2. Contraception Confusion

At the get-together on friday night at " N Grill " restaurant, Jia and her friends decided to probe into the various methods of birth control each of them had adopted. It all started when they were having dinner and Preety's phone alarm went off. When asked if it was her cue to go to sleep, she answered that it was a reminder for her to take her pills she had recently started on. Mohini suggested that it was not a good idea, saying her husband is a doctor and he gave a no-no to pills. When Preety said the pills were giving her acne, weight gain and mood swings and asked for a better contraceptive method, everyone looked around the room and realised each of them had their own different coping strategies to this contraception issue. Pooja and her boyfriend it seems use the pulling-out method. But dosent that have a high failure rate, especially if the guy cant control himself? What if he's stressed that day or the girl is really sexy? How would this work??? But when Pooja suggested condoms, Preety said it gave her pain and that she has to use a numbing ointment with the condom everytime. Hmmm isnt that why lubricated condoms exist? Or isnt that good enough a solution? Jia suggested the use of gynaecologists recommended Xylocaine 2% gel to numb the pain; and a water based lubricant called K-Y jelly for easier penetration. Injection shots were suggested that would keep conception at bay for 3 months or so. Nina said she took the 'morning after pill' and still got pregnant(she has a baby to testify it...ahem). The copper T Intra Uterine insert apparently was voted a popular choice, though Mohini noted that her aunt got pregnant and delivered a baby even inspite of it... she apparently fell in the 1% failure rate category. And like any contraceptive, it has its side effects. Abstinence would lead to frustration and extra marital affairs. While counting the menstrual cycles and avoiding the central week is a good precautionary method to practice contraception, (though it works only for those women having regular periods), the irony of it all?.....The exact opposite of that calculation is used for calculating ovulation dates and getting pregnant! It amused Jia's mind how all through college people try so hard to avoid getting pregnant and when people finally feel its time to have babies, its like a marathon mind boggling mathematical formula....Yikes. While everyone rambled on about diaphragms , tubectomies, spermicidal creams and.......Mohini shut everyone's mouth with the final statement "The husbands can just go in for a vasectomy"!

1. Hug me - not!

So this afternoon when Raj came to " Beans " Coffee and Hookah place to meet Jia, she was faced with a queer dilemma. Upon habit, she would give him a hug as a manner of greeting. {her hugging code:
-A casual hug if it was not a close friend.
-A warm brief hug if it was a friend whom she saw everyday (just another version of saying "Hi").
-A nice tight hug if it was a good friend whom she saw after a long while.}
Now in Hyderabad, some people seem to feel awkward about hugging. Either they dont expect it, but gracefully respond when you initiate a hug; and some others who are used to it it, will respond naturally. But Jia would definitely come across the kind who stand uncomfortably like a rock where it's just her hugging them ; and while she's pulling off from it, she'd wish she were dead rather than face the after embarassment of it.
So when she saw Raj, the knowledge that they were friends prompted her to give him a hug upon his arrival at her house. Then her brain went through a whirlwind of anxious thoughts:
What if he isnt the hugging kind and finds it awkward?
Worse, she remembered Mohini's hubby's words to Mohini - "I dont like you hugging guys.   Even a friendly hug.  Period.  I dont understand why people need to hug at all in the first place".(Raj was married, so maybe he held the same opinion regarding women?)
And the kicker - Jia's friend Jeev told her once that she would never hug a guy cause she could never imagine her b**bs coming in contact with any other guy's chest except the man that she would marry!! Now this brought a totally new angle to her way of looking at plain ol' happy friends hugging.
So her head went like , "Is that what runs in a guy's mind when he hugs? Does he rate your b**bs on a scale of 1 to 5 or so? Damn." Fearing the fate of hers, and not wanting to go through the pressure of racking the rust in her brain for the sake of whether or not she should go through with a 'Hi there hug', she simply chose to just say 'hey' from a distance and protect herself from the potential life threat a hug may have caused.