Simply Me
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Dekho baarish ho rahi hai.. Its raining.. Its raining..
The summer stretched on… the days hot, the nights hotter... awful and miserable is how it felt… So we beckoned the rains….
Jhalak dikhlaaja, jhalak dikhlaaja…
Ek baar aaja aaja aaja aaja aaaaaaja…
Ek baar aaja aaja aaja aaja aaaaaaja…
And finally we caught sight of clouds… accompanied by light shows and background music... But would the rains put up an appearance? Noooo… It was interested more in the game of Hide and Seek... We just couldn’t seek it that’s all :(
Kaale megha, Kaale megha, Paani to barsaooo...
Bijli ki talwar nahi, boondon ke baan chalaaooo...
At last it rained :)…
Aaiye aapka intezaar tha…
Der lagi aane mein tumko, shukr hai phir bhi aaye ho…
This just marginally improved the situation though… It was hot in the mornings and afternoons, followed by rains in the evenings and the days ended in cool nights…
Tip tip tip tip bearish shuru ho gayi…
A little more rains we thought... that would cool the city…
Barso re megha megha,
Barso re megha megha,
Barso re megha barso…
But then, I guess the clouds decided to have their fun... It just kept on raining… Dams had to be opened to let out the excess water… the low lying bridges flooded. If you were planning to go somewhere, it just had to be a wet day :(
Nahi nahi, abhi nahi, abhi karo intezaar…
But I guess this hurt the feelings of the clouds L It was the end of the rains... no rains... no clouds… no thunder… no lightning… It got hotter than before...
Feeling hot hot hot…
Sorry we said, please come back... we won’t complain we said and now its back... back with a bang...
Dekho zara dekho barkha ki jhadi…
Labels: Baras ja ae baadal baras ja..
Friday, July 27, 2007
Friends..
In college we were an inseparable group... Anagha, Priyanka, Sujata, Supriya, Varsha and I.. always together in college... watching movies together.. going to college together.. calling up each other when we got back from college and then talking for hours on end.. conference chatting late into the night on weekends... An year after engineering has ended, I find that we are slowly drifting apart. When we do meet, we just keep on talking, like we did back then.. all at the same time.. But the times when we actually meet are few and far between.. Studies, work, marriage and life in general seem to have torn us apart... We call each other up once in a few weeks or meet up once in a few months and though there is that link, it just seems strained.. last time we met my friends kept on saying how quiet I had become... I guess it was just enough to see them again after so long and listening to them that I couldn't get out the words to actually say something..
Last time we met, we met at my home as we had many times before... For almost an hour, we just sat and talked about what was new in our lives... We didn't even want to decide where we would go out to eat... Just sitting in the hall and talking was enough.. When, at last, we decided we would go to Marzorin, I don't think any of us was too hungry, talking together had filled up our appetites... We missed one of our really good friends, though, who is now married and has left Pune..
As soon as we finished engineering, Anagha and Supriya started on their jobs, Priyanka joined MBA, Varsha started preparing for MBA, Sujata started with a course which pretty much kept her longer at the institute than I was awake during the day(OK thats a hyperbole, but come on.. her classes went on from about 9 in the morning to 10-11 in the night.. and add to that 30-45 minutes travel time each way... and that on all 7 days of the week), who soon got engaged and is now married.. and I started with a course myself(and no.. I wasn't that busy). So now with just 5 of us still in Pune, Anagha leaves for the
Will this mean that we will be further apart from now on or does this mean that we will grow closer? What will prove to be truer... Out of sight, Out of mind or Absence makes the heart grow fonder????
In the final year of graduation, I had written a poem for the college magazine.. Priyanka had thought, she told me later, that this would never actually happen with us... but even though in my heart I had never wanted to believe this to be the truth, the future, I find myself thinking that when you are apart, that when you don't meet each day, you DO sort of grow apart...
Well here's the poem, the reality of life... life after college.. Starting off with a new chapter of life..
Ringing in the New Year
As an old year ends,
In comes the new,
Old fancies, old mistakes,
All this we are through.
We step into the new year,
Resolution in our heart,
Of a new beginning,
To become a part.
New places, new faces,
Everything brand new,
A whole new world,
Of which nothing we knew.
Soon we settle in the new life,
The new us, that we are,
But we can’t shake off the past,
Which suddenly seems so far.
Gone are the times,
When carefree were the days,
When we still hated the present,
But still had fun in many ways.
The SMSes, the phone calls,
Chatting late at night,
Journals, submissions, VIVAs,
Now seem alright.
‘What about a movie?’
And we’d suddenly decide,
‘Why not go eat bhel’,
Or ‘Together go for a ride.’
Did really we think then,
Nothing would keep us apart,
Every month we will meet,
We’ll be together in our heart.
We start off well,
Phone calls every week,
‘Sure, why not?
At Vaishali we will meet.’
Slowly the meetings trickle off,
The calls, they do too,
We become caught in our lives,
In various things to do.
‘I have an exam next week,’
‘My PM is breathing down my back,’
‘My project is due soon,
God! I’m becoming a nervous wreck.’
Then, ‘I’m being transferred,’
‘I’ll be married soon,’
‘I’m going abroad to study,’
For each other we have no room.
It was not like this before,
We never thought it would be,
It just happened a day at a time,
What was WE turned into ME.
Then one day it arrives,
A window into the past,
A moment of joy,
A Reunion Invitation at last.
Some have come, some have not,
We laugh and dance and sing,
‘Of course now that we have met,
Next week I’ll give you a ring.’
Labels: If only I could turn back time, Yaaron Dosti badi hi haseen hai...
Friends
Whatever the category of friends though, it is just too painful to lose them. Some of my school friends, when I see them on orkut, I wonder what went wrong.. Why when we were together and so close in school lost touch later.. Did we just grow apart? Is this the future of my friendship with some of my friends now?
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Colour Therapy
First of all let me mention, drawing has never been my forte... The only pictures that I can draw well are ones with brown hills, a river, one or two trees and a sun behind the hills... Maybe some women filling water near the river... That's about it... I can't colour... Like a child's, my drawings have colours running out of the lines.. In other words, I am hopeless at drawing...When I was a kid, my handwriting was just aweful... So when the time came when I would have to switch from pencil to using pens at school, amma put me in a drawing class... My drawings are still horrendous, but my handwriting improved immensely...
So coming back to my drawing skills, I realized there was something quite therapeutic about drawing and colouring.. Well atleast if no one else was gonna see my drawings that is... And most of all, I find that when I am nervous or bored, somehow just drawing polygons and circles and filling them with colours even if it is on MS Paint helps a lot.. I don't know how that works, but somehow, it does seem to work.. To lift my spirit...
So here's one such pic... I don't know how it looks.. maybe modern art.. For whatever reasons it looks like a face to me and that's what this pic is called..
For the record, this is probably the first and last MS Paint image I'll put up on my blog..
Labels: Rang bhare baadal se...
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Freaked out!!!
Anyway lets come to why I am writing about reptiles today. Today morning, while I was getting ready to record for the new edition of Puneri Thecha for Radio Idli, amma rushed in to tell me that there was a lizard dead in the house. She was cleaning something and there it was, staring up at amma. Now amma, she like, totally totally goes berserk at the name of a lizard.. One bad experience involving amma's childhood visit to her relatives', rat traps, lunch and a lizard tail are enough to make her run a mile away at the mention of a lizard; If you get the drift. Amma pretty much takes everything in her stride... but 'sokni's... [-( .. So here she comes to my room talking of dead lizards. It is the season of dead lizards probably. Amma had told me that she had bravely got rid of a small dead baby lizard the other day. Well looks like it was my turn to get brave. (I guess knowing that I was at home, and there was another option besides having to remove the lizar herself, amma's courage left her. All she managed to do was poke at the lizard with a newspaper and the lack of movement proved that the lizard was dead or atleast knocked out.. Guess it partied too hard last night... TGIF???)
Now I have always believed that 'There's nothing to fear but fear itself.' But come on what do you do about lizards? OK, time to face my fears... I get armed with a newspaper and a dustpan and bravely go to the table where amma had found this lizard.. All right I was shaking in my boots, well I would have been if I had been wearing shoes, but I went to take a look. One look at that unblinking stare and I took a few steps back... You know these things look alive even when they are dead.. They do have eyelids apparently (yeah I checked on the net), but this one had its eyes wide open.. Lord you'd think it really was alive.
Ok, Tejaswini, take a deep breath. If amma can do it, so can I. I poke at the lizard with the newspaper too..... Ewwwwwwwwww the damned thing seems to be stuck.... Ickkkkkky... I back out... Sorry people show over.. I'm getting outta here... I go to amma's room, she has already beat a hasty retreat. She can't even bear to look at what I am gonna do... Sorry amma.. Not possible.. OK fine, I'll ask the watchman to come when I am leaving for work, she says. But what do we do till then. I mean seriously, a dead lizard in the house, this house is not big enough for two frightened females and a dead lizard... OK this time I am gonna do it... Back outside... I again pick up the newspaper and dustpan... I take a deep breath and in one quick stroke, get the lizard on the dustpan. Amma suggested, just flush it down.. The trash was already taken for the day, so no option.. that is what I do. Flushhhhhhhhh...... And over.. That lizard is out of our lives... Wish I could flush the memory too.. :(
Labels: Door hi rehna paas na aana...
Up on a pedastal
Well when I heard this, I was shocked anew. Kids doing this is not exactly news. The first season itself saw Rahul Vaidya and Prajakta Shukre placing the show on a higher priority than their board exams. What I don't understand is how do these kids actually make the decision to put their career at stake. Singing is a great career if you are successful, but not everyone can be Sonu Nigam or Shreya Ghosal. There must be something you can fall back on, at least some sort of backup plan.
These shows and the contestants are like shooting stars, they suddenly cross the horizon of our TV screens and everyone is gaga over it; And after that except for small mentions, the contestants are gone, from our television screens, from our thoughts, from our memories.
I sure wish these contenders all the best. May their wishes come true. I wish them luck in their endeavour to have a successful singing career, but at the same time I also do wish they have the sense and maturity to realise the odds of make it big in the industry that is Bollywood.
Labels: My All...
Friday, July 13, 2007
Courage
She was married during her graduation studies and was expecting her second child at the same time amma was expecting me, amma's first. Soon after her pregnancy and delivery amma's friend noticed a swelling in her legs. The swelling wouldn't reduce and when the doctors were contacted, it turned out to be a sort of fibre illness which caused excess fat and water to fill up in the body. The solution the doctors finally proclaimed, was for her to undergo an operation and remove that excess fat and water. However, scary that might have sounded, the young lady had to go through the operation. Things seemed to be normal for a while, but then again her leg started to swell up. Operations and swellings continued for a few years and then finally, the doctors told her that her leg had to be amputed. The leg however had to amputed in such a way that there was no chance for fixing an artificial leg. After sometime though, even the rest of her leg started to swell up.
Amma still visits her whenever we visit our native place, Mangalore, with my aunt joining her before amma got married and then later used to visit her with my uncle to accompany her. On my last visit to Mangalore, I insisted I wanted to meet this friend of amma. Amma had always been afraid of taking her daughter to visit her friend fearing my reaction to her condition. This time when I visited her, it was not her missing leg that caused me to start. It was her spirit, the smile on her face, her zeal for life. I had expected the lady to be quite depressed with life. Our legs which we take for granted; I can't even imagine what she must have gone through when she had to actually lose half of one of her legs.
This lady who when she first faced this illness, was in her twenties and was just about forty when her leg had to be amputed. This is not just the story of her courage, but also the dedication and love of her daughter, her husband and her son. They have loved and supported her through all these years. When you think about how callous some people can be, these people exemplify how the promise of the 'Saat Phere' is kept.
Hats Off to this family! To the lady who smiles in the face of despair. To the gentleman who supported and has loved his wife even though he too was very young when she started with this illness. To the daughter who has dedicated her life for her mother. To the son who inspite of the storm in his life, has now finished his studies and is working in an MNC today.
We read about courage, we hear about love, I can say I have seen it.
Labels: Courage
Monday, July 9, 2007
Horror-struck
The ‘Horror’Scope
I squirmed, I twitched,
I nervously bobbed my knee.
I looked at his face,
As he looked at me.
“Oh no,” he said,
“This is not right,
I shudder to think,
That this is your plight.
“Saturn overlooking your health,
You must beware,
Or of bad luck,
You will have more than your share.
“Wear an emerald ring,
No clothes blue or black,
Or you will face injuries,
In your legs or on your back.
“Remember that Amavasya,
Is bad for you.
Go out and bad luck,
Will follow you.”
“Oh! What can I do?”
I asked him close to tears.
“Pay me Rs.5000,” said he,
“And I’ll rid you of your fears.”
“I will pray for you,
And give you a chain.
And I can tell you,
Bad luck won’t follow you again.”
I told him I couldn't
Pay his grand fees.
But I’d pray to God,
On bended knees.
I worried, I wondered,
What would happen today.
For today was the most dreaded,
New Moon Day!
Not too much bad luck,
Followed me around.
Though I did jump,
At every little sound.
As the day ended,
I realized I could cope,
With the course of destiny,
Of my ‘HORROR’scope.
P.S. If anyone could tell me how to add a saved doc file from my system, that would be a real help
Labels: Horror of horrors
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Ready, Set, Go...
So maybe lets start with what this blog will contain... well I haven't the slightest clue as yet. But maybe a few poems and maybe my thoughts.
I write when I feel like doing so. So won't be posting regularly thats for sure.. So now that I have actually started on the blog, lets see whether I ever update... Wish me luck
Labels: Starting off
