All about ......

Last weekend was surprising even by my standards. I ended up watching 4 movies in 5 days. The first was "Happy Feet" - it was very enjoyable, the animation was amazing especially on the big screen. The second was "Premonition" - Sandra Bullock, it literally kept me guessing till the end. I enjoyed the movie a lot not only because it did not have a oh-the-usual ending but because at each step I could not figure out how the plot would shape up. The third was Pam's Labyrinth - also a very good movie in Spanish. It is on the heavy side, and is a very sad movie with a lot of torture that can hardly be seen by timid hearted people like me. But what gets you is how creatively the story is crafted. The last was "Dancing with wolves" - Kevin Costner, and all about red-indians and this lone american soldier who wilfully chooses a border-post for his assigned duty. 3 out of the 4 were oscar winners. And in themselves, very original and enjoyable in their own essence.

I also came across all these new songs from my yoga class..... no they are not meditation songs :). But they provide good listening pleasure all the same.
Warning: all of them are soft songs and my guess would be.... rock-fans would not like them at all.
Breathe (2 AM) - Anna Nalick
This year's love - David Gray
Just another ordinary miracle - Sarah McLachlan
Here comes the sun - Beatles
Thinking over - Dana Glover


Thats all for now, another 43 days till I leave Tucson. Meanwhile, I am missing one of my best friends - Monika's wedding in India. Little explained, little said..... there were times when we had naively planned all to attend each other's wedding, and to be there with each other through some of these life-defining moments.
Well if not in presence, then in spirit.... we are all there with you as you take this next step in your life. :)

Snapshots, sentimental drivel and philosophical non-sense

It is amazing how sometimes there are these little things....memories that get etched in life more than large or prolonged incidents that you have enjoyed and laughed or cried to.

Even in my last semester I had to take two courses, one of them being a core which leaves me with two projects that I must complete before the semester. This has started me off on coming to the department late nights (after 9 saves anytime minutes on my phone on calling safe ride - our campus shuttle service.) Day before I was so sleepy I had to tell Lopa (my partner in project) that I have to leave, only after an hour of brain-storming. Yester-night however both of us hit on the solution of Starbucks. As god is my witness (source - Gone with the wind), I can swear (sorry!!) by Starbucks. I am glad Seattle has one in every nook and corner....... and guess what I never knew..... that coffee actually makes you feel happy. No wonder they need it so much in Seattle,............ what with the weather and the job-pressure all you can be is on the brink of suicide. :)

Anyways, without drifting off, we walked down University Boulevard. (I know now that there is an University Boulevard in probably every campus in USA.) It is one of the most pleasant walks at night. Its a street lined with most of the good eateries and pubs and hangouts in the area. The trees on the pavements have lights spiralling around them giving the feel of christmas all throughout the year. There are always students hanging around in the open air spaces of the eateries, adding a constant buzz to the otherwise quiet night-air. Its beautiful, pretty and very romantic. (depends ofcourse on which eyes you see it through).
We both grabbed a cafe mocha, tall.... (I added sugar, chocolate and vanilla powder inspite of Lopa's dismissal that this did not need sugar)......... and we headed off. We walked back through the dark bylanes on campus where the springs had been turned on. The jets were spraying water all around and going a merry-go-round while they were at it. You had to literally dodge them in order to not get drenched.
But the muddy ground, now soaked, smelled exactly like that after fresh rain. And the air around was misty with the fine spray of water drops. I then remembered that this was one of my first snap-shots of Tucson. Four of us had been out on a freak midnight visit to the Udall park I think. There we had run across the water fountains and got wet. The sprays there had been reaching much higher heights and moving at faster speeds ...... which had made it literally impossible to dodge them. And then again, it being one of the warm nights, we had not wanted to escape.
Surprisingly, things changed a lot between some of us ....... there was a falling out and a on the surface make-over, and again, some of us moved off, for some of us the circumstances totally changed (and I am trying to be as vague as possible here). And its not possible that we will ever go back to that. But its amazing how there are these little things that stay on in your mind or how they come back sometimes that you get taken aback. And its amazing, how sometimes life points out the jarring headlines that you were missing that there are these small everyday things that are life. You were only too blind to see. (or too immersed in yourself to notice that life is speeding by).

There are so many times that I have thought that I have lived my life..... my best years of college and friendship are over and there is nothing more I could want from life. And this usually happens when either the motivation is lagging behind or friends or just depression seems to be overcoming you. I know for a fact that atleast a couple of my friends were on the same wavelength about having had lived the best years of their life.
And it is sometime then, that you look around and find a world ("a whole new world") you never saw before. ("Finding neverland ???") I just wish I would remember all this when I am down in the dumps..... they just don't seem strong enough to bring me out of the well then .


(P.S: This was to be expected, the more I come closer to leaving Tucson, the more sentimental drivel will keep washing up about the city which I did not try to belong to for two years, and now its trying to own me. )

Many ups few downs....

I don't think I will be able to continue with the Grand Canyon travelogue. Not bcoz it was not equally enjoyable and a hundred times worth mentioning, but that there have been so many other things in the offing that its fast fading from memory. :) Having said that, lets still give it a try.

The last time I was on a road trip, I was never in the driver's seat and all I could think of was how much fun it would be to actually drive on the curving, smooth roads that is California. Well, this time I had my wish. Karthik was indeed very sweet to take the risk of me wrecking his car which I did. I went over the road once when I was trying to reverse, which broke half of the new hub-cap on one of his tyres. I also managed to crash over a pavement on a very wild left-turn where I panicked. And yet, he let me drive on the freeway all the way from Phoenix to Tucson. :) Needless to say, the freeway was not without incident. I would have nearly rammed into a truck bcoz I was on a fast-ending lane with the truck blocking my only right exit, but thankfully as you can see I am still here, alive and writing. :)
We were late in setting off for Grand Canyon. Most of the time was to have free breakfast in the hotel and to pose for snaps. But we did finally make it around noon and just stood in awe in front of what can only be described as "grand".

Many have remarked, what of it! Its just a pile of rocks and a huge hole. Well you have to see it to know what of it. Its so majestic and at the same time so humbling. I couldn't thank my stars enough for being finally able to stand there and see it for myself. I loved it. I was just sad about having to leave it. We hiked for an hour down the Bright Angel trail, I think. The down slope was exhilarating, the up-slope was ...... phew ! very tiring. It seemed never-ending and quite steep. But it was fun. We finally made it to one of the viewing points for the sunset. Believe me, if you are ever at Grand Canyon, sunset is something you should not miss. The colors and hues of the canyon and the sky in combination, the departing sunrays, and a great friend's group amidst that is all you could ever want.

I had a rest of a day in-between before I headed off to Maryland. I could hardly have expected how great a trip it would be. I put up with Paromita di and Dipan da in their beautiful house. I could not describe the fun I had in those three days with justice. It was after a long time that I was in a complete, very quintessential bengali life. The evenings were marked by a lot of delicious bengali cuisine which so reminded me of home, and a lot of Pictionary and Taboo. It was so much of excitement, bickering, competition and enthusiasm that now probably any get-together without a game would lose its charm for me. I made a whole gang of new friends (Shouvikda, Moumitadi, Shantanuda, Arpitadi, Subratoda, Arindamda, Sneha, Kuntalda, Piyushda)and they accepted me so fast and instantly as a part of the group that I couldn't help falling in love with all of them.
And again, this was the first time, I was in a group where everybody was older or of the same age as me. Of all the times, of having been the eldest in the group and feeling more or less like a grandma, needless to say, I felt very young and the kid :). The other group that I met and befriended was Aninditadi, Debdeepda, Sabyasachi da, Baisakhi di, Gopalda and Khushi. Reading all these names here probably doesn't make sense to most of you, but I need them there if only say to a big thank you to all of them.

The saying goes, that with new friends, you should not forget the old....
I also got to catch up with Ayan and Mincy, my college-friends at Levantes in Bethesda. The name of the city itself is so quaint and old-fashioned. :) We had a good time, just catching up on who is where and doing what and touring Maryland, College Park campus. They have a lovely campus and it must be more beautiful in spring (I thought spring meant Feb-March but most of the trees were bare and it snowed while I was there).

I also got to visit Washington city. It has the most amazing architectures that I have seen in a long time and it reminds me so much of Romans, and Greeks and of my ideas of how Standford and the ivy league universities might be like.

I could not end this post without talking about the sweetest couple I have seen in a long time. Paromitadi and Dipanda went so much out of their way and did so much to ensure that I have a good time....... it was almost like being at home. They touched my life in a way that I might never be able to touch theirs. I am sure everybody who comes across them will leave feeling as special and wanted and accepted as I did. I can only wish that every relationship is touched by a little of what they share.
And I had the whole flight back, of 7 hours with stops, to feel sad about leaving the few days that I knew there or the "snapshot" as Paromita di called it. Its difficult to get back to life as I know it especially as room-mate problems are far more antagonistic now than before and I would have found it really difficult if it were not for Vishnu. But then..... there is yoga, and ball-room dancing and all the UA presents concerts and ...there is life as I know it............. even though its far-removed from the quintessential bengali life, which made me forget I was in USA.... for sometime. :)

Tale of 3 cities

Its been a long time since I have written a travelogue, mainly becoz its been a long time since I travelled. But as it happened, I got the chance to tour more than one city all at once.
The first city I visited was San Francisco - weekend of March 1-4th, for the annual CRA-W grad cohort. The conference in itself was very inspiring. You get to meet all the women in your field who have struggled through their careers and now become established. If not the round-trip to SFO,
or the stay at a five star hotel which in this instance was Westin St.Francis (right in the middle of Union Square).........meeting people from all across your field is motivating and awe-inspiring enough. One of the things I finally got done was get my name on my passport corrected. :) So I am no longer FirstName Surname (obscured because people scared me with privacy laws) where first name = FirstName Surname and last name = Blank.

But the best thing by far was making two new friends , Deepa from NCSU and Khushboo from TAMU. We met over the conference dinner and it took what 5 mins to gel .......just like that. I had been doubting myself for sometime on being actually being able to get along with people. Believe me, I couldn't have asked for two closer soul-mates. :) We had an adventure tour of the city around mid-night (to experience BART trip to Berkeley = the equivalent of metro in India). We danced to the tunes of ABBA and others at a Google hosted party (last time for me would have been college where I have had so much fun), we ordered margheritas but took two sips before settling for fruit mocktails , becoz we could not appreciate the taste, we rode the hotel elevators some dozen times until it became out of service to enjoy the view from the 32nd floor, we took pictures dil chahta hai style :). When it was time for goodbyes, all of us were equally sad to say farewell to the times together. The only smile was bcoz the conference would be shifting to Seattle next time and maybe we would be able to meet there for another rocking time.

SFO itself however did not welcome me like last time. So the entire Sunday morning I spent trying to study compilers in the hotel lobby. I did not have anybody to go around town with and thats when I realized that out of all the things that can be done alone....... touring places is not one of them. Maybe at another time I would have convinced myself otherwise,......... but then the very thought of taking the cable car and going alone to visit the water-front or Golden Gate bridge did not sound appealing at all. Nevertheless I left with happier memories than I had had in a long time.

Moving on, next stop White Mountain. The gang : Karthik, Lopa, Natasha, Swapna and myself
the cause: Road trip to Grand Canyon. Much as it seemed that the trip would almost not happen, it did and started off my spring break with a most cherished dream coming true. I did not want to leave Arizona without having seen Grand Canyon. Its like living in Kolkata all your life and never visiting the Victoria Memorial.

We started off at 7:30 a.m on Sunday, March 11th to the White Mountain, Sunrise run by the apache indians there. (The latter fact, by the way I came to know only today.) The road was amazing, there was snow around with pines and conifers sticking out, looming mountains in the distance with white snow covering them. The ski resort where we landed was just like one out of a movie with the cable cars plying up and down the slopes and people on skis and snow-boards all around us. We were beginners but that did not stop us from hiring skis to try our luck on the slopes.

Firstly, it is difficult to balance in the hard boots with two long poles attached beneath them (incase you haven't figured out I am talking about skis). Once you have lost your fear of falling, and learnt to balance and walk or slide around on the flat ground on your skis........then comes the part when you have to actually try it out on the slopes. We, brave or not, managed to get into line for the cable cars for the steepest slope. It was only when the operators saw us shaky and unable even to get on to the cable car without it stopping (like all the other skiers)...pointed us in the direction of the childrens' slope. Natasha, Swapna and Lopa after a lot of waiting and poising for the right moment, hoisted themselves on to the cable car in front of me. Lopa in the run, lost her skis however. So much for the effortless way in which everybody just stood in front of the cars as they came and just smoothly, (as if nothing could be more simple) plopped down on the seats as it started its journey up.

I took the next cable car and thankfully managed to hop on without much of an act. The cable car journeyed up the slope, with all tiny dots of skiers and snowboarders below us, jumping over the ice hills, falling down, getting up and continueing on. The difficult part seemed to be to get down from the cable car. Guess what, Natasha and group figured that they should jump. So no sooner than the cable car came close to the drop off that they jumped. Natasha fell, Lopa fell on top of her. Swapna stayed on and the cable car almost was on its way down when the operator stopped it. :) The skier next to me with his ten year old or so kid beside him, remarked how he had never seen that happen before. I was sure he would see more interesting things in a few moments. Inspite of his advice to just stand when the drop-off came and I would automatically start skiing down the slope,...... I stood up, lost my balance and fell. :) And then I couldn't stand.
I managed to push myself out of the way of the other skiers. Finally the operator came out and helped me out. I went a few micro-seconds before my feet flew up from under me and I was on my back again. Natasha was faring better, she was atleast standing. Swapna and Lopa were in the same plight as me. Swapna managed to stand , Lopa managed to slide down the slope on her back to where the others were. I could not stand. I had no idea how. :) No matter how I tried the skis did not offer any help. I finally decided to take them off, stand up and then re-wear them. Once I had managed to pull off one ski, and placed it on the snow......... guess what happened. The ski started on its own down the slope to where the others were a few feet below.
I started shouting , with one leg in a ski and the other in a sock. Natasha did try to hurl her pole out and stop it but alas! :) My ski apparently seemed to know how to ski and I didn't.
The only thought that crossed my mind then was what if it continues all the way down the slope .... I would never be able to follow it. :) Well the ski missed a turn and stopped. And I took off my other ski, hopped along in my socks on the ice and managed to grab it. I fastened both again
on to my feet. And then I stood up and fell again. This was impossible for me. Ice and I did not seem to be on the same ground. Well I did what seemed to me the best idea then. I took off the skis, held them and hobbled in my socks to the cable car drop-off. I would take the cable car back down.
To my embarrasment, I was the only one going down. Everyone coming on the up-ride stared at me and kids even managed to comment about whether I was too scared. :( Well I fared better than the others, who got on all three on one car and followed my cue. The kids did not spare calling them weepies.

Imagine my relief when I finally reached down, in front of all the kids and their parents asked the operator to stop the car and then got off. My friends followed up a few minutes behind me while I related to Karthik , our snow escapades. Then all of us noticed the children slope. It was a small-few-feet-high hill which would still have been doable, nested on the extreme right. We laughed and clicked snaps, posing as if we had accomplished a lot. Well we had, we had been on skis.... :)

Next stop Flagstaff before continueing to Grand Canyon. But I am too sleepy to write anymore. Will be continued........

What is common among the following ?

So guess already !!

Chak de chak de (Hum Tum)
Jaane woh kaise log the jinke pyar ko pyar mila..(Pyaasa)
Woh shaam kuch ajeeb thi (Khamoshi)
Mitwa (Kabhi Alvida naa kehna)

Ok please don't beat me up for this. Answer will differ from person to person and there is no logic unless you brilliantly come up with something. Its just a timepass pj !! :P

What is with people and relationships?

Till date I have seen very few people who have, once they have committed to a relationship actually been able to divide time proportionally between friends and their better halves. And everytime I see such a pair I am filled more with respect and awe. Because according to me that not only shows that the pair involved are mature enough to maintain their relationship at a certain level, and do not suffer from "I have to talk to you every minute" or "I have to spend each remaining minute of my life with you" syndromes. It also shows (to me) that the pair know how to have fun without being dependent on their other half all the time, they know how to proportion and enjoy their time among their friends as also with their bfs/gfs. It teaches me how important it is to "balance".

When I was in college, (not that I am not in one now), once somebody was seeing someone (if I may put it that way) the lesser you would get to see of them. They only wanted to share things with that one person and spend time with that one person. With all due respect, that they were in a new-found relationship or love or whatever, for heaven's sake your pair is the person you will end up spending the rest of your life with. But as far as your friends are concerned, that will never be true because your paths will diverge.

But I am being unjust here in not attributing sufficient credit to the fact that a relationship is where you feel loved and wanted and adored and respected. So it isn't surprising that you would want to spend maximum time here. What is surprising is the factor that time plays...... in your relationships, in your friendships, in your family. Everybody feels loved and wanted when you give them a little of your time ...... it increases their self-esteem that you actually consider them fun or comfortable to be with. And time for others is probably what you would not have in a relationship :).

Forgive me for my incoherent blabberings. I think its an irremediable infection.

Nature, treats, money and me

"I walked with my coat hugged tightly round me. As the snow began to fall thicker, I shoved my hands deeper into my pockets and bent down slightly to carve a way through the drift." This to the best of my knowledge are the first few lines of an essay I had written in class IV. I even remember I was sitting in the near to last benches that day. And I absolutely loved writing about such things, .......... I was a great Ruskin Bond fan (still am)! And somehow the words which captured the moods of nature seemed to me more beautiful than any other. I would like to go back to doing that. But I think there are a lot of things which have changed since then, principally ...I have grown older. :) And so it just doesn't happen anymore, that I can sit and write a laid back article on brown, autumn maple leaves ruffling under your boots..... yes yes , romantic, how boring and a plethora of adjectives. But then there is something which is a refuge for everyone ...this is it for me. And in that one of the pictures I have is of a frozen lake with frosted trees showered in white snow, standing at the edges ...and me sitting there in this red hat and muffler with a black coat :). (I think I borrowed this scene from the movie "Love story".) Maybe someday I shall live to see it too.

What is it with people and treats. Why do people go on the back-foot whenever it comes to giving a treat ? I thought that that is something that should come naturally. When you feel happy and want to spend time with someone, when you want to show someone that you really appreciate their being in your life or what they have done for you ..... you would never hesitate to give a treat. So the fact that anybody would make excuses in giving one, means that either these factors do not exist or that money matters more.

How much does your emotional quotient matter in your life ? I know IQ matters a lot...isn't it what they say quantifies your intelligence! I have a very average IQ I know, I wonder how much of EQ I have. Does it really matter to have some or is it perfectly all right to feel nothing about anybody ? Is it ok to make relationships stepping stones, and not live on one as soon as its worth is lost ? Is the amount of money that you make at the end of the day matter more ? If you were very rich, would you be happy ? And why in heaven's name do I ever ask questions when all the answers that they have are personal opinions.

Don't bother answering them , they are all questions to myself.

Sometimes and yoga and waltz

Well I am listening to "Everybody Hurts" by R.E.M ...so if thats any indication :). I am sure everybody in this world (and sorry for the generalization) fears something, dislikes something. I figured that life tends to throw more of what you dislike at you ... and the Einstein in me figured that its not that life throws more of it at you, its just that you tend to remember these more, more than the last time you smiled or the last time you laughed till tears came to your eyes.

(That reminds me, its been so long since I laughed till my stomach ached. Oh come, I am in this utterly despondent mood and I wish I could just snap out of it !)

I am not going to talk about what I fear most or dislike most or why I cry more often than not : "Why me"! But lets talk about what I have been doing new. I have been busy in Yoga and Dancing. And while yoga leaves me aching and groaning ........with muscles that I never knew existed ,writhing in pain everytime I move, at the same time there are so many things going on side by side. For one, there is a yoga class every day and each class is one of Iyengar, Power , Hatha yoga. So everyday, I get to see new people try out the yoga postures like me, some beginners who fall and get up like me. Others practised and experienced. I won't lie. I find yoga postures difficult. When I am balancing on one leg with both hands in the air, the only thing I can see are the beads of perspiration rolling down my forehead.
But did you ever know about why yoga has all these benefits. The simple trick is that, when you are doing these postures, there is no way in the world that you can think of anything else. So you are all there. So what, I am always all there!! Isn't that what you thought just now. Well think again. Even when you are reading this, there will be a million things swimming through your head, the yet to be cooked dinner, the unsolved program. Its very difficult to be all there. ... at anytime. And yoga teached you just that. Pretty neat according to me. But don't worry I am not trying to indoctrinate you or something.

Now that we are done with yoga, lets move to dancing. I watched this movie while I was in India. Richard Gere, Jennifer Lopez, and the movie name just might be "Shall we dance"! Have you ever seen the waltzes or the salsas or the tangos ? Here I think I am going out of my breadth, because I know many people engage in learning to dance. India is all alive with salsa at the moment. Each dance is beautiful .....at the same time learning to dance is a lot of fun. Its one of the things I have always wanted to do. And I loved it. Especially the waltz. There is quite something about just twirling round the room with those steps ....effortlessly. The girl with her neck carved over the man's shoulder, her hand resting gently, and off you go. Especially if your partner is good (and mine was) ......... you will be left flying as if you were a ballerina. And so goes my love story with dance ...especially the waltz. Part of my childhood was Strauss and Tom and Jerry dancing to it, :) Its a great feeling to have been in their footsteps.

Sometimes I feel that the most difficult thing in the world is to get along with people. There are such a mixed bag of emotions and its so difficult atleast for me to get the proportions and reactions right. So far , I have always shied away from being aggressive, I still do. Its more like the ostrich head in the sand kind of attitude, if you know what I mean. And thats why the start of the blog ... its therapeutic for me :).

Snow-flakes that stay on my nose and eye-lashes

Ever since I have been back in Tucson, I have either been sleeping or complaining that nothing is happening or cribbing about not being able to take lesser courses. Ofcourse, meanwhile I got to hear that it has snowed on Mt.Lemon. Considering that this might be the second time I might miss seeing snow at close quarters, I had an extra grumpy disposition. :) (I make up for it by the extra smileys in the posts.) Anyway, God thought he would send a surprise down our way and something which happens probably once in ten years happened yesterday. It snowed.
When I first heard it was snowing, I didn't believe it. It doesn't snow in the middle of a desert. But thenyou should have come out and stood on the porch and see the white drops, which could not be mistaken for water come swirling down. From far it still seemed like water drops, albeit with reduced speed. But if you put your hand out, the drops would fall softly and condense into little drops of water on your palm, without hitting it like raindrops do. They just came to rest as if on whatever they touched.
We were so excited for words that we stood in the snow, posing for pictures. It was a very thin layer ..... but the twirling snowflakes, settling down all around and sort of replaying a white christmas.....it was breath-taking.

Today morning, with a -2 degrees celsius, the whole world seemed to have been covered in a light layer of white. Thats the most beautiful part, the white roof-tops, the white car tops, the trees with white glistening on their top branches.
All in all, I guess all I can say is "Thank you".

Journey back home and holidays ...

I used to get a lot of what-do-you-do with a 30 gb video ipod. Everybody told me the video on my ipod was useless. But thats more or less what marked my coming back home. I arrived so early at the Tucson airport itself, that there was nothing to do but sit and while away nearly 2-3 hours. And all I did was sit and watch the video of "yeh jo desh hai tera ....". Believe me, nothing could have made me feel more patriotic at that point of time :) . I was extremely nostalgic. I have always liked these lets say moments when you are thrust to be alone. Watching people living their lives around you, just getting lost in your own thoughts ......... it seems like you are in this ethereal world, where everything around you is going on as usual but you have this power to just stand and stare. :)
And ofcourse , the Tucson sunset from the airport was lovely as well.

India ... I had thought it would be difficult. Maybe I had become so used to a way of life, that it would be difficult to get back into the mould here. But how can you forget a way of life of two dozen years, how can you simply stop loving it or wanting to stay away from it. The colors, sights, sounds, ...... the taxi drivers screaming and shouting at each other and at pedestrians, people crossing the road anywhere and everywhere. If I get scared sitting in the front seat while driving on US freeways, I had better close my eyes while driving on any road in Kolkata. Taxis and cars always pass by within an inch of each other and without ever a scratch. I trust I will never acquire the same level of skill.

Shopping was equally fun, I was doing reverse conversion to gain an idea of how much to spend :). Very funny indeed !! But alas, as all good things must come to an end, I have another what week or so left at home. And I soooo don't want to go back.

On a sidenote, I got interviewed on a Bengali channel for new year and how I spent the past year, what I have planned for the next. :) No they did not get a dream that I was a yet-undiscovered celebrity and come to take my interview. They simply happened to land at the very restaurant called Charcoal where we had gone for dinner on new year's eve. They telecast it at midnight on 1st Jan on tv. Whatever :) but it was nice to see myself on tv for the first and the last time in my life and start the new year with that. :)

Happy new year!!

Story-time

There was a time when I used to write these stories which inevitably ended with a heartbreak or worse still someone in the relationship getting killed. :) At this time, I felt I could capture the dynamics of a relationship pretty well. I think I have lost the touch now. Today suddenly somebody reminded me of an arbit attempt at writing while in Oracle. And I thought I would keep them on my blog just for the record. :) Sometimes reading immature writing can also be fun. So below is the attempt at the story and below that is what my colleague had responded with his version of it. Happy reading !!

THIS AND THE OTHER NIGHT

When he saw her in the party, the first thing that struck him was that it had hardly taken him a second to recognize her. Even though the last time he had seen her was probably fifteen years ago … in the college graduation party.

He watched her from where he was standing for a few more seconds. In between the interrupting and unending stream of party revelers he could see that she still had that ease of making herself comfortable in any place new. The way she caressed her drink, the way she whisked her hair as if it was really long and not just shoulder-length, her guilty childishness which in those days would have everybody falling in love with her….including him. No, she hadn’t changed.

He walked up to her and unwilling to interrupt the ongoing conversation, politely cleared his throat. She turned, and a slight frown of recognition creased her brow before a smile followed on her lips. “Anci, and fancy meeting you here” , she said warmly shaking his hand. But behind her obvious delight at seeing him, he could sense a faint trace of uneasiness.

He smiled to himself that uneasy was the last thing they had been in each other’s company in college. Being the most talked about pair, there was hardly a weekend they had not spent together. They had been so comfortable in their own company ….. and with each other. Neither his friends nor hers had ever had any doubt that this was one couple destined to be together. Then what had gone wrong … or right …

He brought himself back to the present “Got a few minutes to spare?” he asked her. “Ofcourse”, she smiled and politely excused herself from her immediate circle. As she followed him out to the verandah, carefully skirting around the now almost all intoxicated guests, she shot him a question to start off the conversation.

“So what have you been upto all these years?” the hint of uneasiness and surprisingly unfamiliarity, was back in her voice, As if she was trying to fit into a long forgotten groove.

“Not much really”, he replied with his casual air, trying to make himself audible over the blare of the loud music. “After my MBA, got a job abroad. Now settled here in California, and you?”

“I joined an art course, after working for a year. The Art Academy organized a tour of some of the most famous art galleries in the world. This is our last stop. We will be here for nearly a month before returning to India.”

He couldn’t help wondering whether she would be having any grudges against him. After all, contact had been broken off so suddenly. He had got into his MBA course, and she had somehow ceased to matter in his life. The endless telephone calls of college life had seemed more like a burden. And then…his irritation, when asked about the long gaps. Finally the intervals had stretched, until one had never quite ended.

As he looked at her, now trying to make small talk about classmates and their present careers, he felt a pang of emptiness in his life. What if…..

He had actually never proposed, and she had never tied him down. Sort of like when you know that words fall short of describing what you share. Strange that he should now feel empty without her. Maybe somewhere, she had actually mattered more to him than he had thought. Strange that seeing her after all these years should make him remember… what her absence had made him forget.

“Married?” the question was directed at him. He replied with, “What about you?” It was as if the acceptance of this one word would seal the betrayal, and each one wanted the other to go first.

“Not yet”, she replied, turning her face away to the city lights, and leaning further out, over the railing.

“But isn’t it already pretty late for you…you must be what ..around thirty five” and then immediately stopped himself. He colored at his words, which he had flung out without even thinking.

She smiled wryly back at him “You are not supposed to ask a girl’s age, didn’t you know!!…. You are still the college student I remember, not changed a bit”, her eyes twinkled but they were misting with memories….he couldn’t say whether painful or not.

He tried to change the topic, “My parents are in India and they keep writing to me to come back, but my wife will not hear of it. Actually once you get used ….”

“Oh…so when did you get married?” her face was again turned away. There was a pause.

He turned to face her and said “About two years ago, she studied in the same MBA institute and …”

“Ofcourse”, she said now turning to face him as well, and smiling as if the pieces had just clicked.

“Its not like you think….Smita”, he said suddenly, defensively. “It was an arranged marriage”.

She didn’t reply for quite sometime. He, exasperated with himself for his outburst, emptied his drink in a single gulp and stared at the other corner of the verandah, as far away from her as possible. The party was still on in full swing and he could see through the open windows the dancing couplets, in each other’s arms.

“You know Anci, many a times in life a relationship doesn’t work out. It doesn’t matter that it didn’t work out. What matters is whether you are hiding from the fact that there was no commitment. Anyway it doesn’t matter, harboring hurt never brought anyone happiness and….”

Her words trailed off in mid-sentence as he felt a nudge at his arm and looking back saw his wife.

“Its pretty late,I think we should be leaving”, his wife whispered to him in a very audible voice.

“Smita… my wife”, he introduced them, pointing at each other in turn.

“Nice to meet you”, Smita shook her hand, “and all the best to both of you”. She raised her glass as if proposing a drink, then turned and slowly walked back to the room to join her friends. Anci stared after her for a few seconds, before turning to his wife. He remembered it had been a party like this in his final MBA year… when he had proposed to his wife.

And I thought …

Is it she? Yes its her… its been such a long time, years I should say, but a flash of hers in front of me was enough to dilute the years. Suddenly the dull party seems different, and in a queer way, so familiar to the college graduation party… probably because that’s where I saw her last.

I couldn’t help looking at her with undivided attention, didn’t realise how long I had been watching her… my spell got broken by the sudden announcement made by the host. I guess it was about the host’s engagement, but my mind was not into the party, instead it was experiencing flashes of the past, about her, her eyes, her hair, her hands, her palm, the back of her palm, her slender fingers, her flowing robes … I said to myself – “she must have changed by now”. I drifted into doing something, which I used to do so often in the graduation phase of my life… our lives. I remember the first time I noticed her, it was a warm sunny day and a sleep inducing class in progress. The teacher happened to ask a question to the class, I was anyway oblivious to it … till I heard a voice answer it. It wasn’t the sweetest of voice, neither was it jarring enough to wake me from my slumber, but there was something distinct, something which made my head turn, probably it was the way she spoke… that’s when I first observed her. And didn’t realize how and when I slipped into a habit of observing her. Of course it wasn’t as if I was staring at her all the time, nobody would had even figured out that I used to ‘observe’ anything except the books of Physics. But I soon mastered the art of observing, and I would often notice subtle things about her, the way she waved her hand when she spoke, the way she would remove the hair falling on her face, the floral patterns on the handkerchief clutched in her hand, the way she tilted her head when she wrote, the way she would hold the pen, the way she would respond when called by name, the way she would place her bag when she would sit, the way she looked at her answer scripts after the exams, the way she would sometimes look out of the window to see the lush lawns outside, the way she would hold a test tube in the chemistry lab, the way she would drink water from the cooler, and of course, the way she would smile back when someone smiled at her.

I was again observing her at a distance, this time, I wasn’t observing in the same sense, I was trying to figure out the extent of change in her. There she was, at ease, cheerful and cherubic, sporting a smile every few moments. Has she changed?

I was in deep thought, then I decided to walk up to her. I stood just a few feet away from the group, unable to decide what to say – should I call out her name? It’s been years my lips have spelt out her name, and I felt lightening struck. It used to be the word I loved the most, her name that is. It used to be a pleasure to say it out, and here I am, years down the line, with a lump in my throat and all knotted up. I have a feeling that god couldn’t see my plight any more, and made her turn. “Oh Hi ____, where have you been!?”, she gushed. I was strangely comatose, and she had to literally take up my hand for a customary handshake. I had started feeling a bit conscious….of what? of the past? of her? And I could sense it in her too … I had always been able to comprehend what she is thinking, how she is feeling. Don’t know how, maybe cause I observed her so much, it was second nature to me to read her mind.

I tried to smile, putting up a fake one. And I knew, that she knew, I was trying to fake it. She used to often tease me of being pathetic at bluff. I guess more than me, it was she who could read my mind. I tried to say something, but couldn’t decide what to say, stark contrast from the days, when we used to talk of everything under the sun. Hours used to pass, without the conversation showing any signs of drying up. She could sense the uneasiness, and said – ‘isn’t it beautiful out there’ pointing towards the lush lawns, under the twinkling sky. I looked at her, and we moved away from the crowd. No words required, a single glance said what we were thinking, a glance is all we required to know that both of us wanted to step away from the crowd… some things never change.

“So what have you been upto all these years?” she said trying to break the ice which seemed to have set between the couple who were known to be the firebrand couple of the batch.

“Not much really”, I replied with a casual air, but unable to talk eye to eye. “After my doctorate, got a job abroad. Now settled here in California, and you?”

“I joined an art course, after working for a year. The Art Academy organized a tour of some of the most famous art galleries in the world. This is our last stop. We will be here for nearly a month before returning to India.”

I couldn’t help wondering whether she would be having any grudges against me. After what all happened … or rather didn’t happen. Wonder what she must have thought about me while I went ahead to pursue a doctorate in the states. The phone call marathons of the college days had dwindled to calls of a few minutes, leading to frequent bickering about it. Slowly, but steadily, the distance took a toll. I felt she was no longer with me, and I think she felt the same. Ironic, that both should feel that the other has changed, while neither has … the ironies of life.

We were talking about our classmates, where they were, who all had got married, how many kids they have … but I wasn’t quite in the conversation. I was thinking. I was known to be a thinker among those who knew me – a thinker who thinks about so many things, always has so many things to talk about, is more of an analyst, an intellectual. I was thinking. But this time, it was my life which was flashing past me again and again. And a question hounded me, hitting me hard, and I groped to answer it – “how did I lose her… how could I?”

I had never proposed to her. Neither did she. We didn’t need to, did we? Anyone and everyone who saw us together, would always compliment us as a couple. It was something which was there in the aura around us. We complimented. Completely. And although never let out in words, we knew it whenever we looked into each other’s eyes. It was probably the biggest mistakes I committed, we committed, that we never spoke out the true feelings. Although on one hand, you both know and feel it, but sometimes it is essential to spell it out. After graduation, I got an offer to pursue doctoral study across the far seas. Although I was known to be very professional minded among friends, deep inside me what bothered me was a perennial question - “what about us?”

We were sitting in a restaurant, with the offer letter in her hand. She looked at it many times, then smiled back to me and said – “this is wonderful, you must take up this opportunity” I simply nodded my head. A bit later, she smiled again, and said – “and keep in touch”. I nodded again. Nobody said anything else. I wish I had. I wish … she had.

“Married?” the question was directed at me. I knew it was coming, sooner or later. And to be brutally honest, I was dying to ask the same. “What about you?”, I said.

“Not yet”, she replied, turning her face away to the city lights, and looking further away, at the fountain. For a moment, I felt she was hesitant to face me. And then, when she turned to look at me, I turned my face away. Imagine, two people who used to spend hours looking at each other couldn’t face each other … ironies of life.

“But isn’t it already pretty late for you…you must be what ..around thirty five” I blurted out. I tried to search for some words to say, but my quick wit evaporated in no time.

She smiled wryly back at me “You are not supposed to ask a girl’s age, didn’t you know!!…. You are still the college student I remember, not changed a bit”, and landed a pat on my arm. Sometimes little things can bring in a whirlpool of thoughts. Earlier in college days, I used to tease her for being a month elder to me. And every time I pulled her leg about it, she used to retort back by saying “u r not supposed to know my age” and start hitting me playfully on my arm. Some habits never change ….

I tried to change the topic - “My parents are in India and they keep writing to me to come back, but my wife will not hear of it. Actually once you get used ….”

“Oh…so when did you get married?” her face was again turned away.

There was a pause. When she looked back at me, I said “About two years ago, we were in the same institute and …”

“Ofcourse”, she said, smiling as if the pieces had just clicked.

I didn’t know what to say, my mind was thinking too much in too less a time. I was trying to figure out what she must be thinking right now. Is she sad? is she feeling betrayed? Is her smile real? Probably for the first time, I felt a fakeness in her smile …

“Its not like you think….”, I said suddenly, defensively. “It was an arranged marriage”.

She didn’t reply for quite sometime. I didn’t know where to look at. I felt as if an eerie silence had engulfed me. I tried to look towards the party hall, and saw a couple looking deeply into each others eyes. I stood still for a moment, and then forced myself to look away. I managed a glance at her, she was looking towards the horizon … maybe looking at the stars … which seem to be so close… yet so far.

“You know, many a times in life a relationship doesn’t work out. It doesn’t matter that it didn’t work out. What matters is whether you are hiding from the fact that there was no commitment. Anyway it doesn’t matter, harboring hurt never brought anyone happiness and….” Her words trailed off in mid-sentence. ‘Hiding from the fact that there was no commitment’ echoed inside me. For a moment, I felt as the person who has shied away from commitment I felt hollow from within. I was engulfed in random thoughts when I suddenly felt a nudge at my arm, and looking back saw my wife.

“Its pretty late, I think we should be leaving”, she whispered to me. I always bend down whenever she whispers to me, but somehow I didn’t do it this time. While she spoke, I just kept looking at her blankly. Stared at her, trying to recognize my own wife. Then I suddenly blurted out - “____ … my wife”

“Nice to meet you”, she shook her hand, “and all the best to both of you”. She raised her glass as if proposing a drink, then turned and slowly walked back to the room to join her friends. I kept looking at her walk away for a few seconds, before turning to my wife.

I looked at my wife for a few moments. It was in my second year into my doctoral studies when I met her. My move to the states – I don’t even know whether it helped me or destroyed me – was well appreciated by my parents and relatives. It was supposed to be the stepping stone to a booming career. It was to be the foundation of the rest of my life. Everyone was happy, my parents and relatives, my friends, everyone – except a couple of souls. The distance was taking a toll. It was becoming increasingly difficult to be the same old self. I could feel it, I could see it – I could see myself slowly drifting more and more towards work. Work became a way of life, labs became my home. I started exhausting myself to such an extent, that all I did was work and sleep. I could feel myself drifting away from everything, and looking around, I saw work as the only saviour. I didn’t even realize, that I had lost many more things apart from my sleep – my sense of humour (which is probably the first of things which attracted her to me) had dried up, thanks to the battering I had faced in the hands of the ironies in my life. Life had become colorless and clumsy, it was like a slow moving tortoise, who doesn’t care whats happening around, all it does is doodle at its own pace, and retract into its shell from time to time.

I woke up from my slumber on hearing a female voice, probably arguing with someone. My first reaction was of irritation, but as I turned around to say something, maybe something harsh, I saw a young lady, clad in specs, books in hand, looking at me in a strange way. It was only a few moments later that I realized why she was staring at me – I was nothing more than a haggard face, unshaven for days, who had dozed off on the keyboard in the early hours of the day, after a night long stint. Not to mention about my dressing sense, which I seemed to have left back in my mother land. I had seen many students come and go after a stint in the lab, often leaving with a forgettable impression about me as someone who keeps up to himself. I didn’t expect a different behaviour from her either. She came across as a warm person. And she had an inquisitive streak in her. Her inquisitive nature drew me into talking to her about varying things, from research topics to as diverse as the latest fashion trends in Milan. What struck me the most, was the astonishment similarity between her and ____ . I couldn’t help take a liking to her, more so cause whenever she was around, it reminded me of _____. I suddenly found myself in a different world, I started seeing ____ in her. But then, every time I saw a glimpse of ___ in her, it also reminded me of how things had fallen apart… or rather, how and why neither ____ nor I tried to hold on. I was on a road of a bitter-sweet journey, where every few moments, I would bump into landmarks, which reminded me of the past. Its hard to explain, to have someone besides you, who reminds you of someone endearing from the past. One moment I felt that ___ was with me again, a few moments later, I tried hard to get touch ground, get real.

I look around, trying to spot her in the party crowd. It is the graduation party, myself being one of them receiving the doctoral degree. Didn’t even realize how the past couple of years passed by. Probably cause I had her with me all the time, she, in whom I had seen an image of ____. I saw her from a distance, she looked at me and smiled. I reciprocated. It has been 2 years since I met her, and we share a very special bond. I owe a lot to her, in fact, I should say - she resurrected me. Standing there, on the graduation day, I felt a strange expecting look in her eyes. Does she expect me to … but I don’t think I can, I am so stuck up, with a feet in my past and another feet dangling somewhere in the present. I kept talking to her for a while, when she suddenly said – “what do u expect in life?” I was a bit taken aback at the sudden philosophical question I was facing. I let out a sigh. She looked at me with childlike curiosity, while I tried to look away, unable to decide what to say. I think she could sense what I was thinking. After a long pause, she spoke up again – ‘are you going to settle down in California?’

I knew the time had come to take a decision. I couldn’t leave everything hanging in mid air, I couldn’t face her imploring eyes any more … she seemed to be perplexed, cause I never gave a response when it came to the future, and now it was the graduation day. ‘What about you?’, I said, trying to avoid answering the question. She looked at me, I expected her to say something… but she kept looking at me. After a few moments, which seemed to be ages, she said something unexpected. ‘Don’t you know why I asked you?’, she asked. I looked at her, into her eyes, which were a touch misty, and suddenly felt a searing danger of losing her to time and distance, just the way I had lost ____. I decided not to lose it all again.

I looked at ____ walk away, while my wife stood besides me, holding on to my hand. I remember it was been a party like this on the graduation day of my doctoral study … when I had proposed to her.

Life happens...

I have two final exams in line and yet I cannot let this just pass without writing about it. Life happens.......and is happening all around me in so many myriad forms that I cannot help but stand and stare at it for sometime.

I don't know if it is true for everyone, so maybe I should write about it as from my perspective. But time and time again I have always got confirmation that the situation I am in or the feelings that I have or the thoughts crowding around my head ..... have been felt by others, have been thought by others, have been experienced by others....(those others by the way are called friends)... and in that confirmation I can make a generalisation.

Every girl or guy for that matter always dreams of that someone special in their life. That just one person who is so much like you but yet so much different that you want to spend the rest of your life with that person. What is amazing is how it gets manifested differently through different ages.

I remember when I was in school, it was such a big deal to have a boyfriend. It was something which caused your friends envy, made you a very talked about item and just the fact that you have a boyfriend gave you so much more importance. I don't think that any of us had the maturity at that time to understand even what the word "relationship" stands for. But I am sure that even having a sense of one was enough to make a whole world of difference.

Come college, you were much more grown up and a boy friend just for the sake of showing off did not make any sense anymore. You knew it was more than that, that it was a commitment and yet I know many of us who went into it just for the fun of it. I have seen very few college relationships actually go the whole way, but when they have they really are something remarkable.

Ofcourse, by then among us who are still searching or not searching and just waiting for life to happen, there are a lot of crushes, flirtations but somehow none of them stand the test of time or of the heart. You are left lonely yet again and still searching.

Professional life, and there is so much of time that you get to spend with people and get to know them better that this is probably where most of us commit finally. Ofcourse time plays a major hand in it, but also the fact that we have independence financially, able to sustain and maintain a life of our own.

However for me there is another phase of life which happened. University. Its a very different stage of your life (as are all the rest) in the fact that you have reached a level of maturity, where you know what you want from life, what your goals are, what your constraints are and you know the kind of person you want to spend the rest of your life with. But then since when did life happen on your terms. Even then, life springs such an array of surprises I never thought possible. Among the marriages of old collegemates, both arranged and love, I still see new relationships developing. New people falling in love and rediscovering themselves and I am so awed by the relationship that is love . I don't think there is anything that can be as sublime as the feeling of love. It makes you rise and yet you "fall" :). It is so many things, that it is difficult to put it into words. But time and time again that I have seen it happen I have been awed. Not everyone is lucky to find love or live the rest of their lives with the person they love, or maybe for many it happens at some point, but not at the right one. Its not as easy as it sounds, its not something which happens without its own demands, or that there aren't any compromises involved. But in itself...... it is so complete.

Hence, life happens........
I am still wondering what the point of the entire writeup is but anyways......sometimes yo uwrite just for the heck of it :)

title-less

Good that I named my blog "writers block". So nobody can blame me for not being on board.... for god knows for how long I havent even thought of writing. Even now I dont think I have anything to write about....... this semester has been only a roller-coaster ride of assignments and projects and mid-terms and messing each one up. But I know I want to write and for the time being and to fill the space up :) - this reason should suffice.

I had always thought I was not meant for computer science. After XIIth, "people" all around me had opinions like how engineering or medical were the only careers to be in. Even in that, one should take engineering bcoz you wont have to work too much and whatever you have studied in XI-XII should be enough to see you through. You can call me lazy-bones or whatever but I followed "peoples'" opinions letter for letter. The thought of not having to work too much was so enticing. Ended up taking something I didnt know about (I have never had had computer courses even in school) but according to people was the in-thing to be in, with less work and lots of money. Whole of my engineering life, thats all I have done. Frittered away my time. Grades in exams more or less came easy even after not listening in class. So I somehow never took interest in the subjects. Programming never seemed to work for me, and true to my "less-work" nature I managed most of the programs by ftp. :) (And for the record, shall we restrict that bit of information only till here.) I should have atleast found out how the programs worked, but as long as they ran when I had to show the output, I didn't care. Don't start about girls getting away with all this bcoz there were a good number of guys too who did the same.

I should have known life always gets even with you. Master's hit me full in the face. After a year of only pl/sql programming in Oracle, and having lost touch with even the little programming that I knew in college, I was totally drowning in my first semester. There must have been some rescue ship smwhr that I have managed to make it to the third semester. :) But it really took me a year - 1. to settle down and like the place 2. to love the subject that I had taken by choice but never understood.
There were so many details that make computer science interesting and alive. I first came to learn how young it was. :) (sorry for being such a romantic, but thats how I connect with things), I came to know that while I was being born what was happening in the field. That there were new languages and discoveries springing up in my subject even as I was uttering my first words.
People here know it like the back of their hand bcoz they have been through it. They have worked on the first mainframes and seen the first personal computers take the world by storm.
They have worked side by side with students, many of whom have gone on to make the next discoveries and I am part of that world as long as I am in academia.

Had I been given a choice when I was in XIIth I might probably have chosen english honors. I might have loved it or shirked it when I found the load of learning Chaucer and Shakespeare and Tennyson. But I have grown up loving books and I hardly think I would have not loved any of it.
That however will always be one of those I could have been ..........

I watched a spate of movies in between all this and I loved all of them except ahista ahista, either bcoz of assignment hangovers, or bcoz I was plain just taking time off from studies. Bas ek pal, kabhi alvida naa kehna, dor, lage raho munnabhai, don, ahista ahista....................... most of them were about relationships and hence were very close to my heart. Don was a little off beat and plus I missed the real twist , so I didnt end up liking it.

(On re-reading the entire post, it seems like the spluttering of a car which is reluctant to start, I think I have lost touch completely with writing, and it will take a lot of time and work to get back :).)

Leaving ... is difficult

I shouldn't ever look at College snaps..... I just have to start once and there's no end to all sentiments that come rushing in. Interestingly enough , and I know everyone who has tasted college life would say this..... How come I cursed it so much when I was actually there. Now the roads, canteens, everything seems so close to heart ....from thousands of miles away.
So I am at a college/university/school now too. How come its so different! Or is it that places leave their flavor only after you have left them and gone ! I Have always talked about how hot Tucson is ..... well that other day , while in the cat tran shuttle, it had rained ...... there was the smell of dried mud soaking in the rain, and Tucson looked beautiful. So much so, that I actually felt bad that I was going to leave it in a year. For all these days, all I have ever said is when am I going to leave Tucson.
Guess all I want is to hold on to something familiar, and when the time comes to change ...I resist with all my might. I loved Seattle, no doubt, and I should be happy to be going back there. At a point of time the crowded streets, too many people of Seattle used to remind me of home. Now I think I am kind of getting used to the empty Tucson roads, the hardly meeting any people when you walk to the university, the soaring Catalinas in the north and their play of shadows with the sun...... :)
So typically me ! Just when the time to leave Tucson is drawing near, I feel I will really miss it.

I seem to be living from assignment to assignment these days. The course load has exploded and all I can keep in mind is when the next assignment is due. Its fun ... sometimes not my kind but. I like the kind of fun which comes with less work. And I am sure the sentences are making lesser and lesser sense, I am not a good stay-awake-after-sleeping-only-4 hours kind of person.

So cheers Tucson ! and adieus !

Tongue tied - brain tied - whatever....

I have always been tongue-tied for as long as I can remember. There have been so many times when I have been asked the time, and all I can do is stare blankly at my watch trying to figure out what on earth the position of the two hands on the watch could mean. Or even worse, I would offset the time by an hour and people would respond that that's not possible. Then I would mutter an-under-my-breath apology and hurry away. Its always been like this - I wonder what it is between me and sudden questions. I can never get my brain to react fast enough. I might as well mutter something like "blargh" and that would make more sense than when I do try to speak coherent words.
Thats not the only thing, ask me the name of a person I meet practically everyday suddenly, or a birthday ........ I go completely blank. I think the key word is "sudden". Me and sudden dont go together ... I must have an extremely lazy brain, lazier than me.
Here, people are usually very polite and generally greet you with a "Hi, how are you? " or "How are you doing?" Initially I found it easier to smile than muster up an answer from the depths of my unresponding brain. Then I had this answer of "Good, how are you ?" sort of taped in to my brain so I could respond without thinking.
So guess what happens, a passing fellow asks me "Whats up ? " and all I can reply is "Good" and then due to some dull quick thinking manage to change the second half of my answer to "How are.....is it going for you ?"
I don't think I will ever change or rather my slow responding brain will ever change. !!!

To my brother.......(I have tried to avoid being sentimental)

The first little living thing that was mine, after my birds was my baby brother. Baby , because we had an age difference of 8 years but then it never quite turned out that, the age difference inspired him to call me "didi" or pay me respect. Rather it turned out to be the other way round. :)

So when my brother was born, I was just eight. And most of the sentiments echoed here are those of an eight year old girl which I am trying to jot down as I remember. I have never really written this down before, its always been those memories too dear to be penned down and yet can never be forgotten bcoz they are so much a part of you.

I had always wanted a younger sister when I was young. So when my mother told me that I was going to have a sibling, I had made up my mind that "it" would be a baby sister. I was so looking forward to the day when I would have my new play-mate. I could not keep my smiles hidden.
My brother was born at 1:00 a.m in the night, in Woodlands hospital, Calcutta on September 12th, 1989. I have a vague recollection of my parents leaving at night. And the next day morning my father telling me that I had a little brother. I was very happy to have a new playmate but I won't deny that my enthusiasm was a little dampened when I heard I had a little brother.

The first time I saw him, he was wrapped tight in a white cloth and placed among a score of other similiar babies. I don't even know if I had correctly pinpointed him when Baba showed him to me. He immediately also added "he has jaundice".

My brother was born with jaundice which is not an uncommon affliction in newly borns. But he was also born with a conflicting blood group to my mother's 0+. I don't know what the complications were but they started blood transfusions on him, they were drawing out his blood and pouring in my father's B+ blood group. Ok, if ithis doesn't sound correct, this is what I could make myself understand then.

I didn't know what all this meant, to me the gravity of the situation never struck. Every evening when my father drove me and other aunties and uncles to the hospital, all I would see was everybody's face going graver and graver. Those one hour visiting times with my mother on a white hospital bed, seemed so short a time to talk to her. And with everybody crowding around her, I would never even get a moment with her alone to tell her that I was miserable alone at home. Nothing went correctly without her, my food was not given at the correct time, everyone was telling me what to do. When would she be back. How my brother was, was one of the last thoughts on my mind. I think it was somewhere around the hospital room that I found a little notepad, the kind they give in hotels, and that is probably when my writing career as I know it ;) , started. Everyday that I visited her I would leave little notes of how much I missed her, asking her the same question of when she would be back, poems about things I don't even remember now.

Sometimes I would hear the grownups conversing among themselves, saying leave it to God. And also an unending babble of advice to my mom, my dad. What was most surprising to me was, there would be people and friends breaking down and my mother comforting them.
There were people who had been to Tirupathi and came back with flowers and prayers for my brother. Nuns from my school went to bless him and pray for him. When we waited in the lobby, my father would sometimes introduce me to other uncles and say he has been giving blood for your little brother since morning.
Every day in class my class teacher would ask me how my brother was doing and whether I knew anything. I would say with authority that I had overheard my father say "billirubin is 3".
I had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. The only thing I did see was my teachers shaking their heads in anxiety.
The next thing that happened was my mother was released from hospital. I was overjoyed, even though the hospital with its white beds and air-conditioning and nurses and doctors in spotless white uniforms had left an indelible impression on me. My brother still was critical.
I remember this one particular evening when we went to visit him. He was being fed by a nurse who then cradled him on her shoulder immediately and everything that he had eaten so far he started vomitting. Woodlands had these strict rules of not allowing us in to touch the baby and we could only see him through the glass. That scene I will never forget, of my little brother upturned on a nurse's shoulder who was not even noticing while he vomitted everything. His little black eyes were wide with fear and ofcourse they still had him tightly wrapped in that white cloth, which made it seem as if the baby was not even able to breathe. That was when I guess my mom decided to have him moved to another hospital.
The next hospital was nowhere so sophisticated as Woodlands. When I first saw my brother I was in tears. His entire bottom half of the body had developed rashes becoz of being tightly wrapped in those cloths at Woodlands and which we had never even been made aware of. He had developed green diarrhoea. Now as he lay there on an open cot under a ceiling fan, he looked like a stick on "knathas" as we call them.
That was however not the end. From there he was shifted to another hospital so that we could have him treated by a better doctor.

The next thing I remember was one day coming home from school, and finding my father trying to mend this cradle. My brother was finally going to come home.
The next few growing years of his were awesome for me. When I first held those tight closed fists or tried to open them and have them close over my finger, my joy knew no bounds. I remember how when my friends first came and asked my mom whether they could take him on their laps I was so jealous. Jealousy was not something I understood them. All I knew was, he is mine and why should others love him or get to cradle him. I loved having him on my back and patting him to make him burp, I loved the tiny hands of his and the mischeivous smile. The first words he started saying was "ba-ba " bcoz thats how we would always commend him when he ate up his meal. He would sit on the table, a little bib tucked beneath his chin, cerelac or whatever gooey lunch he was having dripping from his face. He had a chuckle of a laugh and learnt quickly to play "tuki" or hide-and-seek with me. He is one of my most precious gifts and I don't think I will ever be able to thank God enough for him.
Ofcourse he never called me didi, he always assumed himself to be the more maturer and I always let him think so, he had a better judgement, a stabler mind and even in the thin frame of his could pack a punch or pull my hair so tightly that I would have tears in my eyes. I would always retaliate in full strength and send him spinning across the room, then we would both be bawling. Sometimes I wish he had been the older. Bcoz rather than be an example to him and make him grow up sooner, I became a kid with him. I even competed with him at Cerelac, I loved the brand that he loved. And so there were always two tins which were bought from the groceries.
Things haven't changed at all, if he starts a fight today I will still fight him back. I agree I respect his decisions much more, from my camera to ipod , everything was chosen by him. Ofcourse his demands are still preposterous, "why don't I work at Microsoft, then he could have the xbox for free". "How dare I call my dog my dog bcoz I was never there to look after him and he has to take him out every evening".
Today morning he said "How come you never write about me". In the afternoon, I dreamt of holding him as a kid on my back and remembered how we played pillow fights and turned somersaults which he was always so bad at. Everybody with a younger older sibling would probably have similiar experiences and fond memories to return to. Its just that I never thought about them at length so much before or rather dwelt on them. Today I am suddenly very nostalgic for that sweet little baby brother and me being 8 years old. This might be true for everyone, but to this day, to me, my baby brother as I saw him in the cradle and while chuckling and while crawling on the ground, is the sweetest little baby to me.
And this I dedicate to a 17 year old gawky teenage-brother , nearly a good five inches taller than me who has been gloating/harping on that ever since he became just a centimeter taller .......

Frozen

At first it was I won't blog, its just a means of drawing attention to yourself. Why would you want to share your life with other people. Next it was, oh what the heck, maybe I should maintain an online diary that will reduce my one to one emails of writing the same stuff over and over to different friends. I would restrict the diary (read blog) to only my friends , after all a url like 21writersblock is not an easy one to guess. Then it was, wow there are people actually reading my blog, people who don't know me or have just started knowing me. And now it is, my blog , a forum for thoughts and ideas and just mumbo jumbo about what I think ........ which to me are in no way mature or profound, but just that when I read them later after a month or two or when I am down, they sort of bring back a moment in time and a smile on my face - and I think "wow! did I ever think that way". Sort of like writing about your first crush in your diary and coming back to it years later and thinking ...... could I have really had a crush on this guy!
Its the same way with photos, when you see that picture with people frozen in action, some smirking, some having fun , some trying to make horns on your head, its so much a part of time that is frozen. That mood, that crowd, that feeling .... they immediately bring back a few more memories, of what we did before and after that photo was taken. Of the jokes that were cracked , of the moments that were shared and lived together. From then till now, there must have been so many incidents that might have changed you. Experiences as they call it, made you more mature, more ready to face life. But tell me if you would never wish to go back to that moment in the photo, which is frozen, given a chance. There are so many times I have looked at a photo, at an unknown face in the photo or someone I don't recall or someone I had met just once, and I can't help thinking : how did life treat them , what are they doing now ?
There are so many times I have seen a photo of a friend, seen the carefree smile on her face, and then turned to look back at a smile which is more knowing now, and not as much carefree.

Wishful thinking, but when you don't feel like working and you have an assignment due in two hours, this is where I guess your mind escapes to.

Knick Knacks

An ok day, except that I went through it as if I had just got out of bed on the wrong side. I remember reading the same expression in a Noddy book. Somehow that day would go all wrong for him, for starters the bell on his hat stopped ringing. Good old days, - childhood :) I remember I used to go to school in a chartered bus called Raja Service. We somehow had never thought of asking who is Raja. Anyway, today was not a bad day just that my mood was bad.

What scares me is this, and I am sure I caught this from Monika, I have started talking to myself. (Yes, yes just one more sign of madness) I will be walking along thinking about my stupidity in some random incident and exclaim out aloud. I am sure I get quite a few stares but I choose to hurry on as fast as I can, looking down and avoiding all eyes.

A rainbow over the Catalina mountains on the north side of Tucson reminded me of a song as I was walking back. I don't know why , rainbows can never fail to awe you. So it happened that after a long time, I was humming Sunshine on my shoulders. Its a beautiful song by John Denver. When I was small/young (both mean the same thing now - ages ago :) ) there was a beautiful ad which came on doordarshan and this song was played in the background. The best lines would have to be:
" If I had a wish I could wish for you, I'd make a wish for sunshine all the while."
What is most beautiful about those lines is wanting to make a wish for someone else but I guess I needn't have said that.

Back to my bookstore

I was back at Arizona bookstore today after days. I was hoping to find some book that would interest me. I usually need a book which grabs my attention fast, is usually about people, relationships and I am happy. When I entered the store I had no idea what I was going to pick up, so I made my way to the only section which interests me. Fiction. Maybe if you have guessed so far you will be able to guess the book I picked up too......but thats a far cry.
I started alphabetically and stopped at C. Yup, Mistress of Spices, by Chitra Divakaruni. The book caught my attention and I am 20 pages down. So I will not venture a review yet. I had read Rana Dasgupta's book for which he won a prize and the name of which is completely eluding me now. (Its some Plane to Tokyo or something) Though it started great, all the literary analogies had me in a whirlwind for a day or two. I think that book had the longest hangover on me becoz I could not digest everything in his stories or his writing.
I saw Yun hota to kaisa hota yesterday, thanks to Niyanta for having downloaded it. Its a good movie, different, and I think more striking if you have been through part of the process. The whole hype about coming to USA, the visa process, the plane journey..... I am homesick, waiting to get back home I guess. For someone who was known to run home at the slightest opportunity from Trichy, I think I have outstayed long enough from home.

Losing interest

I never had to try to write. Whenever I would sit down, there were a zillion things I wanted to talk about. I guess something has changed. Now even when I sit down to write, all I end up doing is analyzing my thought process. :) Which even to me is very boring , leave alone all those who persevere to wade through it.
When I had written that Seattle took away something on one hand, I don't think I put it in strong enough words. It took away the very foundation of my belief in relationships. I tried so hard to grasp on to something that I guess I had to let go of it all. Coming to terms with that, rather learning to accept has been the hardest thing in my life. The good thing ofcourse is, you know nothing can hit you harder. So I think my everyday pangs of worrying, fretting, anxiety have visibly reduced. Everyday is a great new day now because nothing that could happen could hit me as hard as the truck that already did.
And somewhere some part of me is dead, because what I believe in no longer exists.
We were having this discussion the other day about how, to everyone their worries seem the hardest and most important in the world. I am no exception, I have so often tried to rationalise with myself that there might be worse things in life, I just can't end up convincing myself.
Oh ...I think I am plunging too much into me myself again :) (seems kind of contradictory seeing that the entire blog is about that.)
I think I read this saying somewhere "Hope is the quintessential essence of man." So hoping, maybe I will start believing again in what I thought was once true.