Ritu Sarin, now a mother of two teenage girls, was once herself a lanky, unkempt tween. And by her own admission, a tomboy to the core. “I was a tomboy if ever there was one. I dressed up like a boy and had short hair and was always getting into trouble for using inappropriate language,” she recalls. “Now, when I see my daughters growing up and trying to behave like tomboys, I go back to my past. It’s a past I look back fondly on. At that time, all I wanted to be was a tomboy. Nothing seemed more important and more fun,” she adds.

Similar stories can be heard from scores of young women and 40-something ladies in the city. While some say they became tomboys to defy tradition and appear rebellious, to others it came more naturally and was like second nature. “In my family, which is very traditional, girls were always relegated to the sidelines. They came second, in everything and every aspect of life. So, I had to do something about it and becoming a tomboy was the easiest way of showing my dissent,” says Kusum Pathak, now a housewife but a very outspoken tomboy during her teenage years. For a lot of young women, growing up can be a time of extreme trials and hence, getting into rebel mode can give much needed respite.

However, for a few, this phase of life is something which comes naturally to them and there are no assertive undertones to the same. For Ashima Negi, a civil services aspirant, growing up in a family of noisy, brash brothers ensured that she too grew into a tomboy, without really wishing to be one. “It came so naturally, since all the time, I would be imitating their way of talking and their way of doing things. I didn’t have to ‘try’ and become a tomboy, consciously. It was all quite innate,” says Negi.

Peer pressure, too, is instrumental in getting some lasting converts to any cause and in the case of tomboys as well, it’s no different. “All my friends dressed in a certain way and talked in a particular manner. Since we hung out together most of the time, I had to ‘fit in’, and that’s how a bashful me metamorphosed into a gregarious tomboy. It took me a lot of time, and another set of friends, this time in college, to get over the entire phase. But it’s something I recall with a mixture of mild surprise and affection,” avers Meeta Sharma, a 30-something software professional.