Don't be a pig.

Junk food. 

This was the topic my beloved Amethyst asked me to write on.

And I thought, why not. If I can write about kidnappings, child marriage, train stations, and smuggled tortoises, then why not about a multi-billion dollar food industry? Bring.it.on.

The term junk-food, according to Wikipedia, was coined circa 1972, and it means food that is low in nutrition and packed with saturated fats and carbohydrates.

Food that the likes of Adam Ritchie lurve, and food that the upper-middle-class-I’m-too-vegan-for-my-shoes- kitty-party-type DIKHNEE aunties abhor.

We see tonnes of write-ups on the subject, most of them on the not-so-positive note. Often along the lines of ‘city kids giving in to the fast-food trap’ or ‘seven year old suffers cardiac arrest due to obesity’.

I know, there is a plethora of words to choose from, to describe the trend- the picking up something for dinner while heading home ‘cause you’re too tired to rustle up a decent nutritious meal after an exhausting day at work trend. Unhealthy, probably being the most direct. 

But. Have we stopped for a minute and thought about the light-hearted-ness of it all? I am by no means, advocating the practice of gluttonously devouring un-godly amounts of fat and meat and carbs at un-godly hours, of course..  But the culture that has come to be, with modern fast-food at the center of the table. Quite literally. Imagine. What would your average rave party be like, with pot roast and Yorkshire pudding and roast turkey? I, for one, imagine Jeeves standing at the doors and butler-ing around all my teenage friends, much to their mortification. 

Or your glitzy glammy all-girl sleepover, for that matter, with ginger tea and masala dosa for dinner? They’re not completely crazy ideas, coming to think of it, but those  affairs wouldn’t just be the same without the usual kegs of beer and finger food and ketchup spilling on the carpet and wraps and pizza and coke and tubs of ice cream now, would they? Or imagine, waking up in the middle of the night and craving for a mid-night snack. What would your mind immediately think of? Ahot cup o’ noodles, or to go through an elaborate (not to mention painful) heating up the tava, rubbing an onion on, and ladling out dosa batter on the griddle? At 2 am in the morning, huh? Oh, let’s not even get started on the chutney. *Shudder* 

My, my. I pride my planet on its ability to have become a melting pot of traditions (Pardon the bluntness), cultures (pardon the reverberation), flavours, dimensions, cheeses, herbs, and wines. *drooool*  An alternate universe would’ve been trauma, given the times we live in. Tantrum-y  teens missing  their burgers and root beer, torturous toddlers wanting their lollies, uptight yippees without their diet cokes and Subways.. Ugh. One post apocalypse sight it would’ve been. 

So folks, thank your stars and take a generous bite off that fritter, for, we live in hard times when happiness is got with the execution of a man who doesn’t know half of us exist, so we will have to make do with the little pleasures life throws our way- like that oh-so-yummy mayonnaise and lettuce sandwich, or that de-freakin’-licious vada pav you just polished off. Stop being a pig and stop cribbing about how you’re ‘letting go of yourself’.

So work out, eat right, and pig out at regular intervals. Remember, little pleasures. Don’t fuss about how your skin’ll have a breakout or how you aren’t going to fit into last birthday’s jeans.

Ciao. J

Introducing Meera

So. Here I am, squatted on the floor, laptop  on my.. well, lap, racking my brain to squeeze out a witty, informative, entertaining piece for this blog my friend and I are about to start. Having taken a year off after school, the two of us have quite a lot of time on our hands, preparing for our Law School entrances being our main agenda in the near future. And so, we came up with the idea of writing a blog. Initially, we decided we'd dedicate the blog to current affairs, what's on the news channels, and all. But hey, who reads the news? (I mean, apart from the clever kids- the over achievers and the likes.) Reading the paper is one thing, and following through on every inch of progress on some treaty between two minuscule countries, even the names of which the rest of the world is bound to forget in the next couple of days, is another. 

And so, we decided our blog'd contain all things fun. Like articles on religiosity(okay not the kind that set off mobs running after us, after tracking our IP address, that is), food- everybody loves food! Clothes, fitness( this friend of mine, is a fitness freak. She's bent upon having her waist measure the same as her age), TV, movies, art.. pretty much anything that leads a person into believing writing (or reading, for that matter), doesn't require a very learned person's brain to be smeared all over the piece, showing off their smartness. Sometimes, it's all about enjoying yourself; and most importantly, keeping things simple.

Now. What's this article (or whatever one may wish to call this) about? I'm still trying to figure that out. As I write, I'm juggling the Big Bang Theory, Two And A Half Men, and Facebook chat with four friends, and also the sixth chapter of Queen of Babble gets hitched. That book is goooood. So that means I'm good at multitasking, right? Oh, also, I suffer from ADD.. Which, is how, my English essays on child labour end up having excerpts from Wuthering Heights and Holes. Yes, I'm talking about the same essay. :) 

But hey! I've got a functional brain! Whoo hoo! I've realized, there's a reason we've been created with a brain. To think of ways to ward off evil friends who want you to type pages and pages of replies to their crazy queries, and when you're finally done writing to them, all they do to display their copious amounts of gratitude is with a sleigh of a hand, say 'hmmmmm'. I haven't still gotten to figuring out the 'warding off' part. But I'm getting warmer.

I almost forgot. I double out as an agony aunt as well. And I'm so good at it, that I can probably make a living out of it. In all modesty, that is. I'm serious. I've been doing this since 9th grade. I wrote this column- 'Ask Estabanitha'.. And the one drawback of it all is, it leaves you so high and dry of opinions and advice for yourself in times of crisis, that you don't trust others enough to rely on them for some honest feedback. That's something like, being the world's best masseuse and therefore, never trusting your foot/back to the hands of another. That, borders in on insecurity. But it isn't exactly that. Is it?