Christmas is freakin' HERE!!!!

Christmas is 2 days away!!! and for 15 years of my sad life, i had no idea how wonderful Christmas really is.

Apart from the Christmas tree, drawing and colouring which would be our assignment every year in art class before the little Christmas break; and the skit on sports day, generally on 23rd or 24th December, in which i used to dress in my frilliest white frock and have a halo, i.e. be an angel for a few minutes, Christmas holidays meant chilly nights, someone dressed as santa and distributing toffees on Christmas, and hard core preparation for the exams that followed the holidays!

So Christmas was no Diwali for us.

However, when my English prof told me and my friend Raadhika that we had to set up a carols group about 2 weeks ago, Christmas took a whole new meaning....

The trees in the woods were all decorated with tinsel and bells; the air had a chill to it, my thickest blanket became my best friend, the secret santa chits were all drawn, lectures were bunked incessantly because we so wanted to win the carol singing competition, Meryl's mom had sent us a freshly baked batch of spongy and sinful walnut and date cake, and Michelle, Sanjana, me n Maddie had started planning the Christmas sleepover, with the Midnight Mass, and then a little fire on the terrace, milk and cookies, plum cakes, pizzas, marshmallows, and ghost stories and gossip... and even the VLC media player icon donned a Christmas hat (which my brother suspects is spam)...

Christmas was freakin' here!!!!!

But, then, along with that, the last day of SYJC drew near, people started posting senti statuses on Facebook and were hugging and kissing all over the college, and then, prelims.... But what the hell, its Christmas!!!!

So now the next two days i'm going to be singing jingle bell rock all day:p
Merry Christmas yeverybuddy!!!!!!!

Why am I monkeying around?

Monkeys are adorable. They love bananas, they're naughty, they're also a pain in the ass. A lot like me!

I've been called a monkey by almost everyone i know. Probably because i can talk non-stop, make funny faces, like a monkey. And just like a monkey jumps from one branch to another, so do my thoughts.And unlike a monkey (or like it, i really don't know) i do end up wondering what i was originally thinking!

Monkeying around is simply what i do all the time. And that's what i do on this blog too. And it took me about one and a half years to realize. Plus, of course, the template was perfect!

So now I'm unleashing all the monkeyness inside me, and i'm gonna have some fun.

Lets swing it!!!

Off the top of my head...

Yesterday was a great day. we had three free lectures and we were done by 1. And I stayed behind in college as usual. My friends can't understand why i prefer staying in college than going home. I don't get why they do otherwise.

And then 'Eat, Pray, Love' was on. Great movie, really. Though I don't get why the whole 'I'm depressed because my love life's a mess' is so huge an angle in it. I like her travels. Hell, i would love to just pack my bags, leave my whole life behind and travel to some completely unheard of place. Or just some day, shut my books, sign out of facebook, say goodbyes and start walking, and just keep walking...

There are so many things I would love. I would love to be extremely rich. I would love to be 25 so people can finally accept that I can do stuff I knew I could do since I was 12. I would love to not be a CR. I would love to not be hated. I would love to bunk all my lectures and just hang around in the college all day. I would love to be loved back. I would love to be able to write and get published. I would love to live in a hostel. i would love to be independent.

And I would love to be thinner, less pimply, less miserable.

Then again, I love to be thrifty, to be 17, to be the CR, to sit for lectures, to be with my family...

On a completely different note, psychology's finally started to interest me. I've been spending time in the library looking up Freud, Jung and Eyesenck. The best part i think is the dream interpretation concept. I mean, we all dream. And it couldn't be meaningless, right? Of all the times we've woken up feeling extremely happy everything's worked out, or woken up sweating, or woken up completely blank and confused and then realised it was just a dream; did we ever wonder why our subconscious wasted so much time showing us something that was not real?

Or was it all real, but we just didn't know it?

And then my brother's going to be 25 in a week. I see a baking opportunity! How about a white chocolate sponge cake with vanilla cream and strawberries? Or a cheese cake? Or a mousse cake? Oh, or a coffee cake...

I tend to get carried away...

Where's the time, i think! the time to have nice days, the time to watch movies, the time to sit in libraries and think about dreams, the time to have wishes, to love,to write, to bake? But then i realize that somewhere between lectures,being crushed in the morning rush, breaking my head over maths and falling asleep reading textbooks, i do manage to find the time...

It all ends today.

In my very first article on my blog, I told you how big a Harry Potter fan I am. It'd been over a year and I have come a long way since then. Nothing changed. Nothing ever changed.

Today I saw the franchise end in 3D. And amazing though the journey was, I can't help but feel hollow inside, like a part of me ended with it. To what extent that is true, only I shall know!

One may argue its a kids' book, a kids' story. But theres no denying the fact that it used to be a TREMENDOUS part of my life... I lived and died in those 7 books, ever since I became a harry potter fan about 5 years ago. And a lot of what I did become later on, Harry Potter was a huge part of that. And though that sounds like a hyperbloe, it is not...

Harry Potter was the first novel I ever picked up. And it inspired me to read more and more, eventually encouraging me to pursue languages. J.K.Rowling inspired me to begin writing, and created in me an interest for plotting and storytelling. It indeed came storming out of her books; the way she linked each book with the other, making it sort of a jigsaw puzzle, and how she left loose ends everywhere, and then tied them all up to make perfect sense, to make the readers believe in the magical world. It is not just a book, a mere story, it is a work of genius.

As people change, they keep one something from their past, something that reminds them of what they really were inside; Harry Potter was that one something for me. And so it is really hard hitting the reality that it is now over, and that there isn't really anything more to look forward to in it...

A lot of people say I'm weird about Harry Potter, and that its about time the HPmania ended. But does it all end here and today? who knows...

The Busy Bee drops in every once in a while...

How awesome is being busy? perhaps as pathetic being not busy is. And this blog has borne the brunt of both extremities of my life in the past year. Thats right, I have been blogging for a year...

Its like a cycle, I realized. I get bored, i blog about being bored, about it being increasingly monotonous, and then i get busy! And then as if all of a sudden, I am too busy to enter my blog, and even if i do, too tired to actually blog... There is a lot to write about, but it is just too hard to select something to write on.

There has been so much going on in life; college has begun, and with quite a flare, i must say. And my lucky streak! The first 2 weeks of college were so eventful, its hard to believe its been only a month since it started off! My cousin moved in to town, and i discovered how close we would have actually been if he'd moved in before! And my birthday came and went by, without so much as a whisper to the kaleidoscope. It was great, we had a good time, but beyond that, whats there to write about?

Malhar work has begun, and between lectures, auditions, preparations, math classes (and a few feuds with friends here and there) life has been exhausting. Perhaps one of the reasons I am sitting here, with my laptop, very sick, instead of going to college which is so much more fun!

And then there was the day i went completely goth over my grief of Harry Potter coming to an end. It was quite emotional, and all my friends wondered if I'd fallen down and hit my head or something.

And so much more! Life is such a roller coaster ride, and right now i'm sitting all buckled up, hoping for more loops-a-hoop!

cheers =)

The nonsense that happens…

There was a guy a few decades ago, who did weird unheard of stuff to test the patience of the opponent, and did ultimately end up freeing a whole nation. He made history, and of course a few controversies, and he became an example. It made perfect sense.

Now the nonsense I’m referring to is the sense other people make of it.

A supposedly great yogi gets blamed for corruption, has a ‘satyagraha’ of over hundreds of people, and then escapes police capture feebly, dressing up as a woman. Satyagraha? Really?

The police could put an end to the ‘satyagraha’ by mere tear gas and lathi charge… is that history repeating itself, or history being slapped across the face?

And this tear gas attack is compared to the greatest massacre the country has ever seen. I mean, seriously. A massacre means people dying, not people crying!

A person fasts for a while, and states get divided, organs are formed, bonds are changed. My mom fasts every Friday. So do I get something out of it?

And of course, the whole situation gets turned into politics. This party blames that party, this minister blames that minister, and it goes on. Our country was freed and independent over 65 years ago. I’m just a teenager and I’m already bored by the nonsense that politics has now come to mean.

On a completely unrelated note, a politician starts dancing to patriotic songs, and calls it ‘freely expressing her patriotism’. What are you even supposed to say to that? Good for her maybe! But it is still an issue, and a rather ridiculous one at that.

We have a tendency to blame the world to point at every silly crap that happens and say, ‘it happens only in India’, and argue that India is much more than just that. Well, I’d take a double on that and say, ‘really? You believe that?’

What is India, other than a battleground for politicians trying to get into power, seek maximum attention? What is Mumbai, other than a city where beautiful heritages are plagued with slums and posters of one politician wishing another politician a happy birthday for mere cheap publicity? We know its more than that, but how are we going to convince the world? With all the nonsense that happens, we are very far from bringing the fact that India is a fast growing economy, a hard-working nation, a friendly, peaceful nation with rich heritage and history , to surface.

Politics is weird, because it is game where everyone is a loser, and the winner is in fact the biggest one. Where greed wears the mask of morality. Where you have to think and rethink everything, even democracy, which is the biggest hit in political science yet. Is it really working?
Frankly, I have no idea.

Down that lane...

How often do we click pictures nowadays? A lot, compared to what we used to, say, 15 years ago. And its amazing, how our digital copies and pics remain new all our life, though we keep changing, but thats not my point. I am not talking about the digital memories, which are stored on our D drives; I am talking about the real memories, collecting dust in the back of our closets, or on our lofts. And it is not very often that we care to take a little walk down that lane...

And that is great. In fact, the longer we take to revisit the memory lane, the better is the memory lane. You would'nt marvel at how you looked 15 years ago if you kept looking at the pictures every day. It takes a minute to have experiences. It takes a while for them to become memories.

So why am I bringing out my hidden memory lane suddenly? Because today I had a look at how I looked when I didn't even know what memory was. When I was a 1 year old, with my whole family doting on me.

It was fun. I looked incredibly funny and tiny. And grumpy by the looks of it. And what caught my attention from the 1 year old me, were the 16-years-ago-old-everyone-else!

Its great to see what people you now know used to be like. How my home and family once looked like, their styles, their clothes...

Did whoever invented camera know that it would once be the thing that would preserve memories forever? Probably. And it has. These sepia snaps don't just bring out the faded old colurs of time; they bring out, from the back of the closet and from the back of our minds, memories that never die:)

Maggi......and this time its yellow!

given that yellow is in fact its natural colour, i wouldn't be surprised if you weren't surprised. its just a colour after all. but what do you do when you would like to see 'yellow' dance on your tastebuds like sunlight on a river in the dawn (not that many would, but, well, i did)?

you do what i did. chop a small onion and fry it, add a bit of turmeric and a little bit of chilli powder.then add some water and put in a little bit of sweet corn. then make maggi. add a generous amout of butter, and top it all with a little squeeze of lemon. this is what it should look like, or at least this is what it looked like before i devoured it.

and here's how it tasted. not very different from the maggi you have probably tasted. a little spicier, and the corn gives it another, by large neutral, kick.and even though the pungentness of turmeric seemed to give way to the tanginess of lemon, i was glad, not much of a fan of pungentness. one of the reasons i hate raddish. the butter seemed to bring the spice level a little lower, but apart from the slight smoothness it gave, it didn't do much, seeing as my tongue is still burning. in the end its mainly a wrestle between the corn and the noodles. needless to say, both won!

heres what i could have also added; some chopped yellow bell pepper, sauteed,some baby corn, some asefoetida, and maybe some cheese. thats about it, seeing has not every yellow thing goes.

you can try it out too. here's another thing, it goes amazingly well with chai. cheers=)

GREEN, RED, YELLOW. And Maggi.

Just when I thought boredom has a limit, it got itself a new one. A completely boring Tuesday afternoon, the television has now officially turned merciless on poor collegians on holiday on a weekday by making television programmes miserable. I was lying on the couch, completely insane, and I called up mom, just to bother her at work for time-pass, she said she was busy, and that I should help myself to some maggi noodles in the cupboard. I hung up feeling flushed. Completely stale. Sick. Green…

And then comes the *twink*. ( figuratively, the light bulb above my head lit up). I sat up, walked straight to my kitchen and rummaged in the refrigerator for everything that’s green and that goes. Finally I made up my mind.

I first sautéed a whole capsicum chopped, with some garlic cloves and a green chili. Once that was done, I added 2 cups of water, and the maggi masala, and made the noodles as usual. Then I threw in some oregano herbs, some fresh coriander leaves, some pani puri masala, some chaat masala, and then, after it was done, squeezed some lemon over it.

The first mouthful of ‘green’ maggi threw in a blast of the flat yet somehow spicy taste of the capsicum. It was immediately followed by the freshness and tanginess of the lemon juice, and then came on, the mixed taste of all the herbs. And of course, the maggi taste. I could see green, I could taste green, and everything about it said green.

One eats with his eyes just as much as he eats with his mouth. So this colour concept is going to be the highlight of my blog for the rest of the vacations. Its going to be called GREEN, RED, YELLOW; following the fact that most of our food is green, red or yellow primarily. I’m going to separate each of those colours and explore the colour characteristic of taste; and experiment on the food that we usual eat.
some images:

the official pic of GREEN, RED, YEllow.

cheers:)

In a nation where no one knows that cricket is actually an insect...

India is a land of religions, of unity, of diversity, and, more importantly, of cricket. The world cups on, and the temperatures are running high; in case you think i'm mentioning the weather, you are definitely not from India!!!!

I was never really into cricket, and i suck at playing it as much! But world cup's almost driven home now, and i can't help but give in to the cricket talks, the blue clothes, the 'bleed blue' slogans; in stations, trains, Xavier's and at home! (My brother and my cousin are cricket maniacs)
And when the master blaster is about to make gis 100th International ton, Sehwag is hitting boundaries over and over again, and Yuvi and Bhajji are taking wickets like hound dogs do raw meat, how can you ever stay locked up in your room and STUDY, and miss the fun of the light blues kicking the asses of every other colour? Yes, my exams are 3 days to go!

The India v/s Pakistan match on Wednesday was the first ODI match i'd sat through from the coin toss to the last ball, 100 overs! And surprisingly I enjoyed it a hell lot. Though the 20-25 overs in between get boring, the last 10 overs are worth watching every bit. And yes, i just discovered it!

This is a nation where cricket is what people live, eat, drink, breathe and bleed. And this sport is what brings the whole country together. so I'm going to sit tight, today, for the India v/s Sri Lanka finals and root for India, no matter what the match ends up to be!
enjoy!

INDIAAAAAAAAAAAAAA INDIAAAAAAAAAAA:):)

Summer, summer time is here...

It’s time to whip out your cool tank tops, shorts, darling bumble bees, colorful scrunchies, comfy flip flops and chappals , to cool yourself down with icy lemonade before and after escaping the sanctuary of your homes; to pack your bags and escape to the beaches! Summer’s here!

Well, summer is not exactly the most favoured season in Mumbai, seeing as the sun sucks the life out of you if you are a regular commuter of the bus and railway services like me, but well, its got its own charm, right! Its is the season of sweat and back aches, but it is also the season of pure cotton and icy golas; summer crops and funky styles; of tan and , well everything that goes with it!

This is also the time of the year when you yearn water as much as you never have before. With temperatures running as high as 42°C, the sun shining mercilessly on us well, 12/7, and sweat-glands threatening to use up all the water in our body, ( I know, but it could’ve been grosser) one can do no more than run home to the refrigerator stocked up with water bottles you didn’t know existed in your homes as yet, but nevertheless thankful to the great heavens for them!

Summer is in fact, the wonderful, colorful season that makes India what it is! And ça la va sans dire, that it is an absolutely amazing time to look forward to. For overlooking all the humidity/ dryness, the dhup and the heat, is a season with a heart. Well, we sure can look forward to some citrus juices, rocking chairs, long vacations and fun, in the real sense of it, this season! Bring on the vibrant oranges, mellow yellows, peaceful greens and cool blues;

the time for no limits and some great memories, is just round the corner. Cheers =)

P.S. the title is in tune with “ Christmas, Christmas time is here” in Alvin and the chipmunks

Motorcycle lessons, fun with speed...

I grew up in a home where we owned 2 motorcycles all the time; one for my brother, one for my dad. Naturally all the travelling took place with me behind my dad or bro, with my always-short hair flying freely and my eyes fluctuating from right to left, taking in the scenery changing every second. I did not know the confinement and safety of a car for a long time, nor did i like it much when i did. My love for speed stems partly from this, and partly from my experiences behind my brother as he drove at dangerously high speeds with alarming ease. I made up my mind to learn from him and my dad, this awesome trait of flying on wheels, as soon as i could.

I started the lessons about a year ago, with my dad trying to teach me, first, the ignition, then the clutch and shifting the gear, and third, releasing the clutch. i remember how the beast used to jerk under me when i released the clutch too quickly(it still does, sometimes!) and when i finally mastered it, i used to ride the bike in my colony area, whenever dad returned home, or on Sundays. I slowly graduated to riding on the road at 11 in the night with my brother behind me, shouting instructions over the wind, sometimes rain. Then i could take it out to a little crowded area behind my home. Slowly, i could ride the motorcycle on the way from my swimming classes, again in the vicinity of my colony. My dad/ bro, always behind me, sometimes shouting urgent instructions to turn or brake, sometimes telling me to master the minutest details such as when to brake, when to keep your hold on the clutch, when to honk, how to judge the motorcycle coming from the opposite direction, sometimes scolding me over my silly lax of safety; but always in a way, boosting my confidence. And today, in fact i just returned from it, i was permitted to ride on the highway.

Of course there were too many flaws, like there are always, but the excitement couldn't die even after i returned home. The speed, as i learned through all the lessons throughout the year, is not just alarming, it is exhilarating. The feeling of accelerator turning in your palm, and the clutch changing the gear from 1-2-3-4-5; as you fly through the roads is simply superb. But i know that however self-asserting the accelerator might be, there are always the brakes reminding me to come back down to earth! I would never risk mine or anyone else's life for my fun with speed, 'cause it is not worth that high a price!

Every time i take the bike out is a whole new experience for me; sometimes learning to park, sometimes learning to use the kick-start, sometimes learning to put the double-stand on... every lesson teaches me something new; learning from my mistakes, i survive every lesson. And i really love and appreciate me dad and my brother for everything! I just hope this continues till i'm finally confident, mentally and legally, to hit the road! So far, so great:)

Before and after ' Being Done'

Something got me thinking about relief, about 'being done with'; i have felt it many times. I felt it every time i went on-stage, maybe for an elocution or for a dance competition, i felt it when i gave my last SSC exam, more so i felt it when i gave my last geography exam (that was a BIG relief, believe me!); and i felt it recently when i finally gave my economics presentation, along with my 9 teammates, which consumed more than 2 months, many headaches, many agreements, disagreements, etc. etc. There is something i feel, very peculiar about this feeling of relief...

I have found that situations that consume too much of work behind it, will give you relief when you are 'done' with it. Maybe it is because we cherish the getting over of the hardwork, and await a time of relaxation. Maybe it is because we have too many things to do, and we are relieved as and when each one gets over. I have always seen Tom and Jerry touching their forehead and waving it off, with droplets of sweat being sprayed in the air. Phew, what a relief! We are sooo 'done' with it! This is before and during 'being done'.

But i have never come across any book, or show, or cartoon that showed the emptiness after 'being done'. I experienced it after all those feelings of relief. All those blogs where i cribbed about being bored throughout summer, were just an expression of how empty my life was. Because my life revolved around those exams for a whole year, once it was over, i didn't know where it was going now! Once a job is over, it just sets your system off-balance, it's like, now just go back to being what you were before, but you can't. Things change, the biggest focus has shifted to the margin, now search for a new one!

I am writing all this because that emptiness has crept back into my focus. A few days ago, it was the project that formed the center of the universe; edit videos, make a presentation, practice presenting it, get everyone together, get through all approvals and disapprovals, and finally celebrate the anticipated freedom, the anticipated 'relief'. Don't get me wrong, i AM stuffed; i have my classes, i have my college, i have another project to submit too, but then when this thing i put all my hours into got over within half-an-hour, it sort of leaves me into a pit i dug myself, and now i have to find a way out...

Long story short, 'being done' is seriously overrated. I would never, ever want to be done with anything for a long time, because an empty feeling is tough to get away with. Also, this is when i have to deal with the daily routine (which i hate), monotony(which i hate too) and sleepiness (which i do not hate, but, come on, imagine being slurry and sleepy for 24 hours!).

Let's see what forms the next focus of my life....:/

the change...

the turn of the decade has turned the whole world i used to know around...the people i used to be close to have drifted apart, new people have now become close; my surroundings have changed, places have changed, television has changed, fast food has changed, topics to chat over fast food have changed, but more than that, i have changed...

i don't know whether its for the best or for the worse... i have become moody, these days, have taken a liking to old hindi and english songs, started wearing kurtas, earrings, chappals, have started to grow my hair, have stopped going down in the colony to play, i am usually too tired and irritable by the end of the day to speak, i just have my dinner n spend rest of the time on facebook...why, out of my 200 friends on facebook, how many do i really feel like talking to at the end of the day? hardly 2?

Change is never constant they say, and i like change... it is perfect for a person like me, but is this change in me stealing me from me? i recently read my diaries, that i wrote in my STD.10th and it felt like i was watching my younger sister from afar, it wasn't me at all!

I recently met some friends from school in my schools annual fun-fair; and everyone was like, oh my god! you have changed..." you've grown fat/ you've grown thin, Oh My God, Shruti in a kurta! seriously, Xavier's has changed you..." and the rest is about as predictable as the last moment!

I liked a link on facebook a few days back. it said ' "you've changed a lot"-" i grew up, maybe you should try it"' So true, isn't it? this change has taken a while for me to accept, but well, change is just another of the little wonders of my life:)

.an awesome end to an awesome beginning,for an awesome beginning...

This last decade has been no doubt special, with everything going around so very fast... n more so for me! when the clock struck 12 on the 1st Jan, 2011, i just glanced back on the decade and, wow! these 10 years have really done so much to my life!

First of all, these were the 10 years i spent at my school, growing up through the pencil marks on the wall, growing up through the "g's" and the "f's" on my school notebooks, growing too much for my cramped school benches;

growing up with Maggi, Cheetos, Lays, Alpenliebe; Popeye, Tom and Jerry, Richie Rich;

with long walks with grandpa whenever i fought with friends, with Amar Chita Katha in the afternoons and Tinkle Digest at night;

growing from a-b-c's to long 10-mark essays, from water-cycle
to functions of the brain;

from chit- passing from the last bench to the first, to Facebook and twitter...

from fighting with my hands to fighting with my words, from crying in front of everyone to crying all alone; from being satisfied with 2 Rs. to not being so even in 2000;

from kabaddi, pakda-pakdi and hide and seek to football and now Facebook apps!

How everything has come so far, leaving a long, long trail! how can this decade not be special? but i guess, this chapter is about to close forever, and it is time to move on to the next. sounds fun, though, cuz this is an awesome ending to an awesome beginning, for an awesome beginning. who knows, maybe 10 years on from now, i would be sitting in front of my computer in exactly the same way as now, and typing away at how life has changed again! boy, have i grown or what!

HaPPy New YEAr EvERyOne, EVerYwhErE......