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Ernő Rubik, the inventor of the prototype of the Rubik’s cube was born on this very day, July 13th, 1944 in Budapest, Hungary.
A simple request and promised surprise. Varun knew quite well that Shalini was game. “Try to solve this. Each face must have only one colour. You are not allowed to look at how-to videos rampant all over the internet.”
The six-faced puzzle bubbled feelings of desperation and anger in her. She could gather only two out of those six colours. Her prior attempts did no justice. This was no easy task. There had to be a secret trick to it.
Exasperated and exhausted, she kept it aside and went to grab a cup of coffee. But, her mind felt no comfort. The colours kept reeling inside. Red, white and blue arranged adjacently clockwise. The “plus yellow” logic resulted in the corresponding opposites orange, yellow and green. The colour theory classes from years ago tugged her towards a long unvisited memory.
Motherhood had been an easy escape for her. She was to pursue her PhD but pregnancy was exhausting. She buried her dreams, quit her career and focused on raising her baby. Varun had always been supportive and appreciative. He had urged on rekindling her passion but she acted a coward. She was scared her ingenuity had fizzled out. Her courage bled in the attempts to forbid her from retrospecting her self-worth. The thought of grovelling beside younger, brighter talent terrified her. She was scared to be left behind; just another artist among scores of others. Afraid to face her insecurities, she hid behind the blanket of societal values. She blamed society but also knew it was a deviant façade to not face reality.
The feel of fresh taut canvas and soft bristles, the smell of turpentine and linseed oil, overalls shaded in every hue and tint of colour there exists; the hours cooped up inside the studio, working out ways to bring an empty canvas to life. The freedom to express, the vibrancy and audacity to bring about change, all conveyed through art; hidden truths in layers of paint and gloss.
Yes, she missed painting! It was a part of her soul. A part neglected and caged deep within. She had restricted her individuality, diluted her voice, chained herself to the views of the society; an absolute moron to quit something she loved so dearly.
It was time to mould a new version of the old Shalini. One who paints emotions colourful and deep. Her spirits surged as she heaved a sigh of relief. She decided to re-adopt expression through art, her much-needed healing.
A unique art piece ideated in her head. These six strayed people towards reminiscing the colours of the Gay Pride Flag aka the Rainbow Flag. The colours reflecting diversity. As Artie Bressan had rightfully deemed it, “the dawn of a new gay consciousness and freedom.” They had assigned values. Red for life, orange for healing, yellow for sunlight, green for nature, indigo for serenity and violet for spirit. The inverted rainbow.
Shalini sat down with her cup of coffee and messaged her friends, asking them to associate their emotions with the colours of the magic cube. Several responses and couple of rejects later, the collective resulted in red for passion, white for uncertainty, blue for calm, orange for innocence, yellow for happiness and green for lively.
The ideals of the public and the LGBTQ community matched in extremes. This was no coincidence. Homophobia was in no state to promote gender labels. They protested, “It is an abnormality. They are an abomination. It is against the rule of the universe.” If we are in such stark contrasts, then the possibility of expressing the same emotions would be a far-flung idea. But, the results proved that any man, irrespective of his sexual preference portrays the same emotions.
Then what exactly is different?
It is the ability to love and to express, transcending boundaries. We all are human. No other labels can define us.
Varun arrived home to a lovely hand-painted wall hanging. It was a Rubik’s Cube. But it had all the colours of the rainbow mismatched. Man is a collab of emotions and no amount of boundary can restrict his individuality. Every man’s a free bird. An art piece dedicated entirely to Ernő Rubik, for it was his Rubik’s cube that had inspired Shalini to take a step towards self-growth and enrichment.
Image source: YouTube
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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