The Last Song of the Dusk

In a race effort to banish my self-pity over lonliness, I sprained my neck and finished " The Last Song of Dusk" in less than twenty four hours. This happened two weeks ago and the song has been giving me goosebumps all the while. As I read, the book invoked so many different reactions and emotions in me  that I didnot know existed.


The writer, Siddharth sanghvi, is a talented story teller. The book is unputdownable, as the author's narration spans across time, places and feeling. The quality of writing is exceptional and the story carried a certain amount of magic in it. Set in the '20s, the story is simple yet superbly written. The author holds you thorughtout with his narration. The story is about love, art,jealousy, karma and destiny. The last song of dusk is a story of Anuradha (singer), Nandini (painter) Shloka (kid) and Vardhaman (doctor). Mr. Sanghvi was impressive in his debut, the story is an emotional roller coaster. This is one story that delights you and disguts you at the sametime.

To poke or not to poke :P

Well this is usually my constant affirmation. I have this urge to fix things, people or anything depending on my OCD. There were times when I did not leave the plates in the sink even in a stranger’s house ....but now if you visit my place, my kitchen sink will be filled with utensils at one time or the other in a day. Anyways I'm not here to discuss that though. I have another problem, I offer my piece of advise most of the times. I  offer to help depending on how well I know them and many a  times I help those I do not know at all. Now that is a good habit... isn't it??  My other poking habit is I listen to conversations haha creepy!! not that I'm interested in others lives,  but I have this tendency to grasp reality. People, behaviour, the way they talk and other wierd details. I am an analyst and its my excuse for research, but I do know when to draw the line. I don't try to press my ears hard on a door to hear what's going on inside, or take too much interest in a whispery telephonic conversation.By this I simply mean the conversation has to have the quality to catch my attention. Sometimes I even miss the conversation my friend is having sitting right next to me.

Today I was sitting at a  friend's beauty salon, when my friend told me that he had to go to the car service center to collect his car and asked me to watch the salon until he's back I gladly agreed. After 20 minutes  a woman came in along with her teenage daughter. I dutifully told them that my friend would be back in 10 minutes or so and gave them few magazines to kill their time and I myself picked up a magazine called "Latest hair trends" which was entirely in some south-asian language but for the name. I was bored to death and suddely I heard a conversation between the 40 something year old woman and her 16 year old daughter. The magazine I was trying to read was bad anyway. I heard the mom asking her daughter about school and friends. That grabbed my attention. The girl patiently answered like she really wanted to share. How many teenagers do that? (Not like i am the 40 year old mom) Then the topic turned to men/boys. Mother asked if the girl liked anyone in school. The girl just giggled and said " Oh no mamma no way"!!

The mother gave her daughter a puzzled look and then  rehearsed something in her head  and spoke after a long pause “You know sweetheart just because me and your dad didn't work out it doesn't mean marriages never work" The girl just kept listening (surprisingly the culture here in Goa is some how so umm say western!! and the girl looked comfortable having this conversation) “I really loved your dad and tried but its unfortunate that it didn't work. We even tried for you but it just didnt” I really respected this woman that very moment. Not bothered about my opinion she continued “Now you must be happy to have two moms” The girl smiled and nodded. Mother asked very cautiously “She takes good care of you right?” The girl was eating kurkure i guess, she nodded as she ate. “I am sure she will take good care of you. Anytime you feel low and want to talk to somebody, will you call me?” One more nod in agreement.

After the pack was empty the girl looked up and asked “Are you not going to find anyone?” Mother said “I am looking desperately. I need to find a man faster before you do” The girl laughed. Then she started teasing her mom about some colleague. Mother went red for once. It was a moment. “I will move on sweetheart. I promise. I needed my time. Now I am over him. And yeah that man is beginning to look good these days” The girl squealed in excitement and started singing songs. It was chaos. It was like girls day out(in a beauty salon) . That's when I realized that I wasn't actually part of this conversation I was so involved in whatever was going on between them and before I could hide my blushing face it was too late. The mother just looked and I shrugged. I said “I’m sorry I didnt mean to” She said “No issues".She smiled and went back bonding with her daughter. My friend came at the right time and saved me from further embarrassment. So here is a piece of advise "DO NOT POKE".

Lyrically speaking

This habit of Y really gets on to my nerves.....he doesn't take things seriously. the other day I almost ruptured my vocal chords yelling at him for being irresponsible and he smiles at me and starts singing a song in a self made on the spot tune  which goes like "meri biwi gussa hogayi" can you imagine!! Now as i recollect, that was not the first time he did something like that, in fact I was so busy yelling at him all the time that i failed to notice this unique quality of his. He has the habit of singing about everything he does. Like say, if he's wearing his shirt ... the song would be "mere white shirt pe blue stripes hai". or "mera woh  white shirt kahan hai". Sometimes when I'm irritated his songs make me smile...laugh most of the times.

Yesterday as he was cleaning his cupboard, he came across many interesting things. He worships MJ and he even maintained a diary where he wrote all his songs, not only MJ there were songs by  Eagles, Bob Marley, Boney M, and many others. he even wrote ghazals , Ghulam Ali's "chup ke chup ke raat din" is his favourite, Bhajans by Pandit Jasraj and Pandit Bheemsen Joshi. I get my daily dose of bhajans. I mean he is one person who can annoy you by singing(not that he doesn't sing well...oh no.. he's got a wonderful voice), but by singing songs like "Tukur tukur dekhte ho kya" , "Jethi ki dopahari mein", "Awaara hawa ka jhonka hoon". He stopped cleaning and started to glance through his notebooks  I lost my temper and told him that we had plenty of time for all that and cleaning the cupboard was more important ( i know that was rude, but I had a lot of work to do and he said he would help me finish it). As i was looking at one of his books he told me that he used to write poems earlier(hindi). I thought it would be some kind of weird stuff, but after I read it, I was like "awwwww my jaanu is soooo talented" 

here it is

हर पल तुम्हारी याद

 हर याद एक पल के बाद

यह सच्च है या है एक ख्वाब

मेरा प्यार शायद देगा यह जवाब

हमारा मिलन शायद है एक अनहोनी

हर जनम में पुनरावर्तित होगी यह कहानी

कभी लिखता में, कभी लिखती वोह दीवानी

पुस्तक नयी है लेकिन भाषा है पुरानी

 आओ अतीत को बहलाकर भविष्य को सुधारें

उस कठिन पत्थ को एक और बार निहारें

इस कहानी की शुरुवात  हर अगले जनम में हो

मुझे विश्वास है क्योंकि तुम साथ हो....

Committed!!

A good friend of mine is getting married. He called me yesterday and shared the news. After the call I sat in my room and went back to the days when we said things like "I will never marry" or "Marriage is not my thing" and thought about my own wedding day.  I was acutely conscious of the significance of that moment when the groom  ties the mangalsutra (aka thaali) around the bride's neck and each accept the other as partner for life. The acceptance and commitment are primarily from the heart and a wedding ceremony symbolizes the fact that one is ready to stretch beyond individual selfishness and take another being in that warm blanket of love,
makes the sense of togetherness and the big bad scary C word "commitment" authentic. We humans  have always needed symbolism and social recognition to mark accomplishment and the wedding ceremony is, in many ways, precisely such a thing. Set to the mellifluous and traditional music of the Nadhaswaram, the bride
and the groom, both clad in sacred White & Red  traditional saree and dhothi respectively, walked hand in hand around the Agni as they completed the final symbol of holy matrimony.

The couple is then blessed for a relationship that is satisfying, comforting, and precious. A relationship that is based on mutual trust and understanding; a relationship where there is much more give than take; a relationship that anchors  oneself when the disturbing waters of life test the spirit. Honestly, in the long run, it does not matter if your partner hates cricket or if you hate your partner’s sense of dressing. It does not matter if the dream world of your silly  expectations crashes down, because replacing that delicate teenage world will be the strong bond, a bridge built on companionship.

A marriage is a good thing for everyone. Though it seems like a restrictive chain for self-progress, it is one of the best ways to challenge one’s limits and to grow as a person. Some marriages start out with a delightful bang and then become a life-long whimper. Others start out on the rocks of prejudice and caution and then
settle into a steady ride on Ceat tyres. Everyones will be a unique roller coaster ride, a ride that you will have to make on your own negotiating all the fears and inner conflicts. Be adventurous and have tons of fun! You wouldn't know what marriage really means until  you stop thinking about your self and start understanding the other.

What's your Story??

As a kid one always considers numerous career options. We even write essays in school about what we want to do when we grow up. I knew I  wanted to be a doctor, though I hated hospitals (naturally), the smell of medicine, injections and lab coats. I always wanted to own a doctor's set. I always imagined having it and examining my toys with the stethoscope huh!!

I realized pilot, army personnel were not my cup of tea. Which meant most of the conventional career options were not available for me.I wanted to be a superhero. I always had ideas for my costume (someone like Mr. India...ya know the idea of becoming invisible by wearing a watch like thing sounded soooo cool back then). But being a superhero meant getting up in the middle of the night to help people. It also meant lot of exercise. I immediately abandoned the idea and actually, this piece of wisdom came from another friend of mine who was thinking on similar lines. But now I feel she discouraged me to eliminate competition but then she too never became a superhero . Perhaps she was wise.

My next plan was to be a private detective(inspired by television series like reporter and Tehkeekat). This could not go wrong. I could investigate during the day and sleep peacefully at night. I was great at talking to people, I could piece up clues, that’s it, that’s all I needed. I was so confident that I discussed it with my friend. This was a bad mistake. She discouraged me. She asked me to solve few puzzles (involving mathematics...ya know I sucked when it came to numbers) and I failed miserably. Then brutally she told me if I could not solve such simple stuff I could never do anything bigger. Don’t ask me how she made those connections, but after I had fallen off a bicycle (with trainer wheels) after bumping into a wall I felt she was right, I mean how could I fall off a bicycle which had trainers??. Fine, I could not ride a bicycle and unlike most kids I kept falling off it; but come on which detective came on a bicycle! Give me a break.


After all my options died a premature death I decided to settle for either a lawyer or a Businesswoman. I, of course had no idea what they meant . But these were just halfhearted decisions. I knew I could never be a movie star since I had to look like Hema Malini or Rekha or Sridevi. Even after 7 births (being born Hindu the religion said I have 7 chances) I would come nowhere near them. You see, when it came to looks I was practical. I knew where I stand.

However, like most kids I had this imaginary character in my mind. A rotund girl with two pigtails who got her powers from carrots. This again was stolen from Popeye I only replaced the food (the carrots idea was stolen from Karamchand). But she was no superhero. She was a great detective. All she had to do was visit the scene of crime and the clues would float up automatically. If she needed extra powers to crack the mystery all she had to do was eat carrots. She was super rich since she had found treasure and lived in this beautiful house by the sea(the being rich thing was again taken from Duck tales and Richie rich). When asked the question’ What do you do?’ she used to smile broadly and answer ‘I really don’t know. I guess I solve things.’ (again you have to realize my universe was totally constructed by movies,serials,cartoons, hence the smart answer instead of saying I am a detective.)

Ironically, the rotund girl never vanished. The pigtails did, not because of age but due to severe hair loss. And since there was no treasure the big house did not happen. Today if you ask me what I do I will say the same thing, ‘I really don’t know.....guess sometimes I solve things…’

The other side of the coin!!

There are zillion things about me you will never know & a zillion you would never want to. Ok ok let me not exaggerate things, well here are a few things you don't know about me

    * I love making a things to do list, everyday. I do it religiously every morning. I mostly make them on plain paper or  post-its and kill myself by looking at them 75% of the times I follow my time-tables. I'm simply in love with the idea of putting my to do lists together to get an idea of what my life has been.
  

* I once advised a friend( who wanted to kill herself) about an easy way to commit suicide I asked her to drink Phenoyl (the one used to clean toilets) and when she complained about its awful smell and was not sure if she can withstand the taste, I asked her to dip either a 5 star or a diary milk choclate in a glass of phenoyl...I know its stupid, but I did   

 * I smoked a cigarette in my 10th STD. I sneaked one in to the servants' tiolet from my dad's room ( took it from a pack which was left over after the party  by my dad's friend the previous night)  I did not know how to have it...so it just got wasted :D

 * I am terribly scared of cockroaches, lizards, grasshoppers, butterflies, moths, caterpillars, rats, frogs and other similar non-human animate beings which are "YUCK" looking. In 1st STD, I developed this scary feeling on seeing a cockroach on the wall in my classroom when it told me "I'll come back and get you" and vanished( sounds creepy I know, but back then I didn't know that the feeling I had was called creepy, come on I was just 6 yrs old). During Intermediate 2nd year( 12th STD), I failed in a class test (quarterly exam) not because I did not study, no I was a bright student, but  my seating for the exam was in a biology lab, filled
with bottled dead creatures which kept distracting me by staring at me and the moment I thought I had control over the situation, the paper was pulled out of my hands :(  .

* I was immensely sad and extremely happy at the sametime when I came to know that a close relative of mine passed away ...disgusting I know, but frankly I never liked the person, not even once in my life and not even for a second.

* I wanted to marry Steve waugh, Mohammed Azharuddin, Aamir Khan, Tom Hanks, Abhishek Bachchan, Kamal Hassan, George Clooney, VVS Laxman, Colin Firth (after watching the BBC series "Pride and Prejudice"), Roger Federer, Stone cold steve Austin (WWE champion) at some point of time or the other in life, actually I wanted Abhiskek bachchan, Roger Federer and VVS Laxman at the same time  ;)

* I hate attending pujas/homams/religious ceremonies, I used to like them earlier,but decided otherwise after the "Satyanarayana Vratam" we had right after my wedding ( I courageously dozed off throughout the puja).

 * I don’t claim to have a prodigal memory, since I honestly forget a lot of things, a lot of times. (I recently gave away a 500 rupees note instead of a Rs 100  to an auto driver!...my husband doesn't know about it, but i'm sure now he does) But to my own surprise I can't forget , Phone numbers, several dates, occasions, happenings, colors, things spoken,order of events. May be I've selective memory :P

* i never wanted to read all this stuff but as I did now its different (written by my husband)

I'm Tagged

Hello all its a beautiful rainy morning here in Goa and I'm posting this sipping hot, refreshing herbal tea. Well I didn't know something like this existed until a friend of mine mentioned it in her blog and said she was passing it  to me and that now its my turn to be tagged!!

Well here it is

I'm thinking about * ways to kill time

I said * how do I do that?

I want * to fit in to a size 34 low waist, skin tight  jeans

I wish * I could do all that I wished to

I hear * my drunken neighbor abuse and ultimately thrash her husband every night

I wonder * how long will this go on??

I regret * for not being able to tell my dad how much I love him

I can't * understand physics

I am * adorable

I dance * everyday

I sing * every night

I need * a magic wand

I cry * for all the wrong reasons

I make * good food

I write * crap.. mostly

I confuse * when it comes to needs and wants

I miss * night long bitching about love, loss, work, life with Sree

I will *  probably write a book someday, even if it is a cook book

I should * control my temper

umm finally... I must leave

so now its your time to tag :)

I don't know if I'm sick, my TV makes me feel so

Okay, so the other day I was doing dishes in the evening and was listening to the song "tum jo aaye zindagi mein..." from Once upon a time in Mumbai when my battery died. So I decided to pay attention to what was on TV. Though I was in the kitchen I could hear the TV loud and clear( thanks to granny-in-law). My husband granny is kind of addicted to the daily soaps on Zee TV, especially "Jahnsi ki Rani", "Yahan mein ghar ghar kheli" and "Pavitra Rishta" phew.Then I wondered the kind of effect these serials have on people irrespective of the age group, I mean come on she is 85 and its hard to believe that someone of that age take interest in daily soaps.So talking about the soaps, there are two things, firstly they are pathetic and  secondly they are more pathetic, so let them be.

What I want to talk about is the advertisements aired in between they are truly disgusting as most of them are either cosmetics or sanitary products.There are few commercials which get on to my nerves and there are these shop on TV commercials which talk about drugs that pepole can take care of their asthma and it was being promoted by once bollywood actress Raveena Tondon. Towards the end of the commercial, the voice over starts listing off the reasons whay you wouldn't want to take the drug and people sharing their experiences after using the drug. What bothers me is the effect it has on people who watch it... I mean most of the commercials which involve health care encourage people to self-diagnose. Its not the drugs alone almost all the commercials on TV convey more or less the same thing. I mean now that's why they are called advertisements, but bleh....

The problem is the psychological effect it has is tremendous. These commercials describe conditions that you might or might not have, describing the symptoms, and then suggesting a treatment plan (which always involves their product, naturally). If I were a doctor, I would be sick of conversations that involve my patient diagnosing him or herself and then asking me if they were right. I mean come on I'm the doctor here. Now I ask you, who should be deciding a patient's treatment plan?? a doctor and that's what I'm saying. I don't say that the doctor is always gives his patient a spot on diagnosis, but after all He's the one who spent years training to make such decisions.

If I had the power I would ban all these commercials from being aired..ok i'll leave it at that.

I'm Back

Hello all you wonderful people out there, I'm back, I mean I think I'm back...I've started this one in hope of posting regularly. You know when I first began to blog,I didn't think much of it. I've started blogs earlier all of which fell through. I've made an observation I'm not a great blogger. Most of the time it's like there is nothing much going on in my life that's interesting to write about, so I don't. Finally when there is something to write about...I do not find the right words to describe the events that have transpired. So most of the time I try to write with a certain amount of caution, not to sound repetitive for the fear of boring to death those who might actually read what I write!!