Sarkozy un'veils' his agenda

French President today told the French parliament that burka "undermines the dignity " of women depriving them of their identity. This statement is probably going to create furore as Muslim groups in France have reacted angrily. He may not have been politically correct in saying what he said and should expect a backlash from the Middle East.

For once I agree with Sarko because I do think that an identity of a woman is reduced to the tent she is wearing. However much it may be said that it is her choice, it's the social conditioning or pressure which allows these women to make a 'choice' if it is a choice. While critics argue that women wearing lesser clothing doesn't make them 'liberated', I think a woman needs to have a choice to wear or not wear whatever she wants without her action, intentions and thoughts questioned. And when we reach this utopian situation, then we can say we are free.

And after all that fuss...

I am not moving out! They renewed my contract for the next few months. But I am excited as one of my flatmates is staying back and a couple of friends are moving in. So I will be in happy land in the next few months :)

I didn't want to miss out on mid night walks contemplating whether the snail who lives near the bushes got home that night and whether the slug (fondly called sluggie) sat happily on the food menu pamphlet after we left.

And a friend set the fire alarm ringing when she decided to bake cookies and scones at 1 AM! Of course as a punishment, she fed me some fresh off the oven scones as we sat by the stairs, on a moonlit night and talked about life, about the cities we love and music and art.

The time when I knocked on a friend's window (he lives on the gound floor) at 3 AM and asked - Do you want to go for a walk? After recovering from the shock, he gallantly braved the rain to discuss the women in his life with me.

And the time when I raced a friend around a block or the time when we threw snowballs at random people and I confess, we wrote romatic love notes and left them in random letter boxes in our blocks.

Or the time we dressed up for halloween and giggled like school kids who were going for a fancy dress party. The times we made disasters in the kitchen to making pancakes and feeling like we were the best cooks in the entire world.

Or when we laughed and cried and hugged and smiled and discussed crushes and men. This is one girlfriend for life (and I can count the number of female friends I have on my right hand).

A few more months of late night chats over a cup of tea, stressing about our dissertations, laughing, loving, crying, doing grocery shopping, travelling, talking, wondering what life holds for is and then we will all be gone. In different directions. In different parts of the world. Here's to all the lovely men and women I have met this year.

All that fuss about a Table?

Everytime I sit at the study table in my tiny room here, I wonder about the people who stayed here before and what memories they have, sitting in this room.

I wonder about those who did not have a laptop. Did they just have a stack of books? What about the sloppy ones who had leftovers or a pile of clothes there? Maybe someone else was a neat freak. Did they study hard? Did they get drunk and pass out? 

What are they doing now? And do they remember the table (of all the things to remember about living in uni halls!)? My memories are of 'trying' to work on my essays there. And doing movie/TV shows marathons on my beloved laptop with my knees scrunched up between the table and the chair. 

The only reason why I have written this really random post is coz I am moving out of here in a couple weeks and going to live in another place with new flatmates and make new memories. Till then I'll hang on to the..err...table here.

Link of the day: India get it's first female Lok Sabha speaker

Forecast for the next few months

says:

Changes! Changes! Changes!

Decisions! Decisions! Decisions!

Note to self: Hang in there

Note to others: Wish me luck