My World

The Big Change

2011-04-14T10:21:00.000+05:30

For the world population that is not following up with my super-fast changing life, I am now married! Yes, went through all of the traditional arranged marriage routine.

Past few months… So much has happened!

Numerous heavy bull fights with parents when the tabooed topic of marriage was initiated; mom’s strong persuasion; crying out to friends on how painful and irritating the discussions were; Progress in career and hectic stressful 16 hour working days in office; Finally mom’s victory in finding ‘The Guy’ for me and days of convincing me to get married; my first retaliation to the very idea of marriage; Dad’s pitching in on the project of convincing me for marriage; my first embarrassed gtalk chat with Him at 12 in the night; our first few hesitant and awkward talks over the phone; our first meet in McDs’ in Velachery; His first gift of a Fasttrack watch; nice McDs' Burgers and ice tea :P; Both of us nodding a ‘Qabool’ to “Us”; Our Engagement; His visits to Chennai and mine to Blore; Wedding plans n shopping; More and more office work in the peak; Kadalai with fiancé; More Shopping; Advices from every Tom Dick and Harry; More work; Driving in Chennai heat and increasing traffic due to Chennai Metro; More kadalai; More and more unending shopping… and it went on till the end on my bachelorette life!

The marriage itself was a blur. Lots of people telling me when to do what, what to do how, how to do why, why… there was almost never an answer to that other than – “That’s the tradition, and it has to be done that way. End of discussion.” I was specifically instructed to bundle up my rationality and logic thinking and throw it away until the marriage got over. Rule number 1 was DO NOT ASK QUESTIONS.

Though a lot of people came to the wedding and told me that the food was great, I was hardly able to have a bit of it. Loads of controversies; several rituals – both meaningful and meaningless; many Saree changes; numerous pics – by professional photographer and relatives/friends; now and then pampering :P; parlour ladies and their resolution to make me look unrecognizable; Flowers everywhere; And Jewels too; Hymns, Chants and Holy Fire; Buzz in my ears; People colorfully dressed, running around; Total chaos and noise; People saying “Aww she looks so beautiful” though I felt that I looked like a stuffed goat with Jewels and flowers; Continuous ‘Cheese’ and ThanQs in the reception for full 3 hours… Sigh!

These are all I remember! The rest of the picture, I got only from the photos!

It all blew so fast, with hardly any time to stand aside and breathe. After a week in Andaman (yeah, nice break, but not planning to elaborate on that :P), here I am in Bangalore, settling down - back to eating eggs, going on facebook and GMail as and when I want, blogging, sitting in a silent office that the Bangalore branch is (dead-silent when compared to the Chennai office, which is much more friendlier, casual and noisier), wearing sober cotton kurtis, watching Dexter and House, driving my pep+ (which was taken away from me in the month before marriage for ‘my safety’), eating corn flakes, sight-adichufying good looking guys in Bangalore (;D)… slowly settling down…

The Challenge

2010-10-03T16:05:00.000+05:30

I woke up on Saturday morning to find out that there was a ticket to the second day second show of Enthiran. The movie unexpectedly turned out to be pretty good. The theatre was about 45 min from my place and considering the traffic on mount road n all, I was looking at an easy 1 hour drive. But I was not really worried about it. I love driving! So there I was, returning home after the show, and you know my driving skills, when I was challenged.

I wouldn’t have crossed a few of blocks from the theatre when a couple of guys driving a bike stopped right next to me in a traffic signal, right behind a huge truck. The signal turned green but without the truck moving, neither of us could move. I, not usually a patient driver, sneaked through the side making the car coming in the side brake and honk like crazy, but hey, I was gone by then. But I guess this impressed the guys.

I saw them watching me while I cruised through the continuous vehicles with speed and smartness and in the next signal, they again stopped right next to me. Though I was doing my best to ignore them, it was hard to do so when a couple of smart looking guys standing next to you are staring at you. So I looked back to see what the hell were they starting at (hoping it wasn’t me).

The green signal turned on and the cars in front of us rolled, and the guy in front gave me a look that screamed out “Go on, let’s see who is better!” Right then, I heard Ross Geller’s voice saying “Challenge extended.” and I accelerated, overtaking the car and them, which I think they heard in Ross Geller’s voice as “Challenge accepted.”

So there we were, driving in and out, overtaking as many vehicles as possible like crazy people all through the Mount Road, both of us enjoying the little competition, when it suddenly struck me that these guys were total strangers and I was almost nearing my place and I definitely didn’t want them to stalk me forever! So then I tried to slow down and let them go ahead, but they just wouldn’t! They slowed down too, and in the middle of the road with vehicles at high speed right behind them, they both (including the guy driving) started turning their heads and searching for me. It was so creepy (but in a weird sort of way, flattering too :P).

So after some time of this hide-n-seek of me slowing and hiding and them slowing down and seeking me out and me eventually catching up with them, I found a perfect way to outsmart them. As I was nearing Kathipara flyover, I slowed down and stuck to the right side so that I could climb the flyover. FYI, people who need to go towards the airport do not climb the flyover, they go left. So these guys, just a few vehicles ahead of me, turned back and saw me trying to climb the flyover and decided to extend their chase and took the flyover. When it was my turn, I took a sudden left (making the car behind honk like mad for which I was really sorry), and went down the flyover. These guys got a shock and applied sudden brakes, but they knew just as I knew, that the flyover was a one-way and it would take them more than 20-25 minutes to come back to the same place by when I would have safely gone. They knew they were outsmarted. So they started their engines, waved a goodbye, while I shook my head, laughed out at the ordeal and came back home!

What an adventure!

The Long Process

2010-09-02T22:14:00.000+05:30

The worst time to run out of petrol in your two-wheeler, esp the one where the petrol tank inlet is below the seat, is in the morning, when there is a heavy downpour and when you are already late to work, when you are wearing multiple layers of rain proof clothing to protect your office laptop and your clothes so that you wouldn’t look wet, filthy and stupid in a monthly meeting with your superiors.

But when Murphy strikes with his world class law, there is simply nothing you can really do but brood and swear under your breath and well, fill petrol!

Now here is the process it goes through. While standing in the queue, first the helmet has to be opened and removed as the raincoat’s hood is stuck under it. Then the raincoat’s hood is untied, and the raincoat is unzipped and removed. Then the bag is removed, unzipped and the purse, which is placed inside a plastic cover (for water protection in case there is leak into the bag), is taken out from the cover. To avoid the other contents and the bag itself from getting wet, they are again zipped and hung back on the shoulder, and the raincoat is worn again. Then you get up, open the seat, and fill in the petrol, by when the wet helmet slips at least thrice.

You pay the guy, move forward, close the lid of the tank and the seat, and again the raincoat is unzipped and removed. The bag is removed, unzipped and the purse is placed back into the plastic cover and safely tugged in, then the bag is zipped back and hung on the shoulder, the raincoat is worn again, zipped, the rain coat hood is worn in the head and tied tightly, then the helmet (finally) is placed back on the head and finally, you get to sit back and drive away!

Phew!

6117

2010-08-08T16:22:00.000+05:30

I was driving back home at around 8 pm a few days back, in fact to be exact, on 31st July, after a really long tiring Saturday, with lots of multi tasked work and weekday-pressure-spilt-over-weekend. Work that should have taken ten minutes took half an hour, work that should have started was not even remotely close to starting and work that was planned to have been completed was nowhere near the end.

Above all these, I was damn sleepy!

About my current sleep pattern -

The more I sleep, the sleepier I feel.

The less I sleep, the sleepier I feel!

I ALWAYS FEEL SLEEPY!

So there I was on my pep, trying to safely-drive-rashly (yes, I find rash fast driving very soothing, but I tend to drive cautiously all the same, n hence I call it a safe-rash-drive), when I saw something that made me smile.

I have this habit of looking at the cars, if a really royal cool looking car, look at the driver (it is my belief that the coolest of cars mostly get horrible looking drivers) and any vehicle, look at the license plate to check out the numbers and their pattern.

So back to my story, I saw a really cool Honda City, in royal red color. But I did not even go to look at the driver, coz I was too busy staring at the license plate. It was 6117.

6117…

That was my first year’s room number. 6th block, ground floor room no 17. 6117.

It brought an instant smile on my face, and brought back a series of memory flashes. I had shared the room with a Delhiite, who hated South Indians, esp. Tamilians.

We hardy used to talk to one another, since both of us were a part of totally different worlds and had complete different attitudes and absolutely no roads crossing each other’s paths. But surprisingly, we kind of got along pretty decently.

I was thinking of all these things when an Innova crossed my track, with the number plate 6320, my third year room!! Boy, would you call that a titanic coincidence or what?

6th block second floor room no 20. That was the best year, my third year.

Filled with hopes of future and beliefs in present and loads of extracurricular activities and positions and fun in labs, lots n lots of friends and what not!

I just can’t remember the last stretch of my drive home. I was drowned my pensieve filled with memories of my past, my insides happy and sad at the same time.

I am afraid I might never, you know, be there, ever again.

Last July 31, our ID cards expired and we officially became the BITS Alumni. This July 31, it was like the world was reminding me about my one year of having been a part of BITS Alumni.

I was truly overwhelmed and came back home and watched a couple of college videos. I truly felt like back in Summer of 2004. :)

Yelagiri Part II

2010-06-11T22:59:00.003+05:30

Do you know that climbing down hill is exponentially more difficult than climbing up? Yeah.. we had heard about it too, but got to experience it in Yelagiri.

At least on our up-way, we were able to control out movements and the thorny bushes. While climbing down, the thorns were as much of a problem as the gravity! And the place was becoming cloudy and dark so fast, and the guide kept taunting us by barking like a wolf or a bear now and then when She, the meek docile female, immediately clung on Her who in turn held to Her-Bf for her life. It was hilarious when the guide hid behind the rocks and I went a little ahead on the path. They followed me, trying to wrench their way out of some bushes, when the Guide jumped out of the rocks on them barking and freaked them all totally! She was nearly going to have a heart failure! :D We all reached the resort, laughing big time about it.

We were back just in time for dinner, all feeling so great about our achievement, and planned for a night safari in the jungles too. But sadly it started raining so heavily, that we could go, as the resort owners said that there would be too many poisonous snakes prowling and the forest was not exactly a neatly paved tar road with neon lights, and they were bound to be extremely slippery. So we didn’t really want a snake hanging on our framed-photos instead of flowers and just went back to our rooms and slept soundly.

The next morning was one big comedy. Before I go on with that, there is a side track you should know.

Yelagiri is the name of the entire mountain as such, which includes a number of villages (basically just a few houses put together) once every few kilometers. Our resort was in Athanavur, the biggest ‘town-with-an-ATM’, with a single road with about ten or so shops here and there, and the rest of the buildings were other resorts. So the previous day, we decided to go cycling in the mountain side in the early morning, in the cool breeze. Aaah, it all sounded so good… But trust me, BAD IDEA!

We had gone to one of the other resorts- Yathri Nivas, and booked three cycles for rent at 30 bucks/hour/cycle (She couldn’t ride, so we all took turns in taking her doubles). We picked up the cycles at 8 in the morning, with the idea of returning it by 9. Horrible planning!

It was awesome fun while riding downhill. The cycles were completely out of control, moving at like a 100 km/hr (or so it felt) and there were 2 hairpin bends too, where gravity overtook our breaks and even I started praying (funny, when science and rationality lets us down, the only thing anyone can do is call the ‘God’), but well, I could hear Her screaming out to Her-Bf with her hands and feet in the air, and Her-Bf too was helpless and in quite the same state.

We could come to a stop after half an hour of the downhill slide, our hands and feet and all wrong parts were all sour and we all wanted a break. We found this small rocky hill in the side, and decided to lock our cycles in the roadside and climb it. Later after a 45 min climb up and down, we kind of didn’t know which way to take to return, We couldn’t take the way we came coz It was too steep to climb on cycle, but a passerby told us that the other way would lead us to our resort after some 2-3 hours!

We decided to take the route we came and climbed. The cycles started rolling backwards, downhill even when we were putting in all our energy trying to peddle the other way! We got freaked, and decided to push it and hopefully reach the city within an hour. The sun was soaring up and we were barely prepared for such a scorching heat. We didn’t have a cover for the head, not a bottle of water. The place was completely desolated from any civilization and we were stuck, without as much as a tree to take shade, in the middle of nowhere, unable to climb the steep mountain roads, with or without the cycles. We found some rocks under some bushes in the side of a huge valley, and decided that we couldn’t take one step more, and sat down, waiting for someone to walk by to guide us.

So there we were sitting in the valley side not knowing what to do, when a shepherd, an old lady sympathized with us, took out her Nokia handset called the auto-stand in Athanavur, told them to get a tempo big enough to accommodate four people and three cycles and thanks to her, a tempo with an open back arrived to our rescue! We piled up the cycles, stood like politicians in the back of the tempo and in the scorching sun and three cycles tied in front of us and no place to hold to, we climbed the mountains thus! What a roller coaster!

We returned the cycles at around 12 noon, completely exhausted in the heat, went back to our resort, washed up, ate our lunch, played chess (and FYI, almost won) and finally, took back a cab to the station at 3pm. The return journey was pretty uneventful, in the train filled with bickering and bitching families and irritating mamas n mamis.

But as we returned home with sour legs and sun burnt hands and tanned faces, we were thinking… What a weekend!!

Yelagiri Trip - Part I

2010-06-04T15:22:00.002+05:30

The talk of a trip had been going on for quite some time now. With parents, sister, friends, colleagues… They all mostly vanished after the planning stage. After Jaipur, Jaisalmer, Bikaner and Jodhpur, Darjeeling, Sikkim and Nepal, I now got a chance to take a weekend off in Yelagiri.

About approximately 350 km away from Chennai, Yelagiri is supposedly a hill station. I had expected something like Ooty, cool and commercial, but it wasn’t. It was as hot as 9 am or 4 pm in Chennai, not as sweaty and irritating though. There was a cool breeze all through the day, compensating for the hot sun.

The trip as it is wasn’t exactly a ‘planned’ one. It was more like a last minute idea. Wednesday morning, we discussed about how nice a trip would be, Wednesday evening, we browsed and thought of Yelagiri, Thursday morning we booked the tics in tatkal to Jolarpet (Thanks to pathetic speed of irctc at 8 am, managed to get only waiting list tics), Thursday evening called some resorts and ended up getting one- Auro Ville with two single rooms available and booked it, Friday morning booked the return tics to from Jolarpet to Chennai again in tatkal, Friday evening left office at 9.30 pm, went home and slept off, got up at 4 am on Saturday, got dropped off in central station by dad at 5.15 am.

The unconfirmed onward tics were the least of our problems. The seats actually got confirmed, and we all, Me, She, Her and Her-Bf successfully boarded the train at 6 am. Our main impending problem was the fact that Her father did not know about Her-Bf coming along with us. She had told him that the fourth person was a girl named ‘Divya’, whose seat was in some other coach. So Her inquisitive father came and sat with us until the train started, and enquired about the ‘fourth girl’ and about her seat and where she was n all. Little experience that I had in lying, my BP was rising with every question of his. After a point, I just got up and went outside in the pretext of getting water, and returned only as the train started moving!

Phew!

Her-Bf came and sat with us only after the train left the station and the coast was clear. We got introduced, had our breakfasts (She thought she could survive on biscuits) talked about everything from religious beliefs, purity of Ganges (much to the irritation of the old mama n mami sitting with us in the same bay) to office politics and movies & series. We then played rummy and ace, and finally reached Jolarpet about an hour late.

As we had missed the bus that was supposedly at 9.45 am, we took a share auto for 300 bucks and climbed the mountain at the speed of ooty toy train. On the up side, we got to take a lot of snaps on the way.

We finally reached the resort, got freshened up, had lunch, made friends of Nala (the dog), and fixed up a guide for trekking.

We started at about 4.30 pm from the resort and went into jungles in the mountains. IT WAS AWESOME! Initially, we were all so highly enthused and the slopes were quite easy to walk on. We went on taking loads of snaps and enjoying every small thing like the touch-me-not (or so we think) leaves, and watching huge termite hills and everything.

Our guide was equally enthused about climbing the mountain with three girls (and a guy :P), and taught us to suck nectar out of small flowers, to walk on wood splinters on the ground without falling on them and getting killed, showed us the holes that bears had dug to eat the roots, dead scorpions, how soft the nest of birds felt and how a forest looks after a wild fire.

We were amazed by them all!! The path was so difficult to cross, with the thorny twigs scratching our faces and our skins, getting caught in our hair and our clothes. The mountain became increasingly steep and rocky and thorny and slippery and hence, more and more interesting to walk.

We passed all our obstacles and finally reached the mountain top, and sat there, panting like Nala. We had forgotten to take a bottle of water. If only we too had a bucket of water to plunge into!

We took some rest up there, talked about the jungle life and wild fires and emergencies and bears and snakes for a while and finally as it was getting dark and cloudy, decided to climb down. We took a long shot of the projecting rock on the right opposite mountain peak, and started off.

Our return journey and the next day events in Yelagiri Part II

My Choice

2010-05-08T21:40:00.008+05:30

DISCLAIMER: The contents of this post are not meant to be offensive and definitely to the general population. It is just another post with no double/triple meanings or inner implications or any other intentions, just plainly right from heart.

A lot of things that some of the NRIs I know been saying saying about me that has been pissing me off for quite some time. But something that a dumb pampered distant relative with rich parents and no idea of the actual meaning of life or reality said quite recently about me and my life and my choices kind of ticked me off a lot. It was like a spillover from a bowl that has been getting filled for quite some time now. The first thing that came up in my mind was:

House: "Spoken like a true circle queen."

Cameron looks at him funny.

House: "See, skinny, socially privileged white people get to draw this neat little circle. And everyone inside the circle is normal. Everyone outside the circle needs to be beaten, broken, and reset so they can be brought into the circle. Failing that, they should be institutionalized, or worse, pitied."

Cameron: "So it's wrong to feel sorry for this little boy?"

House: "Why would you feel sorry for someone who gets to opt out of the inane courteous formalities which are utterly meaningless, insincere, and therefore degrading? This kid doesn't have to pretend to be interested in your back pain or your excretions or your grandma's itchy place. Can you imagine how liberating it would be to live a life free of all the mind-numbing social niceties? I don't pity this kid. I envy him."

I am not comparing anyone here with anyone I am referring to, including myself. But what he says is almost always the absolute and unarguable fact, which people sometimes in real lives just refuse to accept because of their own circles.

So here is some clarification for the sake of all the above mentioned circle kings and queens.

This is for the people who keep wondering: Why are you not doing a foreign MS?
1. I have chosen not to do an MS simply coz I was, and still am not a fan of 'an-MS-in-US' concept, and I specifically wanted to get a few years of work-ex before an MBA.
2. I do not feel the pressing need to race the world in getting settled in some foreign land and get an NRI title, coz I am fully happy and satisfied in what I am here, what I have here, what I get here and who I am with here.
3. I chose not to study immediately after graduating with 2 degrees simply coz I was and I still am, sick of studying. I will probably just go and murder anyone who asks me to take a test or study some course at least for some time in the near future.
4. I joined a good company after passing out coz just like a lot of people, I too wanted self-earned-money, quality experience and an identity other than a college kid. I am extremely happy with what I have now and I DEFINITELY don’t envy or judge anyone who has taken along a different path of life.

This is for the people who just can't get over the question: Why are you working in a field that is not relevant to your degrees?
5. I took up a job in a field that may not appear too relevant to my degrees because, one of my degrees is useful only for research purposes, which I am not a fan of, and to be an expert in the other degree, I had to do an MS, and not what I wanted either.
6. The job I am in gives me most of what I want and a good percentage of what I need, and that is how much any human (not an Indian, any human) working anywhere would expect. Even a professional bungee jumper would have at least 10 things to brood and complain about his job!

I could go around asking people, about why you had chosen to get settled in US when you were born and brought up in India. No matter if you are studying or working there, you still are an Indian by birth. No matter how much you fake your accent or eat burgers for lunch or wipe your ass with a tissue, you would still not be accepted as an American there. But I certainly won't ask any of that coz its rude to intrude and I certainly won't judge you. I would respect the fact that you are educated, have brains and are old enough to think and set your priorities and choose what you feel is right for you.

Please note, I have NOT attempted GRE or any other exams even once, so I am NOT in a 'the-grapes-are-sour' state. I am simply not interested right now.

Also, I am NOT in any way against NRIs. In fact, I know a lot of sane and sensible NRIs whom I respect and admire a lot; so many relatives and friends. But I am a 100% against the those who sit around judging me for being me and not them!

I am also not against people's suggestions. They are all welcome. But just understand that the final decision is all mine. I shall go abroad when I wish to or when I choose to, and not just because some narrow minded people happened to have low opinions of me or insult my parents for my decisions. My parents have given me full freedom to decide my life and they give all the respect in the world to my choices and for that, I am extremely thankful to them.

And finally, there is only one thing I would like to say - Climb out of your holes, people!

And yet again

2010-04-23T22:50:00.005+05:30

There was an incident that made my close friends think that I am an extremely sensitive girlie creature, which I most certainly am not. It was even mentioned in my write up while leaving the campus. The incident left me so embarrassed that I never went anywhere near doing it again, until today.

For people who have no idea what I am talking about, there is this sweet romantic movie 'If Only', which I happened to watch in my third year. My roommate was lying fast asleep on the other side of the bed, while I was happily watching it in mine, with my head phones on. The rest of my friends were all sitting in the next room gossipping away.

The movie was no suspense, highly predictable and I could guess where it was going and the ending too, within the first few minutes. I got so engrossed into the panic and desperation of the hero and his romantic ideas and his way of showing how much the his girl meant to him and everything, that by the end, I myself fell in love with him!

With his last monologue I was already in tears; and when she asked "Aren't you coming?" and he replied "Of course I am" knowing what was going to happen, and him covering and protecting her and actually dying for her.. I was weeping by then, uncontrollably!

I hardly realized that my roommate had woken up and was blinking groggily asking what had happened, and even my wingies in had come from the next room inquiring as to why I was crying. When they all saw that I was crying over a dead romantic hero, omg! They burst out laughing so loudly, that it broke my 15 minutes trans and brought me back into the real world.

All this while it has gotten screened a number of times in HBO, in Star Movies n all and I never even turned to that channel. I was that embarrassed! In fact, I have had it in my comp for quite sometime now. So I took a bet against myself, and decided to watch it and check out how mature and realistic I have become.

And to my greatest shock, the final scene this time, left me weeping only for 5 minutes rather then the 15 last time. Sigh! Apparently I am still quite unrealistic! But now, may be I can bet again next time, and end up not crying at all; Or may be never ever attempt watching it again!! :p

Physics

2010-04-05T19:01:00.003+05:30

After the movie ‘Daybreakers’, I still wasn’t sleepy, though it was 12.30 in the night. So I started watching an episode of Bones, the one that started with a devil burning on the table in a church n all. The episode went on with the usual cool gross stuff and a psychiatric ward full of weirdoes. I wasn’t sleepy even after the episode, but decided to close the laptop nevertheless and tried to shut my eyes and brains. The AC was making such a noise and it was pretty cold already, so I switched it off and lay down in the dark silence, trying my best to go into my very own Pandora, when I heard a sound. It was a small hissing-squeaking sort of a noise. I got up to check if there was some insect in the room, but found nothing. So I switched the light off and rolled on into the bed, when the noise started again. It was growing bigger and was not continuous. I kind of got a little freaked, with my mind considering all sorts of possibilities from squeaky rats to snakes and switched on the lights to give a thorough inspection of the room, with the door open in case I needed to run out (;P), and yet I still found nothing.

I switched everything off again and cuddled back into my sheets, but the hissing sound kept bothering me. I decided to ignore it, filter it out and stop my bloody imagination from running miles. A few minutes later, it struck me. The darn sound was coming neither from some cricket nor from a rat. It was simply from the water bottle’s cap that was squeezed too tight, and was generating air bubbles at the cap rim. Damn you physics!! I simply got up again, opened the cap a little and the sound just vanished, and I finally drowned into deep deep sleep. :)

Anandi Dies?!?!?

2010-03-10T11:25:00.002+05:30

WTF?? This is the girl who has till date, been portrayed as ‘the-innocent-Indian-village-kid-being-illtreated-in-the-name-of-culture’, is seen (in the trailer) to be running behind gangsters in Mumbai, in her shiny Rajasthani robes, and somewhere down the line, gets shot at and falls down dead. The subsequent clips also show her Photo framed with a lamp lit in front of it. Good God it was shocking!

If this twist in the story was even given as a headline in India Today as “Twist in Balika Vadhu”, then imagine the shockwave it must have created! Jobless that I am. I went ahead and Googled it to find that she has either bagged a huge movie offer or she has her annual exams in real life and might later on, come back from the dead. Well… Good for her either way!

The Beeper

2010-02-26T11:27:00.003+05:30

Once again, its been a while since I had time and mood enough to blog. And yet again I am typing away while importing an obscenely huge ugly file into an analytics tool and waiting, waiting and waiting. This waiting seems to have become quite a habit these days, but all the funny incidents that I keep thinking of posting now and then get lost in huge numbers and scripts and other screw-ups.

Yeah! The past 10 days have been an utter screw-up of a lot of things, and then me getting bashed by seniors and managers, first politely and then not-so-politely for my stupid gimmicks. Even at home, parents these days are not as forgiving as they used to be!

Everyone keeps telling me to grow up, though I seriously can’t really relate me growing up as even a remotely possible solution to the existing problems! First of all, why should I grow up?!? And what fun do they all get in making? I live in my own goddamn world and do not intrude into theirs, nor do I try to change their world. Why do people keep trying to invade into mine? Oh well, I guess that’s the definition of ‘Mature Adults’.

Seniors in work keep telling me to take things seriously and attend all meetings and trainings and remind me that I am no more in College and I should learn to be a ‘Professional’ in a ‘Corporate world’.

Parents go a step further… No No.. One step each, and one + one here = three… so three steps further and have taken it as a primary mission in their lives to make me ‘a-marriage-material’ for which I somehow show a shockingly strong resistance, according to them.

Mom that day made me stand in front of the servant maid and her little girl and asked me to identify the different Dals (Kadala paruppu, thuvaram paruppu, ullutham paruppu, etc) and the different types of flour (kadala maavu, maida maavu, arisi maavu etc). The wicked Grandmom and gossipy Servant waited for my answers, which as everyone expected, were totally and completely wrong. I got embarrassed n irritated, Grandmom started laughing and as usual called up the relatives and narrated a hugely exaggerated version and mom was extremely psyched about my ignorance even at something so basic such as ingredients. From that moment, I just resolved openly that I would not set foot into the kitchen even if the rest of the house was on fire, and have been religiously sticking to it since then. The fact that I can cook pretty decently when the ingredients have been identified and given, doesn’t get a lot of credits, it seems.

Grand mom then asked: How are you going to cook for your entire family after you get married?

Me: Family? It would be me and some loser iyengar guy, who would be earning too, I suppose, so we’ll either order from outside or go out and eat! Convenient for both of us!

Beeeeeep. Wrong answers. Yes… Plural.

Grand-mom’s reply to my wrong answer no 1: After marriage, my family would not only be the guy, but his family too.

My response (Sarcastically): Shearr.. just like my current family would become his. So he can come n cook n serve my parents in my place, n I would do the same to his in his place.

Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. Wrong answer again.

Grand-mom’s reply to my wrong answer no 2: ‘Order from outside or go out and eat’?? Really?? You are really proud that you are earning, aren’t you?

My response (Bewildered): Well, why shouldn’t I? I mean… I am not stealing money or doing anything illegally or immoral, for me to feel ashamed! I have money, so I can spend it the way I want! Now if I buy one pizza, after marriage I’ll probably order two, one for each.I won't mind that.. Honest!! What’s wrong in that?!?!

Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppppp
And the beeper never stopped!!

Well, maybe, just may be, sitting in the office was a tad better than sitting at home with an irritatingly ultrasonic beeper going on every time I open my mouth!!

Good lord.. the import is done earlier than expected! Yeah well, I m sure I’ll get more of such ugly huge files in the near future, and hence more possible blogging time!! :)

Queen of the Road

2010-01-21T11:13:00.004+05:30

And yet again, its been quite long since I could write my heart out into my dear darling pensieve. The job takes up almost 3/4ths of my day, and the remaining 1/4ths goes off sleeping and in driving. Yeah.. driving my pep+. :)

Oh yeah… driving.. :) :) Even though my family has been in Chennai for quite sometime now, I used to come home for hols n drive the old scooty now and then, but actually driving for about an hour every day, is cool! Infact a couple of days back, the whole road from Cenetoph Road to Raj Bhawan was empty, with traffic police all over the place expecting some VIP. I was the only one on the entire road with no signals, all the police personnel stopping vehicles from perpendicular streets just to let me pass to keep the road free, and there I was riding alone, with all the police and people in sides giving me so much attention that I felt like the Queen of the road!! I was wooping with joy when the speedometer in my pep+ reached 80! IT FELT AWESOME!!!

There have been quite a number of such small small incidents, that I keep wanting to post into my pensieve. Infact I type the whole thing in my mind as and when they happen, just never get time to physically do it. Thanks to the really loong time that 'vlookup' takes for like a million records, I could type this post! :P

Just like millions of other Indians, work has taken over my entire life, it seems!

Happy New Year

2009-12-31T22:02:00.004+05:30

There is always a lot of excitement surrounding ‘the New Year’. Everyone wishing one another greetings and wishes, loads of offers, HOLIDAYS, special TV shows… It’s truly a great time. The one thing that really beats me is the usual (ridiculous) question that usually follows the wishes, “So, partying tonight? Big plans?”

Seriously people! Help me out here! One thing I don’t understand is what their very idea behind the question is. I mean what DO people do ‘specially’ on the New Year’s night that they don’t do in the other nights or in other parties that the party-buffs may attend, other than probably wish one another “HAPPY NEW YEAR”? I think the whole thing has become too hyped-up.

This weekend, being a 3 day weekend, one more question follows- “What plans for the 3 days?”

This question is even more maddening! I live in Chennai with parents, friends’ living with parents too, in places that are quite far from one another, sick bored of travelling. The only places that one can think of is eat-outs and restaurants where families/hungry-hostel-people would go, or spencers/city-center which has become a little too clichéd, or beaches (that are toooo far for the only few friends living in Chennai) or some local shopping places like in T-Nagar where we have already met a little too often and have nothing left to do there.

Well, honestly, I can’t seem to think of any other place(s) to generally go out here in Chennai, probably coz though this is my native, the main high-school and college days of mine n my friends weren’t spent here! Plus when living with friends in Bangalore or in Pilani, going out for fun or for time-pass or for food and entertainment and to avoid loneliness made sense. But now, being at home with a TV and more importantly, parents, meeting every weekend just to eat, or for time-pass when work is tight, or to avoid being lonely when you always have company doesn’t make any sense, especially when we all (friends) get to happily talk about every small detail of our lives all over the day through mails n chats.

This is why, the very question is sad bcoz it has no answer from my side! And yet, every known-unknown person walking past asks “Hey! Happy New Year! So what plans for the 3-day weekend? I m gonna Pondy with my gang with some bottles n glasses! What about you?” And I dumbly say “Uhh.. I don’t know. ~~No plans yet/can’t think of places to go/don’t have a huge gang here/living with parents~~ well… I might just have a quite weekend at home, I think. Happy New Year to you too!”

As I entered the house, my parents were right there, drowned deep into Sudha Raghunathan’s concert on TV; and I said to myself, “Here starts my New Year weekend.”
Oh yeah… Happy New Year you all!! Hope you guys have a great weekend and a great year ahead!!

The Wet And The Cold

2009-12-22T08:15:00.006+05:30

Have I ever mentioned before that I hate wet and cold? Well, ordinarily, moisture would drive me atleast a mile away n cold would make me shiver and cuddle into warm clothes. But today neither affected me at all! No Sir, not one bit! All coz I was where I have always wanted to be! Nothing mattered!

The past couple of days have been a few of the most blessed most cheerful days. After shopping extravagantly for clothes n shoes n heavy dhaba lunch with friends n big time gossiping about nothing and everything, life seems all too colourful! I know.. shopping, beauty parlour and at times, gossiping are the best turn-ons for young women!

In addition to a new wardrobe, now that I have a new scooty pep+ with an awesome electric blue colour, my happiness seems to have no limits! I mean literally! Today, as I rode on the roads at 60 kmph, over taking heavy bikes without stopping at some red signals(though they weren’t intentionally done), the cool wind blew through my hair, slight shivers ran down my spine and chill rain drops started falling on my skin.

Now I had to stop coz I was wearing a white sal and if I continued driving in the rain that had now started pouring, I would be arrested for indecent exposure! :P So there I waited in the shade of a huge tree with a hundred others, and then it hit me! I had a rain coat! So what the hell was I waiting for?!?

So I wore the huge rain coat and with the rain splattering on my face, I rode home, all wet and cold, though with a wide smile on lips and peace at heart.

Ex

2009-12-16T00:58:00.003+05:30

When people lie right on one’s face, I just don’t understand how easy it seems to them. Coz for me, lying, with or without a valid reason, is extremely difficult! I am as pathetic as Joe Tribbiani(FRIENDS-season 9 epi 8) in lying!! Giving false reasons in the right places and hiding the right amount of facts from the right person or manipulating the truth here and there to serve some useful purpose, is still, may be at some level, acceptable and understandable and forgivable. But again, lying blatantly and shamelessly thinking that the person listening doesn’t know or wouldn’t find out, is highly dumb and cheap!

There were a couple of guys on campus who were well known to lie about marks and grades and how they were the top of the course when the whole mark list was displayed on the notice board and they were in fact, one among the last, and about how girls went fida over them when all the girls ridiculed them big time, and even about some imaginary girl friend back home… but these guys portrayed their character as dumb idiotic weak insecure and with a very high inferiority complex, and got black listed! But hey, they were just students, and they were obviously trying to get a girl by showing off, and even though they miserably failed at their purpose, they did actually have one!

And here is this boss of mine, an ex-boss from tomorrow, who has the talent of lying and exaggerating and manipulating the facts even without a purpose, just because he can! Now that is not stupid, that is sadism! I can hardly understand how someone about 30 yrs old, who in reality hardly works at all (though pushes his subordinates work even without lunch or dinner), can act so cheap and earn the disrespect and hatred of everyone around, and still be ignorant of the fact that, well, his secret- that he is a sadist and an egoist and knows much lesser than a no of his subordinates- is not really a secret at all!! Well, whatever. From the list of lessons that I have learnt in the past 6 months, the entire sub-list of how-a-team-leader-shouldnot-be comes from him.

When a truck loaded with sand comes in the wrong direction, it is the bike that should leave way and stand aside, or simply take another route avoiding the sand truck. Instead if the bike tries to go head-on with the truck just coz it has only mud or coz the bike is in the right direction while the truck isn’t, the damage is entirely to the bike and the people on it. The sand truck would have no impact at all, right?

In any case, I am glad I have finally gotten the opportunity to leave the highly unorganized road and take a much better way,a whole new direction, thanks to God-who-finally-listened/Luck-that-changed-at-last/Good-time-that-has-arrived/Hardwork-and-sincerity-that-eventually-paid-off.

One of Us... One of Them...

2009-11-28T22:19:00.007+05:30

It’s been so long since I blogged, actually, since I wrote at all about anything or anyone. After all, life isn’t filled with sunshine and rainbows and butterflies and puppies, now is it?

The weekends seem to have huge ‘to-do’ lists and going out of towns and weddings (yeah.. awfully lot of them these days!! We’ll come to that one later.) and weekdays… umm.. well, what did I do on weekdays? Good grief! I really can’t even remember what I did on weekdays! They seem to have just flown away (nothing too pleasant though, I assure you!).

But amongst everything/nothing going on in the mundane life, one very special occasion that happened last weekend in Salem brought back wide smiles and sound laughter and back-in-the-past feelings.

It was our wingie’s wedding!!The first of us to enter into ‘the holy matrimony’, and all of us (well most of us) gathered in her home town Salem to attend the function and be there and wish her the best of luck.

Well, it all started way back in their psenti-sem, my fourth year, when one night at 1 am, the female called for a mid-night-wing-meeting and ushered us all into her room. Anxiously, we snuggled comfortably on her bed as she sat opposite to n told us about how she, one of us (happy singles) had had become one of them (committed ones), about how this guy from her PS station liked her n proposed to her and how she had taken her time to think about it and finally agreed the day before that night, while we all sat looking at her in total shock, with our mouths wide open. After all, she was the most sadhu-est most rational and level headed person in our wing and here she was, in love (no offence to the other lovers in the world)!! I mean it wasn’t rare to find girls ‘in love’ or going out with guys on campus, just that it was hard to imagine her there!

Far away seems those days when she would lie to us about her sleeping and hide into her room talking with him over phone and think we didn’t know what was going on. But they all came back when there she was, standing in her wedding sari, with all the bridal make up, blushing all over when the photographer asked the bride and the groom to stand in a variety of poses (please don’t imagine anything perverted.. they were cute pics taken all done under both parents’ supervision. :P) while me n data were standing in a side, commenting big time and making them all laugh.

All five years on campus, whenever it came to wing’s decking up session, I was the one who used to tie them all saris, helped them with eye liners and kajals, etc. (yeah.. and I loved it- and as I remember, the decking sessions used to be so much fun!!) Here in the wedding, though a couple of beauticians were onto her, it was really cool to look at, a girl being dressed and attended and pampered like a queen!! Complicate hair-dos, face makeup, kundan stones being stuck on hair to give a classy effect and even designs on hands with sparklers and stones stuck here and there, lots of bangles clattering on her arms, as she stepped out of her room in the Bengali-styled sari, gosh! She looked so pretty!:)

From about a month ago, us wingies had been brain storming about the best gift we could get, and loads of ideas were pooled in, and we finally, after a million email-threads, successfully decided and ordered one. For the wedding, since the gift itself was too huge to carry, we ordered it to be delivered at her home when she went back to Hyd, and gave her a huge greeting card in the reception, with each of us personally signed- with love, from wingies.:)

The Saturday night was in a hotel room with all of us sitting and gossiping away like old times, showing each other the dresses and accessories we had gotten for the wedding, telling each other’s stories, taking snaps.. wow! It was like having fallen into a fantasy pit of the past!

The wedding itself, was pretty simple, about an hour or so full of rituals n relatives gathering around the stage. After the wedding was over, she came and sat with us for some time, and her happiness and her peaceful mind and genuine smile said a lot about how much she had enjoyed every bit of the ceremonies and how much she loved this guy and the extent to which she was looking forward to this new lifestyle as a wife to someone she loved and someone who in turn cared a lot about her.

There have been loads of times when I have thought (actually all of us wingies have had discussions on), about how embarrassing the whole ordeal of bearing with our parents’ look-out-for-a-groom drama and how awkward it was going to be to be introduced in front of strangers, to a stranger, whom they would have supposedly chosen for us to move in with and live with when we didn’t even know if he, in the very least even respected us! I mean- a happy life starts with love, love starts with friendship, which begins with trust and understanding, the very basis of which is mutual respect and acknowledgement of each other’s likes and dislikes, attitudes and ideas, policies and beliefs. With none of these, with complete faith in just a small piece of paper called horoscope, when our (I refer to girls alone here) parents would get us married send us off to a stranger’s place (that too after spending completely for the wedding, as the groom’s side would, in most cases, hardly even open their purse!), it wouldn’t be just embarrassing or awkward, but much more.

Anyway, we were all glad about how our friend found love and trust in the hands of someone with whom she was a good friend first, got to know him well, and then fell in love and after an year of being a ‘girl friend’, got married to him, and escaped the-parents-pressure. For everything, there is a worst case and a best case and loads of cases in between, and hers, I would definitely classify amongst the best case.

On Sunday as we all started off in different directions after the wedding, there were a chain of thoughts haunting my mind, ”Damn! After the really awesome weekend, here I go back to reality, the @%@#$#&^*%^$ world that I live in, and back to office on Monday! Why-o-why does Monday have to come so soon?!? Why-o-why do good times end so fast?!? Oh the nooo… I don’t wanna go home now… I don’t wanna go to the damn office tomorrow, and to think about it, I don’t wanna go anywhere! The only place I wanna go is to the past, and that’s the one place I can’t go! AAAHHHHHH… #$%$&Y^%E$&*%^@$%@!!!!!”

Who the hell are you?!?

2009-09-25T12:35:00.004+05:30

When 2 people meet, there are 3 possibilities:

1. Neither of them know one another, in which case they just walk away without any problems (mostly, I think..)!
2. Both of them know each other and wish/greet/acknowledge their familiarity.
3. One knows the other but the other way.

The third case, I believe, is very common these days, and frequent in my life. At such times when we get to meet or are obliged to make conversation with someone who happens to know us, and yet are strangers to us, what the hell are we supposed to say?

Usually if it’s a relative and I can roughly guess who they are looking at the people around them, I fake an all-knowing-and-understanding smile and talk about general stuff, politely inquire their health/wellbeing and before I get caught, I get the hell out of there. In such places, the words ‘aunty’ and ‘uncle’ helps loads!

However, what happens if they just call out of the blue and you happen to pick up the call up? Or they knock on your door when you are alone at home and you open the door?

In the first case, I usually just ask who they are and then if they mock at me about not knowing them, I just make up stories like poor transmission or voice not clear or instrument fault or simply say that I was sleeping before the call!

In the latter’s case, what I tend to do is give a non-committal smile and look at them with polite, yet mild surprise. Smart people who can actually tell that the poor dear standing opposite doesn’t recognize them, they introduce themselves and all will be fine.

Nevertheless, there are also some stupid people, who don’t understand the mind expressions or gestures, and wait for US to initiate. I try asking them very courteously, “Uh.. hmm..Sorry.. But who are you?” Again, people with even a little decency tell who they are, may be some identification, explain some relationship or from where they are. The others, I guess, are just too dumb take the cue. Some (idiots) pose riddles, while others (fools) demand, ”Why? Don’t you know me?”

Now wait a minute! What the F do they think? If I had known who they were, WHY THE HELL WOULD I EVEN ASK’M? Such dumb acts only lower their own dignity and self respect, I say! And to these half-wits, I just can’t help replying with fake-patience-plus-light-sarcasm, “No… No I don’t! So, again, Who are you?!?”

If they still refuse to answer the out-right question, the only possible thing that can be done, is shutting the door on their faces to show that they were definitely not recognized and their dumb-wits were certainly not entertained!!

Wrong Attitude?!?

2009-09-21T22:00:00.003+05:30

Navaratri time, loads of relatives to visit. Since I am agnostic (more of an atheist these days), it doesn’t mean much to me. But I usually hate this time of the year.. the whole festival in general; though it’s a pretty vibrant atmosphere with hyper-active people buzzing around various colorful idols and all. There are two main reasons.

When I was young, I was sent to classical music lessons, probably right from when I was three. I used to learn it sincerely, practice it meticulously. As I grew up, so did my self-consciousness. But my parents, being ‘parents’, couldn’t see this, and continuously encouraged me to sing in public, in front of relatives and especially in ‘Navarathri/Dassara’ times when they all met up in everybody’s houses and young girls were made to sing to ‘God’ while they sat around staring at the poor embarrassed creature, commenting about her, her voice, her skills, compare it with every other ‘budding singer’ whom they had come across while the little singing girl would be secretly wishing to disapparate from there and apparate in the North Pole.

Years of experience in such singing-in-front-of-people embarrassment and hundreds of arguments and fights with parents and millions of curses from them, I quit classical music with a lot of hatred and aversion to both singing and Navarathri days and as a bitter disappointment to my parents since I had failed to fulfill their dream! But at least they don’t force me these days since I am much older and I tend not to stick around them much when the old ‘music’ topic is rekindled.

Second reason is stronger these days, which is being with curious gossipy ‘know-it-all’ relatives who judge anyone who thinks differently and bitch about everyone who does not follow their rules. Today’s get-together proved to be enjoyable mostly; until they all started discussing the topic I hate the most- marriages. They were discussing about how one of my cousins, 26 now, was weeping a whole day refusing to take a man’s hand, who was more than 7 yrs elder than her and who wanted her to leave her job here in India and move to US as his ‘house-wife’. Educated male chauvinistic bastard is what I would call him. Then when I started saying that it actually made sense, and that it was her call and people should mind their own business and not emotionally blackmail her, they all started targeting me!

There is a family friend, well educated girl, marrying an American colleague and so all of her relatives are abandoning her and her family. She fell in love with him and decided to tie the knot with him despite the hell of objections because she was so damn frustrated with her religion and caste’s pathetic ridiculous superstitious beliefs in horoscope and her birth-star being unpopular for girls and bringing ‘bad luck’ to the groom and his family and the grooms in her caste demanding 6 lakhs as dowry.

In fact another reason she is doing this is because her life is more comfortable with him than it probably would be with any South Indian, and especially, any guy of her caste. He, being an American, believes that his wife has her own life, understands concepts like ‘privacy’, and most importantly, in sharing daily chores like cooking, washing plates & clothes and cleaning and shopping, and takes equal part in it with pleasure, which most of the guys here would certainly fail to oblige!

To this, my paati(grandmom) went on about how women are responsible for all these and they shouldn’t trouble men with them and how women are born to cook and clean and serve men and how men should be manly and just earn, eat and sleep. When I said otherwise, I realized it was a mistake simply coz I had no one to back me up. I was a single person up against all the stereotype elders who now started sniggering at my ‘attitude’. Finally, I just gave it up when my mom was giving me murderous looks and they too ended with a conclusion that my parents were going to have a really difficult time in looking for ‘a suitable guy’ for me and that when they do find a ‘match’, they should probably not let me talk to him before marriage coz then, I might scare him away with my ‘equality attitude’ and ask him if he knows cooking or likes cleaning and might just never get married!!

And now I am so damn pissed with all this nonsense but decided that all I could do at present was avoid relatives when they start talking nonsense stuff, give up on trying to figure out a way to jump to Jupiter and not worry about my future and simply enjoy House MD!

Cameron: "Men should grow up."
House: "Yeah, and dogs should stop licking themselves. It's not going to happen."

Yeah... I do love him!

Did I Scare Him?

2009-08-21T14:23:00.001+05:30

Yesterday I went to a departmental store to get some domestic supplies for mom. My mom usually writes me a huge list, and since I really don’t know the difference between dals (thoram paruppu, kadala paruppu, ullutham paruppu etc all baffle me big time!), I usually handover the list of groceries to a helper in the store.

It is there that I saw Him… a cute guy with a cool French beard, picking up some snacks. I just looked at Him for a second, and He looked back, I picked up a few chocolates, and we both moved on in opposite directions. Then I went to choose soaps and my ‘private’ stuff. There was a mother and a teenage girl, arguing over which brand was better while mom was insisting her daughter to take Whisper. Gosh! Thank God my mom wasn’t this fussy in public over these issues! I would have to kill myself if I were in that girl’s position!

I was so engrossed in my thoughts that I didn’t notice Him coming to the same place, to get His soaps and creams. Yes… creams. I saw Him take a ‘fair-n-handsome’ cream while I was holding my ‘girl-thing’, and before I could put it away, He saw me too, and blushed like a little girl, with cheeks all pink. I thought He might need His privacy and walked away to another section.

After collecting a few other things, I stopped near the razors to pick up one, and had the misfortune of running into Him again there as He was choosing a Gillette! Dear Lord! He turned so red on the sight of me with a pink razor, that I thought His face, neck even ears were just going to burst out! I have always thought that blushing guys look cute, but this was weird!
Before I carry on, let me tell you guys about a habit of mine. In places where I cannot talk or rather choose not to say things or voice out my opinions, I usually say it all inside my head, for my personal satisfaction.

So there He was, turning beetroot red, not knowing how to react, when I, without giving as much of a second glance, walked off without any botheration, telling Him off inside my head, ”Dude! Quit blushing! All women use Whisper and most of them use a razor to remove hair from hands n legs!! Did u really think movie stars were born hairless?!? Seriously, GROW UP! Having a good French beard is not enough, dude! You should also learn to act relaxed and at ease in public in such situations!!”

Finally, when I was standing in the queue in one of the counters with my trolley full, He came and stood behind me with His basket. The moment He saw me, He quickly shifted to a counter farthest from mine. Was He frightened?!? It certainly appeared so! But why? For having seen me buying a Whisper and a razor or for having been caught taking a fair-n-handsome?!? Or… did I actually say those things out loud? Oh NO! I didn’t! No I was sure I didn’t!

Well, I really have no idea what I did to scare the hell out of Him. But it sure was fun watching Him scoop His change and run out of the store clutching the bag like he was clinging to his life!!

A-Z Tag

2009-08-17T13:27:00.006+05:30

Thanx a lot Varun, for the award. I am honored!
The rules for this tag are as follows:
1. Link the person who tagged you.
2. Display award on your blog with these rules
3. Reply to the questions below
4. Tag 7 people deserving the award according to you
5. Come back to BLoGGiSTa iNFo CoRNeR (PLEASE DO NOT CHANGE THIS LINK) at http://bloggistame.blogspot.com/ and leave the URL of your Post in order for you/your Blog to be added to the Master List

1.The Person who tagged you : Varun
2. Award Displayed above.
3. Seven people I tag are :

Vimal
Karthick
Rya
Sowmya
Vignesh

Harini
Priya

Tag
A – Available/Single? Both :) :D
B – Best friend? Have tonnes n love'em all!
C – Cake or Pie? Cake.
D – Drink of choice? Hot Tea/Chololate/Complan, Cold Lomon Soda/Ice-tea, Coconut water.
E – Essential item you use every day? Mobile, Internet (other than Toothbrush/Soap/Comb etc).
F – Favorite colour? Black, Brown.
G – Gummy Bears Or Worms? Eww.. Neither.
H – Hometown? Chennai
I – Indulgence? fantacy stories (books, movies n series)
J – January or February? Makes no difference to me.
K – Kids & their names? None.
L – Life is incomplete without? Internet (for me).
M – Marriage date? LOLest!
N – Number of siblings? 1 Sister
O – Oranges or Apples? Apples
P – Phobias/Fears? None at large, but may be a little of Atelophobia n Soteriophobia
Q – Quote for today? Don't pity the dead... pity the living.
R – Reason to smile? Lots in general, mainly being with family and friends, cant think of anything else specific currently.
S – Season? Spring
T – Tag 7 People? See above.
U – Unknown fact about me? I love the idea of having pet dogs.
V – Vegetable you don't like? Brinjal, Tomatoes(conspicuous and/or raw)
W – Worst habit? Impatience? .. Cant think of anything specific.
X – X-rays you've had? Stupid Q.
Y – Your favorite food? North Indian, esp Aalu fry with rotis.
Z – Zodiac sign? Virgo

What the hell?!?

2009-07-27T21:15:00.004+05:30

Yesterday, I had a very infuriating conversation with my parents. It all started with some stupid Tamil serial, where the parents weep and wail over a couple who run away to get married or something equally stupid.

Dad : This dowry system was so widely prevalent even now in the rural areas, that the girl’s father actually encourages his daughter to run off with a suitable guy, get married and return after a month or so. On their return, he would pretend to be abashed by their act along with the boy’s parents, and eventually both would accept the married couple without lakhs being spent by the bride’s family in wedding customs and dowry. Apparently such cheap and effective ways were used by the couples and/or the girl’s poor parents to avoid the wrath of dowry system.

Me : Well, as at some point, someone had to stop giving dowry one way or another, coz the ones who would get money mostly might not take the initiation. Why... even educated grooms of today still don’t spend a penny or offer to share the wedding expenses from the bride’s parents! A t least most of them don’t, unless it’s a love marriage and the girl has guts enough to make her guy see the right and the wrong and make him ‘be a man’ and share.

This was all I said, no double or triple meaning intended. To these words, my dad gave me a very sarcastic smile, something I had never seen before.

Me: what? You don’t think running away, as easy as it may sound, to be the right solution to dowry problem, is it?

Dad: no.. not that. Personally, I did not take a penny from your mother, and I don’t intend giving anything in your marriage either. But running away of my daughter is something I wouldn’t even think of. The very thought is extremely ridiculous and infact, its funny!

Again, a sarcastic laugh.

Me: Sure! Because you trust me that much, right?

Dad: Not that I don’t trust you, its just that I don’t think you can!

Mom : (giving dad a stern look) He is just joking dear. Just pulling your leg.

Me: WHAT? Why not?!? I could run away iff I wanted to! Not that I do want to…

Dad: naah.. you are not the kind of a girl who could, you know, have a boyfriend. That’s all.

Me: what nonsense! I don’t have one coz I didn’t want to break your trust and coz I chose not to. What makes you think that I ‘can’t’ have one? I just have to wave a hand or give a signal. You’ll have to eat your words then.

Mom(sitting upright): really?!? Why? Is there someone?

Dad : (openly laughing by now) yeah right!

Mom : Who is this boy you are referring to? Is he your college mate? Is he a Christian? Is that why you always, and more often these days, keep praising Christian weddings and how you love them?

Me: Alright! You guys have got to stop your wild imaginations for a sec and listen. No mom, there is no one like that!

Dad : (stops laughing and turns to mom) I am telling you. She is not like that. Now her sister… I wouldn’t put it past her! But she just can’t be like that!

Me: I can’t believe you don’t trust me! You have such a low opinion of me!

Mom : Nonsense! He says so because he trusts you and has a high opinion of you.

Me: Well, after I get a good job, I’ll get a guy too, whether you like it or not. Its not that difficult, you know? I’ll prove it to you that all these years I have been single only by choice and that too, for you guys only.

Mom : So there definitely is no one right now?

Dad : So you are ok with being with a guy and getting married and that sort of life. Our girl is growing!

Mom: (smiling with comprehension) That is such a relief!

Me :(Feeling cheated) Hey!! I didn’t say that. And NO! I am not interested, let alone ready for those things! What the hell!!

With that, I stormed out of the room with my fists balled and my back turned on my ROFLing parents. Parents these days, are becoming too smart for their own good! Hmph!

The Master of Unforgivable Curses

2009-07-22T14:02:00.001+05:30

Till sometime back, I used to very proudly believe in only and only logical reasons and scientific explanations, and I kind of overlooked things or issues that didn’t have tangible or explainable evidences or witnesses, and restrained(as much as possible) from indulging into common social practices that did not have logical and rational grounds.

I used to feel that miracles and fate don’t exist. Nothing can be achieved without fulfilling the requirements that included sincere efforts and hard work, and vice versa. But this goes against the existence of miracles, which are unnatural unexplainable occurrences, said to be supernatural acts of God. Similarly, I used to call ‘fate’, as the last reason claimed by the people filled with hopelessness, helplessness and despair, when in reality, it doesn’t exist. I would say that I prefer knowing and feeling that I control my own life, and not some unknown unaccounted factor called fate.

Here I am today, sitting at home without a job, praying to God, wishing for miracles and cursing fate, when nothing happening in my life seems rational and justifiable. Everyone I have spoken to in the past couple of months seem to feel that I was not at fault, and that I had done my level best at every step, and that I was not to blame myself for my present condition, and I was to wait patiently and pray God. Well, then if I weren’t to blame myself, who the hell am I supposed to blame? That is when everyone said in unison, “FATE!” That’s all! Wow. That was easy! Not remotely satisfying or helping my cause, but somehow, I felt the pieces fit together, with this illogical reason! This is what set me thinking.
While everyone praises God for his creation, everyone normally curses Fate for destruction. May be Fate is just another name for God- the wild and bad and sinister sadistic side of Him, just like the black-Spiderman. Fate, I guess, is the master of unforgivable curses- the Imperius Curse, the Cruciatus Curse, the Killing Curse.

When we plan something meticulously, work hard over it, yet meet an unexplained failure, we say, ”Man proposes, God disposes.” How very true. We think we are walking down a lane, when Fate hits us with an Imperius Curse, only to make us walk where we never thought of and do mortifying things we never intended to do. By the time we wake up from the curse, the damage is already done and though it looks like we did it, we really aren’t responsible for it, are we?

Similarly, let’s consider innocent people who happened to be grievously injured in some terrorist attacks or freak accidents or bomb blasts or natural calamities. This is Fate shouting, “Crucio!” Unbearable pain that could numb your senses, and sometimes lead one to painful death. After all, You don't need thumbscrews or knives to torture someone if you can perform the Cruciatus Curse!

Likewise is unnatural untimely death, which is when Fate points its wand and says, “Avada Kedavra!” As we all know, no one has ever survived it except the famous Harry Potter!

Anyway, what I meant is that seeing things this way does make believing in oneself easier, in a weird way. It makes one feel better knowing that it wasn’t his mistake. I haven’t yet seen any glimpses or snapshots of miracles to start believing in that too, but Fate, I guess I just cant ignore it anymore! Not that I can do anything about it, like anyone can do anything about God, simply coz Fate infact, is God’s darker side, and as I said, the Master of unforgivable curses.

Anchored to misfortune…

2009-07-06T15:55:00.004+05:30

HOPELESSNESS(Band)- Broken Tears in Solitude(Album)- Anchored to A Past(Song)

Recently, came across this band (not a very popular one though), and checked out its album lyrics. The songs might not be brilliant in English, but they do manage to convey their meaning. I found the following lyrics very poignant and significantly meaningful.

….
….

The curse of solitude
The sentence of distress
Lost tears that crossed me
With mutilated senses
Of hopelessness

Anchored to misfortune
Sighs of pain resound
The waits that enclose you
In the train of confusion
Sorrow never comes alone

Hesitate false steps
On a cracked ground

Anchored to A Past

Anchored to misfortune.

Trial and Error

2009-06-15T21:25:00.001+05:30

Yesterday, a few of us friends met after quite some time. It was really very invigorating, to roam on the T-Nagar streets aimlessly, to gen-enthu crash into Naidu Hall for water and AC there, generally sit in there gossiping and pretending to be looking at the skirt collection, make a friend try out utterly ridiculous clothes in the trial room and take snaps, sit on the iron bench on the platform licking softie and cracking jokes about strangers and their clothes n all, remembering and quoting funny n stupid nostalgic incidents. I realized that my life had come to a total standstill, a huge mundane meaningless void.

I waited for a really long time in the terminus for my bus thinking all of this. I felt really mad at myself for having landed there, where I was, and told myself that I was the only one who could save myself from sinking further into the emptiness, and I simply HAD to spice up my life, at least a little bit for the starters. There were other buses coming in and going out, with school/college punks making a huge racket and climbing on the running buses. There it was right in front of my eyes, something I could do, or atleast try. I was as good as any guy, not too fat, not too old, and not too stiff either. So, I finally found a bus to get on, and decided to wait till the bus started and get on after that! Afterall, I was alone; no parents/sis/friends with me, who would tense/freak/snigger at my attempt. Even if I embarrassed myself, I would be only in front of total strangers who I might never see, like ever again! So… I did it! I mean, tried getting on the running bus.

First attempt: total failure. The first step of the bus seemed to be too high for my legs to reach and the hold was slipping. People had spotted what I was trying. Some loki perverts were cheering, while some adults were keeping a what-the-hell-is-she-thinking face.

But then, I heard my own voice in my head. “ What the hell female?!? How difficult is this? If you are going to fail at this, then you clearly deserve to be in the boring mundane void space for the rest of your life and definitely deserve to be in called ‘anty’ by tat one-year-old-neighbor-kid.” That was it.

Second attempt: SUCCESS!! Ruling out the wild appreciating cheers by some and highly disapproving frowns by others and the throbbing pain in my arms and nicely hit legs & toes, I completely succeed in getting into tat running bus!! :D Now this was something I had never dared to risk or never been allowed to do by the accompanying person. There! My life was not as mundane as I thought afterall!!

I came home, smiling widely, much to the pleasure of my parents. But I become conscious of the blunder and the painful after-effects of my ‘enthued experimentation’ only today, and got appalling feedbacks from various parts of my body. Every time I walk, my damned head now groans and says, “Awww…. That damned bus!! You knew I was blabbering, having stayed in the scorching sun for a really long time! Why-o-why did you have to listen to me?”

So I have decided 3 things:
1. I might be as good as a guy in most of the stuff, but getting on running busses is definitely NOT one of them.
2. My brain doesn’t die like in stroke when exposed to scorching sun for a really long time; it just tries TO KILL ME!!!
3. No matter how many gimmicks I do, that kiddo next door is going to call me anty nevertheless!! So might as well accept it and never let it come near!! :P

Difficult Love

2009-06-10T19:26:00.002+05:30

Sometimes, just sometimes, love could be torturous. People you love, and mainly those who love you back, often tend to do things you hate and take you for granted to such an extent that you seriously wish you were on the peak of Himalayas wearing an orange dress with a chain of beads in hands, chanting gibberish stuff.

Right when you stomach is upset, they make you eat ‘the-food-they-made-outta-love’ even if you feel nauseous. Right when you have a bitter cold, they offer sweets and serve icecreams or grapes or cucumbers and complain if you don’t eat. Oh, and only when you request them to keep a secret, they gossip about it, claiming to be helping in spreading the word. And when you don’t appreciate being bought a new dress forcefully, you are considered to have an attitude problem; just like they brand you to be too headstrong and obstinate when they are the ones ‘trying to be there for you’ when the main thing you want is some time alone. The worst part is when one is expected to take it all with a wide smile on face, swallowing all the pain and grief of never getting what is wanted dearly, because it never feels great, not being able to control your own life!

Distance, speed, weight, time etc etc have respective global units to quantify. Love, is probably one of the very few attributes, that have no specific units. They are solely quantified based on the method of expression and NOT the amount showered. Being with your loved ones would be the most rewarding feeling if everyone expresses it in the way the other person wants or understands. Else, it equivalent to speaking in an alien language and doesn’t make sense, and after one point, leads to frustration and doubts. Love should be the easiest thing in the world. ,If it becomes extremely difficult and intolerable, then it either means that there is a HUGE communication gap and lack of understanding, or simply that the people are from India!!! It is here that even after 18 or even 21, men and women are still treated as children by adults, and their needs and wants overruled in the name of ‘love’ and ‘care’ of elders who ‘ALWAYS know-better’. Curiosity and joblessness of society and relatives and ‘loved ones’ overrides personal space and privacy. But the most important thing that people don’t realize is that one can retain water only in open and cupped hand. The minute fingers close upon it and try to clench it tightly, the water escapes, and is lost, just like love and respect.

And the sooner people understand this, the better it would be for everyone, else whole bonding might get ripped right from the foundation.

Girl Crushes if I were a Guy

2009-06-07T11:24:00.008+05:30

Disclaimer: Male Chauvinist Guys and Anti feminists- Stay away from this post!!!! This post may contain a lot of exaggerated views, and is not meant to offend anyone.

Well, though this is a tag from Vimal/Vimala, Vimmu/Vimmi, I am definitely not entering any sort of a sex-transformation machine for this! As a girl its kind of easy to think from a guy's shoes, mainly coz- guys don’t think at all!! :P
Just kidding! But if I were a guy, then I would have been a Tambram guy! 8O!! Now that’s a disaster!!
Anyways, if I were a sensible tambram guy (again, paradoxical, as far as girls/sex/crushes/love-life is concerned.. I know!) But, Let me be the first of the kind, and think from a 'sensible Indian Tamil Brahmin Guy's' point of view.

Bipasha Basu- A tambram would mostly looove to gawk at such a girl on-screen only. He would blush and look down or look away and pretend that he just did not see her, if encountered with one in real life, and bitch about her attitude and exposure and 'slutty attitude' behind.
Priyanka Chopra-A Tambram would want the girl he has a crush on to be the ultimate hottie, wearing sexy traditional dresses, who is appreciated by all his friends, and who makes him proud even as an acquaintance.

Sania Mirza- a sportswoman, wearing short cute dresses, playing solo in front of raving audience, representing the country, lots of attitude.. Nothing more to say!

Genilia- Now this, I have no idea why! (Could give it to her cute bubbly looks though..) I haven’t come across even one tamil guy, who doesn't have fantasies about her! So if I were a tamil guy, I guess I too would fantasize her, probably because her characters are normally as dumb as a mcp and an antifeminist would like to think of a girl!

and 5th... gosh! I am running out of girls!! :P or may be I am just getting back to a-straight-girl-who-can't-have-girl-crushes girl again.. :D
Well, since I can't think of anyone specific, in general, I think a guy could and would have a crush on a career woman, in a suit, with loads of attitude and capability to knock him down and kick his ass, and yet smiles on his face and greets him with a charm! :P ( thought of this from a girl's shoes only, n not from a guy's perspective).

So, there you go Vimal.. your rescue card from my side!! :)

The World Needs a Super Hero!

2009-06-02T18:51:00.003+05:30

The racist attacks in Aus on harmless Indian students whose only crime was to farewell in acads and in jobs, while the aussies weren’t as good, and were driven to this point merely by their own insecurities, is just shocking! I mean how lower could they fall? Feelings like these just don’t burst out suddenly! They must have been pent-up for ages! If they thought that Indians were such a competition, then why don’t they just work harder and prove that they are as good! How cheap is it to physically hurt an enemy (as if their feelings towards Indians aren’t obvious!), when he is, infact unarmed. But then I really cant help questioning the Indians either, as to why they still risk walking alone on Aus roads, or even don’t fight back(Oh no! I definitely did not mean the ‘Gandhian way’. See what happened? Even the Aus police are clearly against them.)
May be Indians should start going out in groups, be well armed and hurt the attacking racist mob back, so that they never dare hurt another Indian in their remaining life. I am definitely not suggesting starting a war. But walking away, beaten up by brainless jobless gits for no mistake of theirs is as shameful too, and does infact portray Indians as soft and easy targets as they claim! If we are not as soft and cowardly as they say, then SHOW THEM! If the Aus govt doesn’t see a problem arising at all, if they really are deaf and blind to the obviousness of the situation, then they are playing an active part in the racist movement too. Why don’t they just gather their balls and jus tell the Indians to leave their country alive, and outright?
And here are our dear politicians, walking, talking and thinking in slow motion! Well, obviously, if they take immediate steps, even though people would benefit, they’ll also forget it as fast. The men-in-power want the whole issue to blow up as much as possible so that when they actually do something, they will be able to flaunt it in next elections and gain votes. They are just making news and talking a lot, just like the post-26/11 attacks.
Now that issue is even more ridiculous. Kasab’s trial, his sneering jeering comments and smirks over the accusations, with our dear darling Indian police and military wiping his dribble and washing his poop and feeding him with nutritious diet, when people like him and the masterminds like Hafiz Mohammad Saeed who has actually been acquitted and freed of all charges, don’t deserve a fair/unfair trial at all! All they deserve is to be executed publicly, right on the Rajpath, in front of the India Gate. That would show the terrorists where they stand and what their fate will be if they even so much as set foot on Indian soil with any wrong ideas. But they know just as we do, that Indian politicians are spine-less useless softie-pants who would even bear seeing poor helpless Indians suffer, but never have the heart to give terrorists what they deserve. Even they know how corrupt the post-bearing people are, how corruption starts from the lowest levels and how high all these things run and how Indian politicians are highly predictable and over-ride the military, and can really be taken for-granted. They know that they can get away with anything, without as much as even a scratch on them!
The past few days, have been really horrid, not only in our country. Over 2,000 civilians massacred in Srilanka, even after the war was clearly over, suicide bombs in parts of Somalia and Pak, financial crisis all over the world; Yesterday and today kind of reaching the peak, in all parts of the world. A lot of people have suffered physically and mentally and psychologically. Air France crash taking down around 228 people along with it, their bodies never to be found, about 35 people dead in a bus crash, drowned in Chambal lake, over 400 teenagers taken hostage by the Taliban (who have now been released though, but imagine the plight of parents when their home-returning kinds are in the hands of the mercy-less terrorists!), GM going belly-up leading to a possible unemployment of over thousands, students protesting and suiciding over the smallest of issues like tests and marks.
My mom said that it was high time ‘Kalki’ came to the rescue of humans, or there might not be left any in the future. Kalki is the tenth avatar of Lord Vishnu, who is prophesied to come riding on a horse back, to the rescue of the innocent from the hands of modern-day asuras. Now when they had prophesied this, they might not have thought of predicted the emergence of sophisticated motorized vehicles. But you know what I think? I think ‘Kali’ is simply a super-hero, who could have fallen from a ‘Krypton’ or simply has billions of money and a brave heart to use it against criminals. Kali could emerge from a space-ship or a limousine or a horse-back (as predicted). But right now, the world could really use a Superman!

Out-of-Ordinary

2009-05-27T22:45:00.002+05:30

Here is me, in this mundane world, hoping and wishing for titanic adventurous miracles to happen- for a Godzilla to walk through the streets (I know- a lot of people’s lives might be destroyed, but what the hell!), or a meteor shower with a space ship from Krypton (a lot of meteor freaks might emerge, but it could be good entertainment!), or a volcano to erupt somewhere close(I know- I am turning into a sadist!), or for me to by-mistake slip into the volcano’s crest to reach the center of the Earth (hey! I am not all that graceful, you see..), or find a car which would take me to the past/future at 88 Km/Hr (yeah yeah, highly unimaginable, but I can still hope, right?), or for me to walk through a closet into the monster world(alright! I am not as small or as cute, but I am not scared of ghosts either!), or the queen of Genovea declaring me to be the princess of genovea, the next heir to the thrown :P( I so wish even more for the handsome romantic duke), or for me to discover that I am actually a witch, and get an invite to attend schooling at Hogwarts( fine! I might be too old for school.. but it I can still learn to use a wand!), or fall in love with a vampire(then, life wouldn’t be more exciting!!) , or for me to discover that I had a special ability(may be the healing power :)), or for atleast Kolangal/Kalasam/Solla than nineikiren/Kasthuri to end(Like that’s gonna happen!!). Sigh.. There is no limit to what a person can dream, now is there?!? But hey! Don’t get me all wrong! I am not a terrorist, wanting to hurt people. Just think that I could use some real adventure and some excitement in the world! That’s all. :)

Subtlety Issues

2009-05-17T00:11:00.003+05:30

Now that I am home and pretty jobless, I seem to have loads of time to spend. Not too unusual as its just like any other vacation, in fact summer hols used to last for about 3 months! The only difference is that now, I know that I am definitely not returning back to campus, and have no sense of purpose, as of now. Disturbing though it may be, that doesn’t change the fact that I still have the entire days and sleepless nights to kill (I am mostly insomniac. I sleep only once in 2-3 days, that too during early mornings or noons only! :P Old habits die hard, I guess.). So, now I am into watching movies and a few dumb weepy illogical storyless tamil serials on TV. Well, living with 3 adults who could compromise anything but tamil serials for me, I don’t have much of a choice, considering the fact that I m kinda taking it slow in watching all the movies and series I got from d campus due to fear of running out of them. :D Nevertheless, I watch re-runs of a few of the old fantasy movies and Smallville now and then, when I get too sick of TV. Seriously, they hardly screen anything watchable. But occasionally, a few good ones do get shown, for which I fight for happily and watch.

But if there is anything that I have realized, it is that it is too damn hard to watch a good movie in a house with 3 adults!! One kissing scene and I HAVE TO CHANGE THE CHANNEL! Else THEY WILL!!! If no one does, then there will me my dad giving me looks of disapproval, my mom giving me shocked looks that say, ”Oh my! Why is she watching such movies? Doesn’t she have anything good left in her? Has Pilani taken them all away?!?” and then she would get up and walk away, careful not to make eye contact. But there would me my paati (grand mom), sitting with a smirk on her face, looking at me to check out my reaction. Now she would have loads to talk to the relatives!! You can actually see her hiding her wicked grin and turning away, shaking her head, and nonverbally exclaiming,” Oh!! So this is what she has been upto all these years away from home! Watching indecent movies! Kids these days! :D”. What would they even say if they had a son and they caught them watching porn! Sigh! After all this, anyone would just want to give up on them, switch the channel to some weepy tamil serial, and just LEAVE! Grr.

In our country, ‘falling in love’ with a fellow student/colleague itself is a sin in itself. Expressing it is a crime worth punishing! Absolutely unforgivable!! The whole world believes that marriage is a leap taken by two people in so much love with one another, who wish to spend their entire lives together, a celebration of bonding, a declaration of until-death-do-us-part. The whole world but ours! Here, the whole definition of marriage is different, bonding oneself to a stranger/acquaintance, chosen by one’s parents based on the words of a stranger who draws squares and ‘predicts the future’, so that the two married strangers can live a ‘happily-ever-after’. Outside world-“We are in love, eventually married”. Indian version-“We are married, hence in love”. Why are people here so afraid of expressing love? So uncomfortable of watching even movies that show a girl n a guy holding hands? I do understand the awkwardness in watching your close friends/relatives making out in front of you (have seen a few friends do and felt nauseated), but well, some of the current so-called subtlety rules over watching a nice-sweet-cute-romantic movie really bothers me! Hmph!

Kids These Days!!!

2009-05-04T17:44:00.003+05:30

Recently, I was talking to a very very close friend of mine and we ended up having a heavy argument. I felt that she was a typical Hufflepuff, a lot like Phoebe. She was totally outraged and asked why I thought so! I told her that I thought she was just really nice and sweet and that she values hard work, loyalty, tolerance, and fair play (qualities of a Hufflepuff as given in wiki), and she tells nice interesting elaborate anecdotes of her earlier life (and a lot of other reasons too), that she could just fit into the character/House I had suggested. Her immediate response, ”That’s so condescending!! I can be a bitch too you know?!? I could take things light, not work hard, bark at people and lie a lot too!! How dare you judge me to be nice and sweet and all?” and BHAM! She swooped out of my room and went into hers and slammed the door!!! Then… then what? I had to stand outside her room, begging for forgiveness to have called her nice and sweet and assure her that she could be a bitch too if she wanted- Definitely!!! Kids these days!! Humph!! Just don’t know how to take a compliment!

Connecting the dots

2009-04-18T12:30:00.003+05:30

Disclaimer: Heavy rambling below. Don’t tread if you have better work to do, and continue at your own risk only!
Sometimes, we fall… after all, accidents do happen. The fall though may be an accident or a deliberate sabotage by someone jealous of your grace, or even a harsh revenge, a means of showing contempt by someone who hates you, or a simple act of the disgraceful fate, that you fall in the wrong place, at the wrong time in the wrong position. Which ever the reason may be, the outcome remains independent of it, nevertheless, may vary in intensity, from a slight scratch to a broken limb bone or even severe skull injury and a few unlucky times, even death. The slight scratches vanish in time, replaced by new skin. There is absolutely no problem at all in case of death too! :P

Broken bones and skull fractures take a lot of time, energy and money, cause a lot of pain and stress not only to the injured, but also to the close ones, but they eventually do get mended, but done leave without leaving a scar, that keeps reminding you for the entire life, about the whole incident. The actual physical pain just vanishes away in some time. But the mental and psychological pain is that is the trace it leaves, that sometimes tends to be even more painful than the skull surgery itself!

As Steve Jobs had said in his Stanford speech( incase anyone hasn’t heard it before, I suggest you do.. or atleast read it, for its just really good. I listen to it pretty often. Not that its of much help, but it just makes me feel good and, well, it makes a lot of sense. That’s all.), the dots in life will connect one fine day, and they connect only by looking back and not forward. But the helplessness doesn’t really help, now does it? I have never been the one to believe in prophecies or predictions or horoscopes( which I usually call horror-scopes), and I still definitely don’t! But I guess I now understand why people do go to the seers or jyothishis who claim to foretell the future of even strangers. They hate being helpless and in the dark too. But hey, how can a stranger tell about your future, which even you, who have known yourself since you were born, cant tell? Atleast, that’s my main reason for not believing in them anyway.

In any case, the future will definitely unfold. May be not as one had planned, may be not as one had hoped and may be not as someone else had foreseen it for a payment, but it will fall right under our feet and we will walk through it, whether we like it or not, whether it hurts or not, whether it is pleasant or not. But what ever comes, it is not written on stone. The future is NOT WRITTEN ON STONE. Even Alice Cullen cant predict it right because it changes with each decision one makes, every choice one makes/ is made for him/her. It changes at every crossroad, every turn taken and every new move.

Hence, I guess, that is why it is impossible to join the dots looking forward in life, because they just aren’t there. If Mr. X takes a left to reach a palace and become a king, or goes straight to his wife and kids to live a happy peaceful middle-class life, or take a right to meet with an accident and loose his limbs forever(I wouldn’t say die coz I believe there are things worse than death in this world), and he is totally lost and really doesn’t know which to take, a psychic can tell only upto the point where he reaches the crossroad. It is his destiny that makes him choose a path, fate that leads him to whatever destination.

I guess at the end of a bad road, all a stressed person can do is ask “Why now?” or “Why this?” or “Why me?”. But I guess fate is just deaf and dumb! So it would be a much better use of time and energy, if instead of asking oneself/fate such idiotic unanswerable questions, one would just go back home and continue watching cute sweet romantic fantasy movies, dream one’s own happily ever after, yet live a real life without questions!

Toffee Issues

2009-03-30T00:44:00.003+05:30

Life here is becoming more n more difficult, n well, may be, more expensive. Hey, I am not talking about some stupid inflation or some economics stuff. But well, the conversations normally exchanged in shops here are somewhat like these:
Student: One center-fresh pack.
Shop-Keeper(SK): 6 Rupees.
Student gives a 10 Rupees note. SK returns him 4 coffee-bites, or some unknown 1-Re toffees!
This happens almost always these days! I mean, most of the students have to give the SK the right change, up to even 1 Re coins. Where the hell do they all go? I mean, this is obviously, a stupid mass strategy for chocolate/toffee marketing, and a n effective business tactic for the SKs, coz they get them in a bulk, for way a lesser price, and I don’t know, throw away all the changes that they have (or just hide them) and refuse to sell the customers stuff if they don’t have change, unless they are ready to accept these toffees or simply buy more stuff till they get a round number, when in fact, they intentionally fix the prices at some odd value, just exceeding a round value, in-order to sell more of their toffees!
Today, a friend wanted maggi, and we went to the Nescafe stall inside the Girls Hostel. One plate of maggi is Rs 12, a coffee is Rs 6, Tomato Soup is Rs 7. But we all know that she takes 15 for maggi, 10 each for soup and coffee. If they don’t have changes then why not make the prices round, and just increase/decrease the quantities? Then no one has to lose, except these SKs would make lesser profit! They have gotten so used to bullying this extra unseen money from students, that they have become so damn arrogant now!
Friend: A plate maggi plz.
Gives Rs 15. SK gives back 3 melodies (which we all hate).
Friend: See... I really am not a chocolate person. I'll give you Rs 2. Gimme the five back.
Friend gives a 1Re coin and 2 50-paise coins.
SK: Sorry. We don’t accept anything other than 1/2/5 Rs coins. 50 paise and all doesn’t go in the market.
Friend: Then just note my name, ID and my room no and take 10 Rs, n I promise I'll get the change by tomorrow.
SK: See... I cant do that. But take these toffees. Don’t you know? Coins are not there anywhere in Pilani. The daily market works only with these toffees. They are really good! Just try them! And if they are not good, let me know.
Student: Why?
SK: Then I’ll change to some other toffee! :D

Then my friend had one of those damn toffees that was given a couple of days ago from the same SK. So she gave it in place of the 2 50 paise coins.
Friend: Well, since the market is running on these toffees, there you go!.
SK: Uh.. well, we only give toffees, not take them. Sorry. But then you can buy something else for 3 or 7 Rs, surely.
Friend: Nopes. Don’t want anything else either. But you know what? Forget the maggi. I am not hungry anymore! Your toffees just drove it away!
SK: Sure. That’s fine.
She then turns to another girl who shows a 100 Rs note for some 32 Rs purchase, and gives her back 8 toffees! The girl takes them with no complaint at all! Either the girl is just too dumb, or just very hungry and ok with being cheated! So much for education in a ‘prestigious institute’!!

DIB(The Expansion will be Explained Subsequently)

2009-03-22T11:56:00.002+05:30

1.15 am
BUMBRO BUMBRO, SHYAM RANG BUMBRO…
Me: (Yawn)
Knock Knock.. Door opens.
Me: Hi.. can you please reduce the volume? I am not able to sleep.
DIB: Oh! Ok.. I’ll reduce it.

1.35 am
Bumbro bumbro.. o…o… tummm…
Me: What the hell man? She just touched the volume control or what? I can still hear it well, loud enough and clear! You can hear it through the phone!!! Imagine listening to the same song for the past half an hour!! Whaa I want to sleep!!!
Friend-on-phone: Well.. good luck with that!! Anyways, goodnight!
Knock Knock.. Door opens.
DIB: Oh.. you can still hear?
Me: Yes. Very very clearly!
DIB: Oh.. k.. I’ll reduce it further. Sorry! :D

2.00 am
haira haira hairabba.. haira haira hairabba..
50 kg tajmahal enakke enakkagha..
Me: (Thinking) Oh that is considerate of her to put tamil song for my sake!! WHAT THE HELL?!?!? Doesnt she know how to reduce volume?

3.15 am
Phone rings.
Me: So the world is against my sleeping!
Number seen: +301
Me: Ohh! ISTD??
Hello?
A male voice: Hulloooo…. Aap kaun bol rahe hain?
Me: Huh? Aapne call kiya tha.. aap boliye? Kaun hai aap aur kya chaahiye?
The male voice: Aapka voice bada sweet hai… Aapka naam kya hai? Mere saath friendship karengi?
Me: urgh! (Cut the call.)
Phone rings again. Number seen: +301.
Me: (Thinking) If its not ISTD, it must be some VOIP or some thing like that! Hmph.(Switch it off.)
Aaye ho kis bagiya se..
Bumbro bumbro, oh oh tum..
Bumbro bumbro, oh oh tum….
Me: This is just not happening!! Deaf Insomniac Bitch(DIB)!!(Switch the fan on.)
The noise of the fan drowns the bumbro music.
Me: Well, this noise is atleast bearable!
Cover myself with an extra blanket and finally fall asleep.

The unwelcomed guest

2009-03-09T22:26:00.003+05:30

About an hour back, there was a really unbelievably huge and unexplainably ugly lizard in my wing that caused a huge chaos, and led to a not very new, yet a valuable realization, and a huge sigh of relief. The lizard was kinda playing hide-n-seek with the rooms and the wingies when all of them banged on my door and screamed out,” Hey.. A lizard is coming into your room!!!” I immediately, out of reflex, opened my door, and was immediately confronted by a few of my friends with their brooms held high! I realized that they were not joking, and tried to locate where the stupid homeless lizard had gone, when I sadly found that when I had opened my door, it had gotten stuck to the bottom of my door and was struggling to get into my room!!! I jumped and picked my own broom, and there we were, just staring at the obscenely huge struggling lizard, not really knowing how to tackle it, for none of us, especially me, fancied seeing a dead stinking lizard under my door. Since we were all delirious, NO- NOT SCARED, just you know… kinda panicky, I went to ask the didis for help, thinking they might have more experience and might tell us exactly what to do.

FYI, didis are the 24x7 helpers who stay in the girls hostel and their so-called-jobs are to be there for us in case of any required help. Well, as I was saying, they were all gathered in their own common room, knitting sweaters (Lord knows why considering the winter is long gone) and watching a really old Hindi movie. I went there in a delirious hasty state and pleaded and begged them for help. One out of the five maids looked up, and said she didn’t know what to do, and told me to take someone else. Others didn’t even bother to look up from their ‘knitting’ or their ‘fascinating movie scene’. So much for their presence in the hostel!!!

I walked back, and then the rest of the ‘friends-with-brooms’ were standing just where I had left them- right outside my door, keeping an eye on the lizard, though it seemed pretty still, and I was afraid it was dead where I didn’t want it dead!! Of all the places to get stuck! Urgh! Anyways, then we formed strategies, found that it was still alive, very much actually, and slowly maneuvered it out if its hole, into my room and out through the balcony, using a number of brooms and tracking it to its right path and all. Phew! What an exhaustingly nasty business! And ew! What a disgusting reptile!! Even more than the fright of it lying dead under my door, there was a disconcerting thought of it ripping its tail or a limb off and running away, leaving it in my room. The lizard would eventually grow it back. But my room would have been a mess!!

So the main lesson learnt- Didis here are so used to luxurious life of not working at all, and watching TV 24x7 and doing nothing, that these helpers are just not helpers anymore, except if them not helping leads to us learning to help ourselves is the help that they really are here for! And the huge sigh of relief was hence a mixture of the ugly lizard leaving my room whole and alive, and, me leaving this place for good, by the end of this sem, to a place where I hope to God, not to face such useless irritating unhelpful didis ever in my life. But oh well, at the end of it all, the unwanted guest left my room alive, when all the odds were pointing the other way, no thanks to the didis, but all thanks to the wingies-with-brooms!!

An Irony of Life

2009-03-01T09:42:00.000+05:30

Some time back, I had written about how boring life had become, so much that it was a type of killer. After all these months, nothing much seems to have changed in my belief. For the past few weeks, over and over again, I have lived with them and them and them and them and them and them and them and them and them and am going to further live with them and them and them and many others. Things always seem to happen in series! A person/character always gets what one wants in real life with so much ease. I mean, life in series seems much more exciting and much less boring, much more adventurous and much less monotonous, and life there seems much more invigorating and much less useless than the daily one. One would feel so important, so powerful,so confident, so extraordinary and successful in there. Well, all I have to say is that ordinary life sucks and I really really wish miracles would happen and fictions would be real though the only problem is that fictions are falsities, imaginary tales, fantasies, fairy tales- basically opposite of realities!! What an irony!!Sigh...

The Man in Dhoti

2009-02-19T18:26:00.000+05:30

We were in the library- oh yeah! I go there once in a while. Had to start working on thesis some time before the end of the sem! Well, as I was saying, we, as in a group of 5, had gone to library to ‘research’ on our topic. I had never even touched such huge books in my entire life! Well, the whole research expedition was more like a drill exercise assignment, but did it with enthu nonetheless. There was another girl, sitting in the only comp in that room, referring a number of journals and typing her report. At around 5 pm, a man in around late 50s, wearing a old shirt and a dhoti went to her and asked how much more time she was going to take. She assumed that he was the caretaker or possibly the librarian and said that she would take more than an hour more. He then asked her if he could use the comp just for 10 minutes to check his mails and scraps as he wouldn’t be able to wait for an hour, for his duty was over. We were all shocked!! I whispered to the girl sitting next to me about his guts to openly ask someone who was using it for academic purposes, to check mails, and how atrocious it was! Well, they guys who were sitting on the other site were sniggering! I gave them a quizzical look, n they asked, ”Did you see that? Its funny enough that that guy knows to read and write and type. But its funnier that he has an email account, an active one too, and an orkut account!! We were just wondering the people in his friend-list!” Well, though it was rude of them to think so, I couldn’t help join them, thinking of how important his mails/scraps could be if he had to check them in a ‘library’ and that too couldn’t even wait till the next day’s duty when the comp was empty, and actually borrowed it from a poor studious student!! But well, we shouldn’t be judging anyone by their looks/age/dress… right? ;)

Does She Know?

2009-02-14T10:40:00.002+05:30

I had gotten the idea from Mats about writing a 55 Fiction, a nice one too. i quite enjoyed writing this one and i might write a few more! Thanx Mats!

They wont know.

No they wont!

They’ll foil it.

Hope mom doesn’t know.

Hope she forgives.

Oh that she will!

I fear father.

Your father?

And hers.

And her brothers too!

They’ll never find out.

Hope they don’t!

Atleast not before!

Does she know?

OF COURSE SHE DOES! SHE IS THE ONE ELOPING WITH ME!!!

Dreams on fire!!

2009-02-11T09:30:00.003+05:30

I am in so much love with this song that I'm just not able to get enough of it! Every bit of its music is just so enchanting and the lyrics is also equally magnificent. If a sensible soul in love(since a hopeless romantic would generally give out his heart n wanna sing this song to every opposite-sex walking across his/her path, I am not excluding them from this discussion), is really able to sing this song(or dedicate it :P) to his/her lover and really mean it from the bottom of his/her heart, then there could be nothing more romantic in this real world!

You are my waking dream
You're all that's real to me
You are the magic in the world I see
You are the prayer I sing
You brought me to my knees
You are the faith that made me believe

Dreams on fire
Higher n higher
Passions burning
Right on the pyre
Once for, forever yours
In me
All your heart
Dreams on fire
Higher n higher

You are my ocean waves
You are my thought each day
You are the laughter from childhood games
You are the spark of dawn
You are where I belong
You are the ache I feel in every song

Dreams on fire
Higher n higher
Passions burning
Right on the pyre
Once for, forever yours
In me
All your heart
Dreams on fire
Higher n higher

Whatever!

2009-02-02T17:17:00.003+05:30

Pain.. is when some stranger standing in front of you gives some bloody bullshit reason popularly termed as RECESSION, but really tells you that you are just not good enough, after the 5 years of battle with huge books and numerous tests and useless assignments and meaningless projects. But what is even more depressing is when you have to tell yourself that may be he is darn right and that you ARE not good enough! Oh! Don’t give me that crap on optimism, confidence, hope and all that! It would be really easy for people to spill words of consolation to boost confidence and all, but its just not the same- standing in the battle field, and talking about it watching news on TV. Most of the times, the so called ‘great-people’s sayings’ n ‘motivational quotes’ don’t even make any sense. They just seem like Joey’s thesaurus words! These quotes irritate you so much when uttered at the wrong times, that you would want to kill the person who says them. Anesthesia is given before any painful invasive process to numb the sense organ(s). Pessimism is a type of anesthesia too. It is way easier to face a series of rejections shamelessly and digest the screams of one’s inner self with pessimism and negative attitude rather than hope and optimism. Damn all those right decisions that went wrong! Talking about wrong decisions, I wish I were born two years before or two years after! Being born when I actually did- man! What a disastrous decision(just not mine) that was!

Death Race

2009-01-26T20:33:00.001+05:30

Saw Death Race movie on big screen yesterday! A one-time-great-watch movie, like say 300 or something like tat. OMG!! I was so damn impressed by tat movie( I know it was a remake from the 70s)! What I admired the most is the attitude of the hero. But then most of the people in film seemed to be overflowing with it anyways, n the hero was no exception. Worse; I felt so ashamed to ride my CYCLE- tat too a LADY BIRD back to my hostel just because I have done no crime, when those criminals got to drive such hi-tech cars! Man! What a talent!(assuming such car-drivers do exist, since I m not a very great follower of F1) I know! I know! If I were really there, I would have died long before the race had even started! :P But lets see what I am in my next life!!

Life without background music

2009-01-21T21:15:00.000+05:30

Watched Slumdog Millionaire a day or two before, mainly coz I really had nothing else to do in life! :) Well.. I liked the movie very much, in general. Swinging back & forth between the past and the present, it was really very impressively taken, such that everyone could easily understand. The only other two movies I can think of with this past-present sway are Alaipaayudhe(Saathiya in Hindi) and Ayudha Ezhuthu(Yuva in Hindi), though both had their own unique styles.

In this movie, I was really moved by a few scenes- like the one where Jamal’s mom screams for them to flee, where the younger bro invites the little wet girl into their shelter, the scene where Salim saves his sibling from ‘eye removal’ and the ‘third musketeer’ gets left behind, the one in which they kill the villain n save the girlie, when Jamal meets Her in a bastard’s place, when they ‘almost’ meet in the station- MAN! I just loved every damn scene after that! All till the end when He crosses 3 platforms & 2 tracks and finally reaches her and pulls down the dupatta from her head and when she shyly looks down, all with that melodious ‘Latika Theme’ running in the background… OMG!! Seriously!! Can a guy love a girl so damn much?!? I mean normally in Bollywood movies, the love story is between a heroic manly well-built hero and a fair skinny beautiful (in most cases atleast) made-to-look-damsel. But in this movie, the girl didn’t look all that pretty and the hero looked like the thin puny guy-next-door! Anil Kapoor’s sarcasm was enjoyable in many places, but a little too exaggerated in a number of scenes. But Jamal could easily become ‘the guy-of-dreams’ for many, I am sure! But Cindrella tales don’t exist in real life, do they?!?

But A.R.Rehman’s mesmerizing music throughout the movie, especially the last scene, made me feel that we miss something really important and beautiful in life- a background music, appropriate for each and every thought, feeling and the passing moment. Just imagine how more colorful and musical life would be!

A picture-perfect morning

2009-01-17T09:42:00.001+05:30

Today, I woke up with a wide smile on my lips. It is raining after a really really long time- the first after the long period of bitter cold; and there is a break in the clouds, through which the warm rays of the sun are flowing down to earth. The climate here today is so beautiful, so gloomy yet so delightful, and the place itself is so wonderful, so colorful and marvelously picturesque with a few peacocks dancing(well, actually just flapping their wings & feathers n circling, and coming in the way of people who are walking or running late to classes, and the peahens actually seem to run away scared! :P). And here I am sitting on my bed, cozily snuggled under two quilts, drinking hot tea, not thinking or worrying about anything, looking outside (and yes, typing in the side too :P), wishing this romantic moment could be paused and a ‘5-D snapshot’ (1^st ,2^nd & 3^rd dimensions being x, y & z co-ordinates, the 4^th being time and 5^th being my state of mind) could be taken, digitalized and saved. :)

Back to heaven

2009-01-09T18:22:00.005+05:30

Well… here I am, back in college campus for this semester- my last semester in the prestigious institute BITS, Pilani. In train, my bay was filled with weirdoes! All of them! A guy in early 30s braying all the time, a 50 yr old who played really loud masala music from 7am apparently to keep us entertained and kept ‘trying’ to help me, an uncle who kept boasting about his profession related to film industry n all, a kiddo who loved plugging his ipod into his ears and singing aloud, 3 middle aged freaks in the next bay who kept staring at me all through the journey (to such an extent that twice I went to the bathroom to check in the mirror if something was stuck on my face!), no no- 2 were staring, one was infact glaring for some reason; a couple of romancing teenagers who slept together all through the journey- no they never came down from the upper berth unnecessarily, grandpas sitting below who were frowning on them, and a huge bunch of muslim-orthodox uncles in the bay on the other side of mine who played urdu prayers most of the day and took turns in doing namaz in the small place. On the whole, the journey wasn’t remotely pleasing, a lonely 40hr day train travel (delayed due to dense fog), then a bumpy tiring 8hr bus journey from Delhi to Pilani, with a bloody cold climate and fog so thick that I couldn’t see my own hand when I stretched it out, n the bus was running at the speed of an old man walking with a stick!! I finally reached the campus and the one n only Meera Bhawan (the only girl’s hostel) to find that someone else was already in the room allotted to me! Then it was about 10.30pm when I managed to convince my warden that the room was occupied n that I was roomless on a bitterly cold night and all the issues were sorted and I was given another room. Then I went to C’Not and packed some food n came walked back with a friend, and it sank in my head- I was finally back! It was so peaceful, so blissful, so wonderfully calming to be walking through Shivji! I missed the place so damn much! The next day I went to the institute and there it was, standing as majestically as ever- The Clock Tower! It was as if I had never left! The registration was very simple since I hardly had any courses. But I did meet a number of old friends n juniors, who on seeing me, came over n enquired about my PS. Well, I was glad I was wrong. I did have a lot of friends here n I shall make new ones too. But yes, it wasn’t and will never be the same without my old friends. I am sure it is going to be different in every aspect. Nevertheless I have decided to enjoy my psenti-sem to the fullest possible though 522, 588, 454, 785, 448, 183, 351, 096, 536, 003, 256 will all surely be missed.

Oops I did it again!

2008-12-30T00:30:00.004+05:30

Well, I feel like a total scumbag; a rotten egg; no, a bucket full of filth! I feel like pulling out all my hair, banging my head on a wall contaminated with fungus, screaming out so loud into a mirror on looking at myself that the mirror would shatter into pieces, n running around a tree in the speed of light so that I could kick my own ass. I forgot a friend’s birthday!

I am really really sorry R. I didn’t really mean to do it, rather, not do it. Wishing you I mean. No A; whatever I did to you wasn’t the same. In your case I DID remember that it was on December 14^th. Only, I didn’t remember on December 14^th that it was indeed, December 14^th. It was on 15^th that someone mentioned the date when I said “Shoot! It was 14^th yesterday then?!?" n I called u immediately. But here, I totally forgot that it was R’s on 26^th!! How sadder can I be??? I have totally lost it! I never usually forget B’Days of anyone! Infact it is usually me who reminds people! n D!! I shall never forgive you for having reminded everyone else except me!!!! Grrr…

Well R darling. All I can say is you have the full permission to shoot me down the next time you see me, but yes, more importantly, Belated B’Day wishes from an idiotic me, n may your year ahead be filled with wonderful celebrations n joyous moments!!! U know what i mean [;)]!!!

The Perfect Guy

2008-12-19T14:02:00.003+05:30

Yesterday, I was stranded in the heavy traffic under the scorching sun, irritated as I was, I started looking at the people around, trying to analyze what they were doing to spend the time wasted on the roads while waiting for the damned vehicles in front to move. There was an old man sleeping on the steering wheel on each halt. Wow tats neither good for him or the people around or interesting for me, I thought. Then my eyes landed on a cute girl, who was wearing nail polish in each signal! Now that’s what people call EFFECTIVE TIME UTILIZATION! Then finally my eyes landed on someone, and couldn’t move away after! I saw this tall young handsome guy, with tanned skin tone, with a well maintained body, I must say, with… how do I put it… uh.. really manly wrists and hands with nerves being seen conspicuously on them (he was wearing a full hand shirt, so could see only till his wrists, you see); clean shaven, nice haircut- not too short, not too long, not shabby, not oiled or gelled, just perfectly casual hair, sitting in an elegant posture in the passenger seat of a cab. There was something about his eyes. They were so beautiful, so sad, staring at an infinite point thoughtfully, oblivious to the burning sun or the noisy traffic. They were so warm and attractive that I just couldn’t look away! Then the traffic moved on and so did our respective vehicles, and we again halted at the same relative positions in the next few signals. I was here, trying not to look in his direction in vain, n he was there gazing at infinity, unaware of the real world screaming and honking around him. In one of the signals, his head jerked and he came to the present, and started looking around, trying to remember where he was and why, when whose beautiful thoughtful caught mine looking at him!!! I immediately swore at myself n looked away. In the next signal, I couldn’t resist one stealthy look to check if he was still in this world or went off to his own again. Shockingly, he was still in the present one, LOOKING AT ME, with a faint smile on his lips!!! Now wait! I am not really sure if he was in the present world or not. For all I know, he might have gone into tat floating world of his, n Incidentally, I might have been tat infinite point he could have been gazing! But before I could ponder more on this, his damn driver turned left in that fateful signal and my driver, who was infact my Dad, turned right. Well, cant really blame him, now can I? But thank God my Dad didn’t know about any of this coz otherwise, I m sure he would have decided to turn right way before that signal!!! :D

Aah well, atleast I got the chance to look at the ‘perfect guy’ for a few minutes, and got the proof that such guys DO exist in the non-model non-movie non-fictious world afterall!

And Another!

2008-12-19T12:57:00.003+05:30

And here is another from Kartz, who i believe is one of the most talented persons and one of the most creative bloggers i have had the honour to meet in the blogosphere. Thanx a lot for the award dude! :)

Normally i dont pass on the awards to anyone specific coz i believe the awards go to everyone who is there in my blogroll. :P This too, i present to everyone on my blogroll, and more specifically, to the following people:

Vimal
Varun
Harini
Vivek
Mathangi

cheers!

Butterflies flying all around

2008-12-15T14:01:00.005+05:30

The following awards have been awarded to me by really gud friends in the blogosphere- vimal n varun, . Thanx a lot dear friends! :) I am truely honoured to receive them!

My Message...

2008-12-06T20:18:00.002+05:30

Yesterday, we were asked to observe a moment of silence and pray for Mumbai and its people, and for this craziness to stop. When all of it was actually going on, i used to watch the news to see the extent of damage, sympathize and feel sad. But yesterday, in those 2 minutes of silence, i suddenly remembered a small choir song which we were taught in our primary school. For some wierd reason, i thought i should post it here, as MY MESSAGE. It goes this way...

Its a world of laughter
A world of play
Its a world of joy
And a world so gay
Its a world far and wide
Though the oceans divide
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small, small world

Its a world of plenty
And world of space
Its a world of variety of human race
Its a world far and wide
Though the boundries divide
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small, small world

There is just one moon
And one golden sun
And a smile means
Friendship to everyone
Though the mountains divide
And the oceans are wide
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small, small world

With blacks and whites
And browns everywhere
With plenty of foods
And drinks to share
Its a world far and wide
Let love be our guide
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small, small world

It's a world of laughter
A world of tears
It's a world of hopes
And a world of fears
There's much that we share
That it's time we're aware
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small world after all
It's a small, small world...

Uncomfortable Silence

2008-11-26T20:12:00.003+05:30

Mia: Don't you hate that?
Vincent: What?
Mia: Uncomfortable silences.

Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about bullshit order to be comfortable?
Vincent: I don't know. That's a good question.
Mia: That's when you know you've found somebody special.

When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.

-Pulp Fiction

Love this convo. It’s not something that Chandler alone has difficulty in dealing with - uncomfortable social circumstances and a weird company and probably uncanny situations. But then, our life is filled with these, in all aspects! Under these conditions, people behave very strangely to make themselves comfortable or at least to pass the time, waiting for the ordeal to end. I have realized that I talk a lot, try to make small conversations when I am ill at ease. Man! Tats really hard, mainly because sometimes you know that you don’t have anything common with the person sitting in front of you, staring at you, expecting you to be the initiator and to rack your brains for a suitable subject. But its harder when the person waiting for your response is a stranger, where you don’t even know whether you even have anything in common, or if there is any tabooed topic or how his/her response would be!
I actually love silence n blissful peace, but only when I m comfortable, with a soothing company with whom I don’t really have to ‘try’ to make small talk to relax. Their very presence would be enough to settle my heartbeat rate to the normal 72/min. No. I am not referring to a BF or a spouse here. It could be anyone. Mostly friends coz even my parents are kinda my best friends in a way. Ironically, I am not very fond the silence when I am alone (unless I am depressed about something and want to be alone with my own self :P), or with an awkward company. I prefer some sound, even jarring noises in those times. I hate to be the one talking and making stupid irrelevant jokes that the strangers don’t even understand (one could go crazy if their attempted PJ is a waste and no one understands or appreciates it. It’s an insult to the very joke, u see). But talking crap is better than the awkward silence any day! Hence, though I love that Pulp Fiction dialog, I feel that it IS necessary to yak about bullshit in order to be comfortable, and you DON’T need to have found somebody SPECIAL in order to shut the fuck up and comfortably enjoy the silence. You just need a FRIEND. Tats all. As the song goes…

Jaane kyun dil jaanta hai…
Tu hai to I ll be all right!
I ll be all right!
I ll be all right!

I hate my stomach

2008-11-06T09:03:00.000+05:30

Damn my stomach for always feeling hungry! Its always the tongue being punished for no fault of its! When the stomach feels hungry, it is the tongue that has to eat off anything available, be it good or bad. The stomach doesn’t taste anything after all! The hunger at times is such a pain. I mean I know about how hunger is a way of life for may be half of Indian population, but in my case, its just a pestering MIL who keeps irritating even when I have no mood to eator rather, food to eat! But on rare occasions when I get to eat really really delicious food, when the tongue for once relishes whatever it eats, the stomach after a point gets full n ends poor tongue’s delight over delicious food! How sad is that? Whenever the stomach is ‘upset’, then too, it’s the tongue that is put under restrictions and is penalized. Let us hope that the next time when God decides to create his next species, or when evolution eats away men to leave way for a new variety, some new system would develop such that a there is no hunger. Only taste buds exist. But when someone eats and the taste buds have a nice time, the food does get digested. I mean digestive system should be optional only. Let there be an entirely different mechanism for derivation of energy (for existence purposes), in the next world at least!

Sigh

2008-10-31T12:18:00.004+05:30

Lately i have been having conversations on similar lines with a lot of friends. A number of common if onlys had been discussed. Here are a few of them which i can post in public. :) Some of them are my own, while others are common.

If only our passion got us enough money…
If only we cud dare risk the reality n monetary requirements…
If only we were so stinking rich that it wouldn’t matter if we didn’t earn...
If only we could work where we wanted to, in the field that we were passionate about without worrying about our career or future…
If only we were wealthy enough to learn something just for the heck of it and just for fun…
If only there were people around us who could identify our talents easily and guide us in the right channel…
If only our loved ones recognize our true passion and are proud of what we are, and understand, respect and appreciate our individuality and our beliefs...
If only we were a part of something big, something special, something that would make us feel really important, something that would give us a sense of accomplishment…
If only everybody around us could understand whatever we say in just one go!
If only we get what makes us really happy or we are simply an expert in being happy with what we get…
If only some people who are running behind us could keep up pace with us or just not expect us to wait behind for them…
If only we were fast enough even overtake impertinent snobs who look back and sneer at us…
If only we could come in terms with our conscience, which almost always tends to blame us for every mistake...
If only we were in the right place at the right times to grab the right opportunities…
If only we were innocent and ignorant of some issues… (would save a lot of pain u c..)
If only the Earth spinns faster and we hav lesser than 24 hrs for a day...
If only we lived in the Hollywood world where pain is always followed by a remedy, where loss is always followed by gain, where darkness is always followed by dawn and where coincidences almost always turn out lucky!
If only there was a Batman n a Spiderman n a Superman in real life…
If only I was a part of some great adventure and my blood was full of adrenaline all the time…
If only I were not just a human, may be something a little more interesting, like say a Vampire- looking beautiful, smelling good, never needing to eat or sleep, with musical voice and graceful walk and really quick reflexes…
If only we had magical powers like witches n wizards and we could apparate n disapparate or jus use Portus or floo network. How much time and energy and fuel would be saved!
If only I had an alethiometer, a subtle knife to go to other worlds n a wand to use magic… (I could use Accio, Cheering Charm, Disillusionment Charm (Helps appear invisible), Evanesco (Vanishing Spell), Lumos/Nox, Silencio (Silencing Charm), Obliviate (Memory-Modifying Charm), Reparo n all on a daily basis…) Life would be so much easier, so much better n so much livelier!!

This post is subjected to modifications... i might add in more of them, as n when i think of them.

The Forgotten Arts

2008-10-20T20:34:00.003+05:30

Many a time, we would have discussed hobbies; the options present, the use of each activity that we could think of or someone might have suggested, the presence or our absence of our interest in some of them, or even the validity or worth of each. Some might consider themselves to know all the arts or might think of having specialized in most of them. Some unfortunate ones might feel that the popular arts are too expensive to learn, and hence they couldn’t afford. Some might feel disinterested in some of the arts, but might not know about the others present at all! In the ancient Hindu mythology, there is said to have been 64 different types of arts, which were taught in the schools back then and which were practiced by the commoners on a daily basis.In Srimad Bhagavatam, it is said that Lord Krishna and his brother, Balarama learn all the 64 arts listed in the ancient Hindu mythology. The following are the 64 arts, which have been translated to English from Sanskrit, and further simplified (to make sense in the present picture). I am not sure if the order is right (if at all there is one). If there are any mistakes in the translation or the simplification, please feel free to comment, and I’ll amend the list.

1) Singing
2) Playing on musical instruments
3) Ringing water-pots/creating music with water
4) Splashing with water;
5) Dancing
6) Drama
7) Preparing auspicious designs on the floor with rice grains and flowers (kolams)
8) Flower decorations at home and temple
9 Making flower garlands & preparing wreaths
10) Knowledge of how to build carts & carriages with flowers
11) Skills of cooking, eating and drinking
12) Beverage and dessert preparation
13) Embroidery, needlework and weaving
14) Spinning with a spindle & sewing (making and mending garments)
15) Making puppets dance by manipulating thin threads
16) Painting
17) Mixing colors & mosaic tiling
18) Bedroom arrangements
19) Erotic devices and knowledge of sexual arts
20) Carpentry
21) Architecture
22) Gardening and horticulture
23) Making simple mechanical devices
24) Mineralogy & mining
25) Metallurgy & metal-working
26) Jewelry making
27) Testing silver and jewels and precious stones
28) Hairdressing
29) Head adornments
30) Decorating the earlobe and forehead
31) Applying aromatics/perfumery
32) Costume decorations
33) Artful dressing
34) Art of applying colored unguents and cosmetics on the face and body
35) The art of disguise/impersonation
36) Magic and illusions
37) Manual dexterity/sleight of hand
38) Personal grooming
39) Physical culture
40) Herbal medicine
41) Healing a person with ointments
42) Designing a literary work or a medical remedy
43) Prosody and rhetoric
44) Lexicography
45) Making and solving riddles & enigmatic verses
46) Tongue twisters and difficult recitation
47) Poetry games
48) Literary recitation/reciting books
49) Composing verses mentally
50) Enacting short plays and writing and reciting anecdotes
51) Knowledge of foreign languages and provincial dialects
52) Fabricating barbarous or foreign sophistry
53) Art of conversation
54) Coding & decoding messages
55) Art of guessing
56) Memory training
57) Art of listening (and game of reciting verses from hearing)
58) Training parrots and mynas to speak
59) Personal etiquette and animal training
60) The art of training and engaging rams, cocks and quails in fighting in games of wager
61) Knowledge of various forms of gambling, aakarsha-kreedaa - playing dice
62) Knowledge of dharmic warfare, martial arts and victory
63) The use of spells, charms and omens and amulets
64) Enforcing discipline by mystic power

Wow! Compared to ancient men n women, we are pretty incompetent, aren’t we? It is our life and we do what we choose to do, n mostly, very few of the list above. We work our asses off- for what? Money! Aah. Now there is the answer! These ancient people did not weigh everything they did with money. They didn’t calculate the worth of studies according to the money it would bring in future, or the power n position it would lead to in life. They just studied what was taught by their gurus (which was everything of the above list, or at least most of them); what was essential for a healthy life. No. Money doesn’t count!

Well, can’t really blame anyone for the importance and quality of these arts were lost long back. The teachers n elders may have been at fault for not passing it on to the future generations, or the then children may have been responsible for not having learnt their lessons dutifully. Whichever it is, the very names of some of these arts are lost in the present world where the one who earns the most is considered the most talented n best disciplined!

Well, I have heard my mom mention about this vaguely a really long time back, and I thought of researching on this a little more. So here you go! Now, you have so many options, so many things that you could learn and be proud of knowing just for the sake of knowledge and interest n not for money!

Complicated Life

2008-10-14T20:26:00.001+05:30

The real problem with the world, with her world was that most of the people around her always tended to be good by heart. All of them loved her beyond any measure, loved her company, her presence, her smell, her talk, her actions, loved her in all different ways, physically, mentally, sexually… they all needed her to be by their side, wished her to love them all the same way they did, each one of them wanted to be the one to give her everything that she ever needed n wanted, and to get their needs fulfilled by her n her alone, craved to be given a higher priority over the other, wished that she would be theirs- each one of them did. But what was she supposed to do?

The whole problem was that they were all really good, they all loved her sincerely; n ironically, she loved each one of them as much too. But is it a sin to love more than one person at a time? Oh yes, it could have been if she were cheating them by not being open about the others! But none of them seemed to back out. They were all waiting for the others to leave her. Is it a crime to stick to each one of them simply to avoid causing them pain, much though she loved them back? But why were never satisfied? How could she select among the ones she loved equally? What would happen to the others who were not selected? Will they be able to take the rejection? Rejection? Isn’t that a hard word? A rejection would be a rejection only when she stopped being there for them, when she ceased loving them. But if it caused them so much pain, why even attempt to move away? But that wouldn’t be fair on her part, fair for any of them.

Every part of her was being torn apart with the guilt of having leaded their love to a state where now, their lives would be affected massively when she moved out of it. It caused her infinite amount of pain to know that though she had been totally unaware how and when it all happened, she wasn’t able to blame anyone for her misery, after all, they were suffering too, probably way more than her, and it was all her fault. She was the reason they were being offended this way, being hurt beyond reason. She wanted them to punish her, to curse her to swear on her and to leave her n cause her the same pain that she was causing them. But alas! They just wouldn’t do it; because they were all just too caring at heart. They all wanted her to themselves. Boy! Selfish, aren’t they? They all want her because they need her. They need her to stay, to fulfill their requirements, their needs, their dreams. They needed her to make them complete, to remain alive, a tangible part of each one of them as she had become.

But none could tell the agony her heart was in. Oh wait. But some were well aware of it, but still preferred to remain impassive since they wanted her, and knew that their lives would be in jeopardy without her in it. Now is that selfishness? Trying to live, I mean. The pain was killing them all, burning their insides, poking their hearts with a thousand knives and choking them to death. But they had to get used to the pain, because it was not going to go away, ever. They had to learn to live their lives without her. They had to move on, how much ever effort it took them to do it. But did that make her feel better? NO! She felt even more miserable for having to make them adjust, for having caused all the trouble, for having killed a part of them. But she had tried to withstand. She had tried to endure the pressure of being there for everyone, resisting her own interests to such an extent that she no more even knew what she wanted. Dil ke avaz ko ithna dabaya hai ki vo kab ka khamosh ho gaya. She had pressed her heart to be there for everyone, not to betray anyone she loved at any cost, pushed herself so hard to satisfy them all, to make everyone around happy, that now, her heart had given it up, stopped speaking out, to tell her what she truly wanted, who she was more passionate about, where she wanted to be, what she wanted to do n with whom; it had stopped beating for herself.

Now that she wanted to be happy for herself, to live her life, to run as fast as she wanted, to climb to heights she had dreamt of, suddenly she is the bitch? But somehow, she couldn’t figure out which was worse, people she loved fighting for her n hurting one another, or she hurting them by taking sides, or worse, they empathizing and giving her up for one another, trying their best to feign a brave face, yet crush inside but trying to hide it from her. She didn’t know which stung more. She wasn’t even sure of what her mistake was, n yet she was there unable to stop herself from blaming herself for it all.

She wished she were dead. Sometimes, the prospect of death seemed like a gift. May be she deserved this suffering, this despair, this life. May be enduring it was her punishment. But aah! Death! What relief it could be. She wanted to hug the fate so tight, as even the very idea gave her a sense of exhilaration. It seemed like the silver lightening in the dark clouded sky. But that was not in her hands anyways. Nevertheless it might have been the best n most painless way of taking off, painless for her as well as everyone else, for it seemed like she was such a burden to a lot of people, who in a funny way, never thought of her in that aspect. But she knew. And she was willing to accept the pain, excruciating though it was in blaming herself n no one else, because she loved them too much to blame them. But some of them wouldn’t let her take it. “You were not responsible darling; you have nothing to blame yourself for. If there is anything you have given me, it’s your heart, your love. Always more than I ever deserved”. Some others said,” No sweetheart, please don’t leave me. I need you. I adore you. I love you. You are my life. You are my only hope. Please choose me. Please don’t go!” Some others even blackmailed her emotionally. “I love you so much that you have become an integral part of my life. Life without you is unthinkable. I had rather kiss death than live as a corpse.”

Now, it was way over her head. She had to make a decision. She had to prioritize as this ‘love-all’ concept was taking her nowhere. Yes. She had to make up her mind, and find out the one with whom she was the happiest, the one without whom her life was unfathomable. Yes. She was going to end up losing a lot of other people. But if they didn’t understand her need to do this, if they couldn’t value her feelings, if they weren’t able to realize her state before and after the choice, then they weren’t worth it at all. But yes. It was painful and relieving too at the same time. She felt different, for not doing the usual of ripping her heart into a number of pieces to give one to each, but patching up the broken heart of hers to a single piece and give it to a person whom she loved, and whom she felt deserved. She hoped and prayed to God, to help her heal fast, to give strength to the others who were being torn inevitably due to her decision, and to give her long happiness n peace, a without so many complications.

Aasaikku thaan oru alave illa (Desires have no boundaries)

2008-10-09T16:28:00.001+05:30

There is this New York Life Insurance ad. It shows a whole bunch of people belonging to the same world, full of desires for things they don’t have; though they have lots of other things which others envy them for, to which they are oblivious. There is this super-cool long-haired hunk, walking down the road looking at a bike with jealousy. That bike rider looks at another passerby’s girlfriend, wishing he had one. That girl in turn yearns for a nice family with kids, looking at a young lady walking a child in a pram. This lady-with-the-kid craves for a diamond necklace displayed in a jewel store which she sees a millionaire buy. This millionaire from his side looks at the long-haired-hunk longingly for his hair, bald though he is!

Wow! I simply loved the simple portrayal of real life scenario where people always have some or the other desire deep in their heart, irrespective of what they are or what they have. There is always something that they don’t have or rather they can’t have. Not wanting anything more is probably never possible for a normal man. Even Gandhi ‘wanted’ Indian independence and then he ‘wanted’ Pakistan separation and all. So we can’t really call him ‘free from desires’. I believe that even sages ‘wanted’ peace or silence or simplicity in their life n that’s why they chose their nonchalant form of life. They do penances to get their desires fulfilled. But coming back to the present life, there are actually some people whom I see around, who say wholeheartedly that they are contented with what they have in life and they actually want their life to freeze right there n remain that way. I could actually envy them. Now don’t get me all wrong. I am definitely not jealous of them. There is always a difference between envy n jealousy. Envy is when I say “Wow! I wish I had that too… or I wish I was there too” whereas jealousy is when I say “Damn! I wish I was the One to have that… or I was the One to be there”.

Everyday I think of the things that are there with me, yet I can’t help wanting something else, something different, and something that I probably had wanted all along, but hadn’t achieved it. What if I had reached a different place? It’s a nice one too. But well! There are loads of things that I still want there too! I am definitely not selfish or greedy. But I guess these contented people are either the ones who have reached their goal n achieved exactly what they had worked for, or they have simply learnt to live with what they have without wishing further. But yet another part of me feels that desires inspire a person more than the people around, more than words or sayings, more than even their previous achievements. Desires n dreams motivate a person to visualize a target, provides them an ambition, gives a sense of purpose to their walk through the life n the strength to reach the ultimate point and encourages them to reach further and want more and finally grants them the satisfaction of having accomplished it. There are a lot of such motivational movies like Ice Princess, October Sky n many others. Though I had said before that I could envy the contented people, the truth his that I really do envy those who have identified their passion, who have worked out their goals, who have started pursuing it with full confidence and willpower, and who have even started dreaming about their success. The contented people say “I am there. I have enough. I am happy.” The pessimists say “The journey is too difficult, the destination is too far and the aim is too vague to pursue n realize.” But the optimists say “I will be there soon. I shall have it in a short while. I will touch it one day.”

My first awards :)

2008-09-30T18:50:00.002+05:30

Thank you very much vimmuuu… for the awards. Its been about 3 months only since I started blogging, since I had let the contents of my dear pensieve spill over in the blogosphere. From the time I had plunged into this new world, I had found an enormous satisfaction in sharing my thoughts n beliefs n memories with people whom I had never met before, who had understood my feelings, respected my thoughts, valued my beliefs n even sometimes channeled my ideas the right way. I cherish them all, as they are all a part of my life now- my blog-friends.

A Bad Day Today! :(

2008-09-26T14:49:00.003+05:30

Today is one of the worst days! Murphy ’s Law was being proven again n again!
“Whatever can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible time, in the worst possible way”

Got up really late today (damn the tablet I took yesterday night!). In the hurry to reach my office on time, I had to do everything hastily, and in my hurry, I forgot my mobile at home! Good God! I actually forgot my mobile at home! I realized it on the bus and went crazy! OMG! What would I do the whole day? How could I survive? My mobile is one of my Horcruxes! I was nearly delirious by the time I reached my office. I had a presentation at 9.30, but made it to the office only at 9.50, with an empty stomach making such a racket that I feared people around might hear it!

Then I saw the presentation schedule and realized that I had attended a similar one long back, so it was kinda repetition, so decidedly went to the canteen to have breakfast. I came back to find my blogspace really screwed up and couldn’t even identify the problem. So took some time, identified it n finally modified it. Next, I ran into the in-charge of the presentation, walking out after taking the attendance, and seeing me on the internet pc, gave me a disapproving look. I had to convince him that the lecture was kinda repetition for me. He just shrugged away. Not good! Then one of my colleagues, a friend, walked past my bay from the conference room, and on enquiring about the presentation, I found that it was being given by my team members, my seniors, and my TL was there too! FUCK! I didn’t know that! I asked my friend why he hadn’t called me; I was only sitting a few yards away from that room?!?! His reply was that he didn’t know I was in the office!! Lol!

It was apparently a presentation that my team was delivering. What would have my boss thought of me? How stupid was I to have not checked after coming, late though it was?! Oh God! I was so screwed! Then I tried to sneak into the conference room, as silently as possible, when suddenly, NR called out from the dais,” Hey! You where were you in the morning?”I had to smile as widely as possible to hide my embarrassment, n said,” Er… I came in late.” N another female called out,” Hey! Hardly been seeing you these days?” I thought to myself,” WTF? I didn’t come only yesterday female! I was there even the day before that!” and my boss looks on… I just smiled at her and said nothing other than “uh huh…” the presentation took a really long time, past the lunch time So my friends had lunch n ice cream without me too! :(

And now, I am sitting here, with my half-filled stomach, in a highly confused muddled up state, with some really important life-changing decisions to make, but with HP7 ebook open instead of doing anything else, reading it for the 1000th time. I need to clear my head… you see? :P

Tagged by Aparna

2008-09-22T18:24:00.000+05:30

What do you do when..

- You see a man (or woman) making a pass (trying to woo / flirt / impress) on a woman (or man) you like?
if he does get impressed by that, then to hell with him! if he doesnt, then he has passed the test. so i guess to find out if he passes the test ornot, i wud stand aside n watch!

- Some one you like, is not attracted to you?
then it wud jus be a crush that i might have to add to the list n forget it later if he never gets attracted to me. i m simply not the kind to try to attract him by making false moves to impress him. if he doesnt like who i am, then there is no point in trying to make him like whom i am not, right?

- You are attracted to some one, but both of you are in two different cities?
personally i wudnt consider physical distance as a barrier, as long as both of us r in the same place romantically.

- You are reading a book, and your best friend wants to borrow it and can’t wait for you to finish reading, ‘coz he/she has been looking for it for all their life?
if i really looove tat book tat much, i wudnt take more than a day to complete it neways.. so i wud let him/her wait for jus a day more n then lend it. if i m not really too involved wid tat book, then i guess i wudnt mind lending it b4 i complete it.

- You help plan his / her career, and then, they go on to achieve it, leaving you behind, alone..
i wudnt feel sorry for helping him/her, after all life moves on for all of us, n mostly in different directions. so it wudnt be his/her fault to grasp the opportunity n use it well to go to heights. i wud only be sorry if he/she had refused to use the opportunity for my sake. then no point in my hardwork for his/her welfare right? but if he/she used me to climb up the heights n threw back a stone to keep me down or something of tat sort, then i might be sorry i helped him/her!!

- Insert (and add) a new question(s) / statement(s)..
i m not gonna add ne Qs... but i wud definitely like to add some statements... not my own, borrowed from some1 else, but i love them as i have realized them all too:

I have realized that …The lonelier you feel the lonelier the world makes you feel

I have realized that …Even if I deserve the reward, I need to beg in order to get it

I have realized that …Words hurt me more than the wounds that I had suffered in life

I have realized that …When you have nothing to lose, you show your true character

I have realized that …Closer I am to myself, closer I am to God…

I have realized that …Broader the smile, deeper maybe the wound inside…

I have realized that …No matter how many times I pray, I only get what I rightfully deserve

I have realized that …When I am ecstatic about something, there are never enough people to share it with…

I have realized that …A face is not as important as it is made to believe…

I have realized that …It’s not always a coward who gives up a fight, sometimes smart people too…

I have realized that …You can’t have happiness unless you are already happy…

I have realized that …If you make decisions with your heart, you are bound to regret them later in your life…

I have realized that …Kids are never at fault, they just mirror our faults…

I have realized that …One person’s misery is another person’s merriment…

I have realized that …Every relationship has an expiry date…..

I have realized that …I am better when I am silent….

I have realized that …Smiling all the time can really hurt…

I have realized that …Tears convey more than what words can ever say…

Invisible connexons between the present and the past

2008-09-18T12:10:00.000+05:30

Now I know that I am not a 60 year old or a frequent traveler or anybody famous or experienced or great enough to say the following. But I kind of find it amusing myself. BITS campus was a great place to have spent my vital college years. I had the greatest time of my life, n if there are any regrets, its just that I probably didn’t enjoy it more than I did, though I could have. The campus was cosmopolitan in every aspect with so many people (rather specimens) from various places in India, with different backgrounds, crazy habits, diversified cultures, weird practices, a variety of opinions, a range of tastes and mixed lifestyles. Having known so many people who were so different from each other in most facets, these days, limited though is my new circle of friends/acquaintances is in this new world, I find that I can associate every new person I come across with somebody in my memory, someone from the past! Wow! It feels a little odd at times when I find two totally unrelated people who probably have never even known or met each other, have so much in common, n I start trying to think of some plausible link in their backgrounds. Sometimes it actually feels creepy when I hear someone in the present say the same dialogue as I had heard in the past (definitely not some well-known saying or a clichéd proverb or some famous person’s quote or a movie dialogue or anything of that sort). No wonder poor Amisha Patel in Kaho Naa Pyar Hai flips when she sees/listens to the second Hrithik walk or talk! Though it does spook me, it also brings a smile to my lips and some buried memories in front of my eyes from my pensieve. :)

Love is everywhere!!

2008-09-16T09:49:00.004+05:30

vimmuuu has tagged me with this 'love' tag. the truth is i don't understand the a b c of love. but i have tried my level best to imagine love n me in love (rofl big time!) n answered most of the Q from my heart. some of them are not related to love, coz i see it the way i do. well, go on, read it, n get to know my perspective on some topics, n hav fun! :)
*************************************************************************************

RULE #1 : People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blogs and replace any question that they dislike with a new question formulated by themselves.
RULE #2 : Tag 6 people to do this quiz and they cannot refuse. These people must state who they were tagged by and cannot tag the person whom they were tagged by. Continue this game by sending it to other people.

*************************************************************************************

1. If your lover betrayed you, what will your reaction be?
_|_ to him n then no looking back.

2. If you can have a dream to come true, what would it be?
i have too many dreams that i would wish to come true. dunno which one to mention here. i guess this is one of my greatest dreams/desires: A world full of friends. To walk on the road or travel in a train or sit in a flight or go to a temple or even go to heaven (after death), with all(ok- atleast most of the people) around coming over to say a hi or jus waving or smiling or at least nodding at you in recognition in a pleasant manner.

3. Whose butt would you like to kick?
vimmuuu's for having made me ans dees Q. (kidding!)
actually, wud like to kick a lot of butts... no preference order n all.

4. What would you do with a billion dollars?
Shopping from malls to road-side shops, in different cities, different states n if possible, different countries, without looking at the price-tag or even bargaining, Adventurous trips to unfathomable places and..... may be get a room (not just a closet or a wardrobe) full of clothes- different types of them. lol.

5. Will you fall in love with your best friend?
thats my idea of love itself. moving a step ahead from best friends. if one can't bcom best friends, then how can they love eachother? (but yes- this applies only if my best friend is a guy.. :P)

6. Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone?
second one i guess.

7. How long do you intend to wait for someone you really love?
i am prepared to wait all my life, but i really dont think my parents would take that answer. :D

8. If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do?
i dont know! i really dont think I wud get 'feelings' for a committed person. y wud i wanna hurt others n myself? that doesnt make sense to me!

9. If you like to act with someone, who will it be? Your gf/bf or an actress/actor?
yeah.. i wud faint on stage.(wud to scared to do it u c...) so doesnt matter who ever it wud be as long as they dont curse me for fainting n ruining their scene. :P

10. What takes you down the fastest?
may be lack of confidence or may be lack of patience.

11. How would you see yourself in ten years time?
alive?!?

12. What’s your fear?
a cage. being made to sit at home, doing things i hate, being restricted (by people who mean a lot) from doing what i want or going where i desire, being compelled to be what i am not.

13. What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is?
a gr8 friend of mine in blogosphere, a romantic who wud like to be loved, a teetotaler [;)], n emotional kinda guy, who wud claim to prefer to be single and rich, but i feel he wud choose married but poor, a person with real talent and the guts to pursue his dreams. :)

14. Would you rather be single and rich or married but poor?
plz gimme a few years to think for this answer.

15. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up?
uh... brush?!? may be roll on the bed for a few min (after i wake up i mean), trying to remain in the trans state.(i love it u know- not fully awake, not sleeping, very confused over where i am n happy to think i dont have anything to do that day.. :))

16. Would you give all in a relationship?
if i love that person, i guess yes.(though i may not be too happy to give/give up some things, i wud still do it for i love him n i know that he loves me as much too, he wants me to do it really badly n he is helpless. i wud hate myself for doing it, but well... i wud still do it.)

17. If you fall in love with two people simultaneously, who would you pick?
me? yeah right. sure! even thinking of such a situation makes me rofl! but well, the one who loves me back n the one with whom i can see myself, spending my life with.

18. Would you forgive and forget no matter how horrible a thing that special someone has done?
i wud forgive. yes, coz the person means a lot to me. but i dont think i wud forget. i believe that mistakes of people u love must be forgiven, but not forgotten. (as u must be prepared for a possible next time) but mistakes of oneself must not be forgiven but forgotten.( as remembering it always cud make one's life a torture, but forgiving oneself wud only make one repeat the mistakes more confidently.)

19. What are your three most important expectations in love ( Original Question: Will you marry me?)
faith, understanding of eachother's likes, goals n preferences, being supportive n appreciative in every possible aspect.
ans for d original Q: sure darling! y wudnt i?!? ;)

20. List 6 people to tag:

anu
a.ra
data
harini
Che
viki

Socha Hai… Haan Yeh Kabhi Kabhi

2008-09-11T15:56:00.000+05:30

Aasma Hai Neela Kyun (Rayleigh scattering effect of the molecules of the air due to sunlight)
Paani Geela Geela Kyun (due to polarity of its molecules n a high surface tension?!)
Gol Kyun Hai Zameen (gravity+magnetism)
Silk Mein Hai Narmi Kyun (the fibres have very small n equal diameter)
Aag Mein Hai Garmi Kyun (Combustion reactions- new bonds formed=> exothermic reaction)
Do Aur Do Paanch Kyun Nahi (uh.. uh... wat?)

Pedd Ho Gaye Kum Kyun (u/i/we directly/indirectly, wantedly/ignorantly kinda support felling of trees)
Teen Hain Ye Mausam Kyun (teen nahin hai mausam- char hain- summer, autumn, winter n spring---> so wrong Q)
Chaand Do Kyun Nahi (again, technically an invalid Q; Mars n Neptune ke do do chand hain. yeah.. not for earth though(if they had meant for earth))
Duniya Mein Hai Jung Kyun ( Human spite, racism, communalism, territory, pride n yeah- the obvious- money n power of course!)
Behta Laal Rang Kyun (really? i dont think so)
Sarhaden Hain Kyun Har Kahin (Sarhaden hain nahin.. hamne(humans ne) hi baniyeen hain)
Socha Hai… Yeh Tumne Kya Kabhi
Socha Hai… Ki Hain Yeh Kya Sabhi
Socha Nahi To Socho Abhi…..

Behti Kyun Hai Har Nadi (Gravity, High pressure region to low pressure region; n mostly doesnt happen these days due to dams here n there)
Hoti Kya Hai Roshni (electromagnetic radiation of any wavelength defined by elementary particles called photons)
Barf Girti Hai Kyun (weight, gravity)
Dost Kyun Hain Roothte (huh?)
Taare Kyun Hain Toot The (taare toot the nahin hai dude, those are meteors- rocks n dust, falling into earth's atmos, again due to gravity)
Baadlon Mein Bijli Hai Kyun (static electricity?!?)
Socha Hai… Yeh Tumne Kya Kabhi
Socha Hai… Ki Hain Yeh Kya Sabhi
Socha Nahi To Socho Abhi

Sannata Sunai Nahin Deta (oh really?1?)
Aur Hawayen Dikhayi Nahin Deti (oh.. didnt know tat b4! :D)
Socha Hai Kya Kabhi, Hota Hai Yeh Kyun…………

Aasma Hai Neela Kyun, Paani Geela Geela Kyun
Gol Kyun Hai Zameen, Silk Mein Hai Narmi Kyun
Aag Mein Hai Garmi Kyun, Do Aur Do Paanch Kyun Nahi
Pedd Ho Gaye Kum Kyun, Teen Hain Ye Mausam Kyun
Chaand Do Kyun Nahi, Duniya Mein Hai Jung Kyun
Behta Laal Rang Kyun, Sarhaden Hain Kyun Har Kahin
Socha Hai… Yeh Tumne Kya Kabhi
Socha Hai… Ki Hain Yeh Kya Sabhi
Socha Nahi To Socho Abhi…..

Socha Hai… Yeh Tumne Kya Kabhi
Socha Hai… Ki Hain Yeh Kya Sabhi
Socha Nahi To Socho Abhi…..

n yet i loove dis song! (all the songs from Rock On for that matter.)

Thankyou Daddy

2008-09-05T13:45:00.000+05:30

Long back, when I was had told my father,” Its only Rs. 20 naa daddy? Then what is the big deal?!?”, he had scolded me. He had replied, “Only 20?? Do you even know what the value of Rs. 20 is? Try earning this ‘trivial’ amount n see. Only 20 it seems!” n he was very cross with me. That day, I really didn’t understand why it mattered so much. Another day, we had gone to Globus showroom as some people had suggested that they had a good collection of formal wear. We found that the place was bloody expensive n decided not to buy anything from there as it didn’t seem all that worthy. My father was actually shocked to see that some people actually bought lots of clothes from there, and he said something that I won’t ever forget. He said,” Spending money is not wrong. After all, we earn to spend. But squandering money this way is unpardonable. Not in India, not where people die due to lack of food n money.” Even that day, I argued with him. I told him that it was their money n they could afford to pay 2500/- on a simple shirt n they were doing so. But he never approved of it. he retorted, “We can afford it too, you know? It is not a question of affording. It is a question of spending the right way.” There have been lots of times when my sis n I forget to switch the fans n lights off in some rooms. There he would be, calling out to us, n would make us go n switch them off. We used to get irritated at times.

But now I know. Now I understand. Now I can see his point. Things that never made sense before now seem right! Kudos to my dad for having taught me n my sis the right things, though we might not have heeded to them at that time, and patiently waiting for us to grow up n understand, nevertheless letting us be us till then. Now, I know the worth of Rs 2, let alone Rs 20, I don’t squander money lavishly just for the sake of style, and I always remember to switch of fans n lights when they are not in use. Though I feel really guilty sometimes thinking of the past, I also feel grateful to him in every way. Thank you daddy! :)

Beauty enhanced?? Really??

2008-09-01T15:01:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer: The previous disclaimer holds true for this post too.

Why do most people around here (here as in Bangalore) seem to have an atrocious dressing sense? These are people, I guess, with a huge inferiority complex, or with an absurd, dying urge to imitate their role model who would mostly be a model or a movie star, or simply with a highly misplaced superiority complex, who consider themselves too superior and too modern and too rich to dress in a modest, simple, yet elegant fashion. A lot of people try to wear really expensive trendy clothes that are definitely not appropriate for their structure or for the place or the situation (though I guess I am no one to judge it entirely, it does look ludicrous from a public’s point of view when they themselves seem extremely conscious of their dress and their hair and the people’s look on them). They just kill the very beauty that they possess. Some girls wear dresses that they might have liked on TV or even on their friends, without even pausing to think of how it will look on them, or whether it’ll suit them or not, or how comfortable they would be in that dress. Comfort definitely doesn’t seem to be in the top priorities for these people! They end up being very conscious of themselves, trying their hard to look at-home, embarrassed even at the slightest stares that they end up getting bcoz of their stony rigid behavior in the dress that they choose to wear. Some people go one step further n wear all types of funky/ethnic/gold ornaments that seem all out of place most of the times, that even if you try to control the sarcasm from showing on your face, you just can’t help the smirk that would line your lips.

There is this girl I know, who has suddenly started wearing all ridiculously short tops and huge Eiffel Tower ear-rings that we all tease some of the guys here with her just to irritate n embarrass them. I know! How horrible of us! But then, why does she lead herself to such a position? The guys all fight for her Rakhi! Literally!! The irony is that she doesn’t even know that all this is going on at all! There is another female who usually leaves her long hair loose though she knows that her hair is not suited for that and it gets all shabby n tangled so often that whenever you look at her, she would be combing it with her hand or a comb! Well, I do know that it is wrong to laugh right on their faces, but I really do not think it is wrong to laugh behind such people, who tend to be so self-conscious (pulling down the tops, adjusting the skirts, combing their loose hair n fiddling with their odd set of jewels as often as possible) that they forget to be aware of the surroundings, and how people really look at them. Do these people actually think that they look more ‘beautiful’ or ‘modern’ or ‘sophisticated’ with all the comedy that they do to themselves? I really wouldn’t call these people innocent. After all, they are educated, they would definitely have been taught to look into a mirror in their childhood! I would call them ignorant as they care too much about their looks and ultimately wind up not knowing what real beauty is, and not understanding that comparing themselves with other people or blindly trying to imitate others is not sensible, and that they are just making a fool of themselves.

I personally feel that the beauty of a person can’t be measured by the amount of gold ornaments they wear or by the funky look of their dresses or even by their hair style or make up. In fact, I think a person’s real beauty is seen in the absence of any accessories or make-ups. I really don’t know what really attracts guys or what makes them give these ignorant girls a second look or whether these have any effect on the opposite sex at all, that is intended. Oh well… but then I really don’t know much about guys or their opinions in this matter. But I do feel that if they do get attracted to such an artificial beauty, then I guess they would be a ‘made for each-other’ couple after all! All the best to them! Also, a good luck to these ignorant souls with fake beauty, to get their senses back before they make a huge fool of themselves.

Thought process

2008-08-29T15:07:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer: The incidents mentioned below do not include anyone in specific. If anyone feels that I have referred to them, then it is them alright! If people think it can’t be them, then it most definitely isn’t! I would also like to assert that a thought process is a totally uncontrolled series of thoughts jumping from one topic to another, as random as the chaotic particles in Brownian motion. It’s the time when your heart talks with your brain in the silence around you. I am stating a few of the incidents where my heart n my brain were unable to come to any conclusion, hence, the questions were left unanswered. So I am ABSOLUTELY NOT RESPONSIBLE if any of you choose to take offence in any way.

Yesterday night, I went home from work, as usual, and found that there was no power. The whole area seemed to have been engulfed in pitch darkness with the utter silence being broken now and then by passing 2 wheelers or a few people walking n talking loudly on the road. I went into the house and freshened up. Then I didn’t know what to do! So I sat on my ease chair and started rocking, looking at the ceiling. (Was doing it after a long time you see.) Though there was absolutely no source of light, the ceiling ridiculously seemed to glow! Then when I looked around, almost all the things in the room seemed to have an eerie glow! Damn the excited electrons going back to stable state (thus giving off light as fluorescence, I guess :P)! Well, it was in such times that my mind used to think of a lot of things- a lot of small pieces of conversations that wouldn’t have really mattered while speaking, but I would have put them in my pensieve to look at and muse over later; a lot of bothering incidents that I would have let go at that time, but stored in a small corner of my mind to think over later; some of my mistakes, some of my blunders n some of the lessons learnt from mine and others’ experiences. But after such a session, I would usually be left with a wide range of questions. Yesterday being one such night, I have a mind filled with a whole lot of Qs; redundant though they may be in the world’s eyes, I haven’t yet encountered with convincing answers.

1. I had recently spoken to a friend gone to the US to do MS. She told me that that it wasn’t too difficult to locate Indians in the huge crowd at all! Girls or guys! Apparently, the college girls there wore such outrageously exposing clothes, but the guys there never even turned their heads n gave a second look! Indians- girls give shocked stares, guys gape at them appreciative! There you go! That’s how you locate Indians it seems! OMG! What is wrong with us Indians?

2. Why do people in ‘love’ suddenly start questioning about ‘blue skies’ n ‘pink flowers’ n ‘flying birds’ n what not? Sky is blue due to Rayleigh’s scattering effect of molecules in the Sun’s rays, Flowers are pink due to Anthocyanins and birds fly due to their anatomical structure ans bcoz as they can’t walk all their way! These were there before they were born, and will be there after they die! Such questions are just NOT romantic!

3. Why is it that we can very comfortably see n may be even enjoy watching adult u-know-what scenes in movies or even in reality between strangers in bus stops or in malls or in movie theatres or beaches or hotels or even on roads, but can’t bear see our friends make out in front of us? Why do we get so easily embarrassed n why do the love-birds never understand others’ awkward position and remained ‘romantically involved’ even in public??

(Monica n Chandler kissing in front of Phoebe)

Phoebe: eww get a room!

Monica : we already have one.

Phoebe: then use it!!!

Making out in public doesn’t make Monica n Chandler broad minded n asking them to not do it in front of her doesn’t make Phoebe narrow minded!

4. Seriously, why do some call themselves ‘frank’ n ‘out-spoken’ n talk nonsense, criticize people unnecessarily n judge people outright based on few facts that they know about them? I HATE such people. They really do not know the meaning of Frankness.

Pidichirukku na sollanumnu avasiyam illa, aana sonna thappu illa.

Pidikalenaa sonna thappu illa, aana sollanumnu avasiyam illa.

It means-

If u like something in some1, u dont need to tell them, but its not wrong if u tell them (as it wud only make them happy! ).

If u dont like something in some1, then its not wrong if u tell them, but u dont need to tell them( as it might offend them... coz u might be 'frank' n they might not be).

This is my policy. I m not asking anyone to follow this. But I have seen a lot of bonds break bcoz of these so-called ‘frank’ people who are just too pompous n snobbish to see the reality and the true essence of one’s character.

5. Why do we get an automatic smile when we hear people talking in our mother-tongue? I am not being a linguistic bitch here. I really don’t know the reason, but when I hear anyone talking in Tamil, I tend to turn around to see who it is, though I know for sure that they are strangers talking among themselves. Funny- my reflexes!

Well, I had a hundred thoughts yesterday only I can’t tell them all. Five of them have made this long enough! But the truth is that I really do enjoy these silent sessions in the dark. Gives me a lot of time to think and learn and prioritize a lot of things. :)

THE FIVE MINUTE MANAGEMENT COURSE

2008-08-27T17:50:00.000+05:30

Well… this is not my own work. I got this as a mail fwd. (thanks Data!) I am posting this as I learnt a lot from this… rather, rolled with laughter for sometime! :D So I hope it makes you guys laugh too. Enjoy n Happy laughing! :)

Lesson 1

A turkey was chatting with a bull.
'I would love to be able to get to the top of that tree' sighed the turkey, 'but I haven't got the energy.'
'Well, why don't you nibble on some of my droppings?' replied the bull. They're packed with nutrients.'
The turkey pecked at a lump of dung, and found it actually gave him enough strength to reach the lowest branch of the tree.
The next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch..
Finally after a fourth night, the turkey was proudly perched at the top of the tree.
He was promptly spotted by a farmer, who shot him out of the tree.
Moral of the story
Bull Shit might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there.

Lesson 2

A sales rep, an administration clerk, and the manager are walking to lunch when they find an antique oil lamp.
They rub it and a Genie comes out.
The Genie says, 'I'll give each of you just one wish.'
'Me first! Me first!' says the admin clerk. 'I want to be in the Bahamas , driving a speedboat, without a care in the world.'
Puff! She's gone.
'Me next! Me next!' says the sales rep. 'I want to be in Hawaii , relaxing on the beach with my personal masseuse, an endless supply of Pina Coladas and the love of my life.'
Puff! He's gone.
'OK, you're up,' the Genie says to the manager.
The manager says, 'I want those two back in the office after lunch.'
Moral of the story
Always let your boss have the first say.

Lesson 3

An eagle was sitting on a tree resting, doing nothing.
A small rabbit saw the eagle and asked him, 'Can I also sit like you and do nothing?'
The eagle answered: 'Sure, why not.'
So, the rabbit sat on the ground below the eagle and rested. All of a sudden, a fox appeared, jumped on the rabbit and ate it.
Moral of the story
To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.

Lesson 4

A man is getting into the shower just as his wife is finishing up her shower, when the doorbell rings.
The wife quickly wraps herself in a towel and runs downstairs.
When she opens the door, there stands Bob, the next-door neighbour.
Before she says a word, Bob says, 'I'll give you $800 to drop that towel.'
After thinking for a moment, the woman drops her towel and stands naked in front of Bob, after a few seconds, Bob hands her $800 and leaves.
The woman wraps back up in the towel and goes back upstairs.
When she gets to the bathroom, her husband asks, 'Who was that?'
'It was Bob the next door neighbour,' she replies.
'Great,' the husband says, 'did he say anything about the $800 he owes me?'
Moral of the story
If you share critical information pertaining to credit and risk with your shareholders in time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure.

Lesson 5

A priest offered a Nun a lift.
She got in and crossed her legs, forcing her gown to reveal a leg.
The priest nearly had an accident.
After controlling the car, he stealthily slid his hand up her leg.
The nun said, 'Father, remember Psalm 129?'
The priest removed his hand. But, changing gears, he let his hand slide up her leg again.
The nun once again said, 'Father, remember Psalm 129?'
The priest apologized 'Sorry sister but the flesh is weak.'
Arriving at the convent, the nun sighed heavily and went on her way.
On his arrival at the church, the priest rushed to look up Psalm 129. It said, 'Go forth and seek, further up, you will find glory.'
Moral of the story
If you are not well informed in your job, you might miss a great opportunity.

Lesson 6

A little bird was flying south for the winter. It was so cold the bird froze and fell to the ground into a large field.
While he was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on him.
As the frozen bird lay there in the pile of cow dung, he began to realize how warm he was.
The dung was actually thawing him out!
He lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy.
A passing cat heard the bird singing and came to investigate.
Following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung, and promptly dug him out and ate him.

Morals of the story
(1) Not everyone who shits on you is your enemy.
(2) Not everyone who gets you out of shit is your friend.
(3) And when you're in deep shit, it's best to keep your mouth shut!

THUS ENDS THE FIVE MINUTE MANAGEMENT COURSE. Hope you guys enjoyed and had a great laugh! :)

A toast to moms…

2008-08-25T18:54:00.000+05:30

Yesterday, we friends met up in one of our houses, and decided to cook lunch. We had gas and stove and the required vessels, and we thought that we could manage something decent with the menial knowledge that some of us possessed in cookery, and that it could be something exciting to do together. Well, to tell the truth, it was. Very! But we learnt a very important lesson. A lesson that everybody probably knows theoretically. Every job has loads of pre-requisites and each pre-req have its own pre-reqs in turn! Hence, to do any job, we have to complete a series of these pre-reqs patiently and efficiently to even reach the actual job. Thus, anything in this world, any specific work with a definite goal, however easy the job may be, can be divided and sub-divided into a large number of smaller tasks, mostly related with ‘ANDs’ and very rarely ‘ORs’. Hence if you consider any of those tasks demeaning to your status and neglect it, you’ll end up not doing the final job effectively.

In our case, we initially decided to make some sambhar, rasam if time permits, some sabji, and buy some curd to make raita and have a nice meal. Well, now since we had none of the ingredients, we had to compile the list of things to be bought, their quantities so that they don’t go waste and the shops where we had to get the different items. Believe me! Starting from some oil to fry and rice and vegetables and different types of dal and masala powders and what not?!? Just a look at the list, which kinda looked as long as the Christmas wish list of a 10 year old, some of us had half a mind directly going to a restaurant and ordering whatever was required and happily gobbling it! Way easier now, wasn’t it? So then we decided against sambhar and rasam and all, and decided to make the simplest fried rice. The list was smaller now and we also had lesser work to do. So we all agreed on this and got all the required ingredients. Boy! We already felt all grown up to have thought of every small detail. Seriously! How did our moms manage to think so much? Especially on a daily basis?!?

Then we divided the smaller tasks like making raita, peeling n cutting vegetables, (everyone was initially scared onions :P you know why!), boiling the potatoes etc. We had lots of funny arguments regarding the smaller details in each item, like the ratio of rice-to-water to be kept in cooker, the size of onion bits for raita, the amount of salt n masala in vegetables, and so on. And after one point, we looked at each other n started laughing! A few months ago, we would have considered ourselves most unlikely to have discussions n arguments on such topics! :D It took us more than an hour and a half to do the stuff and by that time, we were all bloody hungry! We were ready to eat anything- cooked or uncooked. Gosh! How DO working women handle all this? Especially if they have to cook for themselves, their families, for lunch too, and most importantly, a variety of items each day, and early in the morning to be on the heights!!

We took all the prepared items with loads of love and care (after all the efforts! Phew!), arranged them on the floor and we had our lunch together, happily chatting away, relishing each dish, complimenting one another and enjoying the fruits of our hard work, saluting our moms for what they have been doing for us for our entire lives without the slightest grumble, and secretly reprimanding ourselves for the times when we had whined over petty things like tomatoes pieces or coriander leaves in food and the times when we had forgotten to appreciate what they had done for us.And FYI, the food was delicious. Really, it was! But we understood that one would need lots of thinking n planning and patience to do all the smaller work. In fact I would like to go one step further n say that one would definitely need a great company for cooking- to help, to share the work, to give opinions and most importantly, to appreciate the final product, however it comes out to be.

~ Life backwards ~

2008-08-22T11:57:00.000+05:30

A lot of things that happened yesterday reminded me of the fact that I am getting older… though a part of me does want to grow old n move on, that part of me seems to be only too small. The larger part of me doesn’t really want to grow, like Peter Pan.

Yesterday, my mentor was asking me about how happy I would be on getting a job and passing out. My instant reply was “Working life doesn’t seem to be as fascinating as I had imagined. So I am not really looking fwd to it.” n that was the first time I had seen him laugh out loud!

But this happens a little too often these days. The same was the reaction when I told this to my cousins. How I envy my junior friends who are enjoying that delightful life! I hardly find gtalk chatting pleasurable these days! Its filled with either friends working busily who aren’t allowed to log in during work time, or other working friends/seniors working with status ‘dnd’, or with junior friends back in college, chatting with who would only make me more nostalgic and conscious of me growing older!

I got an sms fwd recently “Life is tough. After all the hard work in life, what’s there in the end? Death? Is that fair at all? May be it should go all backwards. You should die first and get it out of the way. Then you live an old age. Next, you get a silver watch and go to work. You work for 40 years until you are young enough to enjoy your ‘retirement’. You get doped, booze, party, and after all these, you get ready for High School then comes the Primary and you become a kid. You play and jump around, no pressure, no worries, no sadness, and no madness. Later, you become a toddler and finally you go back into the womb and spend your last 9 months floating in amniotic fluid and finally finish of as chromosomes.”

Wow! What a prospect! This is why I love fantasies n fictions. People there never seem to grow older than the right age! Well… whatever! I guess- some things are not under my control.

A Tribute to Onions

2008-08-19T16:38:00.000+05:30

A long time ago, Potato, Tomato and Onion lived in a house. They loved each other and lived on for a long time. Tomato died of Fungus and Potato and Onion bade him a grand farewell. A few years later, Potato was killed too and Onion was a true friend and dutifully organized a complete death ceremony. Now Onion was all alone in this whole wide world. Later when his time came, Onion had no one by his side. Onion asked God, “I had been there in the last days of my friends and grieved after their times. Why do I have no one to miss me after I leave? What did I do to deserve a tearless depart from this world?” God replied, “Do not be troubled, my dear, for hereafter, the World will cry when you die!”

This is why we all get tears when we cut onions!:)

On my way…

2008-08-18T15:24:00.000+05:30

It was a little too early, about 4 am. I woke up even before my alarm cried! A light headache followed. The morning was cold n cloudy, drizzling continuously after a heavy 8-hr downpour the previous night. My shoes were slushy and sweatshirt was cold n soggy. I kept skidding on the road now n then and my bag seemed a little heavy on my shoulder. Some 6-7 guys of different ages waiting in the bus-stop all looked at me as if I were an alien from a different planet (as I was the only female on road at that time). The bus came after a patient 10-min wait. It was a normal dabba govt. bus with water trickling down the top n sides, on my head and clothes. I reached the stopping and enquired an auto-man for directions which I guess he didn’t know but had too much of an ego to accept, so showed me an obscenely long route to walk. The train had already arrived by the time I reached and I found my compartment. The seats were all soaking wet (apparently came from the shed after a shower!! :P). It was stinking big time! Absolutely reeking with toilet smell. Unbearable! And I didn’t have any waste papers to wipe the seat. So had to use my white bed sheet to clean. Though initially empty, my bay later got filled with all grandpas n an irritating uncontrollable kid with an extremely frustrated impatient mother who poured coffee on my bed sheet. I passed my time by reading a thriller, True Evil – Greg Iles. The story was unnerving and the plots were framed well. But the kid kept disturbing all the way!

From the moment I got up, the day was filled with a lot of incidents that would have usually annoyed me and normally been horrible mood-busters; especially these days, when even the smallest of things starts me off. Surprisingly, I found that none of these even bothered me the way they would have in general. My spirits were high and I could feel a smile on my lips all along. The only thing in my mind was – that I was going HOME…

IRREVERSIBLE CHANGES

2008-08-12T12:00:00.000+05:30

People change; especially after each important chapter in their lives. Some people change slowly n gradually. They analyze and modify themselves, a little here n there, to suit their present scenario. They forge their character the right way and chisel off some of their old dead ways. Yet, their basic traits remain the same.

There are some others who undergo a mutational transform in a new environment so that the new community doesn’t have to know the old them and thus, can start afresh in that new world, leaving back all the traces of their old beliefs, their old habits, likes n dislikes. These people, I believe, have a weak character. They do not really have faith in their own thoughts/beliefs/actions/habits/culture. They simply look at the crowd and just flow along. They don’t think of their past bcoz they don’t feel proud of it. They either are ashamed of it or they don’t have the guts enough to face the world with their true nature or they simply have loads n loads of inferiority complex and very less confidence on themselves. They generally try to blend with the crowd, blindly following the people they consider a role-model in the new place, not even pausing to think of the transformation that they are undergoing. They don’t keep in touch with their old friends, rather with anyone associated with previous life, especially those who were pretty close; close enough to know about them in and out, enough to know what they had been, what they had thought, what they had said and what they had done in their time together. They are either afraid that their history would come to front and cause embarrassment and shame in the new place or may be they just cant face their old friends as a new reformed person. They simply shut the door to past under some stupid pretext as not having enough time or resources to maintain drop a line. If you get to meet some of these people sometime in future, they don’t even dare look into your eyes while speaking! Duh!! How more uncomfortable could the situation be?!

Here is a simple theory: X and Y are thick childhood friends. X changes to X` after his/her college life and loses contact with Y, who is mutationally robust. Sometime later in life, when X’ and Y meet, X` obviously will not be comfortable with Y anymore bcoz Y was X ’s friend not (X`)’s. This could hurt Y but I guess that is how it has to be as far as X` is concerned. Y is a history to X`, just like X. X` doesn’t hate Y. X` is just indifferent to Y.

Changes in a person’s character are not wrong. They are not illegal. They are not sinful. Changes lead to evolution. Changes help in shaping a man’s character. But I feel that those transformations that don’t modify the existing nature instead give a whole new personality, are not healthy. A person is judged by consistency of behaviour and by the amount of progress made and number of lessons learnt and applied after each episode of life. I would personally not respect one who has an up-side-down makeover of values, beliefs, likes, ideas, conduct and character after each stage of life. That is just unacceptable. I would most definitely lose face with a person like that, and may not even regret it. I guess, a little hard though it may be to lose a friend to changing times, the most practical and most sensible deed for Y would be to let go of X.

Another Killer

2008-08-11T15:05:00.000+05:30

There are loads of things that kill people- slowly/instantly/painfully/painlessly. Very often, one finds these clichéd phrases.

Smoking kills.

Alcohol kills.

Tobacco kills.

Cancer kills.

AIDS kills.

Earthquake kills.

War kills.

Carbon-monoxide kills.

After a month in Bangalore, I have realized another potential cause of death.

Boredom kills people!At least it kills me! Slowly and painfully!

School life was full of studies n tests n music classes n hobbies like painting n playing basket ball n all. Never knew what boredom was.

My college life was delightful too. It was the golden period of my 22 year lifespan. (: P)Enjoyed every bit of it; though had some trouble in coping up when there were too many things to do all at the same time. Again there, I used to pray for a few minutes just to laze around. A few minutes to breathe, and not think or talk or do anything at all- just snuggle into my cozy razai in the dark silent room of mine, just staring into an imaginary abyss.But I hardly got a chance to do that back then; always running around at some pretext or another, though mostly, I enjoyed it all lot.

I never understood what my mom and my grand mom meant when they said that I was lucky to have my hands full. I always thought of how lucky they were with nothing to care about, no difficult schedule, no routine assignments or project meetings or tests and all. They had all the time for themselves!!But now, I see what they had always meant. With loads of things to do and so many places to be, I was actually alive. Now, though I have got what I might have wanted, the silence, the darkness, the nothing-to-do state of mind, I find that this huge dark bubble that seems to have engulfed my whole life has left nothing but a void space inside me; and is too much to bear.

People say- software kills creativity. I think boredom kills creativity. It destroys one’s enthusiasm to do anything. It murders one’s passion.I remember I used to state a number of hobbies before, I suddenly don’t feel like continuing any of those or pursuing any new ones. I feel so jaded, that I don’t understand what I should to the next instant. I am afraid this ‘boredom syndrome’ would last for ever.

Here is a huge list of the common day-to-day things that I m now bored of, and some I do bcoz I have to, and some I have stopped doing simply as I am bored rigid to do and some I no longer want to do as I am fed up of trying.

Ø Eating the same old

Idlys/dosas/vadas/pooris/rice/sambar/chappati/gravy/upma/pongal/pizza/noodles/bread/bun/biscuits/thattai/murukku/sweets

Ø Drinking milk/tea/juice/even water

Ø Sleeping

Ø Cleaning my house

Ø Bathing

Ø Combing my hair (that actually takes an awfully long time these days!)

Ø Of deciding which dress to wear

Ø Of searching for appropriate accessories for each dress

Ø Changing clothes while going out even to the nearest potti-kadai

Ø Going to malls for ‘window shopping’

Ø Seeing numerous couples: a senseless guy with some dumb straight-haired fair-skinned female laughing at stupid humor-less jokes

Ø Reading

Ø Watching movies/sitcoms/video songs in comp (since I don’t have a TV)

Ø Browsing through net

Ø Mailing/chatting/Orkutting

Ø Trying to find new friends through net and acquaint with them and start over from ‘hobbies/likes/dislikes’

Ø Endlessly crapping in the presence of an awkward company

Ø Listening to same old songs

Ø Singing/humming along

Ø Sitting in an air-conditioned room full of strangers wearing sweaters, wondering why they couldn’t just switch the damn ACs off!

Ø Trying to engage myself

Ø of feeling Bored!!

Ø My sick ever-annoying cold

Ø Nostalgia that seems to swallow me very often these days

Ø Going on long endless walks

Ø Ceiling-staring

Ø Cribbing n grumbling to

family/friends/cousins/acquaintances/strangers

Ø Thinking

Ø Worrying

Ø Dreaming

Ø Hoping for miracles

Ø Trying to do something useful, some feasible hobby

Ø Trying to think of something to study that could add to my useless resume

Ø Trying to think of my future/career

Ø Trying to find company to be, to sit n talk, to go out, to eat with

Ø Events taking a 180 ° turn (definitely not a favourable way!!)

Ø Things going totally out of control

Ø Trying to make the present place as comfortable as possible

Ø Making sense of confusing situations

Ø Reasoning out failures

Ø Correcting my mistakes

Ø Fighting with myself

Ø Consoling myself for being solely responsible for being in the present situation as I am

Ø All prayers going futile

As Elie Wiesel’s quote goes, “The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.” This ennui creates an indifference to everything. It virtually leaves the affected one tasteless, passionless and mindless. This lack of energy, enthu, concern, sympathy, creativity, imagination, dreams, satisfaction, love, faith is what I call, a road to death while living.

Do dupattas deserve all the hype?

2008-07-30T14:45:00.000+05:30

Dupattas are definitely the most annoying wasteful pieces of clothes. They embarrass girls more than they help/protect/what-ever-they-are-supposed-to-do. Some say that they are meant to enhance the style and highlight the grace of a woman, just to be hung around one’s neck; Some say that its a huge kerchief, that can be used to wipe/dust/swab anything anywhere; Some say its often useful at extreme climates- for covering the head n face by making a mask when out in sun, or wearing like a shawl to protect from chill breeze, or covering your head to protect it from soaking in rain.

I acknowledge all of these. But there is its other maddening side too! It falls off at all the wrong places at all the wrong times (damn the Murphy’s Law!). Most of the times while walking in wind, it flies off, attracting unwanted attention that a girl would be asked to avoid in public. In the winds, if its ends even brush by mistake on some passerby, he would either give a disgusted can’t-you-manage-it look or an appreciative perverted look. A friend of mine was so humiliated when her dupatta just flew off due to strong winds; from her shoulders to the middle of the opposite road. What was she supposed to do? Run after it? How stupid would that have looked? It was even more awkward when the amused onlookers on her side were looking at her for a nice entertaining reaction! Once some guys confronted to us girls that they thought girls kept adjusting their dupattas for fun, as a habit or a mannerism, or perhaps even to attract the attention of guys! How utterly ridiculous! It was even crazier when they actually imitated the dupatta-handling styles of some of our lady-profs and friends!

Oh well… whatever it is, we could even conduct debates on ‘dupattas- boon or bane’ or ‘dupatta- a necessary evil’… it could be a really funny topic to ponder!

Nice Girls

2008-07-30T11:52:00.000+05:30

The description of nice girls has been given by veda with so much vividity that this daring portrayal deserves a wide round of applause and compliments from all the nice girls in the world. The scenario in real-life, esp. of a nice girl is very much as has been depicted. But I personally did not feel depressed in any way at all as some people have felt. It voiced out most of what ever I might have thought and discussed very often with my close friends and my cousins very recently.

I still very staunchly believe that most men- nice/not-nice would never look at a subtle mannered soft spoken shy girl even if they know that they are the ones they would want to end up with. They just can’t help wanting to try out a number of those ‘modern women’; the ones who would be well approved by their circle of friends and the men-world, who could easily arouse the jealousy of every other guy who would see them together, who would not have any problem in a public show of affection, basically a girl who would addict them… who would make their nerves flood with hormones… who would refuse nor refute their acts of insanity or stupidity. So even if they realize their mistake sooner or later, they would only correct it by breaking up with the 'wrong girl' (unless they gets dumped before). After that, finding a nice homely sensible sort of a girl for a life-partner is mommy’s job- not his! The one who would put kolams early in the morning, the one who would leave her family, her job, her career for him to serve his parents, his grand parents and his sisters and their families too without a tiny hesitation or grumble… yuck! The whole concept!!

Why do nice people always seem to end up sacrificing the most? This is most definitely unfair. Hope the nice girls end up with these nice guys without any parents’ intervention or any stupid horoscope shit… and then all would be fair and life would be filled with flowers n colors.

God helps… But how???

2008-07-28T11:33:00.000+05:30

There is this very common saying- God helps those who help themselves (1). But I can’t help wonder a few hitches in this.

Well, in the famous dice-game follow-up in Mahabharata, where Draupadi is stripped off her clothes in public, seeing her husbands unable or unwilling to help her, the first thing that she does is try and resist herself. When absolutely powerless, D stops resisting and prays to Lord Krishna to protect her, which, he does. But I wasn't able to follow one point in this. D was first 'helping herself', in vain. Why didn’t K help her knowing that she was in trouble at that time? Why was he waiting for a prayer even though she was his great friend, almost a sister? Doesn’t this contradict (1)? Does the above incident mean that God helps only those who ask and pray for help (2)?

Another popular philosophical saying is 'Everything happens for the Good. (3)' but we find a lot of things in our daily life, that doesn’t really seem so to our 'naked' eyes. There are loads of bitter feelings and complaints in everybody's lives. So much so that one could ask-“For whose good?!?”

I have seen my mother pray everyday, pray with all her heart, pray with unwavered devotion. I somehow find it a little funny, when she usually says, "In case of any distress or pain, approach God. For anything that you think you deserve or wish dearly, approach God. Anything happy or anything sad, approach God! He always helps..." but I have never seen her blame him if she doesn’t get anything of what she asks God for; or even if the exact opposite of whatever she prays for happens. Then she says, “It was to have happened that way. Every thing that happens in our life is the fruit of our own paap n punya. (4)" Then I ask,” But what was the point of all our prayers?!? If it was to have happened that way all along, then why even ask God knowing that he is not going to go out of his way to help?!?" Now the (2) is contradicted too, and so is (3). Bcoz, if they are all based on paap/punya account, then all the things that happen to us obviously aren’t 'for the good'!

But again, this doesn't seem entirely right. During my PS-I in sankara nethralaya, I saw many patients with various eye-disouders. Amongst them was a 30-day infant, who was apparently born with congenital cataract in both its eyes. Now - in its short lifespan of about 10 months in its mother's womb, what possible paap could that child have done to deserve this? My grandmother says now "Most of the things in our lives depend not only on our own paap/punya (this life or our previous lives) but also on out ancestors'(5). " She also told me a number of real-life stories as proof for this. Now there you go!! This has contradicted (4) in many ways! We can’t expect things that we deserve for our own hard work or punya or even blame ourselves for our own fate!! Wow!!

Now I am totally confused (as usual :))!! Should I just give up a much-required task after a hard try and just pray to God for help? Am I even supposed to ask God for what I want and what I don’t want, for what I need badly and what I desire dearly?? Is it right to work hard towards some goal, and incase of a failure, blame the 'fate' or 'previous lives' or 'ancestors' or the God himself for having been deaf to my prayers???

Well... as I told you, I really don’t know. I am neither an Atheist nor critical about anything related to religions or its beliefs. I am just confused with no straight convincing answers. But I still pray God; not for anything in particular these days (not that I don’t need anything- coz I could write a 100-page wish-list even right now!). I just say those slokas I know, and pray though I feel that life is already sketched out and my prayers aren't going to change anything of my pre-planned life, or fetch me anything of what I need/want/deserve unless it was already meant to be there.But Yes, I still pray.

CHLEEPING BEAUTY

2008-07-25T12:16:00.000+05:30

I sleep when I am sad
I sleep when I am angry
I sleep when I am full
I sleep when I am hungry

I sleep when its hot
I sleep when its cold
I sleep when its gloomy
I sleep when its rainy
I sleep when its day
I sleep when its night

I sleep when I am tired
I sleep when I am bored
I sleep when I am contented
I sleep when I am scared

I doze off in class
I snooze off in office
I sleep when I am sick
I sleep with a book!
I sleep when I am relaxed
I sleep when I am home... :)

Happy times lovely fantasies
Sad times far-fetched dreams
Scared nights horrible nightmares
Contented days dreamless sleep

Bored days disturbed naps
Sick days painful ones
Tired days endless sleep
At home, dreamy sleep
But the best sleeps- the entire day before unprepared exams!! :D

This is definitely not a poem... It’s just a babble from a chleepy me...

"I NEED A NEW WARDROBE!!!"

2008-07-24T14:35:00.000+05:30

Accompanied with a lot of drastic changes in my life, there is one major tragedy which I’ll have to resolve asap... I HAVE NO NICE CLOTHES- 'FORMALS' OR 'CASUALS' THAT ARE APPROPRIATE TO BE WORN IN BANGALORE!!! Girls here seem to wear only branded T-Shirts or sober formal shirts and pants. Dresses were not a huge issue back in the campus, where we always had that 'kuch bhi chalega' attitude. Having practically lived in BITS T-Shirts and cute maheshwari kurtis, i do not find most of them good enough to wear here in this atmosphere where you get all wierd looks and you get judged very easily based on what you wear!! Everyday morning now, it has become a routine for me to look at my dresses and scream out-"I NEED A NEW WARDROBE!!!"

Old habits are hard to die...

2008-07-24T14:34:00.000+05:30

I just can’t stop myself from comparing every thing n everyone n every tiny incident in my daily life here with my BITSian life. The BITSian hangover doesn’t seem to wear out! Even though it infuriates a lot of people around me, I still have to do things and speak out, the ‘BITSian way’!! A part of me just wants to get over and just move on with this corporate-life. But there again, another part of me just simply refuses to let it go!! I just can’t stop myself from quoting an incident or stating a memory or laughing at old jokes or using awkward BITSian slangs or carefree words that wouldn’t have been an issue at all in My World… I know people around me are patient even if it irritates or embarrasses them at times, but I really hope to get a better control over my BITSian styles and learn soon to think/speak/behave normally, the non-BITSian way…

Ex-BITSian??

2008-07-24T14:32:00.000+05:30

There was a time during my BITSian life esp during my CDC years, when I have wished to just run away from that place, with a series of tests, tuts, labs, assignments, presentations n reports… but now after leaving the campus (though not a ‘pass out’ yet, thankfully) suddenly, ‘My World’ seems to have just puffed off like a mere dream! As I remember, I didn’t cry or even look back when I left My Hostel, My Campus, My Universe, (esp after a series of compres), knowing that I won’t be coming back for studies, and hoping that I won’t have to come back just for placements. But now, I wish I had just taken a few moments to stand at each place to feel a little nostalgic n all, like the other psenti-semites. But NO! I was just too ‘busy’ for all the senti-stuff!! Now that I turn back and see, I hardly remember anything of the acads/what they taught/what I learnt!! All that I have in my heart are those stolen moments in FD3 and IC terrace, those mid-night walks on nights with perms, those crappy games played in EDC sessions, those cute jackings in Bio-Assoc, the peaceful walks through staff-quarters and Shiv-ji, SKY patties, Bluemoon MNB, Nagarji’s sam-chat/chai, IP msngr chats, DC++ browsing and most of all, the night-time lacha sessions and wonderful trips with my wingies. I am glad that I was a part of what I was and I really pray to God that I get a gr8 set of new friends here as well, who might never replace what I had left behind; but would help me build another whole new happy world out here.