Devoted to Devouring

Book Review: An Autobiography Of A Sex Worker by Nalini Jameela

I am 51 years old. And I would like to continue to be a sex worker.” This is how the candid and defiant opening statement in Nalini Jameela’s autobiography in Malayalam, Oru Lymgika-thozhilaliyude Atmakadha, goes. It at once throws a challenge at society’s double standards — harsh on prostitutes and soft on the clients. Nalini Jameela, who is the coordinator of the Kerala Sex Workers’ Forum, reveals her sordid story with no trace of compunction. Nalini was a 24-year-old widow when she entered the profession to feed her two children. At that time she did not think about the repercussions of her act. She writes, “I was earning Rs 4.50 at a tile factory near Trissur. My mother-in-law served me with an ultimatum to either give her five rupees a day to look after my children or leave the house. I recounted my woes to a friend, who introduced me to Rosechechi. Rosechechi promised me Rs 50 if I spent time with a man. The first thought that came to my mind was that my children would be looked...

SnooTea: Just My Style

(Photographs by Minu Ittyipe) It began on a lark to spiff up my morning cuppa. Oh well, I just wanted a change from what I had been drinking all my life. I am not complaining about the faithful brew that I stir up with tea dust, it does merrily improve with two extra spoonfuls of sugar but I was just plain bored with the regular. My concept of a cup of tea was corralled in the traditional Indian style- coppery coloured liquid topped with plenty of milk and sugar but now there was in me this undeniable thirst for a more delicate bouquet. Tranquilitea, Coonoor Curiously, though grown in our own backyard, few of us have heard of the orthodox leaf tea, forget the Silver Tips, Golden Tips and the White Tea etc.. that quietly find their way to the export market. To make a foray into this relatively unknown terrain, I headed for Tranquilitea, a tea lounge in the Nilgiris, for a cup of “Tippy” tea. On a sober note, you are cautioned not to confuse “Tippy” with the more commonplace “Tipsy” for...

Meeting Marthanda Varma

Sree Uthradom Thirunal Marthanda Varma, 90, head of the erstwhile Travancore royal family talks of his intimate relationship with the Padmanabhaswamy temple, whose vaults has treasures worth over Rs 1 lakh crore stashed away in them. A last vault—kallara B—is yet to be opened and the Supreme Court appointed panel will take a call whether to open it. However, Marthanda Varma refrained from speaking on the vaults and the treasures, saying the matter was sub-judice. At the Pattom palace with Marthanda Varma I meet up with Marthanda Varma at the Pattom Palace, tucked away behind the SUT hospital, hidden from the casual onlooker. The shanka (conch shell) emblem of the Travancore royal family embellishes the palace gates, the bevy of four wheeled beauties and even the grills of the palace windows. A devotional chorus swells down the corridor as Marthanda Varma, in a simple blue shirt and mundu, meets us in the visitor’s room. A 1939 mechanical Solix watch adorns his left hand. Almost...

Krazy Kochi

Search This Blog