A Slice of Lime.

Locked! Until further notice...

2010-10-25T17:11:00.002+05:30

Photo Courtesy: Khuboz

Knock knock... I think I'm back. :)

2010-02-06T00:17:00.003+05:30

They say that there comes a point in everyone's life when you wake up and you just know what you are born to do. (Like Britney just knew, before she shaved her head.)

So apparently, I had my epiphany this morning. I figured out my destiny, my calling. This is really it guys. I'm born - to clean up my apartment. Why else is this endless tirade against dirt and clutter? It also sort of explains my-far-from-perfect maids, my hormonal urges of obsessive-compulsive-disorder. Gah!

I cant thank every one of you enough to keep logging into this space, checking if I'm still here, and whats been going on with me. I know its been a while since I was last here - in this city, and in this blog sphere...

In the stopgap, I've moved homes, work spaces. And I've been through death. (Yup, cacti do die if you water them, umm, liberally.) I've been dealing with homicidal tendencies. (What! We bought two little Euphorbia cacti from Kerala. And in true mallu tradition, I named them Thangam a.k.a Thangoos, and Kunjyulakshmi a.k.a Kunjya. I water them sparingly, and presto! They're pretty much on their way to the after life. Sigh! I really am a bone collector of the green guys, but more on that lay-ter.)

The Monkey refuses to talk to me anymore since I'm working all the time, and I fall asleep on the couch, often mid-sentence. The last time I checked with the aliens and the zombies, they said world domination sort of fell lower on their priority list. Apparently, they're re-building their economies post the global economic meltdown. And among other things, they have a decorated, peace-loving president who thinks it'll look bad. The bad news is, I sort of ran out of things to say to you.

So I started walking the streets looking for inspiration, to write. Amidst the gutters, stray dogs, stray ducks, (yes ducks) and stray people, I feel like a little girl. Lost in a crowd, teeming with a million people musing over their million moribund lives. I often watch life pass me by like a muted movie, and I wonder if this is sanity, or is it the start of a slow, staggering descent into insanity.

But aall izz well I guess. It turns out I'm still here writing mundane memoirs of middle-class madness... and we've come a full circle. Sigh!
[P.S: In other news, the Muffet Diaries update shortly. Pakka promise. :)]

I'm back to waging a war against my apartment. Life is calling people. I could use a slice of lime to squeeze on my life though. Lime, anyone?

Chiggy wiggy with me boy!

2009-10-12T03:09:00.006+05:30

Now, does someone know what on earth does that mean? And while you're at it, try and decode mukkala mukkabla laila, oh maga siya waagi yaga*, ringa ringa ringa for me. I love that Isai Puyal** A.R Rahman. I just don't get the esoteric gibberish in his lyrics sometimes!

I've been listening to one of my favourite tracks of recent times - "I'd rather dance with you than talk with you" (yup, its the one playing for you right now). The visual in my head through those heady lyrics is deliciously flirtatious - a bar, an evening on the dance floor with a tall, hot, deep-voiced indie folk singer/ stranger who'd rather swing you around than sit around talking politics, several happy faces around, tequila shots, sepia lighting... but I still find myself a tad offended at the prospect. So I wondered why.

A little introspection and we realise its because while I can talk, and boy can I talk, I cant dance! Certainly not in a manner thats socially acceptable, and definitely not in a way that would keep someone twinkling toes with mine for over 5 minutes, considering in those 5 minutes I haven't trampled his toes, tripped over, or died of excessive-consciousness-while- in-movement-syndrome. Sigh!

Do you guys think good dancers are genetically good dancers, or is it something we are all programmed to do, once we learn the ropes? Leave me shout.. :)

* Remember uyirin uyire, anybody?
* Isai Puyal - Tamil for storm of music, a title with which Rahman is referred to by the tamil paparazzi.

Where am I going with this?

2009-09-21T18:44:00.004+05:30

And so, after nearly a year... I finally desist my urge to log out, and blog! I'm so sorry friends, to have gone off the radar. It was at best, an unplanned dormancy, sans a shelf life. By way of update, I have finally relocated to Mumbai (yes, after all that acute whining) and I'm back to being jobless, with loads of free time and therefore countless hours of useless thinking. Which brings me back to square one of my thought - existential crisis.

So where am I going with my writing? Should this be another read at someone's cheeky take on day to day mundaneness? Should this be a forum to share with the world my schizophrenic view of life? Should this be a support forum for my battle against a dying system? Or should this be a forum to purely entertain?

I don't have an answer. Do you have a thought? Leave me a shout will ya?:)

And then God said: ROTFL

2009-01-08T13:22:00.015+05:30

I have always maintained that there has never been a comic, parallel to Life. In fact, Incredible Stupidity is now an international religion, playing on a news channel near you. Well, decided, with the New Year, that I owe it to you guys to keep you entertained.

So what do we read this week. Or not. Spiritual Goru* Deep Luck Chopra came out last year with 'Why Is God Laughing?'. Priced at an exorbitant INR 495 and heavily endorsed by Bike B(u)yers in his adjective filled prologue, my Curiosity just piqued. Bike has made me laugh, a lot, specially in his James Bond spoofs and that ogre cartoon movie trilogy with that cute donkey and the cat in boots. Speaking of cats, we know Curiosity usually kills them. Or as my friend puts it, chokes the damn cat with butter, ties rocks to its fours, puts it in a gunny sack and rolls it down the river. :) You get the picture, right?

So Curiosity, she pestered the life of me to know how and why Bike and Deep Luck discovered that God laughed. I caved in. Then Curiosity and I read the bed time story of a comedian, whose loss of the dad opened "exciting doorways of spirituality" and "he understood the power of laughter in its true depth". It took us about 49 days to complete, because it needed a lot of grit and gumption to inch from para to para, and thereby page to page. The things we do for you guys! Anyways, you should know that God was laughing, because after growing 495 bucks poorer with spiritual psychobabble, customised for individuals with the IQ of Paris Hilton, the joke was really on me! Recommended for people who ~~dig~~ read Pamela Andher-sen-sational frontal protruberances.

Sometimes, you really can judge a book by its cover, and a movie by its trailer. So as dutiful followers of Incredible Stupidity, armed duly with a napkin to wipe excess drool, Curiosity, me and my favourite boy went to watch Ghajini. Its a make believe world in Ghajini, where a corporate honcho falls for a pretty chatterbox who dates men without doing her homework. I must be pretty religious or what. I sat through three straight hours watching a woman clueless about a celeb she dates; she sells her car for her "boyfriend", whose identity, credentials, background, ethnicity or life she has no clue about and doesnt care, because he says he's going to his "gaaon" to treat his "ma". He says it, she buys it. Like Jayaprada would have years ago for Jumping Jack Jeetu in some shady flick. She asks him no questions, and tells him no details. even their calls are brief! [What, did I just hear- the perfect woman? Sigh!]

Oh well, Ms. Heroine quite a devout follower of Incredible Stupidity. In fact, while hiding from a bunch of goon-pursuers in her apartment, she does not switch her cell phone to 'silent mode'. Worse, when boyfriend returns her call, she speaks loudly on the cell to her boyfriend from her hiding place and all through this time she doesnt call or text for help! Move over Scientology, Incredible Stupidity is the flavour of the season!

Oh, you expected a review. Here's what I think: Aamir Khan does a fantabulous job of that six packs and making you believe that his memory shelf life is really 15 minutes. But the rest of the cast are either very silly women or Tamil Movie style villains, making it seem rather surreal. With counteracting elements (such as Aamir Khan vs. rest of the cast) the movie really is one big oxymoron. Like a chaste whore? I'd still give it three stars and a one watch, considering there's a conscience that cries Drool-farhamosh!

And, there's good news! Move over sexy ~~bitches~~ kittens, its the march of the behenji brigade! Don't roll your eyes at me, go read TMSS. This should pretty much be the quote of the seaon:

Where Maxim girls are purposefully brainless, we look at a TMSS and say she's hot because she's smart and beautiful".

Oh Thank you, thank you, you metrosexual male. We can now grow fat, not wax, not do our eyebrows, burp, fart and behave like you, in fact legalise PMses... And we'll be a TMSS! :) Suddenly equality doesn't feel like a concept anymore. :)

That said, Scrubs fans can have one more laugh. Episode titled "My Intern's Eyes" has J.D and jingbang in the Cafeteria, and J.D rebuking Omar in shudhdh turkish "o benim muhallebim ömer" to guard his pudding from being stolen. Only Omar paaji is a Singh is Kingg. Jee! I didnt know Turks were Sikhs. Or worse, my mommy certainly didn't tell me that turbaned bearded men were always called Achmed and should be deported from sight. Meh!

Watch the video for graphic details:

And for you guys wondering who the dickens is Sairekha, I'm a world dominating megalomaniac who has 37 galaxies under my control and bought this blog from Z in Arkhyam Asylum for a lie.

Ok, caught me. I'm outta the closet people, real name and all. :) Till the next rant, this is Sairekha signing off....

Now Listening to:

Miss Independent - Ne-Yo

* Assamese for four legged, milk bearing, religious mammal which is also a source for beef.

A blog revival, the year end obligatory patriotic rant, and and a brand new blog!

2008-12-28T04:46:00.007+05:30

We live in a world of nonsense, of excuses and sub standard television. I often think it resembles the movies. Like Equilibrium, V-for-Vendetta, and Aeon Flux. And Batman and Superman comics. And in our fiction-esque world, (fiction-esque only because it’s getting close to black and white), we the masses would be those people, like cattle, manipulated/oppressed/taken advantage of by a select few on top. And look forward to a hero to save us. That’s probably why we love comic characters.

I’ve been taking a walk the last few days, in the wonderful world of existence of the insulin pump. This is a useful little device that resembles a pager, to which you can outsource the task of keeping track of blood sugar levels and accordingly give you adequate insulin. In India, this lil thing I am told is priced between INR 1.8 lakh to INR 2.8 lakhs. Other things you get for the proximity of that price is usually a spanking new small car! A little birdie hopped on to my shoulder this morning, with the not so good intent of instigation. It told me US citizens are given free pumps by the government, as part of social security.

My first thought was, hey! What happens to our taxes and social security? Being the nation to arguably house the largest number of diabetics, the government could really ~~arm twist~~ work out a deal with MNCs to ensure every diabetic has a free wonder pump! But looks like what the bosses did was make a buck out the pump makers by augmenting the taxes. So the government gets richer with the taxes, the company makes its profit in spite of the tax, and the customer pays a hefty price should he/she want the wonder pump. Free medication is just that far a cry. We’ve been paying 30-x% income tax for donkeys years with the promise of more roads, electricity, water, no more poor people, better AIDS and cancer care and what not. While no signs of marked improvement due to policy makers’ initiatives showed up on any of the promised fronts, there were complaints on how increased population was the culprit. Its almost like the bosses thought, ah, let them all die. We’ll have lesser heads to worry about. And in the meanwhile, might as well use those losers’ money to some good end, an indicative list of which would look like (i) a huge ass house for self, (ii) bigger cars, (iii) foreign trips, (iv) floozy women, (v) booze and most importantly (vi) some local henchmen.

Now if I were to go weeping to say, my supreme court, that my social security should be channeled to give medical concessions (such as the wonder pump), I’d get swatted away like a fly that innocently appeared on the snack of a fat irate housewife on a particularly warm summer noon, just a few minutes after a powercut during her favourite saas-bahu serial (when the MIL encouraged the vamp to marry the husband). I’d probably even be the precedent of being rebuked with a how-could-you-when-40%-of-the-country-doesn’t-have-food-shelter-clothing? And lawyers like me would cite that to dissuade others who’d try reasoning with the top thereafter, for benefits.

Take a minute to think how your peers earn and live better in other countries. How those peers come here as expats and still earn and live better, under your runny, complaining noses. And why brain drain hasn’t reduced one bit since it started, so much that only Indians among a few other pariahs, are denied visas in bulk worldwide. Think of how the most expensive buildings and hotels in your city in India is usually occupied by foreign nationals. And tell me how it feels that although Gandhi, Bhagat, Bose and the jingbang of freedom fighters drove out the Brits, we pretty much continue to remain second class citizens in our own home town.

Call me jaded. It’s been a whole month since 200 plus people died in Mumbai. We talked and talked and talked. Then there was that politician shuffle, some terror tourism. More talk. Net net, we haven’t even tried that silly boy in court, who was caught after he took up that offer of getting a 1000 virgins in his afterlife. It appears some of our bosses think he shouldn’t be represented for patriotic reasons and banged up potential lawyers’ houses. It didn’t matter that none of these guys showed up during the Mumbai siege, and it doesn’t matter that if that silly boy doesn’t get represented, he just can’t be tried! And if he’s not tried, well, in time, in the name of justice to foreigners, which we’re prompt at ensuring here, we’ll have to parcel him back to his folks! Now, you do the math.

I’m sick and tired that things don’t, can’t and won’t change. Like Newton’s law on inertia. Only that external, unbalanced force is nowhere in sight. We need that hero, you know. Mutant or alien, or just twisted with ~~shit~~loadsa money and dead folks, but humanphile. With real powers, like flying, superstrength, artic breath the works. Or real influence, to tilt the odds.

If any of you want to argue on how we-can-make-a-difference without the above, I am in no mood for your arguments this once. I shall however accept your contentions, upon the occurance of the first event from now that we do as a nation that qualifies that (i) this country has acted with some spine; and (ii) not given excuses that can’t walk; and (iii) does not reflect mild temperament ~~of the faint old farts on the ruling chairs~~.

Call me jaded. But I completely go by something I read sometime back. About how life is really a spiral of despair and your only hope is piling one distraction on top of another, and hoping that your massive heap of delusion doesn't collapse before you die. Sounds extreme, and ranting I know. Even has elements of drama and so many confusing words in there to even pass off for pseudo-intellectual ~~masturbation~~ material. (Yes, yes, with that last line this blog is officially 18+) Although, beneath those layers of words, and words and words, is one underlying fact. If you can’t take matters into your hands, distract yourself and move on.

Until hope and change and a better life sells tetra packed in Spencers.

Meanwhile, if you’re utterly disgusted with my post, which as usual is grey, dull and sugar free, don’t be surprised. My new sugar free diet has me perennially hungry and somehow noticing only the pastries, the chocolates and doughnuts on Friends and Seinfeld. Sigh!

But well, here’s something to cheer us all up. I have a new venture here, which is intended to be a repertoire of recipes, and Viv fans can look forward to all things Viv here.

Happy holidays!

An Indian Dream

2008-10-21T14:58:00.011+05:30

I have always watched with immense amusement how Americans pride themselves to live in the Land of the Free, the Land of the Surplus and funnily yet form the Land of the Paranoid. Living in the world's largest democracy, I have often wondered (while stuck for what seemed like hours in crowded, stinky signals) why couldn't this democracy measure up to provide a Free, Surplus living space for its denizens. Technically, going by our statistics, we should be able to be a Free Land in every sense. I understand, given the number of our politicians, Surplus is a far cry. Can we fix this? How?

I don't know. But the thought does keep rolling in my head. More so each time when I glance upon a souvenir that Boy picked up in San Diego. Its a giant plastic container that used to hold about a litre of cola, with a couple of lions on the lid and a perforation for nesting a straw. Bought outside a zoo. That entitled him to free cola refills a gazillion times at every cola tap he spotted in the zoo.

I remembered the stark contrast of a bunch of us stuck in a queue till almost the end of time, one day at the Bannarghatta National Park. So in the promise of being shown what turned out to be emaciated circus lions in a wild safari, we stood sweltering in heat and dirt, with parched throats, poached tempers and murdered appetites. Forget about cola, even dirty water was gladly bought and sold at a premium. It made perfect sense why every average Indian lit up at the thought of the great American Dream.

Another seemingly unconnected event deepened this process of wonder. A free premiere of an upcoming movie that offered free barrels of cola and popcorn to each invitee - one little hinterland of the free and surplus. Within minutes, that entire theatre floor was coated with popcorn and soggy, cola-drenched popcorn. And filled with people, (fully grown mature adult professionals, if you may) covered in popcorn, soggy popcorn, and cola stains.

That minute I realized, what "free(bie)" does to chaos is what "open sesame" did to Ali Baba's caves! (Its a pity the joker wasted all his time pissing batman off).

It was then that I saw my final vision of a cola container counter outside perhaps Bannarghatta, that entitled people to refill from free cola taps. I saw stampedes in the park, I saw people filling empty buckets and barrels brought from home with the cola and selling it for kilometres outside in black. I saw cola and cola-container trails, cola patterns and cola graffiti on the park floor. And of course cola-drenched animals adding to the general stench. And anthills, possibly formed pursuant to mass migration of the ant community to capitalise on the long term dried-up-cola accumulation. And possibly bankrupt cola companies. So I collected my final vision of a cola container counter outside Bannarghatta... and I trashed it.

Somewhere, in some school debate, an idealistic kid often questions, "Is India truly free?". I now shudder in rebuttal, wondering who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel...

I rest my case. :)

Driving you nuts!

2008-09-04T15:26:00.005+05:30

So we get ourselves two gluttony boxes on four wheels that can be controlled from behind a wheel and a gear box. And it takes us from point to point if we feed it petrol. Lots and lots and lots of petrol.

My glutton is a Veteran. Arguably the first Indian design made with oriental technology, it ruled the roost in its hey day, proudly spouting for the first time on Indian roads, the name of my favorite monkey god. Today, in a road full of swanky youngsters with totally Japanese calibrations, it stands, all of fourteen and pristine white, and unapologetically proud like an Indian war hero.

It stands, coz well, mobility and traffic haven't been bedfellows for a while in Bangalore. So it stands for half an hour at every signal, stands again after crawling an inch, and stands and stands between intermittent spells of motion-like behavior, for the next 2 hours and 8 km till we both reach work, where it stands again for 8 hours before we repeat performance. From the first time I set my eyes on the Veteran, I knew it was born to stand its ground.

Much is said about life, stress, traffic, and traffic related stress in life. Much more is said about a day in the Indian road. Much is experienced for a couple of hours every day, when bumper is sandwiched against bumper, sometimes bumper and bumper are sandwiched with one, two or three adventurous two wheelers trying to 'cut' through a gap while the air is ripe with the cacophony of incessant, unwarranted honking, shouting, screaming, kids playing hopscotch between the bumpers, senior citizens, lazy by passers and housewives wagering on whether or not to cross while halfway down the road the signal turns green, the works.

Much much lesser probably, is the experience of an epiphany. And I had one. Pure, unadulterated epiphany. Of white noise. The sound of silence.

It was this morning, the roundabout of 10 am. The Veteran was slotted as the filling of a jumbo SUV bumper sandwich, with a two-wheeler who was trying to be our cheese slice and if things wouldn't get worse, the Veteran switched off. Nope, it wouldn't budge. Not with the firing and raising. Then it began, the deafening honking, a screaming traffic cop, couple of desperate/amused passerbys knocking furiously at my windows... but my nerves refused to budge. A two wheeler guy knocked the left indicator off, as the honking and the delirious cop only got louder.. but my nerves refused to budge.

Then, it happened. All of a sudden, I heard nothing. The world was playing in mute. Faces moved, vehicles moved, people waved. But not a single sound. My euphoria cannot be compared. Shakespeare was cooing into my epiphany. The world was a stage, people were actors of a mime, in mute. White noise. Pure Bliss.

The Veteran finally started, and we moved ahead. But there was this stunning, overbearing silence, for the next 5 minutes, until the Veteran could feel third gear gain (yes, it does have a third gear, thank you) and the noises trickled back into my conscience..

Selective distortion, is, powerful. Because the world in mute where you cant even hear yourself think, is a gorgeous place. No wars, no Barrack Obama, no Bush. No firecrackers-called-bombs, no ban-on-parties-because-no-parties, no morals, so no-moral-polices. And no traffic. Because the world is but a bubble of silence, now playing at a mime near you. *

Spiderman once said, with great power comes great responsibility. And great spandex is on 50% sale till Sep 7 at a Shopper's Stop near you. But great legs and great hips are six months and 10 kilos away. So you shall not see me hovering above your window, selectively distorting, just about yet.

“Moral” of the post: You can drive yourself to greatness or you can drive yourself nuts. Drive safe. ;)

*For those contesting this post with a “silence is not a super-power”, please refer to the scripture that governs your religious subscription. The first Messiahs kinda did it till their deaths. For those who did their scriptures and still want to contest, two words – buzz off.

Now Listening to: Rihanna - Shut up and drive.

A devil's workshop?

2008-06-25T13:12:00.001+05:30

It’s amazing what ample amounts of free time can do to a person. All of a sudden, 24 hours actually seem like 24 hours, Leona Lewis sounds closer to a beautiful voice weeping, crisp omelettes, washed down with orange juice becomes the revelation to what they meant when they coined ‘sense and simplicity’, and sitting in the balcony listening to the wind whistle over a cup of piping hot tea turns out to be the ultimate amphetamine to the mind wandering like a feather on a windy day.

So where does the mind wander, you ask. Well, the minute you let it go, it leaps like a delinquent far into the horizon, across the sun kissed meadows and then it digs its heels to a screeching halt to look for familiar territories. Such are the limitations of a soul in silo.

But a mind in its holiday bubble is caught in its inertial trap. Its window to the world is nothing but banal newspaper reports, salt and peppering overrated reality. So, in other words, I spend a good part of my day debating relevant social issues in my head (like men developing breast cancer) and their impact on human life (like will a mastectomy leave men with craters in their chest). And I spend my day doing some hardcore introspection till realization electrocutes like lightning bolts, and I’m hungry.

Which brings me to a very relevant subject – the point of my blogging exercise. How much will the travels of a mind in transition enrich your lives? Next to naught, I would think. So keeping value addition as an objective, I graciously offer my leave application.

Catch you guys when I grab my wit!

Until then, cheers! See you at your blogs….

To think, or not to think is the question.

2008-06-01T23:12:00.002+05:30

I’ve always maintained that life is full of overrated moments. And the flavour of the season that never changes is incredible stupor. Take for the example the fact that the youngest defence minister of this nuclear nation is a supposedly firebrand mallu well into his sixties! So three days ago this sextagenarian fainted, or rather collapsed into the ample arms of an army honcho, reportedly of fatigue. At this point, one would ideally look onto the country to seriously consider both age and age-related performance issues for their leaders. Public and “expert” opinion interestingly, tilts towards concern on what sort of signals would it send across if the defence minister of a nuclear nation faints!

Stupor isnt the most stimulating environment. But I haven’t had a dull moment. Not in while. Not with a dozen housewife pentagenarian aunts. Heck, you should have a sample of "tam-brahm-mami-ese".***

It’s amazing to see how people think, or don’t. And how perceptions and preferences are founded, or not. Recently, I flew out of Bengalooru’s new nightmare, the won and wonly BIAL. So, there was this painting that I lugged around and into several dozen escalators, security checks, several peoples’ faces and their middles and finally into an aeroplane, repeat process backwards. An obscenely heavy and particularly unattractive Tanjore painting this one. I am told this piece of bling is worth both my kidneys, both my eyes and my entire bank balance. We’re really talking here about a huge heavy ugly painting embossed in gold and precious stones, of Krishna and the gopikas. It’s not really painted as much as it’s printed on the background. The Krishna in here does not have a human body. He has that of an egg’s, with a cherubic head, disproportionate toes and arms sticking out. There is an oblong excuse for a bovine, with a head and feet wrapped around what looks like the egg’s ankles. I won’t even begin to describe the overweight gopikas. It insults my intelligence. While most under 40’s didn’t even cast the painting a second glance, pretty much all the bengaluru mamas and mamis were making a beeline towards us, much to the Matriarch’s immense pleasure, to ask if it were a Tanjore painting and how much did it cost. They were admiringly, sometimes enviously, feeling up the painting as I staggered to maintain my balance, for those few seconds of opulent nirvana. I guess the ad chaps are right - Somethings in life cannot be bought. For others, there’s mastercard.

I can’t stop thinking about this fantastic new trend called incredible stupor. Certainly not when I heard of the experience of a certain chubby telly actress, who is the super vamp in Ende Mansaputrikku, mallu-land’s hot new sauce bahu serial. The poor woman got beaten up by some enraged aunties to avenge her bad deeds when they caught sight of her in some real-life social function. Tsk Tsk. Do you still wonder why cheerleading is a more heinous moral offence than matchfixing?

***Storing non veg in the fridge means sinning a brahmin. (Eating non-veg outside home does not invoke similar sin). Stomach upsets, dieting, non-contribution during phemily gossip sessions by married daughters means they're probably pregnant. My sides hurt sometimes.

guess whose back?

2008-05-18T00:27:00.000+05:30

Aaaannndddd….. I’m back! This is that updating blog post that is timed to let you know (and therefore enrich your life by rendering it suitably unchanged) that I’m alive and I’m only in transit. My hands have been kinda full, what with the move to namma bengalooru and the better part of the day spent lost in translation. Okay-aa?

Funnily, it’s been an un-inspirational weekend propelled by calculated imprudence. In simpler words, I decided to explore bengalooru starting with the bannarugatta national park. After hours of standing in multiple queues amidst heat, crowds, garbage, pee and stench, we were finally hauled into a rickety mini-bus that took us into the jungle, and stopped beside two sorry excuses for lions. One very bored looking lion stopped to stare at the mini-bus. I’m sure we were a sight. There were thirty of us in a mini bus with caged windows, half of the crowd swooning and all of the crowd trying to get a good look then some good clicks at the creature. One kid, when told that the creature sizing us up quizzically, was called a “lion”, burst into that obligatory programmed response of a shrill wail. I guess that’s the point that cheesed the lion off. He sorta sized us up one last time, looked like he tsk-tsk-ed in lion-ese, then walked away. Dang!

I know you’re guffawing. So did all my bangalooru friends when I told them how, and particularly, where, I spent my last Sunday. Gah! Calculated imprudence I say. And I’m all of 24. Also jobless. And married. Oh well.

I’ll be back. Till then, stay tuned…

Adios.. Amigos?

About me - the scrap book tag.

2008-04-28T18:22:00.005+05:30

Joy tagged me twice this month.. And I've kinda been on the run. So I'm taking up the tags one at a time...:)

**Sniff Sniff!** Something's in the air in blogville. And, it turns out, its the about-me tag.:)

This one quite reminds me of the scrap books that people fill up in school. (I realize Ash feels this way too. Check out her mime at Ashok and her blog linked in my blogroll). And its quite befitting, what with me leaving Bombay for Bangalore that I need to fill in scrap books..:) So here's my two pence:)

Last Movie You Saw In A Theater:
Horton hears a who. And boy! Is it cute! :)

What Book Are You Reading:
I was doing two actually, both rudely interrupted by the big move to Bangalore. Lee Iacocca’s ‘Where have all the leaders gone? And Orhan Pamuk’s ‘Snow’. Then last night, I found, in a friend’s very dusty book shelf, a Vonnegut! So I think I’ll read all three… now you know why all my stories are so mixed up!:)

Favorite Board Game:
Scrabble!

Favorite Magazine:
Femina! National Geographic. Reader’s digest sucks these days. Occasionally Vogue just for eye candy and a good look at those Jimmy Choos! Oooh!:)

Favorite Smells:
Perfumed candles, musk, freshly baked bread, rain on damp earth, petrol.

Favorite Sound:
Music. Drums. They’re quite trippy.

Worst Feeling In The World:
Self Pity. And Heart break. :(

What Is The First Thing You Think Of When You Wake? :
Dang! What time is it? Do I have to go to work? Has the maid arrived?

Favorite Fast Food Place:
Inorbit food court :). For what it's worth... We were regulars.

Future Child's Name:
Hmmm. This is if if and if we choose to parent. Ved, Shlok or Nitya. :) Love Sanskrit namesJ

Finish This Statement. "If I Had A Lot Of Money I'd...”:
Quit work, write a book, open a gourmet restaurant, travel a lot and own 900 pairs of shoes, half of them being Jimmy Choos. Aaah! :)

Do You Drive Fast? :
No. Because, I don’t drive yet.:)

Do You Sleep With A Stuffed Animal?:
Yes. Actually. Two. Go figure;)

Storms-Cool Or Scary? :
Depends on whether I’m inside my house or outside:)

What Was Your First Car?:
It was dad’s Fiat. Still remember getting off and pushing it everytime we went out and the batteries would act up!:)

Favourite drink:
Depends on the mood. Usually a hot cuppa chai or coffee or just cold nice iced tea.

Finish This Statement, "If I Had The Time I Would .....” :

Catch up with my life. Its been a while… :)

Do You Eat The Stems On Broccoli?:
I normally eat everything. Stem leaf root shoot… sigh!

If You Could Dye Your Hair Any Color, What Would Be Your Choice? :
Bright red or copper. But alas! These colours don’t stay beyond a few days…:(

Name All The Different Cities/Towns You Have Lived In
Coimbatore, Bangalore, Cochin, Pune and Mumbai.

Favorite Sports To Watch:
World cup football.

One Nice Thing About The Person Who Sent This To You:
Joy is a real joy. Pun fully intended… :)

What's Under Your Bed?:
Secret. I refuse to tell you. ;) Now, are you dying of curiosity??:)

Would You Like To Be Born As Yourself Again?

It’s a nice life, mine… but a change wouldn’t be too bad an idea right?

Morning Person Or Night Owl?:
Night Owl. Becomes morning person if nocturnal pursuit (read super urgent daily deliverable deadline) spills over, which it usually does.

Over Easy Or Sunny Side Up?:
Over easy. Always. :)

Favorite Place To Relax:
Any place which involves a nice cozy bed, cool temperatures and timely yummy foodJ

Favorite Pie:
Apple pie.

Favorite Ice Cream Flavor:
Chocolate anything!

Of All The People You Tagged This To, Who's Most Likely To Respond First?
Nobody:). Coz I’m tagging everybody who’d like to take this up and nobody in particular!:)

Back with more... lay. ter. :)

Pop! Goes the weasel...

2008-04-15T23:49:00.009+05:30

There’s this feeling you know. It’s kinda like being bummed, but not quite. Because, its quite funny, specially and often solely, in retrospect. It’s like, umm, when you blow blow and blow a balloon in full unmitigated enthusiasm, and then when you're quite pleased in spite of your lungs gagging, it bursts in your face. **Pop! **

Sheesh!

The Choms (anything north of vindhyas) call it “chop”. Mumbaikars call it “popat”. Mallus patented the “chammal”. Does anyone know the English word? It’s not coming to me… oh well.

I should tell you that I regularly have this specific feeling. It’s my destiny. It’s the price I pay to be born to achieve all things great. Gah!

Like today. That starry Boy is down with the flu. As life would take its sweet revenges, he is temporarily stripped of his ability to use his taste buds. So much so that in the height of complete denial, he tried coating his tongue with nutella, only to discover it tasted like paste.

So, yours truly, a superwoman-sans-spandex, flies in to the rescue. Consults MIL and half-a-dozen aunts on the perfect recipe for chicken soup. Brews what could arguably be the most aromatic broth of the millennium, smirks at every imaginary druid who could possibly be competition and takes a spoonful. Pauses to dance in the beautiful harmony of chicken and onion and ginger and garlic married to the cloves and the cinnamon and the pepper. Ooh la la. Ze romance of ze spices! Oui. (** Hi-fis Remi and Gusteau**) (** Then presents the big dish**)

(**Starry boy gives long hopeful look. Dolefully attempts to sniff through hopelessly blocked nasal passages. Shrugs and spoons in a mouthful. Long pregnant pause. Blank doleful stare. Big woebegone, fever ridden eyes.**)

Says, “Dang, this still feels like hot water” ( **Pop! **)

When I die, someone remember to make me statue among those superheroes-who-tried-to-save-the-day. :)

So, pops apart, it’s been a busy fortnight. In fact, it’s been a godawfully busy fortnight. What with the travelling et al. Hats off to those of you with a travelling job. I went to Goa three times in two weeks for three days each. And it sucked kareyla-type-popsickles! Coz it didn’t feel any different from working in a claustrophobic 4 by 4 room in Sion, for what it’s worth. I live with the incredible shame of having stayed in a grande bay view room and not having had the time to even draw my curtains more than twice in 9 days!:)

Incidentally. Ms. Whine, Ms. Frown and Ms. Rant are right here with me. I did send my better conversational skills snorkeling though… So I’ll leave you here with some pictures I took between vetting documents.

And these below are from that gorgeous piece of untouched heaven in Majorda I came across during my field trip...

Goa!!:)

Lets go bang! bang! bang!

2008-03-26T18:01:00.003+05:30

It all started with a phone call. An overseas phone call. Made at a rather ungodly hour. To the Boy. A panel of people who were among the best, the crème-a-la-crème in their genre, made the Boy an offer he couldn’t refuse. And he just didn’t stop at not refusing. He had stars in his eyes and even jigged a lil boogey shake for his happily bemused spouse, a.k.a yours truly. So what did we do for an offer that couldn’t be refused?

We sat on a plane, only to find, within a few minutes from take off, all the tight bloused – tight skirted stewardesses suddenly disappear, and ~~then tolerate~~ hear a co-pilot who [very ashok-kumar-ly] wields his static-ky microphone like he is greatly chagrined ~~to be interrupted in a steamy, amorous moment~~ to have announce to us the distance to Bangalore and the estimated flight time followed by more baloney drowned in copious layers of this -
Captain: “Aaaah! We hope aaah! You aah! Enjoy your flight ohh to Bang-uh-lore with us... mmm”…

Now, I don’t get what’s with the accents these aviation chaps use in India. Not that I have a single intolerant bone in my body. I’m quite okay with the “oi-what-ijeets”, or “whelcum-to-spaice-jhet”, you know. But that guy, he was something else. ~~And of the insinuation he rendered to such unparliamentry things!~~ I don’t remember being this psyched out since I last saw a girl in a moving car bent down on a guy who was on the wheel… ram ram ram! (I take my family name). Or to quote that madisar-clad mami-paatti from Chennai – Aiyo! Aiyo! Aiyo!

The problem incidentally, is not with the act. It is with my un-tether-able imagination and the immense discomfort it leaves me. Sheesh! But I’m not gonna be like a bollywood producer and package and sell this post with tease-worthy and totally morally contrabrand images. So all this teasy- monkey business stops here. Dang!

So we get to Bangalore, that starry Boy and me. And we drive 24x7 for three consecutive days, house hunting, often with that godawfully sweet Prats in tow. And we bunch of compulsive habituated Bombayyites “experience” Bangalore.

For you non-Bangalore bloggers, let me tell you that Bangalore is a very interesting place. And also very intelligent, like a nano-technology washing machine. The Secretariat has its clone right beside it! Osama and gang’s gotta be super smart to do a 9/11 repeat on the right building. Interestingly, (my aunt enlightens me) the local secretariat works on the Balaji Temple model – you stand in a queue for hours, you drop a generous offering into the hundi (drop box) and then you offer your prayers. If your karma is good and/ or you’re plain lucky, your wish is granted. Else, blame it on your karma, forget your donation, and stand in the queue on your next visit to repeat process. Needless enough to say, there’s this huge monstrous caption displayed on the Secretariat that says something like “the Secretariat’s Work is God’s Work”. Gah!

I think I’ve rambled enough. Cut to the chase –

News Flash: Ziah and the starry Boy are moving to Bangalore, lock stock and barrel with effect end April. Yay!

P.S: No animals were harmed in the writing of this post*.

*Though there is a shocking mortality of Ziah’s sense of humour. That starry Boy contests its very existence, but there are always neigh-sayers. Please excuse. Lawyer in peak transaction. :)

Tick Tag Tick Tag Took - the Official Slice of Lime tour.

2008-03-14T16:46:00.006+05:30

Oscar Wilde said –

"Work is the refuge of people who have nothing better to do.”

And I couldn’t agree more. What with a closing coming up and another transaction wrapping up to hit the newspapers, and several painful late nights counting their days – only a matter of time before the wheel reinvents for transaction next. I guess you said it, Wilde boy.

So Joy tags me now. And its here! Faster than a speeding bullet. Is it a bird? A Plane? Superman? It is..... **drumroll** - The first ever official tour of the Slice of Lime. This is how it works.

Rules for the Tag: Post 5 links to 5 of your previously written posts. The posts have to relate to the 5key words given: family, friend, yourself, your love, anything you like. Tag 5 other friends to do this meme. Try to tag at least 2 new acquaintances (if not, your current blog buddies will do) so that you get to know them each a little bit better.

Family: I wish I had written about the Sicilians - the guns, the gals, the olive oil and the pasta. But I didnt! Dang!
I grew up in a nuclear family with mom and dad. Haven’t quite written much on the topic here either, Dang! I guess I did target all my energies in bitching. But I have definitely mentioned this world famous family trait.
Then there's this boy who sat with me for long hours through long years in several café coffee day outlets, and then one fine day overcome by infinite cluelessness, decided to share his life with me. So this is my family for you. More scoop on the boy here.:)

Friends: When Bright-Hoffmann-Crane reeled in the success of their nineties sitcom of the same name that outran ten goddamned seasons, they probably encashed on this one feeling that we all go to bed with often – So just what is life without our friends? Speaking of whom I have to link this woman , my soul mirror. Thank for being there. And these guys who opened my eyes to a whole big world of blogging [....] Does someone know how to link my blogroll here? :-)

One fine morning, there comes this one person, a friend who changed my life. Of all the things I wrote about us, this is one such specimen.

Yourself: I could go on and on and on about this. I adore myself. I spend light years in front of the mirror in self absorbed meditation. And I don’t miss a chance to check myself out, even in a reflection. And I have no end to thinking the randomest thoughts ever. This and this may remind you of just that.

Love: I love mornings when I don’t have to wake up to rush to work. I love coffee and conversations. I love the sea shore. I love to sing and to hear people sing. I love the aroma of freshly cooked food, the sea spray, dew drops or water on fresh grass. I love the rain. But most of all, I love to spin stories. So I link you all here the space dedicated to my tall tales!

Anything you Like: I think the quintessence of womanhood is our pure unadulterated right to rant and to bitch. So this , this, this and this is an ode to womanhood!

And now to pass the baton:
1. Supernova - its time you reflected on the state of your blog:P
2. Keshi - this should be fun!:)
3. Madhu - pick it up if you have the time no..:)
4. Stygian Sailor - would love to know what you've been upto at the Kafka:)
5. Guru - its showtime folks!:)

Thank you Joy for tagging me! This was a lot of fun. Though I’ve been blogging since Dec 2006, thanks to your tag, I took a consensus of just how badly I have abused this space. And thank you guys for being here with me. :)

The random Rant. My God.

2008-03-03T01:04:00.000+05:30

So I feel useful. Did I tell you about these Carnatic music classes I’ve enrolled in? Today was lesson no. 2 (the Saralivarisa, if you will) and there I was singing proud, amidst some random ten-year-olds holding the dubious dintinction of being my “seniors”. Quite cute I say. I likey.

Also gives me some very filmy santoor soap moments, that too in the acquired lingua franca, the exact way it played in DD4 a decade n a half ago. And how. There was this mom who comes to pick up her “senior” 10 year old, looks at me and goes in not-so-chaste Malayalam, evidently interspersed with copious quantities of Tamil –

“Ethu college ilaa?” (which college are you in?)

Yours truly blushes, smiles and goes errr… I’m a lawyer. And then my teacher starts fawning all over the fact that I’m also married. Oh well. And then comes that surprise from the mother-of-my-“senior”, and then, more fawning. Just like the aforementioned ad. Life and its overrated moments. Mein Gott!

It’s interesting how age is such a big deal for most people. Okay, so age is a biological clocker. And legally, age has its privileges/restrictions. But beyond that should it matter? What is our obsession with looking or feeling older/younger or even being or doing things that befit our age? That’s a rhetoric, by the way. And I don’t think I should soul search or get all preachy with my views on this subject. The last time someone applied their creativity to this concept, they made Amitabh Bachchan woo someone half his age, humour a precocious kid and ham really bad while at it and then that someone called it a sugar-free romance! Bah! So you toy with that thought… while I drift into thoughts of being ageless… like music. Like God.

My god! Speaking of which. They say the average vocabulary of an average adult is some 2000 words. But when you think of it, the most common phrase you hear when someone expresses fear, shock, surprise, agony, disbelief (yaya, the whole range)… is a permutation or variation of “My God!” or maybe a permutation or variation of a swear word. Now, when I come to think of it, this post could’ve targeted all those poor souls whose gamut of verbal expression range from A to B. It could have. Ho hum. I'm talking about the “My-god-Oh-shits-Oh-dude-oh-fuck” types, usually in their 20’s, never read much or never read at all coz there wasn’t an exam to be written to motivate reading a book (generally in life); they profess brand “assumed cool”, and, they’re playing their limited vocabulary at a cubicle near you. Gah! Low Life. Tsk Tsk.

But Mein Gott!!! It’s simply fascinating to observe each person trace their spiritual connection through their vocabulary or otherwise. Some, more than others. I should tell you about the time we were driving to a local hill station. Most of the mountains, or what was left after roads were paved, were disfigured by a bunch of possessed bigots who decided they were Jesus’ mouth peace. They spray-painted an entire stretch of mountains to say or perhaps more appropriately scream “Jesus is coming”/ “Jesus will save you from hell” etc etc. Speaking of whom, it’s really unfortunate that Jesus in his time chose to lead by example. We know J as that amazingly nice person who came into being, said a lot of nice things about how to live life, then loved humanity so much that he chose to get crucified so that humankind wouldn’t get damned. And humanity got so encouraged by someone else getting literally pinned up for their sins, so it’s all been downhill since then… And just what do we do in his memory.

Some idiots splay his name all over like merchandising… using brand J to sell their cheap ass ideas… and some other low-lifes look at that set of rocks splayed with the Jesus-claims, shrug and pee right underneath. So what happened next, you wonder. That very next week saw a landslide in that particular stretch.

I sincerely hope Jesus wouldn’t repeat his appearance again. I’d think he’s wasting his time. As for Vishnu, he had nine disappointments and probably learnt the hard way. Coz the word is that he’s threatened that when he loses it, he’ll come as Kalki and finish the job. Basically clean up the world with some hard core annihilation. And I guess we can use the time and figure out our lives and the possibly minimal scope it allows us for retribution.

What is this post about really, you wonder. There was something about some singing. And there was more randomness. And there was something about religion in life. This post is actually a one paragraph rant about what happens when you put the two together –

Pure cacophony! Mein Gott! I heard there was some legislation about decibal levels for speakers used in public places. But the Mumbai cops surely find their scope for retribution questionable. So they waive this rule for the old gujju hags by the neighbourhood temple during their weekly sat sungs. So there was this one sorry excuse for sat-sung where a buncha oldies wailed away like banshees last weekend. Shutting windows didn’t help. Blasting my music didn’t die it down. I swear, they made bela sehgal’s high pitched screech in jodha akbar sound like ecstacy. [Man Mohana, I’m sure you agree too, don’t you? I tried to help you, I really did. I even fried stale fish with my windows open hoping the foul flavours wafted to their hoarse croaky throats fattened by years of houseworking, gossipy malice and hate for the non-gujrati world. But it didn’t deter the banshee army, I know. But you know I tried. So when that chitragupt and yummy show you all the black stars in my chart, we’ll talk okay. You n me. Your lil crusader at the slice of lime.]

Which brings you to wonder, why did you just be privy to that? That randomest rant. Its because I’m God’s little crusader. And possibly we all can voice our views to save the world from itself and yes, there’s retribution to think of too, right?

Stay tuned to this space… Will be back… as always.

[No religious sentiments were intended to be harmed in the writing of this post. What happens after this post is written is the call of the reader. Now you can’t technically sue me, coz it’s a free country. Ho hum.]

Me, the Monkey and Feb 14th

2008-02-14T18:35:00.002+05:30

Sometimes, the mind is but a monkey – fickle and unrelenting to everything it sees and hears, until it has sufficiently toyed with it and tossed it away. So this is what transpired this morning, within the confidential enclave of my head as I rode merrily to the station in an auto rickshaw -

Sai:	Lovely morning, aint it?
Monkey:	Yup. We’re taking in our daily dose of cold air, stench, filth, squalor, crowds and indifference. Lovely morning indeed.
Sai:	C’mon! Its Feb-the-14^th. Look at the florists – the flowers, the chocolates, the stuffed bears!
Monkey:	Look at the ditches and the overflowing garbage nearby.
Sai:	(Rolls imaginary eyes, makes an imaginary face!)
Monkey:	Alright, look. The squalor is nervously garnished with festivity by roadside merchants. It’s like what a self-conscious hostess would to impress her friends on a tea-party at her place. So the city basically screams with flowers, chocolate and candy. But this is for the misguided souls who go and buy symbols to toast to romantic love.
Sai:	You’re such a cynic Monkey!
Monkey:	And I live inside the romantic fool called you. So, any guesses who keeps you in check? (Smirks)
Sai:	Flibbertigibbet. You know I can shut you off, right Smart Alec?
Monkey:	Uh… umm… Hey Zee, you don’t buy this Valentine Jazz, do you?
Sai:	You know Monkey, I haven’t thought about that, yet. But I like presents.
Monkey:	Sheesh! You’re such a loser.
Sai:	Aww shuddup. Nothing wrong in self pampering, okay. You’re a woman’s mind. A proper self-respecting, femina-cosmopolitan-mary-claire-reading woman’s mind. Haven’t you been influenced by any of the crap I read? Besides, how often do men feel morally obliged and fleece themselves to fall all over you? You have to reciprocate…well… but then again… it’s nice, no?
Monkey:	S, come off it. Don’t wade into the herd. Can you subscribe to a value system without completely doing an acid test to see if the system is worth your subjugation?
Sai:	Whoa! Monkey, you do make these intellectual, profound statements you know…
Monkey:	And you hog the credit when you cite them and sound cool. Where do you think you flaunt your vocab from??? And not to forget, you’re verbose blogs! (Smirks)
Sai:	Now now Monkey. Remember I can shut you off? Besides… You know you don’t have an identity outside of me, right? (smirks). Anyway, get on with the programme dudette… so we’re bashing up the myth of a bunch of dead saints?
Monkey:	Yup, we are

So this morning Sai asked the gang of aunties in the 9.56 local what they thought Valentine’s Day was really about. This is what came out of it:

Take 1:

Sai:	So why do you think you celebrate Valentine’s Day?
Aunty 1:	Arrey! Atleast I can bully my kanjoos husband to buy me a saree ya!

Take 2:

Sai:	So why do you think you celebrate Valentine’s Day?
Aunty 2:	Celebrate? I celebrate. He doesn’t. That heartless man. Can you imagine we’ve spent 30 years together! And he hasn’t bought me any flowers… apart from cauliflower of course. Sigh! Atleast he does that…. (looks away, upset).

Take 3:

Sai:	So why do you think you celebrate Valentine’s Day?
Aunty 3:	Because its fun! (looks at Sai and goes D-U-H!)

Take 4:

Sai:	So why do you think you celebrate Valentine’s Day?
Aunty 4:	Coz it’s a day to celebrate love.
Sai:	But don’t you have anniversaries for that?
Aunty 4:	Ya… but what wrong with Valentine’s day? Everybody celebrates Valentine’s Day no?
Sai:	I’ve wondered why. Do you know why?
Aunty 4:	Oh! There’s this myth about some dead saint no who got all burnt up coz he helped couples who were in love no?
Sai:	That’s interesting. Can you tell me more?
Aunty 4:	Uhm. I dunno…

After several of such vague takes, the Monkey got very agitated. It is just not the sort of thing that rests or lets Sai be until it gets to the bottom of something. So the Monkey kept pestering. So, I finally relented and showed the Monkey Wikipedia and a couple of such sites. This is what we discovered:

A Christian martyr was generally referred to as a Valentine. Originally there were 11 Valentine’s Days identified to commemorate the martyrdom. Incidentally, none of them had anything to do with romantic love.

When King Richard II of England was engaged to Ann of Bohemia, Geoffrey Chaucer of Canterbury Tales fame wrote the Parliament of Foules (circa 1380) featuring a St.Valentine, who was a patron for the marriage in the poem. The famous lines are:

“For this was on Seynt Valentynes day,
Whan every foul cometh theere to chese his make [mate]…”

So now it turns out that Geoffrey Chaucer architected the Valentine’s Day imagery. The birds (and the bees?) mate in spring on Valentine’s Day. Sheesh! And I bought it! And well, this is only next in line to my heartbreak when I learnt Coca Cola created Santa Claus donkey’s years ago. [Remember that friendly fat guy from the North Pole with red-and-white clothes???] The bright side is that Coke has nothing to do with mistletoe kissing…

Sigh! The world is a lot duller without those rose tinted glasses. And thanks to the Monkey, I feel incredibly stupid to have hoped for red roses and sinful chocolate and believing in non-existent saints through my Bills and Moons years! :) (P.S: I shut her out, just in case she does the told-you-so war dance)

So I’m gonna have some chocolate cake to cheer Sai & the Monkey up. Wanna join me?

A touching tag! Then some blessings.

2008-02-06T17:37:00.000+05:30

Read TA's post on this, and you'll know what I mean.... So anyways...

Sometimes, the most amazing gift a person can give you is a heart felt Blessing. Considering the one’s I’ve been receiving all of last week were tepid automated etiquette responses from sundry colleagues to my incessant sneezing... you can gauge my plight.:) Lately, I’m beginning to think Pink’s track – “I’m a hazard to myself” is becoming a Ziah anthem. 18-hour work days didn’t help. Nor did the flu or the PMS. But, just when I felt that most of my guardian angels were on a chai-break to eternity, Angel TA waved her wand and brought some respite :)

So here I am, the holder of the wand, passing some good will to everybody who's reading this..:)

God bless you, guys!:)

Pyaar ke Side Fx!:)

2008-01-24T17:11:00.000+05:30

I will not fight with my husband.

This was not my New Year resolution. Atleast not as on 1^st January 2008. This is my conclusion, arrived at with great prudence after undertaking the most futile exercises in the art of domestic warfare. It doesn’t work. It just doesn’t.

Vivek -1
Ziah - 0

And how can it? Look at it analytically. We women are intelligent creatures of great complexity with the ability to process and articulate our emotions. Men, on the other hand are basic creatures with basic necessities, namely food, television or pc gaming and the thought of the ability to think about women. Hardly a clash of equals?

Ziah - 1
Vivek – 1

So last night, I wanted tandoori chicken, no, I had this insane, out of the ordinary craving for tandoori chicken. He asked me if we could take a rain check and eat at home coz it was a week day and he didn’t feel upto stepping out in the cold. (Yes, Bombay is biting cold at night these days!). So Ziah was ‘ditched’ by lazy bones.

Ziah - 2
Vivek – 1

Now PMS has a reputation to piss women off. And my case is no different. And my three 18 hour-day weeks to add to the aforesaid agony only ensured my craving for tandoori chicken only got more intense and got me more belligerent. So I took a deep breath and resorted to emotionally blackmail him about how I fry him cutlets even when I’m tired and when its cold and after a loooooong day at work.

Ziah - 3
Vivek – 1

Then he, the smartpants goaded and goaded me on the liberated independent woman that I was and about how I should not let anything get in the way of what I wanted, so I should just pick up my coat and step down to get some erm.. tandoori chicken.

Vivek – 2
Ziah – 3

I was so cheesed off, and I somehow didn’t have a better argument, so I actually just did that. But when I stepped down, I realized the neighborhood ATM of my bank was shut. The mall nearby didn’t accept plastic money. And all you self respecting, occasionally crabby women will understand how I couldn’t use the option of going home and mooching his wallet, what with my “independence”. So I sat on the swing in the Park below and grimly rocked myself back n forth while fuelling a back-up scheme like a human dynamo.

Ziah – 3
Vivek – 2

Now, I recently changed my phone handset, so all numbers of common friends who lived in the neighbourhood were with Vivek, safely tucked away in his phone. 20 minutes later, I was still hungry, cold, crabby, proud, idea-less and there was no goddamn sign of tandoori chicken! My admiration for the saas-bahu serials vamps and their ability to pull off scams has only grown manifold. So I rocked and rocked and rocked the creaky swing.

Vivek – 3
Ziah – 3

With some fifty bucks and three plastic cards in my wallet, I walked to the nearest store, bought myself some appams and a whole slab of chocolate and walked back home cold and depressed. Then, I spotted an SBI ATM. It just struck me that I had two free transactions in an SBI ATM every month. (I have never tried this option before, given my lack of time and technical inclination. Actually, its a miracle I use my own ATM right!) I went up to the ATM. This place was far more complicated than my ATM. You had to swipe your card to enter the damn room and remove your card after you swipe it from the machine (which I figured after much struggle and almost losing my card to the damn teller machine!). (I missed Vivek who kinda has this amazing ability to figure out all the gizmos)

Vivek – 4
Ziah – 3

After pressing all sorts of buttons and confusing the teller machine, I finally found my wads of cash spewing out. Bravo! Did that feel good? So gloating, I tried to exit the damn room, but the bloody door wouldn’t open. There was no slot to put your card and escape. I was trapped! And there was no goddamned guard outside. I didn’t call Vivek. Atleast not so soon. It was just a few months ago that he rescued me all locked up in a toilet in a suburban restaurant! And I am “independent”. I tried to look around..

Ziah – 4
Vivek – 4

I spotted a switch that looked like a doorbell. I thought that might alert some guard or someone. So I rang the bell. And lo and behold! The stupid door actually unlocked itself! Hail Ziah. I stepped out relieved that I didn’t have to be a D-I-D and create a scene.

Ziah – 5
Vivek – 4

Tandoori chicken, I thought, here I come! Then I looked at my watch. It was 10.30! Most food counters at the mall would’ve actually shut down by the time I’d reach. I sulked my walk up home. I sulked even more as I unlocked the door. And there sat Vivek, all warm and snucked up in the couch trying to start up a movie. I sullenly landed beside him, literally pouting. He made space for me to snuggle up to him.

Vivek – 3-4-5-6-7-8-9….400!
Ziah – 5

We watched the cartoon series of “Spawn” all huddled up… he paused the movie while I served myself some appams and roti bhaji… and we spawned some evening entertainment happily ever after.

Pyaar Ke Side Effects?

Moral of the story: Always fight an equal. Not a lesser mortal….. Sigh!

Happy New Year

2008-01-07T16:33:00.000+05:30

Prats and Joy tagged me... again! :) This was a really interesting mime. I felt like the Indian government penning ambitious, well-meaning, seeming realistic ten year plans!:)

When I sat down to pen this, there was sooooo much to do in the next decade that zeroing them down to the top ten was kinda painful. Afterall, being in your early twentites is being in the lower rungs of the food pyramid. So the steps to climb in a decade are one too many! :) But I've tried. here comes... Spilling my dill..

Get a raise: The supermarket looks like Temptation Island! There are those pairs of Nine Wests and Jimmy Choos that say “Oh Ziah! Take me home! pleaaaase”… sigh! But I, the cold-hearted, tight-pursed, cruel woman, looks away like they don’t exist! Bah! And then there the PS3 and the W960i that I’m eyeing... Well... Everybody wants a raise. What’s the point of a job otherwise? I completely go by Adnan Sami’s philosophy… thodi si to lift karade..:)

Pick up a foreign degree. The way these American and British Law Schools conduct their master’s programme is fabulous. Pure intellectual indulgence. I went to a law school in Pune, supposedly one of India’s best, where I had to listen to a few lectures, read a dozen books, then cram my answers basis the last 10 years question papers. Evidently, examiners didn’t have time for creativity or innovation. Right now, as a working lawyer, I feel like I’m trying to flirt with the law, but am stuck in a loveless “marriage” with a fantastic person, lady law. (Of course, my loving hubby is the saving grace!) So I guess, I do want to go and discover ze loves… ;) And, Starbucks and Steak. ~~And European men are quite charming.. even in America… :)~~ That year I’ll forgo a raise :)

Write, write and write. Not just my contracts, but stories and thoughts and dreams. A creative outlet is very necessary for a twisted woman like me. You know, the number of crazy thoughts in my head is just multiplying with the seconds… So now, I am a woman on a mission! :) What are the aunty mafia upto? Just whose gonna take over the world? What’s fugly and what’s plain ugly? Stay tuned to yours truly…:) And sigh! I intend to finish Muffet Diaries super soon. I hope to finish Muffet Diaries surely in the next decade... :) and yes, I’d like to get a raise.

I’d like to meddle a bit with pop culture. Really. I love the off shoot music… y’know hip hop n all. And I genuinely like western rockstars. [Atleast they don’t sing a wrecked version of the gayatri mantra in a nasal voice sounding like a modulated shout and then make puppy eyes trying to advocate so-called Indian culture. Bleargh!] But that being said, Papa Roach is not a name. Nor is Kilo. Nor is Mile. Nor is Akon… Axl Rose is surely not a (guy’s) name. Guys… John Mayer and James Blunt are perfectly nice names. Thank you. And oh, did I mention I wanted a raise?

I think I’d do with a raise. And. I’d like to convince Himesh to get a nose operation done. Really guys, someone so gifted to compose such foot-stepping numbers and be the anthem composer of millions of unfortunate Indians should atleast be able to sing the compositions. Really. That stumpy chimp-looking thing completely breaks my heart. Tsk Tsk.

I’d love to read Hindu and Greek mythology. And I’d love to devour world history. Where we come from is so truly fascinating. And I’d like to make peace with God and understand him. But before that, I’d want to make peace with myself. Far fetched, but worth the try. And in the meanwhile, I’d appreciate a significant raise? :)

I’d love to haul that Vivek and bag pack every year – kullad tea in our Himalayan dharamshalas, mint tea in Morrocco, sheesh kabob in Istanbul, Gondola rides in Venice, Caviar in Paris atop that new restaurant in Eiffel Towers, warm scones in a London café, watch Vivek get all drunk and pissed on Australian Beer (you know, he’s quite cute when he’s tipsy!)… ooh la la. Ze life, it is! And, at some point, I’d love to anchor a travelogue… sigh! So I also want a fatter raise and lots of money in damages and compensation from those really sick people who steal Vivek's artwork. Shame Shame!

I’d like to perfect the art of being Superwoman. Super Associate. Super wife. Super daughter. Super woman. It’s a nice thought. Specially since all my multitasking leaves at least someone frowning. :( And usually it’s Vivek or my boss or my mom. If I reach work on time without my hair looking like the stray dogs mauled me, and I actually leave relevant legal observations on a report, I forget to spell check or format it. If I manage the report flaw-free, I almost reach a movie 10 seconds before its starts and Vivek is done holding his patience, his hunger and his heart! If I manage the report and the dinner-movie as scheduled, dodging and panting by the local train and the mall escalator… I am sure to have forgotten to return my mother’s frantic missed calls! Whew! Sometimes I think I can actually see Chitragupta tsk-tsk-ing at me and drawing black stars on a chart for Yummy. Gah! And when I miraculously don’t manage my daily frown quota, I’m so sapped that I feel like I could whine all night like a sick puppy. Getting the balancing act together with perfect lipstick and mascara is a Herculean Task. Does someone know the Superwoman formula?

Yeah, I could use another stupenduous raise.

By now I should be close to the finish line of this game plan sketch no? Being somewhere in my early thirties, somewhere in 2017, 2018… I hope to see the light in the end of the tunnel. Wow, that sounds so profound no? I merely mean that I hope to finish what I have started in my legal career with these M&Aing corporates and move to a less stressful, less consuming job. Or atleast float something of my own where creativity is an option. I hope to be able to gently transcend into a start of what I’d really like to do with my life – start spending time with underprivileged and challenged children, and write fulltime, perhaps a book. I hoped to have figured out where would we settle. Maybe, if Vivek is ready, I’d love to adopt a girl child and two little puppies. And I’d like to finish a course in baking and gourmet much later. Sometime… :)

Happy New Year People! :)

Somebody save me... :)

2007-12-12T18:08:00.000+05:30

I woke up this morning and finally decided that I’m seriously out of subject. Of course there are these train aunties in the 7.15 Borivli fast straight out of that hideous Aastha channel, who do pranayama while standing. But I have no proof yet that these are disguised yogis who plan to take over the world by taking over Bombay. Oh, well.

It’s that Christmas time of the year! And it looks like imagination and initiative are the only two things that can take a vacation without really worrying about office leave, cheap flights, full flights, visas, flu shots blah-blah. My imagination is in fact a runaway delinquent that oh-so-often deserts me when I’m at work. And I horribly confess to have spent a god-awful lot of time lately fantasizing (not the way you think, you dirty minds, you!) about He-Man from the 2002 cartoon and his newbie greyskull sword and the sexy new battle cat, what with the goddawful screen writers’ guild on strike and Smallville being off air! Harrumph!

Now I’m terribly fascinated with Superheroes. In fact, my superhero fascination is an infection that I contracted sharing living space with the husband, because of the likes of whom Mattel is a multimillion dollar multinational toy corp. There’s something about a superhero. He’s strong, his histrionics are mind numbing and in the end he always saves the world from aliens or mutants or weird psychos with freaky powers and super-dark power-laced earth-take-over schemes. So it doesn’t matter if Mr. Superhero destroys all the buildings and regional infrastructure that comes from our taxes. What matters is that he keeps assuaged our deepest darkest fears of being taken over by another race and either killed by them or worse, enslaved. Cook the stench of fear laced with a flavour of peril, and voila! Discover the Hollywood writer’s oldest most successful concoction – the superhero story. I often wonder, do we as a race deep down feel the need to be saved?

Screenwriters and songwriters surely think so. In fact the first time I heard smallville’s title track go…. “Somebody saaaaaaave me…” I thought that was clever disguise for some SOS message. Then the scriptwriters went on strike. Oh well. It all fell into perspective.

But now with my tele-entertainment being seriously compromised, I have taken from being plain fascinated to being strongly interested in chimps! [Not you, Sirpy!] Sometime back, National Geographic reported a race of apes to have taken to the sticks to hunt and eat smaller species. It seemed like a rather alarming but fascinating never-the-less, evolutionary trend. I don’t know what propelled scientists initially when they started pitching a bunch of chimps against a bunch of adults for a memory test in Arabic numerals. But boy! Did I have alarm bells in my head when a baby chimp beat a whole dozen adults hands down in the test! Sometimes, little events like this maybe inconsequential. Sometimes, I have to agree with the husband that little events like this may have the potential to alter the future. After all, our track record is worthy of analogy here. We started off living in caves, hunting, then we made the wheel and lit fire… then of course we ruined this planet.

Pushing the thought though, a bunch of clever chimps showing future alteration potential… that kinda disappointed me. I mean I would’ve loved to believe Douglas Adams that the world was actually secretly dominated by rats. But on second thoughts, the “most powerful nation in the world” is presently ruled by some Bush-men, no? So... simian rule... chimps... well, yeah, bring it on.

I still wonder…. Do we need to be saved?

You know, I’ve been having this crazy thought since I read about the chimps evolving. I have the apocalypse all figured out. How about chimps evolving as a major warring race seeking world domination? Okay, it’s the superhero serial buff talking. ~~Shut up. Shut up.~~ Hmmm… okay, how about chimps evolving with the potential to match human abilities. How about one more bush man in the oval office, you know, another power crazy megalomaniac. Hmmm… I put two and two together, I see Big Brother running to wipe out chimps, going far enough to reach for the nukes…. Ka boom!

Maybe, we need to be saved.

Phir Tagged!

2007-11-21T16:41:00.000+05:30

Allow me to thank everyone of you – specially Tys, Prats, Suma, Joy, CU… for looking out for me. Last few weeks have had me caught in a myriad of M&A transactions resulting in longer hours at work, bad health, several outstation trips and a very painful house maid!! So I’ve been doing the veritable work-life balance acrobatics and have grudgingly been denied time on blogland. Another piss-off is the new policy at work disallowing signing in to blogger thru a gmail account. Read Blogs, don’t write blogs. (Why!) There ain’t no real rationale behind this policy. But its kinda turned me into a cyber ghost [I can read you, but you can’t read me! Woo-hoo]. Grrrr…

However. It’s amazing to know you have friends out there wondering what you’re upto and just where you’ve been. It makes life a little more worthwhile.. so thank you guys. Hugs to you all…

Incidentally, Joy decided to take immense joy in tagging me. The deal is that I need to list seven things about me that’s “weird”. Now I always thought “Weird” meant oddball or deviant in a nice, benign sort of way. Until I went to dictionary.com. Here’s what I found:

weird /wɪərd/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[weerd] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation adjective, -er, -est, noun

–adjective

1.	involving or suggesting the supernatural; unearthly or uncanny: a weird sound; weird lights.

2.	fantastic; bizarre: a weird getup.

3.	Archaic. concerned with or controlling fate or destiny.

–noun Chiefly Scot.

4.	fate; destiny.

5.	fate (def. 6).

[Origin: bef. 900; (n.) ME (northern form of wird), OE wyrd; akin to worth²; (adj.) ME, orig. attributive n. in phrase werde sisters the Fates (popularized as appellation of the witches in Macbeth)]

It’s a little disappointing to me now. Like now, technically, superman is weird? Ohhh-kay. And God Almighty, of all the zillion words in the English dictionary, should be zeroed down to be, umm, weird? Now I think the word “weird” is weird. Seriously. What is it with the originators of the English language? I guess they got too busy tightening their bustiers and stiffening their upper lips that they didn’t have time to iron out such inadequacies. Sigh! Weird I say.

First, the Rules of the tag:

Link to the person that tagged you, and post the rules on your blog.
Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself.
Tag 7 random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs.
Let each person know that they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

So anyway, I now openeth my Pandora’s Box of weirdness to unleash it upon you all. I hope not to scare you guys away.

I have big gigantusaur feet

I wear a size 42. Most stores have their annoying managers pasting a fake smile letting me know they don’t really make my size. Some of them have even tsk-ed in complete sympathy of my big-foot disease. I guess I spent a good part of college and high school wearing unisex/ male footwear. That’s one of the reasons I didn’t turn up at my college fresher’s day (the prom equivalent). [P.S: The main reason remained non-permission from patriarch.] Sneakers and floats it was. Until Charles and Keith happened…

I am a compulsive labeler

When hubby and I recollect that episode of Friends where Monica categories and alphabetically arranges Chandler’s ideas, I normally go crimson and there’s a voice in my head that goes (“Guilty. Guilty”.) I even list and organize the proposed contents of a work email that I have to send out to a client. Hubby calls me OCD.

I love alliteration

You must’ve seen it in Muffet. And for the record, I love Captain Haddock coz he says Blistering Barnacles and Thundering Typhoons! :)

I’m a movie whore

I am. I am. I can watch a sequence filmed on Fidel Castro’s left toe nail, if and only if its called a movie. I can watch it in zulu, as long as its called a movie. And yes, I watched Himesh!:)

I switch on lights in the day

In my loo. It doesn’t matter if warm sunlight floods into the room through the blinds and the ventilator. If I’m in the loo, my loo-lights have to be switched on.

Dejavu

I experience this quite often. And premonition. I can anticipate something bad going to happen usually a couple of hours before the event itself. For e.g. the local train bombings last year. Or more minor things like my boss’ bad mood. I just know it. All the time. And I’m unsure yet, all the time.

Chronic cravings for maggi

I have those oh-so-often. I don’t know what’s in a bowl of maggi that makes me want it like a long-lost lover, or a forced celibate looking at a playboy hottie… Someday I should just take over Nestle foods or something.

Now this is the part where I spread the tag virus to seven other people. I love the prospect of being contagious. Someday I’ll come up with something awesome to spread. Right now, I guess I’ll stick with this tag… it’s a great way of getting to know you guys better! :)

Dr. Pancreas – what goes around, comes around. C'mon gal, out with it!
CU - Wanna know what you'll come up with for us..:)
Chimp - Quite curious of the outcome
Super Noah - My lovely wild hottie, go out n splurge your weird side:)
Dabz - Glass Gaon peoples, pliss come out of closet..:)
Kavitha - Passing thoughts on your wild side babes..:)
Ashok and Aishwarya - I want you both to give it a shot!

Tag her!

2007-11-13T15:01:00.000+05:30

Happy Belated Diwali Peoples!! Hope each one of you had a glaring festival of lights. *Loudly blows nose*. I have been alternating between the tissue and my case files the whole of the last fortnight and I deeply suspect the snot has percolated all the way up to my brain. *Loudly blows nose again*….

AP must’ve been in a really vindictive mood when she decided to tag me. This post hence rumbleth….

People I’d like to execute:

Himess Ressammiya – I’ve been putting up with his annoying nasal numbers coated with his terrible hindi diction blared in every mode of public aural aggression (read rickshaws, cabs, ganpati audio posts, festival processions, dandiya raas… egh!). It hadn’t crossed my mind to pick up a hacksaw and chop him to pieces until last Wednesday… I was quarantined from work, what with all my snot and drool and fever… Sitting at home, a movie seemed the nicest kind of distraction to my sick soul. The trouble was I had to pick a movie that hubby and I didn’t wanna watch together. Found my eyes on Aap ka surroor… decided to find out what was all the hype and mass hysteria about. Here’s what I discovered.

The film opens (with his arrest) and him shouting to the viewer – “It’s a mistake!”… I should’ve taken the cue. The plot looks like a it’s been ripped off an abbas-mustan flick and scripted by a rickshawallah. Hansika Motwani cant stop alternating between crying or smiling like she’s trying to overcome some great pain (I don’t blame her, her co-star kinda induces that effect on me!). Mallika and Himesh meanwhile compete desperately with the rest of the star-cast to prove they can’t act to save their nuts. Beat this. What happens when Himesh wants to prove to the ones around him that he’s right and virtuous? He makes puppy eyes!! And yes, please please listen to him coo the gayatri mantra and “dard-e-dil” on his guitar, just for me, please? And the part when he says “I love you” with such pain to that 16 something fat-kid-heroine indicating a stick stuck in his ass. Uff! Priceless! And the part when 3 rickshawallahs appear from no where in Germany to save him from the cops! And when you’re done, you’re welcome to join me lynch that ugly thing gazing aimlessly wearing a football cap and smiling the most constipated smile one can imagine. That maniac has signed on 2 more movies!!!

Kitty Party Aunties – These varieties are a threat to sanity. MIL took me to one Kitty Party on Diwali evening. Proud MIL showing off trophy bahu (or so I’d like to believe) to neighbourhood aunty samaj. Aunties, I have observed in my two-decade-plus life span, come in “kitty party types” and “sat-sung-types”; MIL being the latter type, which is the nicer variety. Anyways, in we sat amidst fat, gossipy horrible women greedily stuffing down copious quantity of food and drink while maligning everything and everybody around them, and occasionally flashing their missing pearlies or guffawing like a hyena. Oh man, these women are one stop whine shops, so full of celebrity gossip. MIL, what does a nice woman like you see in these malicious blondes who live off their hubby and kids?? Some people have too much time in life ya. And when I see such craptacular wastes of time, my hand kinda looks for a mallet.

People I’d like to award the AP nobel to:

Everyone who survives my gyaan and still goes for more – this provision is self explanatory. Go figure!
Everyone who watched Aap ka Suroor, who is not a rickshawallah and who didn’t like it – Dudes and dudettes, you deserve a bravery award, or atleast an AP Nobel. Only I understand the great fortitude with which you must’ve battled for your life when that wicked man sang the gayatri and old classic numbers or when he made puppy eyes, and worse, when he smiled! You rock guys!!
People who drive in Mumbai roads – hats off! You either are aces in adventure sports or you have too much patience to do 10 km over 4 hours daily maneuvering through every crevice, loud honking, curses, dirt, crap, buffaloes et al!!

Here’s a treat from my super talented hubby for every one of you who survived me...

Om Peace Om.

Of foot and mouths??

2007-11-01T00:24:00.000+05:30

Faux Pas. I just love that word. Only, when it happens, I don’t go blushing away to a bloody-mary crimson. Possibly because brown skinned people don’t blush. Possibly because with me, clumsy things happen a time too many. If you ask my husband, he’ll just jump at possibility no. 2. However, since this post is not about his opinion on me (thankfully), you are the designated fortunate bunch that is spared fatal exposure to our domestic differences.

Faux Pas. I first chanced upon this word in its full impact when I was at the age when my pheromones should’ve ideally raged (that’s around 16-17 for you)… And the first time my professor wrote down that word on the black-board, I imagined this foxy little thing, with full lips, full hips and a mole on her chin making a foxy pass at someone...

…and then professor said, “foh-pah”. Gah! I should’ve known better. After all these lower life forms that made the English language ended up restricting syllables so much that you can seldom pronounce the way your write. Specially, if you’re writing French! [Case-in-point is deja-vu [de-zhah-voo] and monsieur [mo-see-eh??]. See? So I have long ago given up on expecting from a pack of stiff-upper-lipped wig-and-flouncy-frock-wearing folk that went around colonizing the world like a pack of pissed off bees leaving among other things ham (yum!) and their language (oh well..) behind.] I realize I’m digressing... Bah!

The freaky thing is that this word is sitting smug in my head for a while now and I have been privy to some serious serial faux-passing ever since. And how!

Scene: Inside a Toyota innova after a business lunch meeting with (French) client. A couple of wines down, both lawyers and clients are slightly, umm, happy. Alcohol unfortunately, does not have the same effect on everyone. Client instantly bursts into incessant rambling in a mixture of French and English on vague thing that seems to be fascinating him a great deal. The Partner (who’s our boss) tries real hard to focus, but its not happening. Asks the equally slow senior associate in shuddh hindi what in the dickens is that French boy saying. Senorita Associate, too slow to realize lingua franca, replies in perfect sing-song English, “I don’t know what he’s saying only. I stopped listening to his crap five minutes ago!” Embarrassed Partner repeats query twice desperately hoping to get a rectification from Associate. Our senorita, slightly irritated, articulates her original reply, loud and clear, both times! (We still deal with the client, don’t ask me how!)

Picture this: My mom, all clad in her kanjeevaram, walks into my Amreeka cousin’s pompous NRI wedding. He’s hob-nobbing with his prospective pentagenarian MIL. Mom walks right up and says, “so this is your new wife my boy? Congratulations to the two of you!” I must’ve checked that aunty’s snap like a million times to corroborate my mother’s observations. Erm….

And this: someone else in my immediate family turned out just as competitive as mom in Dept. Faux Pas. And how. Brother-in-law misplaced cell phone in a taxi. Husband had mentally noted the license plate numbers as a precautionary measure. So the information came in handy and cell phone was retrieved. It didn’t stop at that. The proud family member, so exuding the joy of his presence of mind, announced to an audience (of near and extended family) the tale of his bravado and the finale sounded something like this; “… imagine what could we have done without the license plate number? This is what we call sense of humour”. Sure!

Picture husband and my darling friend Mr. A, Amreeka-return, strategy consultant in a top-of-the-line American telecom company, in a game of taboo with us. A is playing in husband’s team. Husband is getting him to guess the term “Elle Mc. Pherson”. So husband asks him what the letter is before ‘M’. Strategy consultant says oh, I gottit, ‘N’! My husband, irritated, says “stupid phirang! Before ‘M’ not after ‘M’.” Strategy consultant says, “oh ya, I know this… ‘O’!” Uh-oh.

It’s just not me to not catch on a trend. So, it turned out to be one of the rare days that I entered a non-trafficked local and found a place to perch. Soon thereafter, a lady with a nice round belly entered and stood near me. Me being me, completely melted at the thought of one person having to stand for two people. Promptly, I stood up and offered her my seat. She kept insisting that I didn’t have to. I finally told her with her condition she really should be thinking of herself and not of random philanthropists. Surprised, she asked me, “My condition?”. A little taken aback myself, I asked “Aren’t you in the family way?” She turned all crimson and said “uhm, lets just say I’m plain fat”. Long pregnant pause. I’m sure both of us wished the ground gave away and we could exit the moment in true Sita style.

There were way more occurrences just in the last weekend. For instance with my kid brother, all of 21 who hardly listens to his kid girlfriend (already) had a panic attack when he remembered she was talking about something all week he thought was a “Karvrath”. When he asked for some insight on Karvraths, M, wife of strategy consultant, enlightened him on Karva chouth and he went undercover almost. Then he discovered it was a Cravat she was looking for after all and found himself in hot water as he forgot that he had in fact actually called a couple of stores with her to make enquiries. I’m sorry, I don’t know what he was thinking, but we’re family.

(P.S: And my husband loves my brother. He called him Seinfeld Live, you know why now.)

The list of feet in various mouths is endless… and I would’ve gone on and on… but I won’t. I’m not as considerate about your feelings here as much as I’m bored outta my brains typing. So. Get the picture?

I have finally arrived at the conclusion that I am some kind of a carrier for a very wide-spread foot-in-the-mouth-disease that people also call a faux pas. Should you have prolonged exposure to me, you might just catch it!

The meteor freak.

2007-10-20T15:49:00.001+05:30

Reality bites. Like a rabid dog. A sting operation carried out very very recently and its outcome that was instantly silenced, had stumbled upon a dirty secret that transactional lawyers, briefly after their induction, were injected with a disconnection serum sourced from Lexigon, a planet in a parallel universe, so that somewhere down all the mergers and acquisitions and all the sparks elsewhere in their personal life, they are rendered autopilot efficiency to structure Page-1 deals. Interestingly, Page-1 is the front page of a particularly geeky publication written in an alien language. It’s called the ET. Another side effect of this serum I think is that when you look deep down, you can’t quite see your soul. So you have nothing to lose really. And this makes transactional lawyers formidable soldiers. Transactional Lawyers, or Tee Ells, are (the only clan) qualified to fight for Justice (who these days incidentally happens of be Captain Power's new bitch). And Tee Ells are injected to have no souls. See?

In life, like in every potentially available sexy man, there has to be a butt. And a but. The butt and the but in this clan of formidable soldiers was a soldier level 2, Ziah. Our lady interestingly developed a resistance to the disconnection serum when bombarded by a meteor from Crater Creativity in Planet Blog. A result of this unfortunate accident was that our lady would, often in the middle of work, briefly think of her other world called “home” that she shared with super sculptor Hellsangel, a world that she was supposed to be immune to during transactions. This serum resistance also pushed our lady to connect through bits and bytes to Planet Blog. Another side effect rendered our lady to not be able to wipe clean from her consciousness while her colleagues lived in amnesia, of the ride in limbo in a gigantic metal case that connected their two worlds, a ride called “local train”. And it all started twelve months ago…

(*Huge flash of bright light*) (*Scene fades in black and white*) And now playing, at a monitor before you, Flashback mutant Ziah!

Twelve months ago. 9.00 am. Platform no. 5. Goregaon Station…

A battered metal case pulls into the platform. A dozen of fat saree clad aunties swagger their huge hips and heave themselves forcibly and with great difficulty given their ample proportions, through the division bar that separates the entrance of the compartment, and rush in with assumed violence to grab seats. Within 10 seconds all the seats and the atmosphere are occupied by raucous loud saree-clad tetra and pentagenarians. The younger lot is now allowed to enter the compartment. The one odd ignoramus youngster who competitively entered with the oldies and claimed a seat gets angry glowers and unfriendly squeezes by her older neighbors, and then is literally pushed out of her seat. On protest, one particularly loud aunty, wearing a louder bindi and a nasal voice and a tacky saree, cheered on by her aides who were for some odd reason making their cheap thrills obvious, lectures the youngster on how-she-has-traveled-thirty-years-by-this-train. “No respaact for alders. Tch tch.”

A tetragenarian enters sweating like a pig, but giggling like a teenager. “ho, neesha! Tu late aali ka ga?” Gushes a penta aunty, feeling up tetra’s saree as younger others watch grossed out. Tetra, the complete show woman, launches herself on penta’s (and literally on youngster’s) lap and strokes (yes, strokes) penta’s hair… aunties giggle. More marathi. Mentions some hi pitched neeshas. More giggles. Then some.

One belt of saree clad aunties, belts out in instant cacophony, a woeful number usually sang by the unfortunate, the blind and the supposedly crippled seeking arms and unassuming devotees outside temples... (shirdi waaaaale, saaaaai baba…). As a chain reaction, the younger lot plugs in their i-pods and mobile-phone-radios into suffering ear sockets. One i-pod-less youngster standing in the passage is convinced God-turned deaf thirty years ago due to “local train”. The skirt clad aunties, also incidentally tetras and pentas, sitting oppressed in the opposite side, in knee-jerk retaliation bring out their biblical magazines and rosaries.. The rest denied and condemned to the passages, just look at each other, nod apologetically and flinch standing uneasily in the October heat of the jam-packed metal case, suppurating in the cacophony… of these desperate souls, a few of them are blissfully Tee Ells, and therefore with the power of the serums, they will soon forget it all…

A penta pulled up a cellphone and transacted away into it about “blocking seats” for the one on the other end of her receiver… another seated tetra chased away a young un foraying into the seated territory but firing a bullet of lethal words. Wounded, the young one who incidentally was a first-timer on “local train”, staggered into the passage to be immediately pulled by a middle-aged one warning her, “Don’t mess with them, any of these oldies seated. Don’t you value your life?” The young un looked at her startled, and doe-eyed. The middle aged one softened her tone instantly, “Look, one doesn’t mess with the seat mafia, ok? That’s the only way to survive in these locals”.

The seat mafia is incidentally a clique, who travel daily by long-distance “local trains”, and are comprised of saree-clad pentas and tetras, who elsewhere in the world are an infinitely loving clan. But not the seat mafia. They deal with “seat trafficking” so, obviously are pretty territorial. Usually armed with lethal words than can make any civilized soul sick or departed, they fire their arms through stinky mouths and loud tones! And they operate on every prime time “local train”.

A whistle blows, and the churchgate local slowly leaves the platform. In complete bollywood style, a figure runs behind the compartment and jumps in with a little aid from a youngster standing by the door. Figure wiggles to the aunty-section, much to the horror of the youngsters standing in the passage, clears throat and authoritatively requests, to the bewilderment of the lot, a gossiping tetra pack to place her bag on the rack. Surprised compartment stares at this sweetly smiling polite figure… Camera zooms in on the said figure to find, the face, of yours truly…

And angry tetra, closely resembling the vitals of the Incredible Hulk, gets up, picks up yours truly, and indecently throws yours truly from the train through the window bars.

Twelve months ago. 9.30 am….Andheri-Bandra Tracks…

Boom! Pow! Crash! Ouch!

Agent Ziah gets up, slowly caressing a wounded bottom and inspecting her creaky joints. She thanked her stars that she was thrown out bag and baggage. Suddenly, she was hit by a giant bolt of lightning that entered from an opened portal in the hot October sky… hot meteorite and white light completely engulfed her….

(*Cut to the present*)

There’s something hovering above Ziah’s head. It’s a bird… It’s a plane... It’s superman! Oh, no, it’s actually an imagination doing its flight of fancy until … what! It’s dropped dead on its derriere with an undignified thud. Sigh!

So, is this post going any where? Shouldn’t Ziah have morphed into a nemesis?

Go figure! :-) Till anybody has a brainwave…

And until then, this is Ziah on idea-diarya signing off… Peace! :)

P.S: This post is dedicated to my loving husband who has filled up my head and home with superheroes, their effigies, movies, conversation and comics. If anyone just felt like murdering me, please take the hint;)

Gimme Red!!!

2007-10-03T15:02:00.000+05:30

Suddenly I feel my blood rush into my veins as if I’m fueled by an ever- ready battery. And off I am, to live like Jason Bourne, a life that is a gigantose covert operation in itself, shielding myself from the forces of, well, nature, and aware of everyone and everything around me. Such are the trained instincts of a soldier in peril. A soldier, fighting to evade the deathly embrace and ramifications of Project Red-Stone. My overrated life presently, if ever made a sequel to the super-hit Ludlum book/ Matt Damon movies, should probably be called Borne-Conjunctivitis!

In the last week alone, half my office and similar proportions of Bombay is down with Conjunctivitis. Pussy, sticky eye-goo, blood shot itchy eyes et al. Now, I am a multi-million dollar weapon of disease, now malfunctioning to combat it. Typhoid, pox, malaria, flu, mumps... the list is endless of what not I’ve Borne. After this training programme, the forces at nature with its multifarious experiments on me, have brought my immunity levels to naught.

No prizes for guessing that I’m presently Project Red-Stone’s hot target. And as its gunning me down, I run for freedom…

Peek-a-boo! And you’re looking at the present life of this Red-Stone fugitive.

9 am. Mumbai. India.....

Ex-Agent Ziah gets on to Ladies Compartment of Churchgate Local. Wades through storm of desperate women entering to claim window seat, and swiftly, in the speed of light, placates derriere on window seat, away from the Red gaze (hopefully). Whew! Women in all shapes and sizes heave their heavy bosoms and bottoms seating up the compartment. Ziah quickly makes scanning gaze to rule out danger. What! Half these women are wearing goggles. Why why why? Is it Red Eye*? Ziah averts gaze, does not touch anyone or anything. Shrivels inwards, waiting despondently for Churchgate station. Ziah’s radars meanwhile scan the compartment. Will Red Eye gun her? The air is sodden with the stench of October heat, sweat, and suspense. Ziah is a trained soldier. A multi-million dollar weapon of disease, now malfunctioning to combat it. Adept at her skill, she surveys each goggle to figure what lies beneath. Is it the adversary? The skill simply being not to let the adversary know all this time that it is being sought.

9.45 am. Churchgate station...

Ziah momentarily steps into freedom, looks up at the brandishing October sun and hurries to destination next. Office. Ziah evades all aviator glasses there, eyes fixed firmly on her stilettos-with-which-she-can-barely-walk. Gets to desk. Temporary whew! Starts computer, tells self – don’t-touch-what-they-touch, don’t-look-at-them-in-the-eye. The Run continues…

11.15 am. Office...

Enter T. Not wearing aviator glasses today. But wearing a smile and an incredible tale of woe. Fatal request to Ziah.

Cut to T’s Tale of woe:
T, one day ago, dark glasses, i-pod-in-ear, files-in-hand, red eye and all, (deported to go home from work thanks to red-eye) boarded infamous Virar local. Stood on door. Missed announcement that Virar local would goto “yard”. (In Bombay, trains that go to “yards” are taken to the middle of nowhere and stranded for donkeys hours.) T figured the yard bit when train left platform. T, heroically, dived into tracks to land on her nose! Another ‘un gunned down by Red eye! (Result: Can’t move entire right side. Tch tch.)

11.15 am. Office Desk.
T asks Ziah, “Please babe! Can’t move shoulder. Need to put in my eye drops. Have a conference call with client and boss in 5. Pretty please?”.

Ziah, a multi-million dollar weapon of disease, cannot ignore the codes of Secret Sinister Sisterhood of Spooky Shit. Melts like candle wax put in microwave high. Gets up, bravely picks up drops, [co-incidentally named Toba**], and looks ex-red-eye in the eye and goes tapak tapak, ujaala blue style! ............. (Scene fades out)

Did Ziah get red-eye? Did Ziah get the better of Red-Eye? Stay tuned for more in this space….. :)

[*Red Eye is the soul of Project Red Stone]

[* Toba! Toba! is those fat hindi aunties' analogue of our very southern fatso mamis’ Aiyo! Aiyo!]

Some random thoughts on Bombay!

2007-09-20T23:48:00.000+05:30

It’s been a lame week; a lame month and soon it will be a lame year! And I need to constantly snap myself out of this cyclical lameness, lest my blog begins to look like “A Lame Person’s Dairy; Chap X”. Ouch! But, living in Bombay renders your life that touch of lackluster, you know that dull sheen. (And so saying I go on in automatic defense of my ineptitude of capturing and replicating inspirational moments of this overrated life to publish them, rather unleash them on to the unassuming you! Whew!)

Mumbai….Bombay… The City of Dreams….

For over a year, I’ve been an inhabitant of this overpopulated, over-polluted little blob of an island, sold to the British by the French for ten bucks, donkeys years ago. The story of Bombay is quite interesting. For a long long time this was a cozy smalle-ville with Gujju traders and Parsis. When this was made state capital of “Maharashtra”, with Secretariat, High court and all (being hand-me-down-Victorian-edifices ofcourse), there was a slight problem… there were hardly a hand-few authentic “Maharashtrians” in this capital of “Maharashtra”.

Until this point, Suketu Mehta of Maximum City fame puts it, Maharashtrians were but a ‘race of clerks’. (Do I sense some fists tightening?) Suketu goes on to reason that these guys didn’t aspire for power in organizations, despised the idea of eating anywhere except home, and their endeavor in life was to get their kids married well. Violence and aggression was too taxing a quality to have in their mundane lives. Evidently, hedonism hadn’t hitherto found its way to wrap its opulent talons around this little race. But every story has a twist.

Twist? Much can be said about a certain Supremo. This Supremo comes across (vide craptacular gigantusaur sized hoardings in Bombay and on National Television) as a mite of a man wearing those trademark soda-kuppi* glasses, who wishes to delude you with his short-comings (literally, of course) by posing in a grandiose throne beside a tiger! Supremo is that interesting mite of a man whose photograph is found in every politically-connected home in this island, given the same reverence as the photographs of the Gods and the dead. (Pssst… The other people I can think of in this category are Sai Baba and makkal thalaivar Rajni Kant!) The twist in the tale-in-point, as the grapevine goes, happened a decade ago and is called Supremo-and-his-political-aspirations.

Now you can’t rule the Maharashtrians from the capital of Maharashtra where there were no Maharashtrians, not even as many as I’ve used in this sentence! So, Supremo, and his sidekicks at the SS decided to bring in the brand Marathi, Brand Mumba-Aai of the Mumba Devi Temple, and Brand Shivaji (a smart move, since he was the only guy worth idolizing in the lineage, given he was the shining star in the entire clan and went out and fought wars surreptitiously-and-all instead of sitting at home and eating his Aai’s poli bhaji!).

Twist ensured that belts of Maharashtrians migrated to Bombay, to ensure sufficient representation of the supposed lingua franca. [Which I think explains Mahim, Dadar and its stench, Koliwada and those hideous, aesthetically disturbing ‘Jai Maharashtra’ silver reflectors in Flora Fountain! I need to tender no explanation however to Goregaon and Matunga. It is a well known fact that South Indians have major issues with settling in our own home states. It’s a pathological trait, I say!]

But not to digress from our Twist no?:) Twist also ensured the Bombay riots, I hear. [A certain Justice wrote pages hinting the involvement of Supremo and his sidekicks in the ill-fated riots of the 90’s in his Commission Report, stuff that we consumed during law school exams… sigh!] Oh well.

So now, this little island survives, with the political games of a dying SS, the cops and the gangstas, the molls and the "actors" (political correctness shoved down my throat with a ramrod here), the cons and the clerks, and the daily migrating bhaiyyas; often displaying a severe identity crisis given its varied diaspora of inhabitants. Some call it the city of dreams. The kinda dreams that people nurture in their heads until they get here and then reality bites. Once in a while, this chit of an island that poses to be the commercial capital of the country comes to a complete standstill. That’s coz every now and then some thing or some one gets bombed by random ass-wipes, or there is total inactivity due to traffic stranded by filled up gutters during monsoon showers. And then, in total Mumbai style, life moves on. Chalta hain!

[Chalta Hain, FYI, is the anthem of Bombay. Strangely, while it literally translates to “it walks”, what it really means is “its okay with me”. Chalta Hain, like the true Bombayite, says what it means, but doesn’t mean what it says! Deep huh?]

The City of Chalta Hain is incidentally one of the worst planned cities. All of the commercial spaces are located in the South of Bombay. All of the residential spaces predominantly develop from the suburbs, towards the north of Bombay. Therefore every morning and evening occurs the greatest displacement since Noah’s Ark, as insane as it sounds, where at least 10 million people commute hanging off local trains and buses from the North of Bombay, 40 to 50 kms to the south of Bombay, and back, day after day after day. The administration conveniently washed it hands off rectification and development measures eons ago by saying that making life better in Bombay will only “ensure more Bhaiyyas offloading the Gorakhpur Express!”
[So, according to bombay municipal corporation no infrastructure is price we pay to stop the burgeoning population of bhaiyyas in this metro. Hey! I want my taxes back!!]

Anyways. Its an interesting City, bought for ten bucks, comes with no specific history, only to be condemned by dozens of Babus gulping public money in the City corporation, to have no future as well. I guess life will move on here… isn’t this the city of chalta hain?

* soda kuppi = glass out of which soda bottle is made

** DISCLAIMER: this article was only written co-incidentally. Any reference to anyone living or dead is purely and obviously intentional. Anyways, I have no money, so don't bother suing me!!

Ganpatta Bappa Morya!

2007-09-19T17:55:00.000+05:30

Can you believe it! My cab moved, full throttle on DN road for five whole minutes this morning, uninterrupted and in prime time traffic! Incredible, hai na? Life does have some high points.

That being said, you can forget about life in Bombay being normal for the next seven days. Till anand chaturti that is, which very precisely put, is the BIG day when most of the giant effigies of the beloved modak (kozhakottai) shaped deity will be drowned beyond recognition into the various beaches of Bombay! The morning after debris in Bombay is another thing all together…

Ganpati Bappa Morya! Welcome to the local BLARE-WITCH Project!! From Decibel Dynamics to Aural Aggression… Beauty is NOT for the EARS of the beholder. Maybe Aspirin is for the head? :-(

Seven days to normalcy. Seven days of festivity? Seven days and counting… :)

Wish you all a very happy Ganesh Chaturti!!!

P.S: Wrote a rather random piece on Bombay for a blog update... To post or to not to post is the question!

Boys and their Toys!

2007-09-06T14:27:00.000+05:30

All evening and possibly through a good deal of the night yesterday, I watched with admiration and intense fascination the panning video on our PC, where my husband cracked top secret passwords of supercomputers, invaded foreign army bases, fought bombing helicopters and shooting paratroopers, animals, semi-animals, the works with his retractable claws and swathing double kicks. With each wound, he would bleed bleed and bleed, and then presto! He’d just heal! I can’t quite decide what catches my fancy more – his expressions through his preternatural missions, or just the phantasmagoria of the tasks he undertook therein! Priceless I tell you.

For clarification, let me tell you… My husband is not a black cat commando, not a superhero, not some super cool secret agent and least of all, not even an actor! And No, (sorry X-men aficionados, but) I’m not married to Logan!!

The source of his double-life stems from a CD titled “Wolverine’s Revenge”, which is, well, a PC game! A couple of clicks here and there, and Voila! He controls, no, actually, he is Wolverine on that screen, kicking some bad ass out there, completely oblivious to the loud water dripping behind our newly serviced air conditioner, the periodically whining refrigerator and deafening beeping washing machine, totally freed from the mundane-ness of daily chores, teleported into the exciting world of the virtual.

What really surprised me was after seven hours of moving his fingers and fingers only, the love of my life showed up in bed with the weariness that would only befit the one who killed a thousand baddies, detonated a dozen places and looked death-in-the-eye a time too many!

Boys and their Toys! Some deep connection out there…

Paradise Lost!

2007-08-16T15:44:00.000+05:30

When a lawyer marries a lay man, the following events usually prove mirror-cracking material to domestic bliss –

1. He doesn’t appreciate your Jokes. No matter how tear-jerkingly hilarious. Atleast never in public. Infact, everytime you crack an intelligent joke of such high intellectual caliber that requires a fine mind such as yours to appreciate, he passes it off as a ‘lawyer joke’.
2. He can’t stand your articulation and specially your need to prove-things-beyond-reasonable-doubt. By the time you’re done, he’s probably hanging out of the balcony for fresh air.
3. He can never show you his blog. You have this amazing way of spotting only the damn typos!
4. Each time he breaks a signal or violates a traffic rule, the first thing you think of (citing) is the Motor Vehicles Act.
5. Your prenuptial and post-nuptial agreement... (erm)... arrangement… oh, it doesn’t matter if you don’t want a dime from him... everything just has to be on paper and everything just has to be clearly stated!

Tsk Tsk sisters! My heart goes out to you all. After all, ignorantia lex non excusat!

Food for thought, strictly borrowed.

2007-08-10T16:56:00.000+05:30

Manu says, that life is a

"spiral of despair, and your only hope is piling one distraction on top of another, and hoping that your massive heap of delusion doesn't collapse before you die."

Its Ringing!!

2007-08-08T14:31:00.001+05:30

Oh, the wedding bells of course... :-)

Yours Truly,

Sairekha Suresh Kumar, soon to be Vivek Ram.

Meee-aw!

2007-08-06T13:53:00.000+05:30

I love girl gangs. They are such total bitches. One-stop-whine shops. Have a problem with everything and everyone. And every get together is a complete pity party. Boo! More to girl power. :-)

[By the way, gay boys, their French beards, constipated articulation, constant endearment of one and all around and floating movement of hand is totally killing me on the spot. Like us girls, incidentally, they have a problem with everything that is insignificant and petty! Criminal I say.]

Writing a note on Indian Labour Laws and writing some treatise on the Balsamic Evolution of Pickled Brains have the same import – you’re gonna write a lot of crap that sounds important and is of use to none, including you.

You’re still reading – the statement of my life.

Salaam Rashtra Aunty!!

2007-08-01T18:03:00.000+05:30

You really shouldn’t invest too much faith into Indian Polity you know… After all, those ass-wipes who run the national front desk at Delhi didn’t get wiped out when the terrorists tried to bomb them down. (Shame Shame! Pakistan!) And there they thrive, pocketing greedily each layer of disappearable public money into their personal kitties, scam after scam.. and then the hungry mouths become one too many to feed. So now, ta da! Presenting 10.33% TDS for the working professional and 12.25% service tax so that more first wives can afford their celebrity manicures, and well, more politicians can now, umm, “do” their favourite celebrities! Socialist economies of scale. Sigh!

Well, Well. Then some. For all you feminists who went out of business since Shilpa Shetty was last kissed in Public... Sisters! Its time to open your champagne bottles! We finally have a woman prez! And how. She’s a lawyer who keeps her maiden name. Also, she a politician who’s never lost an election in her entire life! Sounds so picture perfect na? Our new Rashtra-Pati, err.. Patni.. err.. Mata.. err.. Aunty? Ahem!

Trivia on our Rashtra-Aunty’s political views: She is the hardest supporter of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). The NREGA provides a legal guarantee for one hundred days of employment in every financial year to adult members of any rural household willing to do unskilled manual work at the statutory minimum wage. If employment under the scheme is not provided to the rural members within fifteen days of receipt of the application daily, unemployment allowance will be paid to the applicant. Sounds cool. But translating it to you and me would mean, therefore, that Rs 11,300 crores of our taxes every year, thanks to Prez dearest, will supposedly go to the rural guys. Aloha!

Now. Rashtra Aunty’s claim-to-fame, apparently, is that she set up various educational institutes, hostels, co-operative societies blah blah blah in amchi Maharashtra. She also was the first and only lady Governor of Maadu-Land. She also founded and was the chairwoman of a cooperative sugar factory and a cooperative bank named after herself as “Pratibha Mahila Sahakari Bank”. (How humble!) She was also involved in setting up an Industrial Training School for the visually challenged and running a school for poor children of the Vimukta Jatis and Nomadic tribes. How touching an act in this nation of SC-ST-philiacs!

Now for some dirty linen on aunty-ji...

The buzz goes that since her nomination as presidential candidate, numerous controversies ranging from her remarks about the purdah to her alleged belief in "divine indications" have emerged. [Tsk! Tsk! Indian women seldom keep their opinions to themselves. Now look at me...]

This one takes the cake. A day before her filing of nomination papers, in a press conference in Delhi, Rajani Patil, the widow of a certain murdered congressman from Jalgaon, alleged that Pratibha used her influence to shield her brother G.N.Patil in the murder of her husband. Well, a day before the “Abhi-Ash wedding”, a certain Jahnvi Kapoor said a couple of things about babyshake Bachchan in a sort of press-conference too.. Oh well, Prez.

Since then various news channels and papers reported financial mismanagement in her family-controlled bank, the revoking of its license by the Reserve Bank of India (the RBI) and financial irregularities in repayment of loans by the Cooperative sugar mills run by the Patil family. Uh-Oh!

Let me tell you that these issues have surfaced from, among other sources, Rajani Patil's petition to President Abdul Kalam, her two letters addressed to Sonia Gandhi,(God! Wasn't Rajani bugged!) RBI inspection reports, court notices, letters from the employees union of the bank, the minutes of Maharashtra Legislative Assembly. Some of the allegations are results of police inquiries, court proceedings, notices from RBI and payment notice from the lenders and from show-cause and penalty notices from Excise Commissioner etc. The allegations have led to further petitions being filed in the courts for disqualifying her from contesting, which were either dismissed or are still pending hearing. Well well, since Phoolan Devi and southern ex-siren “Dr.” Jayalalitha, we have proven beyond reasonable doubt, this nation’s philia to female crooks... Be Catwoman to Aunty Prez, skin-suit, cat-suit, bullet-proof saree, we love ‘em all... right guys?

Interestingly peoples, reacting to allegations “Dr.” Jayalalitha had recently asked the UPA to withdraw support to Pratibha Patil and is quoted to have said:

"It is distressing to see that the highest constitutional office in the country had been subjected to mudslinging ... The nation has been embarrassed in the eyes of the world, because UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi wants a President who will be pliable."

[P.S: Hey! Since when did we start the dog-barks-at-dog policy??]

Anyways, I guess we indeed have a befitting queen bee leading the wolf pack. Growl!

Happy Homecoming Prez! :-)

Picture this?

2007-07-19T12:48:00.000+05:30

Its July and I haven't blogged! (OMG!!!)

My library room of reasons reeks with - new job! enagement! tired! (*Aww-ness!*)

The truth remains that I'm still busy poking my nose into everybody else's life.. and now thats its time for you, I've come up with this month's sorry blog excuse -

After one hour of assiduous online timepass, which is the newest form of workplace terrorism, I finally find a website telling me this....

Your Relationship Will Last... A Long Time!

Your guy is ideal, as close to Mr. Perfect as he could be
If you took this quiz, you may be doubting that...
Don't! No guy is perfect but yours comes really close
You guys will last for many years, as long as you appreciate him!

How Long Will Your Relationship With Your Guy Last?

Oh.. well.. Happy engagement Vivek!!! :)

The weekend that was... a sad excuse for the blog updates!

2007-06-03T12:36:00.000+05:30

This house is one giant trial room for Murphy’s laws. The toilet is just 10 feet from my laptop. Somehow the words pour into my head when I’m on the hot-seat, but by the time my ablutions are through, they seem to evaporate into thin air! So much for writing.

The last 48 hours have been quite interesting, interestingly dull, if I may. The man-in-my-life is out on a weekend trip, and time just doesn’t pass. Friends come and go, pages of the book I’m reading-like-there’s-no-tomorrow turn till the book’s actually through, food cooks and dishes clean… but the day is still young and there are 24 hours to go before he’s back in town! Damnation. Makes me wonder if all I did all day long is just stare at his face or what, coz there’s no sane explanation to time coagulation caused by sudden weekend disappearances of the man.

Well, also for the last 48 hours I’ve been on an un-put-down-able trip reading about a 44-year-old burlesque black American woman dealing with perimenopause, a fizzling marriage, thankless-yet-loving kids and the finding-the-centre-routine. Her sassy lines and hormonal rants sounded so profound, connecting me to her in that womanly way. And then again, maybe more perhaps coz she sounded like my mother! Same old. Same old.

Perimenopausal, unsexy life.

I could run home and get my moma that box of mangoes she’s been craving for in a while now, and then again, after a few days, take the first bus back to bombay, back to my nine to nine, and hopefully to work. So much for being a connected thankless child of a mum-in-her-fifties.Then some.

Stranger to solitude – that’s what a relationship turns you into. There he goes on a weekend trip and 24 hours of the day tick loud in your ears. You’d wonder what you even did with your life for 22 years, that on the 23^rd you feel a weekend alone is like being marooned in an island or something. Punitive solitude? Something like that. But hey! I’m still in denial...

Pre-monsoon showers and lighting have had some casualty in this house. A spike guard, a multi-plug adapter and my internet connection, to be very precise. I live in a city that cannot deal with rains! A few showers and the infrastructure takes a mortal wound. And well into the heart of monsoons, that wound rots so much, maybe it even stinks. Like all the movement in this city comes to a screeching standstill. No one gets to go to work, all shops shut, like its going to a flood. Like “26^thJuly”, say the flurried Bombay-ites. Every country has a favourite tragedy date, like 9/11?? Some of you ignoramuses should know that on 26^th July, 2005, Bombay flooded and many people and many more animals died coz the stupid corporators forgot to dig gutters and the rainwater didn’t have drainage outlets. Now, America has come a far way since 9/11. So much so that Indians with a bit of facial hair and therefore may remotely be passed off as suspectable Afghans, are denied work visas. But nothing much has changed in Bombay...

Anyway, given the casualties in this house, I cant write up anymore for my blog, I cant wash my clothes and I miss him! Okay, this sis the point where I begin to rant… so tata darlings for now. Back for more in a better mood.

No-thing. Really.

2007-04-19T13:45:00.000+05:30

Catapulted from crowded metropolis Mumbai I found myself waking up to freshly brewed homemade south Indian coffee in sleepy smalleville Pune! Voila! What a transition I say! And the weather here is simply sweltering suppurating summer heat @ 40 degrees by the Celsius scale. And now and then nights bring in these freak ugly thunder bolts, lightning and summer showers.

Let me tell you, I am a woman on a mission this week. All day I sit glued with tepid passion watching television news dole out my daily dose of drama (which I once thought, not very long ago could be singularly the prerogative of the cheesy saas-bahu flicks.) World news is the best way to figure what makes the world tick, and what makes it move really. (Gravitation and rotation, of course is passé darlings!)

I must tell you, news hasn’t gotten better in a long time. In fact it is like reality TV given an amphetamine. And how! Recently, Richard Gere in an AIDS awareness campaign/show swooped now-famous-since-big-brother-Shilpa-Shetty into his arms and went on pecking her highly made-up cheeks.. puchk puchk puchk.. was that a sight! Then a mob in Kanpur burnt up Gere-effigies in outrage! Then Shetty issues public statements pleading people not to overreact. Then.. female activists burn Shetty effigies in outrage! Whoohoo! Next what? More talk? Maybe. Then?

News next. Some pissed off dude shoots out 30 plus people in Virginia Tech two hours after he shot two people in Virginia Tech. My mother was the only one that wondered why Virginia Tech campus was not on red alert for the two interim hours. My brother, Prince Go Wind, texts me some New Hampshire-Univ-Campus-Gossip that the pissed off dude was pissed off coz he was really a jilted lover. Of course the news is all about it. No one has any clue even in Virginia about the whereabouts of the victims, till date. Now what? And whats the big point? Is anyone doing something.

Nihil Ultra. Translated to mean - No-thing.

Then some.

I’ve been reading about kids dying in a swimming pool every year now, for the past 5 years atleast that my memory permits. It now sounds like some archaic ritual. I wonder what else can it be, really. Come summer and kids everywhere make a bee line for the pool. Only in Pune, they drop dead into it. No-thing is done on a sustainable basis about an annual casualty crisis in local pools by local corporators or the local government. No life guards, no safety mandates. And your kids and mine may dive into that neighborhood public pool, and may just, die! Wow! I think it just is a strong possibility the authorities secretly believe in some Aztec ritual of dropping kids into pools, that they can perpetuate by “freak” accidents. And guess what, even the rain gods seem pleased! Its been pouring the last two evenings here!! Interestingly, even litigation on these issues fizzled out? So, the point of the now-and-then year-after-year sizzling news on the anguishing annual casualty is.. Surprise! No-thing.

The irony is I came here with the firm resolve of doing no-thing. But read and watch the idiot box. And understand popular dynamics. (I told you, am a woman on a mission!) And now, I have only hit upon the truth behind the prospect of doing no-thing – (*drum rolls!*) - it is the most dangerous thing to human sanity!

Coz no-thing-ness stems from no-thing-ness and the process is only cyclical.

And voila! What moves the world – Nihil Ultra, translated to mean, No-thing. Really.

[P.S: Atlas is joining me for lunch at Mc. Donald’s today. He’s been benched since Nihil Ultra. ]

Miss Me. Literally! Lolz...

2007-03-27T11:15:00.000+05:30

They say when you ask for something, be careful of the words you use.

Its quite a lawyer thing that you articulate what you say really. And then you go that annoying extra mile to explain yourself. They teach you in lawschool to prove everything 'beyond reasonable doubt'... and you stretch it in lawfirms beyond all understandable levels of reasonability to 'CYA(cover your ass)'. Therefore I used to make it policy to make exceptions in my personal communication, specially to close ones and God. It was this rebel thing, you know. They get what I wanna say. So, whatever. And then if they go huh, I'd go on and on explaining myself beyond tolerable doubt, till they're okay next time with my incoherent ambiguous stances.

Then one fine day, realisation dawned that even God is too busy to listen to me unless I'm crisp crystal clear. This fine day, by the way, was last night, when I found myself smothered by apple-the-beagle-pup, as always. She doesnt quit licking my face even after her tongue dries out and these days she's learnt to use her paws to hold me in place while she's at it! Cuteness! And I thought, damn! Should I have been more explicit when I said I wanna come home to some cuddling smothering person who'd well, kiss me sloppily!

So much for face value! Apple-the-pup decides to catch my eye last night and how! She leaps at it!!!

So I'm gonna spend the rest of my time framing accurate sentences - say what you mean, mean what you say. Doubt, or no doubt.

2007-03-26T15:34:00.001+05:30

!!!!!!!!!

Darned lil pimple!

2007-03-23T11:05:00.000+05:30

It’s the stroke of midnight! I’m trying pretty hard to stay awake, sip guava juice, not pinch my pimple and not think of the pending work or the creativity drowned in a pile of sleep. Zzzzzzz… and suddenly I wake up to the soft mechanical twirls of the ceiling fan and the electric whine of the refrigerator… my night companions. Would I rather be in a log cabin sitting into wee hours of the morning listening to that rattling wall lizard and a distant hoot of an owl? Someone slap me when I pinch this pimple again. I am as irritating and idiotic as our 5-month-old-beagle Miss Apple, who every now and then chases her own tail in circles, bites it and lets out a shrill, high pitched yelp. Cuteness! I should tell you about how passionately she chases her ball, bumps into the door and then perks up all alert as her hound self should be on hearing the bump!

Zzzzz… and now I wake up to Princess Ascutta raving about some vague upcoming celebrations.. Its getting harder to keep my eyes open… But I decided that starting right now, I’m gonna let this keypad beat my larynx in getting words out of my system. That’s the point of this blogging exercise. Unleash my thoughts on the world at large, give my throat some rest. Quiet nice?

There! I pinched my pimple again. And the damn thing still doesn’t peel off my cheek. Wonder if you wondered how similar a tortured mind is to a ripe pimple. Torturous thoughts like pus, squirming to explode yet lying there glinting in their incandescent evil till their grotesque emancipation. Both are deep rooted, usually. And most people, like me, have the instinctive urge to burst the pimple when they see it. Yours or theirs. Torturous thoughts interestingly have hormonal foundations just like the pimples. I haven’t quite researched on this, but this just may be the beginning of a very deep psycho-somatic connection that drives millions of women on this planet. Really. This may be a nexus which if not understood may just drive millions of men crazy. Now now. Hormonal women are not just a handful, but form the crux of civilized womankind.

Much can be said in a volley of words about the incandescence of the tortured mind. It just burns in your insides starting the four corners of your troubled head like a blazing conflagration that can’t be doused, consuming every bit of peace and sanity until every cell within your body-fortress screams and revolts in mutinous agony. Hmmm… pretty graphic, ain’t it? An emergency contraception pill pack, incidentally, also boasts of the same physiological side-effects. This, I say, is quite ironic, given normally most young men and women buy emergency contraception as a result of a tortured mind…

What really fuels the tortured mind? Is it grief? Is it internal strife? Rejection? Many beings in this planet have theorized this in grandiose treatises, in take your pick of fields – medical, psychological, emotional and spiritual publications. Actually, it’s simpler to analyze what fuels a pimple. Hormones, dirty/oily skin, stress and lack of sleep.

Sheesh! Its 12.30 now and I’m filled with admiration for this stubborn little pimple rooted so sternly in my facial pore that it refuses to peel off. I shall remember to let this inspire me the next time I try and look within for backups in staying power.

Fire!

2007-03-18T12:01:00.000+05:30

Grief is that slow supporating pyre that can consume the heart, mind and spirit.. and the soul.. Am I but a burning bride beaten back into the licking angry flames by circumstance? Rejected. Unloved. Unwanted.

This is a sick spirit and body, ached and taunted by the mutinous cries of an abused body tortured by medication and hormones.. beaten into a fire of denial and rejection.. and fighting to emerge!

This is the seething voice of a spirit on fire, fighting to find a way.. THE WAY.

The Male Week

2007-03-12T14:49:00.000+05:30

This is the longest week of my life. I shall remember it as the male week. Somehow it has a deep, disentangled connection with all the men in my life, who strangely enough are bald. Bald, again, oddly enough means hairless, plain, direct, receding and blunt.

I present the highlights of the male week. Plain-and-Direct is recently hairless and threw me out of dwelling. I have always found Always-Hairless extremely vapid and vice-versa, so I may soon be out-of-payroll out of sheer personal choice, both ways. Hairless-and-Blunt loves me, wishes me to kick-ass, wants me to show-em-all-what-am-made-of and therefore cuts off my funds and asks me not to go whimpering to hometown. He called later, said he loves me and he’ll always be around. [Hint! He will be and so will the funds and hometown offer, only I won’t ask for them anymore. I have strong views on hoarding. But I love him, a lot. Aww!] Receding came, saw, spoke to Plain-and-Direct, cushioned me, fed me and left. Receding also told me that I would always see him till the day he died and proclaimed paternal love beginning then. Aww! [I love this one too! My old bald men! It’s the younger-uns I tell ya!]

So what does the male week do to gorgeous ultra females who forgo their femme power for a temping? I don’t know. [And you thought I’d have something intelligent or atleast verbose to say didn’t ya? Ha!] Well, male week left me homeless, jobless, parentless, penniless and surprisingly, loveless… there! You will picture the male week felt like a whole bloody year! Oh, it’s true!

Darlings, you may expect I tell darty-detells. Sigh! At this point, my mind is pretty graphic. I can almost imagine my cynical mentor cock-screw her face in her typical bitter fashion, the wrinkles around her mouth crisscrossed in a zillion directions, shaking her head furiously saying, it’s over! Khatam Shud. Finished! Finito! The end! And I can imagine myself at that exact point in time imagining her to cackle and dance oh-so-evilly around a cauldron brewing my doom. Like she did by screwing my review with Always-Hairless by vouching for my competence but ensuring the discontinuity of the payroll by representing my disinterest. Whoa! Very evil. Like Rumplestilskin on the night before snatching whats-her-name’s baby!!! See, we are a deadly team. AbsoluT-lethal.

[Plain-and-Direct who is recently hairless will be reading this and telling I-told-ya-so! Like everything else he told me-so! To which I would have once upon a time meekly said, I know, I know, but then I thought.. etc etc blah blah… sigh!] My loving bloody nostradamus he is!

Seven days can do fabulous things to the female mind. Four out of seven had me absolutely weeping, in hellish misery over the immeasurable loss of a loved one that was born out of sheer insecurity, insensitivity and plain perplexity and that turned me out to the streets, and to the dogs (pun completely intended), the works. Now I live in a cushy, luxurious home in the suburbs with a very dear friend, her lovely parents, her melodramatic but very sweet maids and her two dogs; one fully grown and the other a delightful pup!

Cosmos conspired against me, didn’t it? So in my seven days, summoned were the endogamous group of confidants, [Typical female emotional behavioral patterns may occasionally include-in-varying-degrees the cried-to-every-ear-that-would-hear routine stating that this is indeed the end of the tunnel for me. Finito!] The confidants, you may by-the-way be told, are a secretive group of people who may otherwise be described as “close friends” and who fall in the age bracket of 20 to 33 (approx!) and also include an overgrown 5-year-old dash and a Beagle-pup. Everyone understood, the pain was real. The confidants called, soothed. I howled, and then shut up. But surprisingly, after day four, life moved on, with unprecedented smoothness. Without the home, the money, the love or the support. And on day five onwards, also without the damned job!

And then began the discovery!

1. Life for mua with Absolutely-Hairless is like the life of Munni-Lal married for 25 years to Chunni Lal-the-chindi-marwadi, making burnt chapattis and watching submerged in copious quantities of serious sobs day-after-day-after-day Kyunki-sauce-bhi-kabhi-bahut-thi.. well, applesauce! Oh ji, but seriously, no ji. Too much even for Munni Lal. And this is me! Craazy, naati, saxxy, beachy and all that ji. So darlings, Discovery 1 – jobless and therefore axe-tremely relieved! But dunno for how long! Maybe till the money runs out. Lol.

2. Life for mua without Plain-and-Direct, whom darlings you may recollect is recently hairless, is ummm, not-so-bad? I miss him. Yes. Dreadfully!! But the truth is you don’t need a home or a relationship to love someone unconditionally or share a good time. Actually, you can only love unselfishly after things blow up in your face when you at a safe distance and are in axe-treme “commercial” terms, not sharing controlling interests in the going concern. You may dwell together, well, in the thoughts and dreams and well, just plain simple loving is easy, low cost and low maintenance. And mind well, it is still pretty deep and enjoyable okay.

2.1 I thought I would discover that when you are shit guilty that you screwed up in your own way and though he may have screwed up too, you actually see that the guy in his cold strange way cares a lot but just cant stand being around you for too long, you learn to accept that his conflict is way deeper than yours. Anyways, all you did was worry about everything till now. So maybe, it’s his turn to do the thinking and worrying. You realize you really don’t have much to whine about here. Reality check is that you are so bloody yesterday. You’ve anyway been kicked out of dwelling, and for Bombay standards, a week is such a bloody long time that it guarantees oblivion. So you shut up automatically and you back off.

2.2 Discovery of discovery no. 2 brings me to the unanswerable question, as light on the vein it is, is that when everything else is replaced, where the hell do you sigh and moan??? …. ???? …. ???? Sigh! Moan! That’s a tough one to make out! [He he]

2.3 Discovery 2 – My pride is battered, and dramatically to rhyme, also, my love is shattered.. so… Now I’ll stay prude and clean.

Discovery 3 – polarization. Male week and female week? Happy and sad? Dependant and self contained? Crushed and never-before-this-strong? Dancing-in-a-dupatta and sitting-on-the-couch-whining? Life is full of extreme choices, polarized. Choose wisely!

A stray thought after looking at some retro pics. Was life really good in the good-old-days of our grandparents and how! All you needed was a photograph to decide you would spend the rest of your life with a person. [No use-and-refuse offers!] Once you started life, you had complete space. I quote my beloved Plain and Direct on Feb 14, 2007 when I say here that the men did what they knew, the women did what they knew… and they both proclaimed they did it for the kids. And by the sheer number of kids one can infer the fun they might’ve had in ample quantums of unprotected sex! I’ll leave this thought here, for I’ve a weird feeling I am increasingly disliking lineage now…

So darlings, am going to put this unforgettable mad male week into the Pandora’s Box of memories. And am gonna retire fantasizing about the day when I really will trade my cell phone for a compus, my laptop for a rucksack and a cheap copy of Europe-on-a-shoe-string and run off in torn jeans and sneakers to discover.. maybe I’ll make out.. ;)

[P.S: Yes all women are hormonal. And I’ve erupted into a hajaar pimpals ok.. in fact there are three of them on my face!!]

[P.S.2: Plain & Direct is a really nice guy. A lot of this is venting my fumes but I guess he really changed my world. Plain and simple?]

For today is day one of Discovery!

Abstractions

2007-01-30T12:24:00.001+05:30

Three months ago, I wonder, how can a whole thinking, talking breathing person be alive and yet disintegrate. It seems like an oxymoron. Yet the imagination of such a prospect is fantastic. I wonder if moral fibre can tatter to shreds, like old moth eaten silk? Can die as you live? In spirit? That’s again an oxymoron for isn’t life synonymous to spirit?

Three months down the line I see the reflection… The ink gets dry. The colours fade away. And I stand by the great well peering into its deep waters that display the reflection of a life badly lived. Suddenly, I wish I could drop a coin into that well, instantly rippling the images and wishing hard that the life, like the images would just scatter away… I see.. answers to the old question.. and I see affirmation screaming like the voice of doom…

To live life truly would be to know life and then to let it go.. but what if you lived life, knew it not only to let it slip away.. slip through your fingers like wrenched gravel.. it is a kind of death, slow supporating.. you can hear your spirit tear, rrrrrriiiipppp… like the ripe cacophony of tearing cloth!

WIP

2006-12-05T10:43:00.000+05:30

It feels like eternity since words exploded across my screen like birds breaking out into the evening sky, scattered, numerous and with unassumed violence... It feels like a lifetime since I could feel and give life to the feeling... since I could showcase them into words..

I am but pared to the bone, trapped in the vortex of mundaneness competing with mediocracy and hunting for an identity...

It is time to break out of this Writer's Bloc(k)...