a faceoff with them is the last thing one can hope for. I remember an incident vividly that make me smile whenever it crosses my mind. Once I was travelling from Delhi to Ludhiana alone. As usual, I was deeply engrossed in a book hardly aware that the train was half empty. Suddenly I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder and a husky voice dressed in sari greeted me lent out her hand and asked me to give some money. I immediately recognized the predicament. I was startled, looked blankly at her and impulsively said “Bheiya…no no Didi…no….Bheiya!!” I just didn’t know what to address her. She smiled. I just hoped that she must have wanted me to call her “Didi”. So I said “Didi, I don’t have change.” She just smiled and left. I just heaved a sigh of relief coz she was gentle and left without making a scene. Of course I empathise with them but earning a means of livelihood by asking money from others just coz they are transgender is really inconsiderable.

Well, back at home I am sure the taboos still exist but homosexuals have really carved a niche for themselves. From dance groups to beauty salons, make up artists to fashionistas, homosexuals in Manipur are synonymous to beauty experts and the likes of it. Even if I have seen men frown at the mere mention of “homos” I feel that we owe them the respect that they deserve as they try to fit in this world inspite of all the discrimination and abuse they face. Every time I visit home, I get my hair done by them. They are the best in terms of style and price. At such times I always encourage them to come to the metros and start their enterprise. May be they are still scared to leave the comforts of their home, or may be its just that they are still abused in their own soil that daring to venture in unknown territories is still too risky….whatever it is, I am sure they have something to teach the rest of their counterparts in the rest of the country…to live a life in the most noble way inspite of all the loathing and hatred they endure. For once, we need not question sexuality rather humanity should be perked up.