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Finding Your Tribe of Women

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Female solidarity. An incredibly powerful and important thing that we all need in this patriarchal world that we continue to live in. Yet, there is so little representation of the same in books, on television, or in the movies.  I have had the privilege of experiencing strong female solidarity which I owe to some incredibly talented, kind, and generous women I am lucky to call friends and acquaintances. From dissecting female portrayals in movies to ranting about sexism in public places, they are always there to lend me an ear. They are proof that the oft repeated “Women cannot be friends” belief is nothing but a myth. Which is why I love Sex Education ’s Episode 7 from Season 2.  I re-watched that episode today and powerful emotions hit me all over again, leaving me almost as teary eyed as I was the first time I watched it. The series follows a bunch of high school students in Britain who are discovering their own desires, sexualities, and understanding their bodies while also getting
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Growth and Learning: My Journey In The Swedish Institute's Leader Lab Program

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Over the years, I have realised that my patience for small talk has been dwindling quite rapidly. While I do not wish to socialise as much as I used to 7 or 8 years ago, I do enjoy meaningful conversations. It becomes all the more engaging when such conversations revolve around the work that I do which I am passionate about. That is exactly what I was able to do for about 3 months, thanks to the SI (Swedish Institute) Leader Lab. The Leader Lab is a program that I had been selected for, where young leaders from across different countries working towards gender advocacy could get together to learn from each other's experiences, explore the different cultural contexts we all worked in, and learn from experts in the field.  One of the things I am most grateful for in my life is to have wonderfully kind and generous people around me. One such friend told me about this program which she had been a part of and thought I might be interested. Some reading up later, I filled out the applica
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Aging Like Fine Wine

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Ever since the pandemic hit, the days and months have become a lot more challenging and difficult for everyone in different ways. While a lot of people have struggled with keeping their means of earning alive and putting food on their tables, others with privilege (such as myself) find it challenging to keep negativity at bay and focus on menial, day-to-day tasks. During such difficult times, a heartwarming movie can offer much needed relief and distraction from reality. I recently revisited one such gem that filled me with awe and love for the movie all over again. A movie that released two decades ago, but that still holds up well in today’s day and age.  Rhythm (2000) directed by Vasanth was set largely in Mumbai and centered around the lives of a journalist, Karthikeyan (played by Arjun) and a bank employee, Chitra (played by Meena). After bumping into each other accidentally a few times, they become friends and start opening up to each other about their past lives, only to realis
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Far From Schitty

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Two of my colleagues had been raving about a show for a while. There were references being made to characters I didn't know existed and they highly recommended that I watch the show. And so one day, I decided to find out what all the fuss was about. The first episode of "Schitt's Creek" came as a surprise to me. It wasn't funny the way I perhaps had expected it to be (having watched comedies such as "Friends" and "The Big Bang Theory") and the setting also threw me a bit off guard - a rich family that was suddenly left almost penniless, being forced to live in a random town. Where were they going with this?  A few episodes in, however, I was intrigued. Slowly, I became invested in each of the characters and was excited to see where each episode would end up taking them. I discovered the series quite late - a few year after it released on Canadian television, but in about a month and a half, I watched all six seasons of the show, sobbing my way
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Beauty In Silence

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I was getting ready for another day of cooking. With my sleeves rolled up, I entered the kitchen. I usually have some music running in the background to keep me occupied while I cook. But this day, I wanted to put on a movie instead. And today, I chose Mouna Ragam . Again. Overhearing a familiar dialogue, my partner asked, “Didn’t we just watch it a few months ago? Why are you watching it again?” As if watching it just once in a few months was enough. But why Mouna Ragam ? The movie released six years before I was even born. I don’t even remember the first time I watched it. I only have random pieces of memories here and there. My mom telling me how “ Oh ho, megam vandhadho ” was a song she loved. How she watched the movie with dad   in the theatre after they got married. And how the movie made me feel – warm and fuzzy. As a kid who watched the movie, I loved Revathy’s character. She seemed spunky. She was fun, she said what she felt, and there wa
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Aches and Longings

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All it took was a random Instagram post of an acquaintance who was reading a vernacular book. A rush of sorrow resurfaced yet again, making me wonder. Can you miss a place as much (if not more than) as you might miss a person you dearly love? This feeling came to me at different points of time, and in varying intensities. It happens when I see visuals of Nungambakam, where I spent five of my most formative academic years. It rushes over me when I listen to "Roja". It is there when I watch "Mouna Ragam" or when I have a sudden urge to write something in Tamil. The intensity is a lot more when I think of my parents back home - which then makes me wonder, what is "home"? Is "home" only the place which has seen me grow up and where I have lived for most of my life? Or could it also be the place which saw my personal transformation, although I have been here only for a short while? Or is "home" made up of the people who reside there, li
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Happy birthday, Sir!

People are celebrating the Ulaga Nayagan's birthday in their own ways. So I thought to myself, "Why not watch one of his best works again?" On any other day, I would have preferred either "Michael Madana Kamarajan" or his other equally hilarious "Pammal K Sambandam". But having sat through several classes of psychoanalysis, I decided on "Anbe Sivam" instead. It's been thirteen years since it released, and I remember watching it several times during the summer of that year as a child. As someone who merely watched movies for entertainment and couldn't understand subtleties or notions of communism, even if it was blatantly obvious. So this time around, I paid attention to all of it. The street play song, the direct and indirect references to the bourgeoisie, the suffering of the proletariats, the painting and the domination of the color red throughout the movie. It's no coincidence that Madhavan is an ad film maker in the movie (
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