{"id":1425,"date":"2016-04-09T03:10:02","date_gmt":"2016-04-09T03:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=1425"},"modified":"2016-04-09T03:10:02","modified_gmt":"2016-04-09T03:10:02","slug":"chennai-smoking-ladies-cafe-cigarettes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=1425","title":{"rendered":"Back Off Chennai, Let a Lady Smoke in Peace"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

O<\/span>n a humid, mosquito-ridden evening in Chennai, Meenakshi offers me a cigarette from a pack of blacks. I wrinkle my nose and call her an elitist. She laughs and calls my preference for lights absurd. We sit at a posh, overpriced caf\u00e9 in Chennai, where we go not for the coffee or the food or the ambience. We come here solely to be able to smoke, free of the judgment and disapproving looks of Chennai peeps.\n\nI met Meenakshi two months ago when she was fighting the rain from her soaked chair and needed another table to sit at. We\u2019ve never known each other, but we struck a kinship exchanging stories of publicly smoking in a conservative city. She and I have squeezed ourselves into flimsy chairs and swallowed our indignation at having to pay \u20b9200 for a cup of coffee. \u20b9200 to enjoy a little guilty pleasure. \u20b9200, the price you pay to smoke a \u20b916 cigarette.\n\nWhen Pakistani actress Mahira Khan, elegantly poised in a white sundress on a slab outside a New York restaurant, was photographed <\/p>sharing a smoke<\/a> with Ranbir Kapoor, sanskaari Twitter went berserk. \u201cHow dare she!\u201d was the common sentiment. Meenakshi and I went berserk for different reasons: \u201cHow did she?\u201d\n\nChennai prides itself on being the city that is in perpetual limbo between tradition and modernity<\/a> \u2013 but it skews in favour of men. Chennai men can curse, fart, and say whatever they want and get away with it. For women, however, the diktat is, \u201cKarpulavala irrakaunum, latchanama irrukanum\u201d (Look beautiful and be a virgin), as an old hag in my family used to put it.\n\nTamil women, in comparison to other metropolises, have had the most problems with dress codes in colleges and writing or talking about sexuality<\/a>. We probably have the loudest, most impassioned TV debates on Western culture ruining \u201cour women.\u201d Benign sexism rules Chennai: We are viewed as delicate creatures that need protection. Not that chauvinism doesn\u2019t exist in other Indian cities, but nowhere else have I felt so bludgeoned by this sense of belonging.\n\n

In Chennai, I am an object, malleable and surrendering \u2013 definitely not the kind of object that smokes.<\/blockquote>\n\nA few weeks ago, I was returning from an awfully long reporting recce at a government hospital, and needed a smoke. Dressed down in \u201cdecent\u201d clothes, my hair in a bun, and without a trace of jewellery or makeup, I stopped at Devi Cool Bar for a pack. I made sure a man wasn\u2019t next to me and whispered my request for \u201cone pack lights with matchbox.\u201d I fully expected the counter guy\u2019s gobsmacked stare.\n\n\u201cFor you or for your friend?\u201d he asked, pointing at a man I didn\u2019t know, hadn\u2019t spoken to, and who had too much gel in his hair.\n\nI played along. \u201cYes.\u201d\n\nHe watched me as I sat on the bench opposite the counter and lit one. His eyes widened. \u201cYour friend?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know who the heck he is,\u201d I said, in clear Tamil, \u201cI just wanted the cigarettes without you asking me a hundred questions.\u201d\n\nHe shuddered when I spoke Tamil. \u201cI thought only North Indian girls smoke? Our good Tamil girls never smoke,\u201d he said, dabbing the sweat on his forehead.\n\n\u201cWell, I\u2019m a bad Tamil girl,\u201d I said.\n\nChennai isn\u2019t the only place where cigarettes are held up as evidence of \u201cpromiscuity\u201d and are \u2013 bizarrely \u2013 used to excuse away rape. The Punjab & Haryana High Court, for instance, cited<\/a> a survivor\u2019s preference for \u201cClassics\u201d to grant bail to her attackers. I can almost hear what must have been going through the judges\u2019 heads as they wrote the judgment: Cigarettes = Must be a slut = Probably not rape.\n\nThis is far more pronounced in Chennai. My Uber driver recently drew the same conclusion. I\u2019d made the awful mistake of stopping at a petty shop in an Uber to pick up cigarettes. Suddenly, my ratings dropped by nine points. I asked another driver about this, whose honesty I really appreciate. \u201cThey think you\u2019re a slut. Don\u2019t try to challenge them like this again. Too much for their brains,\u201d he told me.\n\nAfter this incident, I did a little bit of asking around to understand how exactly men articulate their ideas about women who smoke. These usually range from \u201cbad for women\u2019s health because they are weaker than men,\u201d to \u201ceasy sluts whom you can take to bed but not to your home.\u201d The one that took the prize for me was: \u201cWe don\u2019t like it when women breathe in the fumes from their chullas or woodfire stoves. They have to do it because they have to cook for the family. But here you are, smoking of your own volition. It\u2019s a man\u2019s thing. Know your place. We have saved you with LPG stoves.\u201d Probably the most eloquent sexist friend I\u2019ve had.\n\nBut there is a silver lining to this dire situation. Wherever I go, I make female friends united by a love for the cancer stick. On another assignment in Bilgiriranga, a tribal village on the border of Karnataka, I signalled for a pair of scissors to the woman owner of the hotel. She misunderstood my outstretched fingers for a cigarette, smiled, and promptly offered me a pack, free of charge. I was completely gobsmacked, but I took it and smoked two. The other women from the tribe joined me, to smoke and swap stories.\n\nOne of us told a tribal woman that she was surprised that they smoked. The woman replied, \u201cFor us in Bilgiriranga, it is culture. We love seeing the man\u2019s jaw drop,\u201d she said, letting out a puff.\n\nI hope I can carry that sentiment with me the next time I have to smoke in my home city. It\u2019s a place I still love, for its soul and coffee and the excellent cultural festivals. But I can\u2019t stand the death stare I get every time I light up. The lung cancer will be mine alone \u2013 so back off a little, won\u2019t you, Chennai?\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Chennai, I have to pay 200 rupees at a posh caf\u00e9, every time I want to smoke a 16-rupee cigarette. Not that chauvinism doesn\u2019t exist in other Indian cities, but it is especially pronounced in my home city.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":167,"featured_media":1426,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[2456,37,2457,2458,2459,19,2460,2461,2462,572,962,735,2463],"class_list":["post-1425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pov","tag-cafe","tag-chennai","tag-chennai-smoking","tag-cigarettes","tag-female-smokers","tag-india","tag-ladies","tag-restaurant-policies","tag-restaurants","tag-smoking","tag-tamil-nadu","tag-women","tag-women-smoking"],"yoast_head":"\nBack Off Chennai, Let a Lady Smoke in Peace<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In Chennai, I have to pay 200 rupees at a posh caf\u00e9, every time I want to smoke a 16-rupee cigarette. 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