The much-anticipated premiere of Season 5 of The L Word, for which we were teased by two scintillating trailers, was utterly underwhelming. The opening was nothing like that of the previous season, which left me hanging for each and every episode. Part of the problem was that Season 4 ended on a flat note, with not many cliff-hangers or teasers. There wasn’t much the writers could pick up on, and expand further.

Warning: Spoiler Alert. Do not read further if you do not want spoilers!

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Sayoni: The L Word Season 4 Review Part 1, Part 2 and Best of the Season

The episode opened with Helena in prison, for having stole Katherine’s money at the end of last season. Who is Katherine? Just a little rich bitch who Helena hooked up with after being financially cut off by her mummy dearest. She won’t tell her friends where the money is – like that is going to help with not eating the horrible, torturous, prison food she can’t even swallow.

Thats not the only torturous thing on the show: The writers have decided to continue torturing us with Bette and Tina, with that sexy, topless-and-floating-on-the-pool scene. Tina is still hung up on Bette, and can’t seem to take her eyes off her even in a crowd of hot lesbians. Bette and Jodi are still in love, still fighting a lot in a way that proves how incompatible they are, and having completely boring make-up sex. How does anyone make a BDSM scene like that so utterly unsexy? Though this is supposed to be a compelling love triangle, I have a feeling I know exactly what is going to happen.

Jodi and Bette are utterly unsexy, but Alice and Tasha make up for it. Tasha magically came back after being deported off to Iraq, after an entire episode of Alice moping about watching rallies on TV. They are still as cute as ever, and this is one couple I hope will stay together forever. And probably will, as soon as Tasha quits her job, or the US Army changes their Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell policy [I think we all know which one will happen first]. According to Lesbiatopia, Tasha is going to be charged with homosexual conduct this season. The L Word tries very hard to address social issues, and explore discrimination in every season – most of the attempts fall flat or are direly miswritten. So I hope they do this one right. After all, it might be their final season.

Speaking of final seasons, Season 4 was supposed to be Max’s final one. But he/she is still on the show. Don’t ask me why – if it were upto me, I would have fired Max after season 3 and hired Dani Campbell instead. At the very least, she looks better. And I hope she acts better too, because Daniela Sea puts wooden-face Ben Affleck to shame. I acknowledge that transsexual issues need to be addressed, and I can see that they are trying… but did they not do a casting call before Daniela was cast? Or was she the sole applicant?

Phyllis Kroll feels the same way I do about sole applicants, apparently – don’t take the first and only one who comes your way. She is thinking of “playing the field”, though she is having earth-shattering sex with Joyce Wischnia. Why do I get the feeling when Joyce finds out, she’s going to sue for conversion or breach of constructive trust, having paid for the “coming-out” party she threw Phyllis?

Talking about breach of trust, Shane pulls a major one this season. At the end of last season, we saw Shane and Paige wanting to move in. They are searching for a house now, and in a most typically Shane way, she fucks the real estate agent IN the house they were going to rent, and to add insult to injury, in the room Gerard was supposed to have – and Paige walks in on them doing it, when about to show her son his room. Seriously, how does anyone, even the ones with no conscience, do that? If she really wanted to have sex, couldn’t she at least wait a few hours and get a budget hotel room miles away, and lock the door securely? She does get her comeuppance though – because in the supposedly most dramatic moment of the show, someone burns her Wax parlour down. I felt absolutely no sympathy for Shane, because, there is only so long someone can go around acting like a 17-year old boy and getting away with it. I am so over 4 seasons of Shane sleeping around – it was novel at first, but now it is just boring.

And she is not the only person I’m completely over – Jenny is back and doing a perfect Paris Hilton with her newfound wealth and fame. Though how the writers turned her drifting out to sea into a “cruise”, is quite beyond me. In season 3, Jenny accused Max of becoming a monster – seems like the monster decided to hop out of Max’s body and inhabit Jenny’s. If she were any more annoying and bitchy, I’d have to punch something. And it seems she is going to be directing Lez Girls – how someone with absolutely no filming experience is supposed to direct a movie is beyond me, but of course, it is explained away by the fact that a rich old man with a thing for Jenny is taking over the financing of the films. I couldn’t be in more sympathy of Tina, who has to deal with Jenny’s over-inflated ego. Though I absolutely loathe the current Jenny – as if I ever liked Jenny in the first place, I have to say her turn-around into Miss Bitch is completely realistic. Jenny has no EQ, lives in her own world, and was probably Carrie at her high school prom, minus the pig’s blood. So the minute she got power, she abused it indiscriminately, even on her friends. Someone predicted that Shane and Jenny were going to get together – thought I don’t see the chemistry between them, I am devoutly wishing that they do, because the two of them deserve each other.

All in all, the entire episode failed my expectations grossly – if I were not a dedicated fan, I would not even bother to watch the rest of the season. But I am, hence I stick through to the painful end, in the hopes and prayers that it gets better.

Today, immediately after church, kai and i had the honor of being escorted from the overflow room to a windowless tiny ‘prayer and healing room’ by a lady usher. When i said escorted, i meant the lady usher was holding on firmly to kai and I. Pastor Matthew wanted a word with us. The well-furnished room was empty, but for the lady usher, the pastor and us.

He stood before us in a formal suit, his body tall and broad, between us and the door. The lady usher on his right, quiet and petite.

‘Hi, i am Pastor Matthew. I suppose the two of you are new?’ He shook Kai’s hand.
‘No, i am not new.’ I answered.
‘How long?’
‘I have been attending this church since 1999.’ I replied. ‘I know you, Pastor Matthew. You have been a pastor ever since i stepped in.’
‘How long have you been saved?’
‘I have been a Christian since the age of 5.’

Pastor Matthew asked me of Kai, ‘Is she a girl?’
I raised my eyebrows, ‘Is that not apparent? I am a girl too. We are both girls.’

I needed to go to the washroom since before the end of service. But held out till the end of service. So you can imagine me having a high tide. Thought i could go to the washroom first. But he stopped me. Two seconds, he said. Two seconds sounds short. Okay. I held my bladder for longer.

He mentioned our behavior i.e. leaning on shoulders and holding hands. He asked, ‘Are the two of you in a relationship?’ He elaborated- people were observing us and we are causing others to stumble through our display of affections.

I gave him a look of bewilderment, ‘How are we causing people to stumble?’ A male usher outside shut the door of our room.

 

 

Coming out – Step 1: To myself.

Ok, that was the easiest step.
As easy as rain falling from the sky. Didn’t have an umbrella, and even if I had one, I’m not sure I would have pulled it out.

Tomboy from 2 to say.. 17. Two older brothers, a sister who’s 4 years younger. A kid’s got to play, and I didn’t want to be left apart, so I was the goalkeeper of all the improvised football (soccer) games in the backyard. Loved being with boys. Girls annoyed me: I always looked hyper-energetic with girls around, when I could easily blend in with boys – well at least as long as my body didn’t get his feminine bells ringing yet. Boys were fun, athletic, I had a blast being with boys when I was a kid, loved to argue with them, sometimes fight, play, run around, or just sit around reading or doing nothing. Pretty hard to hang out with boys in a Muslim country, when you have 2 older brothers. But well, when I was a kid, I guess they believed it was cool, and innocent. Matter of fact, it was, so everybody was happy about it.

High school, still tomboy-ish. Felt in love with hip-hop, that certainly didn’t help my girly side to come out, but love doesn’t care about what people say, my wardrobe was packed with baggy jeans, Timberland boots, Nike Air Force Ones and hoodies, while my eardrums couldn't find enough time to listen to all the records I was piling up in my room. Wearing large clothes does help with the entering into the boys club. I was dressed like a boy, almost talked like one, and beside my “BFF”, avoided as much as possible the girls in my class, in the school yard, during gym classes… If I had to pick a gym mate or a physics class mate, it had to be a boy. No boring giggling about boys, no boring never ending talks about make up or clothes, but instead, music, action movies, how girls can be stupid and of course my favorite of all time talks with boys back then: football.