third clique

‘That Girl’ collapsed under Indian moms, 9-to-5 jobs, and the unmatched power of homemade chai

‘That girl’ aesthetic was all the rage at one point. She woke up at 5 am, drank her morning matcha, followed her 12-step skincare routine, and then went for her Pilates session. They were all pieces of a big puzzle that supposedly led to fixing every part of your personality. ‘That girl’ sold an aspirational lifestyle that was extremely aesthetic. Although it had a sensational start, the trend has faced a lot of criticism, and reality checks recently, all for good reasons.

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In all fairness, the aesthetically pleasing trend did not stand a chance in Indian households. Indian moms have already mastered the art of waking up at 5 am, but not to drink lemon water, it is to make chai and tiffin boxes. “You will not benefit from eating all of this, it’s better to have vegetables and chapati, was my mom’s response when I was on the final plating stage of my avocado toast. I completely lost it when my dad looked at my fancy detox drink and casually called it lemon water,” says Anika Jain, a 22-year-old textile designer in Delhi.

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The trend was marketed as a lifestyle change but existed more on the gram than in real life. “One day, I spent 15 minutes arrangingmy breakfast just to take a ‘perfect’ picture. By the time I finally ate it, it was cold, that was my wake-up call. I realised I was putting in all this effort for some imaginary internet approval, while my real life was just passing by,” admits Jain.

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Hats off to you if you ever tried to keep up with the aesthetic while juggling a 9-to-5 job. “With full vigour, I set my alarm, laid out my workout clothes the night before, and even made a grocery list full of healthy things I had never eaten before. Day one, I woke up on time, did some yoga and made a smoothie. But by lunchtime, I was already struggling to stay awake at work. I had a headache, and my senior casually dumped extra work on me. By the time I gothome, I had zero energy to ‘romanticize my night routine’, I just passed out on the bed,” says Nikita Gupta, 31, Chartered Accountant at R&J Associates, Surat, Gujarat. “Now, I wake up at a time that makes sense for my job. I drink my chai without guilt, I eat normal Indian food instead of forcing myself to like fancy bowls”adds Gupta.