TRENDS
Keep it down, girls
In most parts of India, misogyny comes to a lather in the labour room. A general disrespect during delivery is common, and empathy is thought to weaken the brisk, practical mood of the ward.
TRENDS
Deranged, unhinged, non compos mentis
To enter a madman’s world and see it his way is perhaps the greatest talent of the caregiver.
TRENDS
Are you there God? It's me
The pandemic has wreaked havoc on some of our plans – even plans around when and how we want to leave this world
FEATURES-2
How do I kill thee? Let me count the ways...
It is too complicated an area to go into, why domestic abuse victims stay on despite the bruises and blows, clinging desperately to stray sweet nothings and routinely spelt promises.
TRENDS
No sex, please… when moral police target a Netflix show
Call them critics or chronically conscientious, vigilantes are ever aware of their duty to mankind. And the latest to come under their scanner is the Netflix show Bombay Begums.
TRENDS
Meghan Markle’s sob story: Courageous or crafty?
Whether people think her story made up or authentic, there is no denying that the interview has made Meghan a star; everyone is talking about her.
FEATURES-2
Gaslight or be gaslit
The world can largely be divided – based on muscle, money and occasionally matrimony – into bullies and victims.
FEATURES-2
Why men love bitches and other relationship quirks
Needy, clingy women, who drape themselves like a vine around men, catering to their every need and whim go unappreciated.
BOOK-REVIEW-TRENDS
Love, sex aur dhoka: Three books on man-woman equation in the heterosexual universe
Gayathri Prabhu’s Love in Seven Easy Steps, Rucha Chitrodia’s It’s Also About Mynah and Madhavi S Mahadevan’s Bride of the Forest look at love and its many aftermaths.
FEATURES-2
You can’t hurry love
In the by-lanes of virtual dating apps, haste is a brag. One day we may have to relearn how to let our feelings breathe. To take it slow.
FEATURES-2
Color me blind — waxing eloquent about tints
In India, where we have our own ‘wheatish’ version, the use of the word ‘colour’ itself denotes only one particular complexion. ‘She has no colour’ and ‘she has good colour’ only speak of that single shade, white aka ‘fair’.
FEATURES-2
Melania: Madonna or Lady Macbeth?
Melania has kept the world guessing about her true feelings for her husband. A world that scrutinises everything about her, including the wordings on her jacket. So is she a victim or vamp?
FEATURES-2
Self-care, the new sunrise industry
There is only one self-care package and that is us ourselves. We bleed, we put the band-aid on. We are the ones who set things right in our own life – this is the newest mantra, the latest spiritual understanding.
TRENDS
Grief, reincarnation and reconnections — Surviving Death explores myriad venues, ends up handing out hope
The Netflix documentary series, which looks at life after death in normal and paranormal ways, is a new style of series altogether and hard to be labeled.
TRENDS
The changed rules on mingling: Two is a party, three a crowd
We remember to socially distance from time to time, making us dancers in a new dance where we dart forward and then lean back at a whim. To hug or not to hug is the new question.
TRENDS
Bridgerton: Bringing sexy back
Bridgerton takes us back in time only to tell us that the sex was perhaps better in the days of yore, that there was nothing fuddy duddy about our dada dadi. From the gravity-defying cleavage served on lace-trimmed trays, to the tight corset that leaves shoulders bleeding, it is wink, wink, nudge nudge all the way.
WORLD
Who moved my Christmas?
Days have been purloined from our weeks, and weeks from our months. At the end of the year, we stand cheated out of all our clocks and calendars. 2020 was kidnapped, held hostage, and no ransom sought. Which is the worst kind of daylight robbery!
TRENDS
Bad sex writing prize pulls out this year
Now we will never know this year’s contenders, or indeed the crown prince, of strangely worded sexual encounters between fictional characters.
TRENDS
Bangalore Literature Festival wears a mask
Bangalore Literature Festival this year is both online and offline, giving you the choice to be or not to be there.
TRENDS
Review: 'Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives' or mundane lives of mediocre people
Apart from the sexist connotations of being called a housewife – who marries a house? – loud neurotic women going here and there, saying this and that is neither good audio nor visual.
TRENDS
We should have known
The latest psychological thriller to hit the small screen, The Undoing, starts off sedately, making us salivate for the décor, the furniture, the wardrobes, the hairstyles, before giving us the violins and the goose bumps.
TRENDS
Why infidelity is everybody’s business
At the heart of any healthy relationship is plain camaraderie. It is all about support, loyalty, friendship, sharing laughs and having a cry together.
TRENDS
‘Lockdown’ is word of the year
Lockdown is a blunt word. A word that speaks what it thinks, says it like it is. It saw over 250,000 usages, up dramatically since March, after notching up only a weak 4,000 in 2019.
FEATURES-2
Age is just a number
Age cannot be the defining feature of anyone’s identity; we are who we are whatever our age. I have seen evil toddlers and I have seen angelic octogenarians. Being really young or at death’s door doesn’t render anyone precious or saintly.
