I was reading an interview with the first lady Air Marshal of the Indian Air Force - Ms Padmavati Bandopadhyay. One of the things she said amused me a lot. She said that people praised her for her role as the Air Marshal but she did not receive any special acknowledgement for managing her household!

Story of many Indian ladies who are homemakers - but of the first lady Air Marshal too???

Friends told me to read "Not Without My Daughter" in one go but of course I couldn't read the book at work :-) So it took me about 3 sittings to finish reading it. At the end I closed the book and just sat there - amazed at the courage of this woman who wanted a simple life of a homemaker but when faced with unusual challenges fought for her own freedom and that of her daughter.

It felt good to read that she is back in US with her daughter. But when she stated that in the 80s the US state department was handling about 1000 similar cases of American women and children trapped in Iran against their will, it chilled me to the bone. Hope the situation has improved now.

I also hope that the guy who helped Betty Mahmoody escape - Amahl - finally made it to the US.

Not without my daughter

I had wanted to read this book since a long time but always thought it was better to read fiction than real life stories. Why invite stress and mental anguish during spare mements?

But one of my new year resolutions (which I hope will still hold by the time 2009 rolls by) was to read some serious meaningful books - that provide food for thought.So I picked up this book by Betty Mahmoody.

I knew the story vaguely - of an American woman married to an Iranian who visits Iran during 1984 with her husband and daughter only to find that she is never going back to US. But I was not prepared for the simply unbelievable incidents that the book brought forth. At some points I did wonder if Betty has exaggerated a bit like e.g. Moody's Iranian relatives splattering food all over walls while eating with their hands. Of course when someone is narrating his or her real life story we get to know only one side of it.

But on the whole, I read with growing disbelief and anger - also fear that one person can have such 2 totally different sides to his/her personality as her husband Moody. Also it seemed unbelievable that the US embassy just stood by and didn't do much to help US citizens - citing the laws of Iran. Then I reminded myself that it was the 80s. Maybe things were different then.

I don't know much about today's Iran but I hope and pray for the sake of women there that things are not as bad for them as they were in the 80s.

There is one reference - Betty thinks Moody is being paranoid when he says that the US is supplying arms to both Iran and Iraq during their conflict and making money in the process. Anyone who has watched Fahrenheit 9/11 will not think Moody was being paranoid.

Finally, Betty finds it amusing that her "Nasr" - a promise to God to do something in return for His favor - is to visit Jeruslem if she and her daughter can get back to US. She thinks it's a mixup of two religions. But I think that for someone who believes that all religions pray to the same God - no matter what they choose to call Him - it makes perfect sense. It did to me.

Happy 2008!!

I have always suspected that none of my friends read this blog. That's because anytime I ask them if they have checked it out recently I get answers like "I did, a couple of days back". :-)

So, for all my friends and those strangers (who really are only friends waiting to meet me) who might accidently (and unfortunately!) stumble across this blog - Happy 2008! May all your wishes come true..........

What's a new year without smiles? So here goes....

Youth is when you're allowed to stay up late on New Year's Eve. Middle age is when you're forced to. ~Bill Vaughn

An optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves. ~Bill Vaughan

A New Year's resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other. ~Author Unknown

Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty. ~John Selden

The proper behavior all through the holiday season is to be drunk. This drunkenness culminates on New Year's Eve, when you get so drunk you kiss the person you're married to. ~P.J. O'Rourke

Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account. ~Oscar Wilde

But can one still make resolutions when one is over forty? I live according to twenty-year-old habits. ~Andre Gide

It wouldn't be New Year's if I didn't have regrets. ~William Thomas

May all your troubles last as long as your New Year's resolutions. ~Joey Adams

He who breaks a resolution is a weakling;
He who makes one is a fool.
~F.M. Knowles

I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is too much of a daily event for me. ~Anaïs Nin

Of all sound of all bells... most solemn and touching is the peal which rings out the Old Year. ~Charles Lamb

And finally,

We spend January 1 walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives... not looking for flaws, but for potential. ~Ellen Goodman

(http://www.quotegarden.com/new-year.html)

Murder at the Opera (Spoiler)

Title sounds sensational, isn't it? So did the plot outline at the back cover of the book. And the book is written by the daughter of one of the ex-US presidents, Harry Truman.

But the book brought only disappointment. Sure, it did give a glimpse into the politics (both at the Opera houses as well as DC!) and I came to know about many terms related to the opera. But beyond that, as a murder mystery I felt it failed to deliver the goods in the end. The plot of assassinating key US personalities in a so-called novel way sounded naive at the best!

Though Margaret Truman has 20+ books to her credit I doubt if I will ever pick any one of her murder mysteries in future.