new wardrobe...

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I am comfortable in my skin and casuals... but with my new-found new job, I will be required to spend most of the time in Sarees and Salwars... I cannot think which is the lesser evil... But I have decided to take the plunge bravely... I decided to go about it my usual way... do a lot of research on the internet, analyse the hell out of it and come to conclusions which i would then duly ignore...

I decided i wanted a role-model to help me with the initiation rights into salwar/saree... the decision still stands unmade... so i watch a lot of television, ransack photos on the internet for indian women celebrities... these

are many... yay! to feminism i don't believe in coz i don't get it... 90% of the famous women wear 10% of the clothes and i duly ignore them... in saree are a bare minimum of the celebrities... 1%??? my knowledge of statistics and numbers has at best been abysmal... i come to the conclusion that the women-politicos are my best bet... i start from the north... mayawati... i quickly strike her off... i just don't have her figure to carry off the salwars...same issue with jayalalithaa... uma bharti??? saffron doesn't go with my brown skin... mamata banerjee's saree is too complex and too white... i finally zero in on the three gandhis - priyanka, indira and sonia... for guidance... i decide priyanka's more contemporary and collect 24 photos of her in various sarees... most look like cotton to my untrained eye... high maintenance and high risk material...

in the evening after i completed a complete report on my ideas for my future attire, i drive past a Garden Vareli Sale... I have driven past that one a million times in the past few months and never batted an eye-lid... but this time, the 'paradigm has shifted'... i just wanted to use that phrase from the old days... nostalgia...  mba days... corporate meeetings... how i'm gonna miss it all...

ok, noses blown, kerchiefs away, i enter the den... women, in all sizes and shapes... knowingly eyeing the array of white, black, colored, shiny, sober, and some downright blinding sarees... i walk along in trepidation, not even daring to touch... shopping's old, familiar territory, but for sarees??? life has been kinder in the past... i finally see an off-white with a brownish border that reminds me of my priyanka-gandhi-collection... i am not sure if the material's right... i venture to ask an old woman who has to be one of the top-5 world experts on all things related to sarees...
"is this material ok???"
she looks at me suspiciously... glares at me coz she thinks i'm making so light of such a sombre activity as saree-shopping... i'm afraid i didn't ease her feelings towards me either... i was in khakhi capris with a white t-shirt and a backpack slung across my shoulders...  not someone you could easily imagine in the eleven yards of an immaculate saree...

but then, all suspense skipped, she takes me under her wing, helps me choose material and color... then her daughter takes over... vetoes everything and starts over again... and i leave proudly with two brand new sarees!!!

last evening, i checked them out... i was hoping for a tall, elegant and graceful look... even one of those traits would've done... instead i look gangly, gawky, uncomfortable, uncoordinated...
that's it... i would've liked to end things on a happier note... maybe sometime else... i gotta go and practise...