I wrote a post this weekend which questioned certain commenters’ assertions regarding how “hot Desi girls seem to end up with White guysâ€. We discussed that misconception as well as…well, a few dozen other subjects, but that’s natural over the course of 1,349 comments. One sub-thread which I followed avidly involved I-bankers and their (for some) elusive prey: the skinny, hyper-maintained, hot brown girl with stick-straight hair.
Some of you compassionately responded to your banking brethren, when they plaintively admitted that they weren’t sure where to locate their loins’ fondest desire; instructions, right down to locations, days of the week and yes, auspicious times of day (yo, are we brown or are we BROWN) were offered and happily accepted. Much like the original exchange which inspired my post on interracial dating, which is where this comedy of heir-ers was going down, what I noticed was that these weren’t one-off sentiments. To me, that made them difficult to dismiss.
The one word which kept surfacing, repeatedly, insistently, was skinny.
Predictably, evolved mutineers were outraged and immediately broadcasted it; even more predictable than that, the obligatory, “I can’t help it, it’s just what ruins my boxersâ€- volley occurred, so that there was essentially a stalemate. Around skinny. While all of them pondered if it was okay to come out and say that “skinny†was a requirement, and whether such a requiring was nothing to be ashamed of, I was transfixed by something else which was related, but not discussed.
What did skinny mean in this context?
To some, Kate Moss defines skinny. To others, the woman who is pictured on our left qualifies.
I like to know exactly what I’m offended by, before I gift someone with a new orifice, so I couldn’t get my outrage-on– not until this question was answered. Yes, yes…we should all eschew superficial everything and it’s terrible that we’re judging female books by their covers, but it’s also a gross reality. And I wanted to know how realistic these I(yer) bankers were.
There was another snag—we were discussing Manhattan.
It’s a rarified world and understandably, the benchmarks are different. Everything is relative (and apparently, if you are an Iyengar reading SM, YOU are all relatives…oy, how I wish that I could actually link to relevant comments from MY OWN POST, which would make my attempts at wit successful vs. inscrutable).
In most cities, D.C. included, my 450 sq ft studio is tiny. In Manhattan, my friend is thrilled to have that much space for her ONE-BEDROOM. In most cities, making six figures is awesome. In Manhattan, it barely affords the afore-mentioned shoe-box, rent-wise and that’s if you limit your methods for self-intoxicating to PBR (note: life is too short for PBR, my darlinks). Anyway, if everything is tougher, better, more competitive, more expensive and more EVERYTHING in Manhattan, then…do brown guys expect brown girls to be skinnier, too? And does skinny mean fit? Or just skinny?
My guy friends (the unManhattanites, if you will…I’m not counting the Murray Hill dwellers et al for the purposes of this fluffy post) would line up giddily for a shot at the gorgeous girl above. Would our I(yengar) bankers? I think we have a bit of a vested interest in all this; the majority of the Desi vomen whom I am privileged to know are curvaceous, if they’re out of their teens. For most men, that’s a good thing. My male buddies don’t like straight lines—on the roads they’re about to break laws on or…uh…you know.
Curves are good. Right? Left? Those are definitely curves, on the left.
So, as I said memorably (and almost 1,700 comments ago!), out with it then. Let’s have the truth. What do you want? Is the woman I’ve wrapped this post around zaftig or is she just right? Err, left? You know what I mean. And this ain’t no heteronormative joint. I’ll be the first to tell you that she could inspire me to discover a love that dare not speak its naam. 😉 What about you?
::
isin’t that a picture of you ANNA?? or may be your sister?
While it easily could be, because my sister and I both have huge, bubble-like Malayalee kundis which resemble two coconuts attached to our lower back, and yes, apparently we also both have “thunder-thighs” like our helpful model above, no, it’s neither me nor my little sister.
I look exactly like that in jeans.
I am dismayed that some of you think that her thighs are ugly, but to each their own; we are attracted to what we are attracted to and that’s that. I bring this up not to call you out (S, you know you and labbie singh are my peeps), but to speak to the women who are lurking, who have body image issues. Because believe me, they are here and they are reading this. They inspired this.
I have no problems in NYC or SF or DC…guess my hatred-since-infancy of LA has protected me from an eating disorder, since I am a size 8, not a size 4, and that is too big for La-La land.
I like my body. I like it so much, I don’t give a shit about telling you the truth– I am 5’6″ and I weigh a whopping 148 lbs. I’ve gained weight, since hurting my leg, because I no longer get to walk the three miles home from work. To go from walking more than 20 miles a week to not being mobile at all…well, it takes a toll. I’ve gained eight pounds, which I can’t be fucked to cry over, because I’m more upset over losing lean mass and the ability to walk comfortably, without pain or this huge, heavy, unwieldy cast on my leg.
To the young woman whose email to me on Facebook inspired this entire post:
Please stop calling yourself “fat” and “ugly”. You look exactly like this picture, I know, because I went through your albums and found one taken at a similar angle. You don’t have luck with desi guys in NYC because of timing, circumstance or that nakshatram with the tree or whatever– NOT BECAUSE YOU ARE OBESE. When you kept reading about how guys like Puli et al want “skinny” desi girls, in the mega-thread, they were talking about you, my darling girl.
I proved this. I proved my point.
The majority of men on this thread think that the woman pictured above isn’t just beautiful but hot, gorgeous, attractive, ideal.
Please eat your lunch today. And your dinner. And work-out, but do so because your heart and lungs and future grandchildren deserve to be taken care of– you’re too precious to starve, especially at your own hands.
To quote you, “Shocker. Indian girls have eating disorders, too.”
Well, they shouldn’t have to– no human should. Eat. Be healthy. Fall in love with yourself. Life is too short for bullshit, and that goes for all of you.
Thunder thighed-Anna, over and out.
come on who here doesn’t like the dangerous brooding man? ok, I might not be dangerous, but at least I’m a brooding man. ok, perhaps not as much brooding man per se, as a quick check man. Who doesn’t eh?
ak, I guess not.
how did so many tambram guys end up being un-religious/atheist (PindaUSA, do you fall in this category?) – reverse psychology, perhaps?
Re: 348
Ah, so that’s what they mean by that future thread about the travails of short men.
Reminds me of the line
“Stop fucking cursing so much, willya?”
Ayyo, out of nowhere I have been given an identity crisis about TamBrahmness?
Look, it’s just something I grew up with, like my nose. I neither take pride in it nor am I ashamed of it – it’s just something that’s there. But my knowledge of rituals (or gothram and nakshatram etc) is close to zero. I think my nakshatram is Lambda Orionis (forgot the Sanskrit name). My mother once challenged me to recite the names of the 27 nakshatrams and I went “Ashwini Bharani Karthigai Margazhi Thai Maasi Panguni”. I am not the person to ask about that stuff.
Now bad multilingual puns – there I am a pundit.
@ak, 353
The majority of Tambram guys I know are religious when compared to the ladies in the same category…..
is this what you tell the priest when it’s time for archanai?
the only nakshatrams i know are those that belong to my immediate family members. otherwise, i’m rather clueless, whcih serves me fine.
but why the need for crisis – so long as you know the food, your tambram-ness is unquestionable to me 🙂
I’d suggest you give me a wide berth, Shaad.
No identity crisis there, as long as your instinctive reaction is to let out an agonized Ayyo.
So, out of genuine curiosity, what’s the joke here? That you didn’t know all 27? And there are 27? Isn’t nakshatram like zodiac? How come there are so many?
Not my experience. But I don’t know that this is going to go anywhere than a see-saw game of he-saw, she-saw.
Beats me. Wondered about it myself. What I do know is that there are a lot like me, and TamLand politics doesn’t recognize the difference. From the Periyar politics era, atheism has been associated with anti-brahminism, so I have had to deal with both people who think I am religious because I am TamBrahm, and people who think I am a Periyar-follower because I am not religious. It’s sort of like US politics in the sense that “If you’re in favor of abortion, then you’re also in favor of gun control laws” is a fair representation of mainstream US politics.
/not trying to threadjack
i can’t really agree with this, as this is not a pattern that has been so obvious to me. in many ways, the ladies are far more into keeping up the traditions than the men, or at least many men are more flexible about it. but, as HMF has pointed out, our social samples are not always exemplary of the group in general
She can barely pull her jeans up past her thighs!!! Stilleto heel is a bad choice for her as it merely accentuates the thigh problem. Plus, the big caboose went out with J-LO. She’d better stick north of 125th to garner attention.
You can find me struttin’ my stuff in the city of New Orleans’. I have silky smooth skin skin the color of cafe au lait, and I’ll leave you roarin’ for MORE, MORE, MORE 🙂
I’m glad this issue came up. I’m 22 and I have to say I’m not exactly skinny and not very tall but I do have my good features. I was away on a 6 mth exchange programme in Europe and I never felt more woman there than I think ever. The men there were completely receptive to people of all sizes. It was almost too good to be true.
I have lived in India and now I am living in Singapore (which btw has a chinese majority, skinny, straight haired female population) and never have I once felt comfortable among them all. ‘She could be slimmer’ or the straight up’ yeah you are fat’. In fact, my mum is on a worldwide groom hunt now and all she keeps telling me is that if I don’t slim down to look like one of those movie star types, I am never going to find someone. Don’t get me wrong, I love gymming and exercise… but somehow even an atheletic, gym body doesn’t seem good enough for some… ‘Too masculine’. Some indians I know love their waify women.
Which makes me pretty sad… when it finally comes down to it all… how much does appearance count? So have I been living in a bubble?
What saddens me further is that some of my indian friends go for non-indian girlfriends because ‘well, at least they don’t get fat after marriage’. Like WTF!
same here, Earlier I hid the fact that I was a Tambram as ppl would often ask me if I knew the mantras to conduct marriages! Thnx to A.R everybody now knows ‘mangalyam…..‘. I now take pride in identifying myself as a Tambram coz I know my mythology better that yor grandma!
“Turn around, stick it out. even whiteboys got to shout…”
-Need I even cite the source?
Your honor, let it go on the court’s record that a Tambram initiated the yo grandma wave that is going to sweep the nation in short order.
Oh man, I’m late to the party! But this is one of my favorite subjects. And for the record, I don’t think an issue that directly affects the lives and health of 1/2 the population is really ‘fluffy’. Just sayin’.
I agree. I’ve seen men comment on size (mine and friends’) from moving cars. Hell, I’ve had my boss comment on my weight in business meetings. (Seriously. I’d put on a few pounds because of a bowel disorder, and he told me that my wedding dress should have a feedbag on it. What a douche. Anyway.) Yeah. It really is that big a deal.
About the woman in the picture– at first glance I thought she was a Latina! But then I spent a few years in a barrio where ‘junk in the trunk’ was the beauty standard. (I loved that aspect of the neighborhood.) She’s definitely a brick house… which in my opinion is a very very good thing. I’m more attracted to curvy women than skinny ones, but she’s got a fit-curvy thing going on that’s hot as hell. And now I will stop objectifying her…
I was superskinny as a kid, then a bit overweight in college. I lost weight recently and am on the curvy side of average now– but again, bowel disorders do crazy things to your weight and shape. I’m white and voluptuous, but not fat. I’ve found that when I lose weight, white men approach me; when I gain weight, black men and Latinos approach me; and I get mad, mad love from desi men no matter how much I weigh. I get more positive attention from desi men (yes, I-bankers included) than any other group; don’t know what that says about me, but I consider it a good thing. This may be a brash generalization, but in my personal experience desi men in the US are a lot more polite with their attentions– they’re more likely to start a conversation and buy you a drink than to grab your ass or scream at you from a car. Why that is would probably be a whole other 1000-comment post…
Oh, Harbeer, we totally need to hang out.
as a skinny girl who went to school with these i-bankers – I got “hotter” as I got thinner, and in my opinion, more unhealthy looking.
Wow, Divya. That’s enlightened.
She obviously had no trouble putting her jeans on and FYI, heels elongate the leg and make people look taller, more slender etc. You’re wrong.
Er, actually I googled it a bit and found it is Mrigasirsham (I found many spellings). I actually haven’t given any archanais for myself.
No, the point is not that I didn’t know all 27 (there are indeed 27 stars arranged along the ecliptic in addition to the 12 constellations). The point is that I jumped track from nakshatrams to months, because Karthigai is a common name for both! The real star sequence is Ashwini Bharani Karthigai Rohini Mrigasirsham….lots of stuff….Revathi. The month sequence is Chitrai Vaikasi….Karthigai Margazhi Thai Maasi Panguni. Effectively I got derailed from one track onto the other, providing much hilarity to my elders.
Ah the joys of growing up…
Anyone who buys girls drinks might as well sever his testicles and place them on the table next to the drink.
HMF, you do put the ‘b’ in subtle.
By the way, has anyone seen Mo’Nique’s Fat Chance? It’s a celebration of big women of color. One of the most empowering things I’ve seen on TV– actually, one of the ONLY things I’ve EVER seen on TV that even questions the dominant beauty standard. I love it when big girls take charge and decide what’s hot– because it’s confidence that’s the biggest deciding factor. One of my best friends is a big girl who’s extremely confident and comfortable in her own body. When she walks into a room, she knows she’s the sexiest woman there– and people react really positively to that. She gets more love than a lot of thin model-types I can think of.
Well, that would be an interesting tactic…
“FYI, heels elongate the leg and make people look taller, more slender etc. You’re wrong…”
Actually, the stilettos draw attention to the thin heel, making the thigh appear more thicker. Had she worn a more sturdy heel or constructed sandal, it would have balanced out her look. Here she looks like she’ll tip over any second, not due to her shoes, but due to the illusion of heavier thighs. Shoes have to balance out the weight of the leg. Pencil thin stilletos always look best on skinny legs, as that is what elongates the look.
me think she is mallu, but then it may be just me! junk in the trunk? nah. Divya is just jealous.
HMF, can you explain the logic?
ouch! defeats the whole purpose of buying a drink for many, bottoms up anyone?
Enough is enough and I cant take Puli’s pain anymore. Whos down to meet Puli (& me @;-) at Plunge this friday? ladies, speak now cuz once Puli is gone, he is gone forever. ps. I love saying the word puli
Is that what happened to you? That would explain your bitterness.
Nothing good comes from pointing that out, trust me. 😐
you’re a good man, charlie brown
Jeet, watchow for what u wish! veetla puli, aana avan vella eli*.
*for the 4 non-tambrams-still following this thread- translation-“in house he is tiger, outside, he become the mouse…”
Sure, when you offer to buy a girl a drink knowing only that she’s ‘hot’, ie. knowing nothing else about her, that sends the message, “I don’t think of myself worthy enough to be in your company, because you’re so hot, and I’m so not, therefore I will spend money on you, just so you hang around me a little bit”
How many women here have been bought drinks thinking to themselves, “Ok, how long do I have to stay here now?” Of course, this effect can be minimized depending how one asks, but the general result is the same. But in the end, the message is the same.
..unless you ordered yours on the rocks.
dude, it’s not just the tambrams that can follow along…
PBgirl, please don’t post links like that. The point of this post wasn’t, “guess the identity!”, it was, “clarify what several of you meant when you used the adjective ‘skinny’.”
As Milli deducted early on in the thread, revealing who she was would affect the purpose of this exercise negatively. Thanks in advance for understanding why we deleted both comments.
This is EXACTLY my point. A women knows why you’re buying it for her, so the minute the glass enters her hand, she’s on DEFCON 2 already.
nah…i dont do subtley. I just figured out how that feature works. but…feel free to help out of u know anyone. If I wanted to get that point across i would have linked my name to my shaadi.com profile. sometimes a cake is just a cake.
aww…
yes. i think she is skinny (enough). i define skinny as not fat. its a wide range. how much clearer can i be about what i would do to this woman. do you want me to paint a series of pornographic cartoons for you?
Is that a safe thing for impressionable girls to see? for that matter, am I a safe thing for impressionable girls to see?
feel better.
i plan on going home after work. cleaning up. putting on one of my flashy “client meeting sales” suits. go to one of the appointed temples of jiggy, and “act like an i-banker”. which is nothing like what i generally act like (which is odd given that i am a banker).
too bad..
me? im an agnostic bordering on atheist. like a fairy tale atheist. my reason for this is that unfounded faith doesnt make any sense. the foundations of religion are fundamentally flawed. the nature of the universe is not dependant on who my parents are, etc. there are a lot of reasons. Richard Dawkins wrote a very good book on the subject. He can explain these things far better than i can in the time i am going to devote to this thread.
they make non religious tam brahm girls? did i miss a meeting or something?
Given that Puli’s name is “Puliogre in da USA”, it is puLi (tamarind), not puli (tiger). But that does not afford the puli/eli pun, so your caution remains. [For the benefit of general population, puLi is pronounced with a heavy retroflex L (tongue curled back against the roof of the mouth), while puli uses your everyday palatal or dental l].
That is so very like those translated rajini punch dialogues….
Took me a few weeks on SM to figure out what ‘Tambram’ meant. I kept thinking why are they talking about Tambaram.
Question for Tambrams or those descended from any brahms: if you visit a temple in India (for religious or touristy reasons) and they asked you to line up based on your Brahmin-ness or non-Brahmin-ness, would you meekly accomodate their request? If so, in which line would you choose to fall?
Question for non-brahms and those of mixed ancestory: Do you agree that there is no choice for us? Unless the choice is to opt OUT of any line?
Not a hypothetical situation at all. True story from about 3-4 years ago. I think the temple in question was some famous temple in Mangalore and they served food in the temple for all, but segregated the Brahms from the non-Brahms during the emal. I was disturbed to hear about it for obvious reasons, but also for the reason that the (non-brahmin) person narrating the story also seemed to take ‘pride’ in the fact that her Brahmin friends lied about her Gothram (or some such identifying label to deflect the priest who kept looking at her suspiciously because she didn’t ‘look like a Brahmin’) and covered for her because they did not want her to eat alone among all the other non-Brahm ‘strangers’.
My question may appear to be off-topic (not that it seems to matter much anyway); but my redemption lies in the fact that I am bringing a desi angle to the concept of beauty/looks. How many of the 2nd generations here can still ‘identify’ desis by how they look, similar to how several 1st generation desis or desis in desiland seem to do? There is “an Iyengar look; an Iyer look; a Nadar look; a Christian look; a Muslim look” etc, apparently, even within one region/ethnicity. And I wouldn’t be honest if I completely distanced myself from this phenomenon. My husband, who wasn’t raised in India, is always surprised when I ‘guess’ which part of India, or which ‘community’ somebody we meet belongs to. And if you do ‘recognize’ lineage (for lack of a better, neutral term) do you have a personal preference? Is there a hierarchy of Indian beauty personally for you (you as in whoever ventures to answer this question honestly)?
i guess i would do as the priest says. if im in some temple, i should respect the rules of the game…
i was just kidding…but i did put it out there partly in the chance that someone who did want to get in touch didn’t notice the link on the handle 🙂 though kush seems to have made it far more clear…
even when a cake is just a cake, it’s still there for the taking 😉
oh, no, that part was very clear. what i meant was that sometimes when guys say skinny, it’s different from both some women’s perception of skinny and other men’s perceptions, as well.
i hear you on the religion – i am not fond of the concept.
Pingpong–many thanks for the explanation for why ‘in house he is a tamarind, outside he rat’ makes little sense, and also for making me realize that eating puLi and spelling it flex the same tongue muscles?
ak-sorryba, didnt mean to exclude tam non-brams.but i’ll stop before some sinhaly bugger comes and asks me why people not ethnically tam, but who understand tam punz shld be left out.
I’ve heard something similar in quite a few temples, it pains me to see this bias in the house of the lord but then it takes a collective effort to set things right.
Till then, I’ll stand in the line that has my gothram in it, coz tambram or not,I wan’t my prasadam!
im going to quit posting on this site. seems a tad more dangerous now….
Please don’t “out†people. If you are clever enough to stalk someone on matrimonial sites based on their name, bully for you. But posting the link here isn’t a nice thing to do.
Deleted.
This thread might get shut down for the following reasons:
It would be a shame if a thought-provoking experiment had to end, because some people can’t play by the barest minimum of rules or expectations.
What’re you talking about? If I was bitter, I’d just be making tardish talking points.