Female Writers: To love or to hate?

After spending 4 hours on the remaining 200 pages this afternoon, my first reaction was anger and frustration. Firstly, I didnt understand why Tita cheated on the nice Dr Brown. Secondly, I was led to believe that Tita married Dr Brown in the end but as it turns out, despite the nice Dr Brown being such an understanding character, Tita chose her first love Pedro. Serves her right that he died in the end which led to Tita taking her own life in a very dramatic manner.

From a conservative point of view, perhaps Tita should not have gone against tradition - as the youngest daughter, she should have remained unmarried and looked after her mother.

However, considering the point mentioned about how romance novels are forms of discourse often written by women and for a female public, perhaps I can try to see from Laura Esquivel's point of view. Perhaps being a female, she wasnt sure whether to choose Dr Brown or her first love Pedro and ended up deciding using her heart and not her brain - despite knowing that it's the wrong choice (Esquivel kills off Pedro and Tita in the end).

Perhaps too, Esquivel simply wanted to frustrate male readers like me by deliberately choosing Pedro over Dr Brown to emphasize the point that females have the right to choose and do as they please. I must admit that it's a valid point: Tita never let inhuman tradition and her tyranical mother prevent her from being with her first love. She was brave. She did what she wanted to and not what was deemed the right choice based on societal conservative expectations and norms. I can only envy her courage.

In Like Water for Chocolate, I can only find parallels in Dr Brown - the nice guy who ended up with nothing. Perhaps that's why I didnt quite like this book.

However, things weren't all that bad. At the end of class, a question was asked:

Are gender roles determined by nature or by culture?

I knew my answer was nature. I scribbled in my pink notebook that physically and emotionally, guys are more suited to work. Hence naturally, the next best thing for women would be cooking, cleaning and looking after children.

I didnt raise my hands to speak my mind - not after someone told me that I'd be booed if I said what I wanted to say. However, someone else did and I noted in my pink notebook how funny, but nice, it was for a lady herself to raise her hand and choose nature over culture. I missed what she said and i wished i didnt. Nevertheless, it was a nice new detail to my fairy tale.

I'll also add that while nature could have played a significant role in determining gender roles in the beginning of time, culture takes most of the blame later on. Perhaps back then, us guys were made stronger than women. However, I'm of the view that if a lady thinks she's capable of moving mountains, why not? Why should one foolishly follow silly traditions and practices? Why restrict her to the kitchen?

I should have raised my hand.

Patience

"Be patient (in adversity); for, verily, God will not let the reward of the righteous be wasted."

— The Holy Quran, Chapter 11, Verse 115

"[W]hoever abstains from asking others, Allah will make him contented, and whoever tries to make himself self-sufficient, Allah will make him self-sufficient. And whoever remains patient, Allah will make him patient. Nobody can be given a blessing better and greater than patience."

— Prophet Muhammad (s) as reported by Abu Said Al Khudri in Sahih Bukhari, vol 2 hadith 548

I can feel a wave of panic and surrender coming. Negative Facebook statuses and comments like how one's tired of everything, tired of school, tired of life are beginning to affect me. My mind was not at ease despite the countless entries on sweet distractions. How could I not have noticed that the frequent entries about my sweet distractions are signs to myself that I'm being distracted from school. The harder school gets, the more I try to distract myself. It seems to me that such entries are my way of escaping the harsh reality of school. I seem to be calmer and "more in control" due to my ability to shift negative stresses to something that I like - things like writing. But is it good?

Nevertheless, I know that no matter how hard I try to be in control, I'll crack the moment I say that I've got things under control. Hence why I'll try to never again say that I'm in control of my situation. Coz I'm not. He is. And time and time again, I forget that He's in control. And I forget to be thankful and grateful.

As Muslims, we are in direct communication with the Almighty. He is the only One Who not only hears and knows all, but Who can change our situation and give us the patience to deal with our difficulties.

"Remember Me, and I shall remember you; be grateful to Me, and deny Me not"
(Quran 2:152)

39 more days to the finals. Stay positive. Keep working. Keep trying. And doa. Insyaallah, all will be fine.

The Truth About Cats and Dogs

"Will looks ultimately be the deciding factor for a guy when it comes to deciding if she's the one?" This was a question asked by a friend yesterday.

I was watching The Truth About Cats and Dogs this afternoon and found out that the answer is NO. Brian fell in love with Abby not because of how she looks, but for the things she says while she's on air, their telephone conversations, listening to her playing the violin every morning over the phone, him reading a book to her over the phone every night.......

.... not her beauty.

However, Janeane Garofalo -the actress that played Abby - wasn't too bad herself. So really, will looks be a deciding factor?

I told her that it wont. The other guys had their own views. My recent entries are labelled "sweet distractions". The group discussion started from my telling the tale of "The guy who has not said hi to a couple of someone in class despite the passing of 8 weeks" to one person. His name is Abby. He is self-conscious. He might not beautifully attractive but he knows he is simply attractive.

The man of few words

Mama Elena sent Tita to the kitchen to get something for the guests. Pedro 'happened' to be walking by at that moment and he offered his help. Tita rushed off to the kitchen without a word. His presence made her extremely uncomfortable. He followed her in, and she quickly sent him off with one of the trays of delicious snacks that had been waiting on the kitchen table.

She would never forget the moment their hands accidentally touched as they both slowly bent down to pick up the same tray.

That was when Pedro confessed his love.

'Señorita Tita, I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to be alone with you to tell you that I am deeply in love with you. I know this declaration is presumptuous, and that it's quite sudden, but it's so hard to get near you that I decided to tell you tonight. All I ask is that you tell me whether I can hope to win your love.'

'I don't know what to say .... give me time to think.'

'No, no, I can't! I need an answer now; you don't have to think about love; you either feel it or you don't. I am a man of few words, but my word is my pledge. I swear that my love for you will last for ever. What about you? Do you feel the same way about me?'

'Yes!'

Yes, a thousand times.

.....Like Water For Chocolate by Laura Esquivel

Esquivel's first 19 pages was torture. Unlike the clarity and flow in Kafka's The Metamorphosis and Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Of Love and Other Demons, Esquivel's style loses out by a far mile. I was tempted to give up after around 10 pages. I'm glad I didnt.

Perhaps what I felt was lacking in terms of structure, organisation and clarity, she makes up for it with emotions and more emotions. I've learnt not to generalize but sometimes, just sometimes, I cant help but feel that women tend to let their emotions do the talking. But then again, I'm pretty sure that for every fault I find in a woman, women will find 5 more in a man. And perhaps, it's safe to say that it's a battle that us men should try to avoid at all cost.

However, Esquivel "spoke" to me through the quote above. I loved it the first time I read it. I think I'm starting to learn to set aside the "flaws" and overflowing emotions of female writers, and appreciate the true meaning behind the veil of words.

Just a thought though: Would the quote above work? What do you think?