Seven things I abhor

Thanks to Sachin for tagging me, and rousing me out of my lethargy! At first, 'abhor' seemed too strong a word, but then these are the things which put my back up, and leave me fuming, so here goes:

1. *Acrobats* on the road, i.e., those who *jump* the red light. Especially Delhiites---they seem to be on a personal mission to score the maximum number of red lights jumped. How pleased they look after achieving this task---what a feather in their cap! Of course, the poor Neanderthals just can’t understand why they should stop at a red light if there is no traffic coming from the other side. Figures. When they have no qualms about dashing through when there IS traffic from the other side, why on earth would they stop when there isn’t any? In their own words, “Pagal kutte ne kaata hai?” (Literal translation: Has a mad dog bitten me?) So the tendency of anyone approaching a green light is to speed up because otherwise the other guy will jump his red gleefully, thus becoming King of the Road! When it is green for them, and the other guy jumps his red light, they shower him with the choicest expletives! Which brings me to the next—
2. Swearing/Foul Language: Why? There was a time, when those who used foul language were looked down upon as not having been well brought up. Any “bad word” used was promptly checked. Certain things were not mentioned in “mixed company”. I might sound Victorian, but actually, it is plain good manners---it just means taking care not to offend the sensibilities of others. I am all for the “washing out the offender’s mouth with soap” routine—be it child or adult! On the one hand we are getting more and more politically correct, we celebrate Valentine’s Day, Friendship Day and Rose day (which are basically about making the other person feel special), yet we are getting ruder and ruder! Nowadays, it is part of “kewl” and the new “attitude”. It seems to also be 21st century women’s lib, for women to swear equally hard, and for men to swear in the presence of women. Maybe women have started swearing so that men don’t use swearing in their presence as a tool of intimidation!
3. The word attitude, used to rhyme with and to mean “rude”, and strangely, a person with attitude is admired. Arrogance, vanity have transformed into attitude. Everybody would like to have it, also enjoy watching somebody else receive it, but if they themselves are at the receiving end, they say, “Don’t give ME attitude” (meaning, I have enuff of my own already, ha!)
4. Overenthusiastic Hosts: They genuinely believe they are good. They offer you something. You politely refuse. They say, “Aise kaise?” (How can this be?) and plop a whole helping onto your plate. You might not have found it tasty and have been too polite to say so! Worse, when you are on a diet (who isn’t at some point of time or the other?) and you tell them so, you are met with what amounts to jeers, and fed-up sounding exhortations to forget about your diet this once. Do they really not realize that you are already struggling against temptation, and they would be doing you a favour by not insisting? Of course, you can get away with saying that you are on a special fast. Nobody argues with religion, you see!
5. The perceived pressure on youngsters to have boyfriends/girlfriends, to try smoking, alcohol, drugs. Poor things. Peer pressure is blamed for all this. Yet there is also a positive peer pressure---to perform well in academics and extra curricular activities and to take up social work. More Power to that!
6. Repetitive dialogues in films and serials. “Main yeh nahin kar sakta! Nahin kar sakta yeh main!” Translated into English, it sounds hilarious. It doesn’t even qualify as “active voice to passive”, otherwise it could be condoned as an exercise in grammar. A similar thing is to say something in English, and then immediately repeat it in Hindi. “Where were you? Kahan thhe tum?”
7. Those who are patronizing about housewives. There is no need for a “defence” of housewives here (though the topic merits a post to itself!); it’s enough to say that such people are plain silly! Recently I realized that for all that they are “free”, housewives just can’t up and go somewhere, not even for a good cause, whereas working people can! Strange but true.

All of you can consider yourselves tagged, and please let me know when you write your lists!