Cousin’s wedding in Kerala

I don’t quite remember why I agreed to it, but I did. Oh yeah, my uncle was threatening (in a friendly manner, of course) that if I don’t make it, there would be drastic consequences. Anyway, I had agreed to attend my cousin’s wedding in Kozhikkode, and had dirt-cheap JetLite tickets purchased three months back.

The to flight was eventless. But then onward, everything was chaotic. Nobody knew how far the wedding hall was from the airport. I finally hired a cab and set out on my own and found the hall. There, I was greeted by all sorts of faces from my past – which I have been trying to hide from, I must admit.

The reception of my relatives, in general was really, good. All of them were happy (or pretended to be) and did not ask too much. A couple of questions about marriage popped up here and there, but I was able to tackle them with humor. After all, I had to keep my word to my parents – they didn’t want me coming out to my extended family.

The only memorable, rather scary, instance was when an uncle took me to the side and started asking me questions like “Are you the old Kris?” “Are you hiding behind a veil” “Are these questions causing you discomfort?” “When will you come back to us?” Then it dawned on me that he was on FaceBook and had seen most of my pictures with Joe.

I guess he knew that I was gay but was shocked and was not very well read about homosexuality.

Of course I met with my Mom and Dad, sister and BIL, and my BIL’s Mom and Dad. I also met all the uncles and aunts that I like and those I don’t like too much. So it was a mixed bag. Some of the cousins that I knew as very small had grown into adolescents and shit. That’s like scary.

Well, apart from that, I spiked up my wedding gift to my cousin (a relatively expensive Bvlgari grooming kit + condoms + lube), and hung out with Ray over beer and beef fry. That was nostalgic. We even rang up some of our old ‘fuckbuddies’.

A social/familial misfit

This Sunday evening, during a break during my songwriting/recording sessions, I logged on to the personal messengers. I found my sister online and started chatting with her. She told me that our cousins were all there visiting her. She also told me that she was chatting from the laptop that she had bought for my mother. She was actually testing the internet connection.

She asked me if I could help her check the bandwidth by video-chatting. I was feeling relatively okay then and said okay. We got connected over poor quality 'broadband' at their end. I saw my cousins huddled together around the computer.

We couldn't really 'talk' to each other thanks to the connection. And there was a whole lot of noise coming from their end. Too many people - three cousins, my sister, my parents, and my wailing niece - and too many conversations going on at the same time. A nightmare for a noise-conscious, ADD-esque, social phobic person like me. I tried working some humor, but my tastes of humor were not quite up to the tastes of my family - innuendos don't work, and any humor that I used came through as heavy sharp-toothed sarcasm, which doesn't really work with my family, except for a few uncles.

So, it was a less than memorable experience and I had to finally make an excuse of having to 'make' my dinner to get out of it. This made me so acutely aware of how much of a social misfit I will be if I ever dared to visit my family as I know it.

My cousins now know

My sister is currently nursing her baby girlchild. That's an enormous responsibility. She seems to want more. Why else would she shoulder the responsibility of coming out, albeit on my behalf, to my cousins. The ironic and funny thing about this fact is that my parents had forbidden me from doing so myself. So my sister breaks the shackles for me.

It apparently started with two of the closest cousins from my inglorious past. They were surprised, but apparently accepted the news rather graciously. They must have had questions and I don't know how far my rather frail (physically, of course) sister would have been able to handle those. I wish I can help her with the burden -- if only my telephobia would allow me.

Now, these two gentlemen couldn't hold the breaking news to themselves. They confided in their siblings -- a brother and a sister. The brother, the youngest of the four cousins involved in this little fiasco, has already browsed through this blog and read bits and pieces. The sister, however, is grappling to come to her senses having heard the news.

She must have been thinking - 'How could it have happened? He looks normal! He behaves normally. He's funny and intelligent. He's educated and talented. He's just like one of us. I don't believe it!'

Well, the heart of the matter is that, my dear cousin sister, I'm exactly what all you think about me - the positive and negative things. Just the fact that I'm gay. I like men just like the way you like men. I like to have an emotional relationship with a man of my choice. Yes, and have sex with him. Sometimes these things can be mutually exclusive. But the answer is yes.

So, take your time. Let it sink in. At the other end, you will still find me.

The Erstwhile-rs : Cousins

In the last couple of days at sleepy old Thiruvananthapuram during my coming out visit, I tried to spend to catch up with the near, dear and not-so-dear ones from my past. It was not really a ritual, something that you would have wished to avoid but rather, something that was agreeable but was necessitated because of the my absence with my parents for prolonged periods of time. Yes, here I was selfish and selfless at the same time – I depend on my friends and relatives for taking care of my Mom and Dad.

On the third evening, I spent time catching up with my set of paternal cousins (with whom I had a tendency to bond better from childhood) having dinner at one of the quaint restaurant which I used to frequent in the last few years of my life at the town. Four of my cousins, all male offspring of the siblings of my father had met earlier in the day and spent some time listening to the Noise Market songs that I was carrying with me on my mp3 player.

About this – they are very excited about my alter-career. It's not often that fame and glamour embraces our family and when its served in the fashionable form of alternative rock, it is exciting even for me. The point is, very clearly, I was excited to. I played them the tracks which would be coming up in the album on their stereo system and later on in the car-stereo and was explaining to them what the lyric is about in a very cunt-sy way.

We had a great bonding moment when the youngest of them all, the 8 year old bag of naughtiness, decided to pose in front of the restaurant as munnabhai while the fag one, quite deservedly, acted as his make up artist. Inside the restaurant, we talked about each others lives and careers and stuff. The three older ones were all either working or poised to land a job so lucrative that anyone, forget myself, would be ashamed of themselves.

Unlike the last time, however, the conversation seemed to religiously avoid the topic of my marriage and it seemed to me that at least my cousins would have come to know about my sexuality through my web presence. That was a pleasant surprise and I felt the cushion of honesty enveloping becoming fatter and fatter thus avoiding the discomfort of having to live/sit with a bony arse a tad less.

The youngest of them all, the one that I really feel fond of, is an adopted child and I have somehow felt more than his 'big' brother since he arrived in my life. I think it's the father inside me that is being gently thawed out. I sat next to him the entire evening and spent some time teaching him how to eat with a fork and spoon and how to be courteous to a waiter etc.

I'm sure that this young man would not have the faintest clue that I did all this. But this would be treasured with me for the rest of my life. Is it just me or am I getting more romantic and/or archaic these days?

Of Horrorscopes

If I were a regular boring straight young adult from the southside of the Indian peninsula, my horoscope would have been published in various matrimonial magazines, websites and newspapers. Believe me, it would have been really platitudinal and it would have read something like this.

‘Dr. Kris, 28 year old orthopaedic surgeon (M. S. Orthopaedics (Mumbai), M. B. B. S. (Trivandrum)), 5’ 10”, slim, medium complexion seeks a bride 20 – 25 years of age, post graduate, preferably a doctor, 5’ 5” to 5’ 8”, slim, fair, beautiful who’s interested in music, reading, computers, etc. The bride shall be open to the option of staying abroad or in other cities in India. The bride shall also be from a wealthy family which will be willing to provide a luxury sedan and about 50 lakhs of rupees in cash.’

Now, the reason why I’m posting this is because during today’s conversation with my sister, she said that a couple of cousins of mine are getting their horoscopes published. This, down south, is considered a sign of maturing into this wonderful, responsible young adult who could lead a sparkling marital/parental life.

Awww, c’mon! These are the same people who haven’t gotten laid, haven’t been involved in a serious relationship and can’t practically take mature decisions. These are people who still drink without their parents knowing about it, who still live with their parents and who still make chauvinistic comments about women.

And naturally, such ‘horrorscopes’ lead to ‘not-so-special’ relationships!

I hope arranged marriages and marriages based on astrological features are abolished forever!