Tales from a Marriage

Priorities or Lack Thereof

One night last week, Nike and I had a long discussion about finances. Rather, I launched into a long monologue about finances while Nike pretended to listen. We expect some big changes in our life in the second half of the year - a possible shift of jobs and cities – and I am worried that we will be in a tight spot financially for the next one year after that. Which led to the monologue where I spoke about how I was worried about finances and how we need to manage finances better; at the end of it all Nike said I worry unnecessarily and promptly went off to sleep!

The next day, he noticed a single strand of grey hair. And fell headlong into depression. I told him a single strand did not a whole head of hair make. I told him that he would look very sexy with grey hair - an Indian George Clooney, if you will (I don't actually think he will look anything like that but you're allowed to lie in extenuating circumstances). That day, he poured half a bottle of oil on his hair and then made his mother put some sort of hair pack on his head. When I came back home from work that evening, he had a long talk with me about how worried he was about his grey hair, and what steps he would take to prevent more grey hairs! 

If ever there was a case of messed up priorities, it is this!

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Of Course, it’s a Competition!

Last week, Nike made banana walnut muffins. I was not happy about this at all. I made a banana cake just a few weeks ago and was still basking in the glory of all the praise I received for that. Now Nike was making banana walnut muffins. And since he is a much better cook, I was sure his muffins would taste better than my cake. I couldn’t let this happen. So I bombarded him with recipes for vanilla muffins, apple cinnamon muffins, red velvet cupcakes and anything else that did not have banana in it. But he was adamant that it would be banana walnut muffins only and rejected all the other recipes I sent him.

I then tried to sabotage the muffins by hovering around him while he was baking and giving him all sorts of incorrect advice. However, he banished me from the kitchen so I went and sulked instead. He called me to come and taste once the muffins were done, and I was forced to admit that they tasted better than my cake. Even though the walnuts were burnt. But, but, but, but, but…..my banana cake looked WAY better than his muffins. So we’re even now, no?

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Great Expectations

My birthday is this Sunday. I am so excited and hyper about it that one would be forgiven for thinking I’m going to be eight, instead of twenty-eight (As an aside, I am rather anal about spelling out numbers, instead of simply writing them down in number format. They look so much more beautiful when spelt out fully. Twenty-eight. 28. You tell me, which looks better? End of aside.) And so for my birthday, I thought long and hard and discussed with friends and colleagues and finally decided I would ask Nike for a diamond pendant for my birthday gift.

Instead, Nike gave me vouchers worth Rs.7000 at Landmark. This is much worse than it sounds because (a) These were vouchers left over from the gift he bought me for our anniversary, not vouchers he specifically purchased for my birthday (b)We (though Nike says I) managed to lose half the vouchers so in reality, I have vouchers worth only Rs.3500 (c) Despite my insistence on going and shopping alone for books, Nike accompanied me and then ruined the entire experience by being in a bad mood, snapping at me, and hurrying me through the shopping so that I ended up buying books that I am not sure I want.

Consequently, I feel cheated and gift-less. I am telling Nike that he needs to buy me another gift. Something that I can show off on Facebook, on my blog, and to my family and friends is thoughtful and considerate.

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And so the countdown starts to Sunday. Happy weekend, you guys!

Of Nike

Dee and SAB have done this fun tag where they listed seven weird things about their partners. And even as I was reading their posts, I was making a list of all the weird things Nike does.

So without much further ado, here is the list:

1.   Nike is obsessed about his hair, or specifically, about losing his hair. He used to oil it EVERY SINGLE DAY, much to my irritation. After much whining on my part, he now oils his hair every other day only (and says he will blame me if he loses his hair!). And he uses an expensive, special oil meant for hair growth. Now all this will make sense if the man had thinning/balding hair but he is blessed with a head full of thick hair so I just don’t understand his paranoia. He’s even calculated how much it will cost for him to undergo hair-weaving treatment if the need arises, and says he felt relieved when he found out it was well within his means – and he was NOT joking!

2.   His attitude to money is very weird. When he has money, he will blow it up like its Christmas every day. If he likes something, he will buy it without even looking at the price tag. And when he doesn’t have money, he will happily sit at home and not spend a penny the whole month! He has lakhs owing to him from a previous employer – after a few months of trying to get the money from him, he’s simply shrugged and given up. Sometimes, I think about it and feel bad for him, but it really doesn’t bother him at all. He recently lost 15000 bucks and it didn’t pinch him much. ‘It’s just money’’ is the thought that defines his attitude to it.

3.    He’s bloody good at everything he takes up! When he takes up something, he shows incredible commitment towards it and works very, very hard at it. When he started DJing at IIMB, he ended up getting professional offers! Six years after IIMB, people mail him to tell him they were at a party, and that they wished he was there to play music. He started cooking when he was in Singapore and within a few months he got so good that when friends hosted parties, they’d call him up and ask if he could bring along his special biryani or his kebabs to the party.

His latest love is photography. He’s been into it only for a year and a half now, but he’s been featured in the Flickr Hall of Fame, has been shortlisted for a National Geographic contest, and even been paid hundreds of dollars by Getty Images for his photos. He has thousands of people visiting his Flickr and FB pages and each photo of his gets hundreds of comments. Gah!

4.   He LOVES shoes. He’s like a male Carrie or something. He can’t resist buying shoes every few months. If we happen to be in a mall or a market, he will inevitably go and check out some shoes. He recently bought a pair of shoes and he loved them so much he wanted to buy another pair of the same, only in a different colour this time!

5.     He swears by the wisdom of ‘prevention is better than cure’. If he so much as coughs or sneezes, he will completely give up on cold water, take a medicine and stay indoors. If he runs a slight fever for one day, that is enough for him to start on antibiotics. That said and done, he handles illness very calmly – doesn’t curl up in bed and moan for mother like someone else in this house (ahem) does.

6.    He looks good in just about everything. When we first started shopping together, I’d be alarmed at some of the stuff he’d pick out because it looked too weird or funky. And he’d try it on, and he would totally pull it off. If you think this is a biased wife speaking, then ask Samee. The first time she came shopping with us, she was gob smacked at how Nike looked good in everything he tried on. After seeing this for a few years now, she’s told him she’d like him to be her model if she ever gets a designer line out for men.

P.S: If you think it’s a good thing, it’s not! For my self-esteem, that is. I forbid Nike from trying on anything when I go on a mission to buy jeans. The experience is traumatic by itself without the man effortlessly fitting into every single pair in the showroom. Hmph!

7.   With the exception of biryani, he cares very little for food. He never craves for a particular type of food, like other normal human beings do at times. If you were to tell him that he will be denied a particular food for the rest of his life, he wouldn’t be too bothered by it. All this with the exception of biryani of course.

I can write much more about Nike and his eccentricities but I think I have done enough damage for one day. ;-)

Two Years and Counting

Today we complete two years of being married. And it's been a great ride so far*. 

We had a small, pleasant dinner with family today. In a few hours, we are off to Kerala for a holiday. We intend to relax by the lake side, where I will read and my husband** will take pictures. We will spend a day in a houseboat which will be all to ourselves***. And we will explore Kochi. I am really looking forward to this, and I need to go now and pack so that I am not short of books, clothes or sunscreen (in that order!).

For our anniversary, Nike gifted me the entire Tintin collection. *big grin*. I ordered a whole bunch of things for him but they are all coming from abroad and the shipment has been delayed so I can't talk about it till they are here. :-(

Since his gifts have been delayed, I decided to order a very special cake for now. I happened to hear about this lady who makes gorgeous novelty cakes and got in touch with her; we discussed themes in great detail, she sent some designs and finally this is what she made for us:

Isn't it the the most fabulous cake ever? I'm totally, utterly, completely wowed by it. 

* On the days when we fight , I console myself by saying that atleast we haven't yet killed each other. Though my family and friends predict that it will be Nike who will eventually kill himself for having to deal with me! With friends like this.....

** It took me two whole years to start referring to him as 'my husband'. For the longest time, I couldn't bring myself to say the word. So much so that I would tell random people that he was my boyfriend or my friend, simply because I couldn't say the word out loud. I've finally learnt to say it, and I'm now enjoying how it sounds.

*** Well, except the boatmen and the cook of course, and I wouldn't want to get on to any houseboat without them!

Birthday Blues

Friday, 10^th June 2011 was a momentous day – Nike turned 30! And the day was an unmitigated disaster. Of course, being the 30^th birthday, the day was at a disadvantage to start with. Now I believe there are two ways of celebrating milestone birthdays – one is to go wild and crazy and make it a birthday to remember; the second way is the other extreme, where you lie low, hope no one notices its your birthday, wait for the day to get over and for life to return to normal.

Nike started out deciding that he would enter the 30’s with a big bang. In an ideal world, he would have wanted to ring in the 30’s at Vegas with his friends. But its not an ideal world, so he settled for a road trip across Lebanon with his friends instead. Of course, as I am only human, I was jealous, and tried to encourage them to do said road trip across Germany or some such less exotic destination, but my ploys were in vain. But then all the upheavals in the Middle East began, warnings were issued, and the Lebanon road trip was cancelled (Let it be said on record that I did NOT rejoice; I felt really bad for Nike, and even felt as guilty as hell).

Then Nike made plans to go visit the UK with a cousin, spend some time with his brother-in-law there, and drive around the countryside. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out either. Undeterred, Nike decided on a road trip to Ladakh with his friends. By this time, I was skeptical of any of these plans working out, so I didn’t die of envy at the thought of Nike going off on a bike to Ladakh while I slaved away at office in the Hyderabad summer.

Ladakh is the sorriest story of all. Nike put in a lot of effort into coordinating among different groups of friends, and a group of friends finalized the Ladakh trip for June. Then, one of Nike’s best friends, A, said he couldn’t make it in June, so could they go in May instead. I warned that May was a dicey time to do a road trip to Ladkah on account of the road conditions, but they decided to go ahead in May anyway. Leaves were taken, tickets and accommodation were booked. After Nike reached Delhi (and was to set out to Kalka early the next morning), he found out that the road to Ladakh was blocked due to an avalanche.

His friends decided to go to Dharamsala instead, but Nike headed back home, deciding to save those leaves and use them in June to go to Ladakh. Unfortunately, due to various circumstances, none of Nike’s friends could do the Ladakh trip in June. The poor guy was so keen on it that at one point, he was considering doing the road trip solo, but thankfully decided against it!

By this time, I was being eaten away with guilt – I was envious of his trips and that’s why he couldn’t go, so its somehow all indirectly my fault, get it?. So I suggested making it a weekend getaway – but for Nike, it was Ladakh or nothing at all (and I couldn’t take so many days of two months into joining a new job). I even suggested a day at a resort in the city outskirts, but both of us aren’t really into that sort of a thing, and of course he wasn’t enthusiastic about it. And so it was that the birthday was going to be in Hyderabad.

The next tricky part was the gift. He wanted a camera bag! I couldn’t think of a more boring and forgettable gift. So I suggested I would enroll him for a two day paragliding course instead – he wasn’t enthusiastic about it. I then suggested buying him a guitar and enrolling him for guitar classes - he wasn’t enthusiastic about it either.

Two days to go for the birthday and no gift yet – I was beginning to despair. I then hit upon the idea of making a scrapbook. I spent the day reading up how to make a scrapbook, and then left work early that day, and headed out to buy scrapbook supplies. I spent the next day and two nights slaving over the scrapbook, but I had grossly underestimated the amount of work required for it, and so it wasn’t complete on time.

I had decided that we would have dinner at the Faluknama Palace on his birthday. The views, the setting, the service, the food – if reviews are to be believed, all of it is completely unforgettable. So I called many days before the 10^th to book a table for two, only to be told that the entire palace had been booked out for a wedding! Damn it! Why couldn’t people get married at some other time? Why do they have to do it bang in the middle of the husbands 30^th birthday?

The next plan was to send him 30 roses. However, on the night before the birthday, when a discussion came up about flowers, he said he didn’t like being given flowers at all. He said it was silly, and it was a waste of money. Now, I knew he didn’t care for flowers, but I had foolishly assumed that if it was for his birthday, he might actually like the gesture. But he was rather vehement in his dislike of receiving flowers and his opinion on their wastefulness (despite my protests “But you can put them on your desk!”) and so I hurriedly cancelled the flowers.

Anyway, in the midst of all this chaos and confusion, his birthday arrived. The mother-in-law baked a delicious cake for him, which he cut at midnight – apparently it’s a birthday tradition from his childhood and it made him very happy. The next morning, I wanted to serve him breakfast in bed, but since my culinary skills are very limited, I asked him if he’d enjoy being served bread-omlette with juice and the newspaper in bed. He said he would rather eat dosas at the dining table, and that was the end of my breakfast in bed plans – anyway, we woke up very late that day, so if I had made the breakfast, it would have ended up being brunch.

After breakfast, I shut myself up in the guest bedroom to continue working on the scrapbook, but Nike knocked repeatedly till I had to let him in and he ended up seeing the scrapbook without my completing it! He said it was a ‘lovely gesture’; and instead of being content with that, when I pressed him for more he added “Its rather like a child’s craft project, isn’t it” and then “You aren’t very artistic are you” and even “What is this thing on this page? Haha…that’s funny!”.

We then got ready to go out for lunch, only to find out that his parents had taken one car for the doctors appointment and the other car had been sent off for repair. We waited for well over an hour before one of the cars came back, and by the time we set out for lunch, it was well past 2pm, and we were both VERY hungry.

As luck would have it, we were stuck in a horrendous traffic jam, and reached the restaurant at 3.30pm. Luckily, the place was still open – possibly our only piece of luck on that day. Our drinks arrived and tasted awful – turns out, the bartended wasn’t around! Thankfully, the food was good, and we enjoyed lunch.

After lunch, went to pick up the next surprise for Nike – a camera cake! Getting the camera cake had been a major hassle – I had googled for and printed pictures of camera cakes, and then gone to three bakeries around town (and sent friends to another two) before I found someone willing to make the camera cake. So when we went to pick up the cake I was very nervous and excited. Thankfully, the cake turned out beautifully and even Nike was very pleased with it. Though he did comment that it was unhealthy and we shouldnt eat too much of it!

As we set out home after picking up the cake, we kind of got lost, and accidentally ended up in a one way. And promptly got stopped by the traffic police and received a fine. I wanted to tell the policeman “But its his birthday today!” (In case you were wondering, I didn’t). We finally reached home, Nike’s cousins joined us there, he cut the camera cake (which received much admiration from everyone), he showed everybody the scrapbook (which again received much admiration inspite of its incomplete status and gratified me sufficiently), we played Taboo (which Nike and his team won for the first time in the 18 months we have been playing against each other), we ordered in biryani for dinner, we played dumb charades in the lawn, and then everyone left, and Nike and I went for a drive.

After we came back home, I sent him a mail titled ’30 Reasons Why I Love You’. I assumed he would be touched and emotional. Maybe he’s respond with 27 reasons why he loved me. He read it and said “That’s very sweet of you. Now lets go to sleep”.

And thus ended the day. Next year, I’m just going to stick to a simple cake, and biryani for dinner. And the darned camera bag for a birthday gift!

P.S: Oh, and we finally decided that I would gift him a tattoo. It has him very excited!

P.P.S: He did mention that despite all the things that didn’t happen/went wrong for his birthday, he had enjoyed himself and had a good day. And that’s my reason #1 – it doesn’t take much to keep him happy. I should learn from him. Oh, and also, I told him I want to go to Paris for the my 30^th – it’s a good 3 years away, but a little advance planning never hurt.

One Year and Counting

We celebrated our first wedding anniversary last week. I’m afraid I’m going to have to sound clichéd and say that I can’t believe it’s already been a year, it only felt like yesterday! But that’s really how it feels. This whole 10 week holiday is to celebrate one year of being married, and ending the year with a bang, so there wasn’t much more we could do to make the day special.

Friends and family wished us – it felt nice that so many people remembered and cared to call and wish. We went out for lunch to this nice place with great food, and then went for to a spa for some pampering, and then sat at The Coffee Bean and watched the rain. We later went out for dinner to this lovely Mediterranean restaurant perched on top of a hill with fantastic views.

But it was the trip we made the weekend after that was truly special. We went to this magical little island called Siquijor. It was a painful journey getting there – what was supposed to be a 5 hour journey ended up being 8 hours. But we ended up at this lovely little seaside resort with clean spacious rooms, a cheerful staff, and built right next to a little cove which made us feel like the whole beach was all our own, with not a person around as far as the eye could see.

In Siquijor, we watched the most gorgeous sunset ever, and then drove around the island, looking for fireflies in the dark. Dinner was right on the beach – with the waves lapping inches away from our feet. As we drove back to the resort after dinner, our jaws dropped at the stars in the sky; I don’t ever remember seeing so many. So we just sat by the beach again to stare at the sky, and in one hour, we counted nine shooting stars!

The next day, we went scuba diving, and it was F.A.N.T.A.S.T.I.C. We then drove around the island, had ice-cream for lunch, went to a cute little waterfall where we were the only two people (again), and then idly drove through gorgeous hills and forests. We went hunting for the local black magic practitioners but it was getting late and we also wanted to get back to the resort in time for sunset. Another gorgeous sunset by the beach, followed by a dinner buffet and a cultural show, and capped off the night with hot chocolate while watching the stars in the sky, and listening to the waves.

It was perfect. (This is where I pretend to forget about the tortuous journey back home the next day!).

So it’s been a year of being married, and I never thought I’d say this, but married life has been wonderful. Before I got married, I always thought to myself that married life wasn’t going to change much between Nike and me, given how long we’d been seeing each other by then. To be honest, I had agreed to getting married because I thought it was something that I had to do, not necessarily because it was something I wanted to do at that point – I was happy enough being in a long term, committed relationship, and didn’t particularly want to get married.

But what I didn’t realise is that maybe the relationship needed to go forward, and maybe marriage was the next step. The high that came from the whole wedding – it was a little bit like falling in love all over again, and finding out that you’re grinning for no good reason. We are both now so much more affectionate and caring and considerate towards each other. There is no logical reason why marriage should do this to us, but it has, and I’ve been a very happy girl the last one year.

Of course it’s not all easy. We fight about imaginary finances. We fight when Nike tries to control my bad eating habits (because to me that’s naturally going to lead to his controlling my whole life!). We fight when he criticises me. We fight when he thinks I’m being selfish (though of course I’m not being selfish). We fight when either one of us doesn't listen to the other. But these have been small fights – fights which have gotten resolved with a few hours, and with us never going to sleep angry with each other – and I can deal with them. 

So for this awesome year of being married, for this wonderful person, for having some more people to call family, for all the travel, and for so much more, I’m happy and I’m grateful. Now we can only hope and pray that the years to come will continue to see us both as happy, and that we have what it takes to make a successful, strong and happy marriage.

But for now, it’s off to another island for the weekend!

The One with all the Self-Pity

Linda Goodman says Pisceans have an infinite capacity for love and pity. That’s very true. In my case, it is an infinite capacity for self – love and self – pity.

So I’m now wallowing in self – pity, and feeling very sorry for myself indeed. It’s at times like this that I wish I had a car, so I could drive myself to the nearest ice-cream parlour and gobble down a huge tub of ice-cream to cheer myself up. Of course, since the cause of my current woes is The Monster, I can’t obviously ask The Monster to take me in his car to eat ice-cream.

I wish I had a girlfriend, who lived close enough to drive me out for ice-cream now, and to whom I could whine and bitch about The Monster, but alas, that is not meant to be. Since the Big Man in the Sky is a man himself, he makes all these evil plans to keep The Sisterhood apart as much as possible. How else do you explain the fact that my closest girlfriends from school are all in the yoo-yes-yay? Or the fact that my girlfriends in this city live in a tiny village called HSR which isn’t really in Bangalore, as much as they like to fool themselves; or stay at home with parents (which means they can’t really get out at midnight for an ice-cream, or anything else).

As you can see, my cup of woes runneth over. To make things worse, my results are out on Friday the 13^th. And my shouted-from-the-rooftops till I’m hoarse discreet vacation to Kovalam starts on the same day. Which means my vacation is effectively ruined. Excuse me while I go break something.

Okay, I’m back. So. The only ray of light in my dark and dismal life right now is to plan petty revenge against The Monster. Which I would love to share with you but can’t right now, because if The Monster reads this post, he will know about the revenge plans, and then they will be a failure. Can’t let that happen.

But I did have some luck. The Monster lost his keys in the morning, so I was the only one with the house keys. He came back home in the evening before me - and made the mistake of calling me to tell me that he was waiting for me to come home. It was then that I decided that walking was good for my health, and decided to walk all the way from KH Road to my house, which is a good 6kms away. It would take time, but the longer I walked the better – for my health, that is. Of course, I can’t actually walk 6kms, so after dilly-dallying a bit, I took an auto and came home, and felt very pleased with myself for keeping The Monster waiting.

Update: The Monster Nike has just come and apologised (actually he said it’s ridiculous to fight about such silly things, but I’ve generously decided to treat it as an apology). He also offered to make me hot chocolate since it’s too late for an ice-cream right now. Life isn’t so bad, eh?

Have a good weekend everybody. Oh, and pray for me!

The One with the Complex

So Nike and I were on our way home after dinner* and I was telling him this long winded story, and at some point came to the part about how I happened to have two prams when I was a baby**. And out of the blue he snapped at me “There are people out there who haven’t had even a single pram. And you are showing off about how you had two prams! What’s the big deal about two prams anyway?”

I was of course taken aback. The guy was trying to guilt-trip me about prams! PRAMS!

Of course I sulked at being snapped at for no reason whatsoever. And of course Nike apologised. But I wasn’t going to stop sulking till he revealed what had provoked the strange outburst. After a lot of drama he confessed sheepishly “Well, I don’t know, in that moment, I was just mad because you had two prams and I hadn’t had a pram at all”

And people say I need to grow up!

*Dinner was rolls at Chakum Chakum. If you live in Bangalore, and are in the mood for some rolls, head out to Chakum Chakum for absolutely fantabulous rolls. This place is off Indiranagar 100 Feet Road, next to the Daily Bread. We regularly drive from Benson Town to Indiranagar just for the rolls.

**I know this sounds lame by itself, but in my defence, it was part of a rather interesting story about my uncle.

In Which We Tell a Tale...or Two

Okay, so I am a lazy, lazy girl and I am going to put up an email forward which a friend sent me, and which I liked muchly, though it came in a little late:

Once upon a time, a guy asked a girl "Will you marry me?"

The girl said, "NO!"

And the girl lived happily ever after and went shopping, dancing, drank martinis, always had a clean house, never had to cook, did whatever she wanted, never argued, didn't get fat, travelled more, saved more money, and had all the hot water to herself. She watched chick flicks, not football, had high self esteem, never cried or yelled, felt and looked fabulous in tracksuit pants, and burped, and was happiest all the time…

The End...

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Despite hearting this tale, I really appreciate being married right now. And this is the tale of why:

Saturday night Nike and I went to a friends’ place for a game night. The chicken didn't agree with me, and I was throwing up all over the place...including on their very lovely carpets from Turkey. Nike put me to sleep and cleaned up after me. Once we came back home on Sunday morning, he made me fresh cold lemonade (its a different matter that I threw that up too within seconds).

And so that is how I spent the Sunday, with a stomach bug that saw me throw up anything I tried eating or drinking. When I’m ill, I move into a“I wanttttt my mommmmmeeeee” and “I want to go homeeeee” state, and am very very difficult (more difficult than normal, that is. What? Yes, that IS possible). But with Nike in charge yesterday, I wasn’t homesick, despite being sick (heh). He went and bought the medicines, made sure I took them on time, handed me everything from books to glasses to tissues as I lay in bed clutching my stomach, he roasted papads in the afternoon, went out and got coffee and muffin for me to eat while watching the match, and made me soup for dinner.

So THAT, people, is my happily ever after!

Oh well, for now anyway!