1. You were my first friend outside of my family. Shiny long blonde hair… oh wait…no… your hair was black. I did my hair everyday just like you, hair pins and all. But I so wished that you were blonde, like my cousin’s brand new friend.

2. I would often find you in the garden, sitting by yourself. I assumed that you were very rich because you always had a table full of cakes, sandwiches and croissants. Heck, you even had the whole kitchen shelf in the garden. Mom photographed this moment.

3. I thought you were different because you were darker. Your hair must have been a wig since it didn’t look like anyone around me. Somehow, you would always end up alone in a corner, whenever we hung out with friends. Someone called you blacky and I learned to call you that too. I am so very deeply sorry.

4. My very first crush! Well, maybe after Fedrick, but I really thought you were the man of my dreams. My very own synthetic god, who had just walked out of a magazine. If only you could see me the way you looked at Barbara. At least you let me practise my kisses with you.

5. Whenever I visited Miku’s house, I would find myself admiring your thick blood orange hair. You would hide behind the glass door and greet everyone like a self-prisoned, folklorian mermaid. I never understood why I was not allowed to play with you. I have resented mom for this, for the past 25 years.

6. The only swimsuits that I ever knew of, were full sleeved, close necked and knee length. But you wore a sexy red one piece like those Baywatch girls, unabashedly, every single day. Just this very act made me feel like you were a revolution of some kind. I examined your buttcheeks without getting in trouble.

7. Tanmay has always envied me for having so many friends. He even had the audacity to admit it to my face when he saw us together in my study room. So while we were napping, he slathered oil paints all over your legs. I cried hysterically because I felt the sharp sting that you felt, when his mom rubbed alcohol to get the paint off of your legs. I have stayed away from that vicious villain ever since.

8. I never knew that a person so young could wear a saree, a bindi and bangles to playdates. I thought only mommies and grandmas who stayed at home dressed like that. You wore your culture with pride. I wasn’t too keen on being close friends with you, only to regret it now that I look back. I should have put you up on a pedestal the very first time that we met.

 

 

      - Barbie doll collection 1995