Slumdogs (but not all of them are bad)

I am using today's blog to throughly recommend a book: Slumdog Millionaire. Yes, yes, I know, you've all seen the film and whatever ( and if so, I hope you hate the 'remix' of Jai-Ho as much as I do, but please don't get me started...). But the book is very different. OK, given, it's got the same premise- boy from the slums knows the answers to a TV quiz show and wins a lot of money. Except in the book it's a billion not a million, he's not telling the story to a policeman but to his lawyer and... well, any more and I'll have to declare spoiler alert, so you'll just have to read it for yourself. What I kept thinking was, why didn't they film the book as it was? I guess the film has a lot more 'drama' and there was plenty of drama in the book, imho. I guess the structure may also be a bit confusing and the film straightened it out. None of this, however, distracts from the merit of the book or the film in itself, you just have to take it, as with many good films, as a good film in itself rather than a true adaption of the book. Give it a try!

As for my own rag-tag bunch of Slumdogs (they would kill me if they ever found out I wrote that), I will never be able to understand teenagers. One week they're best buds, the next... were we ever like that?! Of course not... ;). But for some of them, I think it's good. They're the ones who suddenly, out of the glare of peer pressure, want to do badges, or go on trips or, heaven forbid, follow their dreams. The ones which you know it's just a phrase and they'll snap of it soon, once the hormones calm down and the exams set in, and they understand boys aren't just for sucking face but also have brains too, you know. In other words... the ones just like me. Looking back, I remember being like that, not so long ago- the fear of being the 'uncool' one, the one left behind. I still get it, sometimes. But when it came to the crutch, I was a silly little girl who grew up and they were, underneath it all, still bitches. My girls are just the same. You want to say this to them, that this too shall past and it will all work out in the end, but they need to find it out for themselves. And just remeber, like Maria Mena says:
"Think all the mean girls/who pulled your hair/are pregnant now/and barefoot... and all this time you have had it in you, you sometimes need a push..."

A song for my girls, I think... but for all of us, too.

Because we're all Millionaires, even the Slumdogs.