Musings
Idio(t)syncracies
Srabonti
Narmeen Ali
I
once used to have this very strange friend. She was the star-pupil
in our beginner's Kathak class and she was just about
perfect in everything. All our parents wanted us to be just
like her and all of the kids, being the nasty jealous brats
that we were, were extremely snide and mean to her. However,
I, staying true to my Bangali identity, was always nice to
her face and made fun of her behind her back -- it is, after
all, the Bangali way, is it not? (Anyone who thinks otherwise
is in denial).
This
unfortunate friend of mine had a really strange habit. Whenever
she would get nervous or came across a confrontational situation
she would raise her feet up to her ears and roll around on
the floor. Sounds weird, doesn't it? I had a lot of theories
behind this. At first I thought she was showing off her flexibility
as a dancer. Later I thought she was extremely proud of her
feet and wanted to show them off -- again, related to the
whole dance thing. Then I figured maybe she was playing the
shadhu bit and trying to tell us that she was the
"hear no evil" monkey -- with her feet. Still later,
I decided that she was just plain crazy, and slightly gross
-- being an official feet hater, I cannot understand why someone
would voluntarily put her feet anywhere near her face, and
then on top of that, roll around on the floor.
She is
now a very successful financial analyst in a big bank smack
in the middle of Manhattan. She is about four years younger
than me and much to her mother's delight and my mother's chagrin
is making six figures -- I can just imagine the conversation
that the two women had. When my mother told me this news in
subdued tones I told her that she should have retorted with
the comment that at least her daughter didn't stick her feet
on her face. My mother was not amused.
All that
being said, I still wonder what made that girl do such an
odd thing -- and so openly, too. She was so perfect it was
strange to see her have such a weird quirk. But that's the
thing about people -- if you observe them long enough and
carefully enough, you will find that almost everyone has an
idiosyncrasy or two.
There
was a girl I knew in college, for example, who used to eat
her hair. Disgusting, right? But she thought it was the most
normal thing in the world. She used to sit in class and chew
on her hair. And she had the nerve to get annoyed when people
stared at her. In fact she would do something even more odd,
she would point at people with her saliva-ridden hair and
ask, "what are you looking at?" Apparently she didn't
understand what was so unusual about her actions.
Yet
another friend has a habit of covering her entire face with
her dupatta. She does so in class, in her outings
and apparently she has done it in the middle of her meetings
at work. Then she also starts tying the ends of her dupatta
together to make a bow-tie affect. Nobody knows what to make
of it. Often people have wondered whether it is because she
is cold but she claims that no, she is just doing it "emni."
Many people
have strange habits which they do not consider out of the
ordinary. These people publicly do things and expect others
not to react. A cousin of mine screams in public places with
no warning whatsoever -- did I mention that he is male and
his screams sound extremely feminine? He never gives us a
reason for screaming. He just lets it all out and then offers
no explanation and walks away laughing -- with a laugh that
sounds like a cross between a donkey and hyena. Is it a ploy
to get attention, a means to get on all of our nerves -- maybe,
but keep in mind, he is nearing thirty!
The thing
about people is that we all have certain mannerisms and quirks
that differentiate us from other people. In some cases they
endear us to others and in others they are just plain annoying
and weird. However, what I don't understand is why we do these
strange things. Is it because we feel so much pressure from
society and those around us to be perfect and have a certain
image that once in a while we just need to do something completely
wacky in order to break the pressure? Or is it that we all
are in some way, slightly insane and we just have to let it
out? Whatever it is, although it's strange to be around people
when they are acting funny, it's always nice to know that
there are crazier people than you around and that everyone
is not always completely together.
Copyright
(R) thedailystar.net 2005
|