Yellowknife!!

All I have on my mind these days is yellowknife.

I am going there. I don't know why.

I cannot remember since when I have wanted to go there. I have never known why.

Just that the name attracts me. Something about the name sounds so romantic and forlorn that I just have to go and see it for myself.

It doesn't hurt that there would be near 20 hour daylight round about now.

But then I know so little about it.

I knew so little about it and booked the tickets.

What does that say about me?

Someone asked me how far it is from here. I had no idea. How long would the flight take. I had no idea. The more I read about it, the more I realize that it is meant for people who would go fishing, or hiking, or kayaking. I am not any one of those people.

So why am I going there? I still have no idea.

But then I am the person, who after just two emails agreed to marry a guy. We will have been married for fifteen years this year.

In that light, a four day trip to yellowknife doesn't sound so bad after all. For all I knew I could have as easily packed my bags and decided to move to yellowknife for good.

I guess I am totally the kind of person who could have done that.

That is scary. Or liberating. I am not sure which one.

I am going to be honest with you.....

What's the first thing that comes to your mind when someone says that?

So were you being dishonest with me so far?

yeah! me too. I really wonder why people say that. It puts me off like nobody's business, especially when I am interviewing someone and in the middle of the interview they say 'oh I am going to be honest with you.....' ohh my god! Usually I stop asking questions after that disclosure or if i do, it is just to be polite. I once actually replied to this woman with a 'thank you so much for deciding to finally be honest with me, I appreciate that.' Well, she didn't get the sarcasm, she just smiled.

No, i have never hired someone who has used that sentence, or kept them for long. Maybe that is my bias against this particular combination of words, but so it is.

And yes, I know there are exceptions to the rule. I am sure I have probably said them myself too at some point, but i am sure that in those circumstances it was perfectly justified ;)

chin up

I am going through a phase in life where I am supposed to keep my chin up and my nose to the grindstone.

Well, here is the trouble with it, incase you have never tried doing them together. You have to carry the grindstone at a very awkward angle. Sorta puts your back out :)

old hindi movies

Here is the thing that almost always gets to me when I watch old hindi movies. They are not that old fashioned at all!! :) You know, the things they show, the things these people do, these women, how forward they are, well... I will be damned, coz here I am, this bright smart intelligent young woman who grew up in the nineties in India, and I did not have the guts to do half the things these women do. They go out for long walks with these men, they sit around sipping coffee in restaurants, and sing and dance around trees. What universe are these women from? This did not happen that way in India, not ten years back, so how come it happens in the movies.

There is Rakhi in bemisaal, going out to see kashmir alternatively one day with Vinod Mehra and the next day with Amitabh Bachhan, while the other one sits beside her sick father, Mr. Hangal. umm... what? If your father is sick, will you be traipsing around a hill station, listening to poems and singing songs with two unknown men? I mean, not to talk about the fact that you are so blatantly two timing them, but just, well the whole situation, is that plausible? Does anybody do that?

There is Nargis so coolly travelling half the country with Raj Kapoor in Chori chori. Granted she was a spoilt brat, but, really, any half brained person would not have the guts to do that. It is not safe, and most indian women I know are very very cautious people. We are forever scared of losing face, publicly and privately, we do not take these kind of risks.

Remember Zeenat Aman in Yaadon ki baraat, aahahaaa! wah! the stunts she carries out. I did not even know what a housewarming party was, untill a few years ago, I must be exceptionally backward.

Then there was Aasha Parekh in Teesri MAnzil. The fool! she is going to catch her sister's killer by pretending to be a naive woman alone in a hotel at some hill station. Her plan is to get this man to fall in love with her and then get him caught. Wow! daring hai boss. But if you think about it, if this man was so sinister that he killed her sister, is she not all kinds of a donkey to be putting herself in the same position. And more importantly why does she have to do this by herself, why can she not get her family involved. Or are they all too smart and she is the only one foolish enough to serve the purpose of an illogical story line, I mean that movie, its dialogues and situations are exceptionally B-grade, it is sad really, because the songs are so magically beautiful.

And the list goes on....

I can remember watching so many movies as a kid and thinking probably when I grow up I would have that kind of freedom to do these kinds of things, but it never happened that way. I guess the movies have always been out of sync with real life, or prehaps they have always potrayed a sliver of the population. Maybe some people out there do stuff like that. The rest just quietly walk the line, and its not that fascinating to tell stories of the people who follow the rules, so the heroines are women who are exceptionally ahead of their times. Like the stuff that Priyanka Chopra does in Anjaana Anjaani - nah! i don't think real people do stuff like that.

an expression of love

In the way that I evaluate the world, I put great stock in the ability to love something or someone to the point of oblivion to everything else. If you have to pencil it in your calendar and force yourself to make time for it, it is a chore, it is not love. When you are in love, you never have to find time, it makes its own time. It nudges everything else around and makes its own space. When you are in love, you don’t think I have no time to call her, no, you think how am I going to finish all this other stuff up so I can call her. When you are in love and she calls you, you don’t bark a ‘what?’ into the phone. No, you just cannot believe that she has finally called you, you try to hide how happy you are, and yet the smile that is exuding from every pore of your being somehow makes its way across the oceans and seven thousand miles away from you, she is happy too. That is love. I know it because I have been there, I have had it, and nothing you say now is going to convince me otherwise.

He now tells me that ‘all the work I do is for this family, for all of us, it is an expression of my love’ well, that is such baloney and crap. Because all the work you do is an expression of your contentiousness, your taking the responsibility of providing for this family, it is not an expression of your love for me. And you are right, you are doing an amazing job of providing for us, I have absolutely no complaints in that regard. But when you have to take your blackberry out to figure out when you can or cannot have lunch with your wife, and you end up telling her you don’t see how you can make it anytime before the 15^th of February because you are just so swamped with work meetings, it is not an expression of love.

And the least you can do is understand why she is not so appreciative of you trying to give her some time. You should wipe that bewildered look off your face when she gets up and leaves, ‘Forget it, I don’t want to have lunch with you. Ever.’ Seriously, you are not the injured party here, so please stop acting like one.

what passes off for news in indian media

I watched this clip on zoom (yes, my own fault) about Amitabh Bachchan and Rekha, and god is it ridiculous or what? Here is the breaking news: Amitabh Bachhan was at an award show, he was walking up to the stage, he passed Rekha, Rekha was looking at him as he walked her by and he walked by. umm... i am still waiting for the news.

What happened? Nothing? Then what was the big deal?

If one person is walking up to the stage and they stop on the way, they falter, they say hi to someone, they talk to someone, well even that is not news, it happens, but the fact that they were focused and kept walking in the direction they were going is most certainly unremarkable, every one does that.

If you are sitting in the front row and someone is walking by, you will have to look at them, it would take a lot of effort to look away, why would you bother doing that. So she looked at him, and he walked by, seriously, who cares? But apparently this is enough for some people to lose their marbles.

This passes off for main stream Indian media? This is journalism? By what standards is this news?
arghh!

Now the other part of the picture, let us for the sake of argument assume that maybe there is something between them. Let us agree that she actually has some feelings for him - no i am not saying that based on badly edited flimsy evidence the zoom people provide, i am just saying, for no reason in the world at all, let us just take that as a given. Even then, where is the news.

So one person likes another person, the second person does not reciprocate those feelings, the first person is unable to get rid of their own feelings, I am still looking for the news? They are not stalking anybody, they are not going out of their way to impose themselves on the object of their desire, they are just choosing to experience an emotion they have, and not bowing down to the fanatic societal pressure that tells them that what they feel inside their bones is wrong. Yes, it stands to reason that they are being self destructive, it is counter productive, and no good ever comes out of this kind of business, but still, it is their life to live, and their life to mess up. Leave them alone people. I do not know a single person, and I do mean a single person on the face of this earth, who has not experienced unrequited love at some point or another in their lives. It is as prevalent as human beings are.

The duration is immaterial, whether you suffered for two hours or two days, you remember what it felt like. You can extrapolate and imagine what it would feel like for someone who has been nursing this for two decades. No, don't tell me you cannot. If you have ever burnt your finger you can imagine the hell it would be if you sustained whole body burns. Yes, it would take some imagination, a whole lot of compassion, and kindness, but if we apply ourselves, everysingle one of us is capable of imagining what it would feel like to be in someone else's shoes, within an acceptable margin for error. So maybe we can stop being Mr. Lazybones and exert ourselves, and let people be.

And finally, the feminist in me is offended by the insulting tone this channel uses for Rekha. If a man nursed a wound for a woman for ages, he would be deified, and hero-fied. The woman would be made out to be a callous, calculating, cold-hearted B***h, who hurt him. But when a woman holds out for a man, the man is made out to be a decent family man being unnecessarily harrased by some female banshee who does not take no for an answer. They make Rekha look so pathetic. Oh my god! are you kidding me! get out of my face! seriously!

That's why I don't watch TV.

It's not love

It's not love, it's Limerence.

Oh I curse the day I read that word and forever will. It makes me laugh, it makes me cry, it often makes me want to die.

and now the cheapo poetry makes you want to die too.

hmm...

my old posts

I spent some today reading my old posts, and wow! I think I just have way too much energy, or had it back then, everything is so forceful and over the top, whatever was my problem?

I should ahve taken up a sport or something.

Anyways, I am not that much of an enthu-cutlet in real life. In fact, I have sobered up a lot.

This friend of mine who found me after years on facebook said the same thing, that I  sounded way too calm compared to what she remembers me - I hope she doesn't read this blog :) - and I liked that.

I like the person I am right now.

But then that is not saying a lot. I liked the person i was back then too. That is something that has not changed, barring those occasional days here and there, I have almost always liked myself.

am back!!

Hey!!

I am back! or so I think. or at least I can think about being back, coz for the last two months that was not even on the periphery of what i was thinking about.

humph.... What do I write about though?


Isn't it amazing how some ideas can get you all riled up at the time and later when you look back you go whatever, I don't care... only you don't know why you ever cared to begin with?

Oh this...

Has it ever happened to you, that you were standing in the middle of the stairs and then, just forgot whether you were going up or down? damn... that's one godforsaken place to be.

nah.. that's not a topic.

You know what, I still cannot believe that an entire human being can grow inside of you and then be expelled out and survive on its own. How can such a little thing know its time to push and come out of the only place it has known for all its life? I don't know what that is? Amazing or scary? I have still not made up my mind. hmm... i so wish I could remember what that was like...

Oh wait! I know. A few days back I had this epiphany of sorts. I finally figured out why I write a blog. You see, people, they say the darnest things. Half the time, I don't know what to say back to them, coz I just cannot believe they have just said what they have, so I just stand there going umm.. err.... hmm... And the other half of the times when i do open my mouth and speak my mind, well, they don't like it, it always ends badly. Apparently most people can dish it out, but not take it. umm... err... hmm... So i figure, its better to shut up and write a blog, 'people' don't have to read it, and I don't have to explode carrying all that steam inside me.

hmm...

tera na hona

You know that song na hai ye pana na khona hi hai ye, tera na hona bhi jane kyon hona hi hai ye, from jab we met, I love that line, that idea, tera na hona ... hona hi hai ye.

I get that. I agree. In a lot of ways your absence is as good as your presence. In a very bad way, it is better than your presence. In your absence I can imagine you to be whatever suits my fancy. In my imagination you say all the things I want to hear. But when you are there yourself, you so irritatingly insist on saying what you want. ugh! what a spoilsport! main nahi khel rahi

ya shayad angoor khatte hain... beggars can't be choosers... whatever... let me live in my delusion. tera na hona bhi .... hona hi hai ye. It is a comforting thought and come to think of it, the external realities of life are of little to no consequence. It is the alternate reality that you create in your brain that helps you survive and get through the drudgery of everyday existence. So go ahead. Knock yourself out. Lord knows I do.

ek vivah aisa bhi

I just watched this movie and well... I cried, like a baby in the end.

I mean it is a cliched and trite movie like nobody's business and yet l thought it was ronmantic like awww... yes I know how to spell romantic - itne bure din nahi aayen hain.

Parts of it were very irritating, but on the whole you fall in love with the characters, or at least I did. But you have to remember ki main to bhai hum aapke hain kaun, aur hum saath saath hain dekh kar bhi royi thi.

In case you do go and watch the movie and then wonder where did I fall apart? Well, the part that I actually cried about was the time when the barat finally comes in the end and and all those loons are singing 'lo ji hum aa gaye hain' It is the second time the song plays in the movie and the first time it was barely tolerable as in the lyrics are not what you might call brilliant, but the second time somehow something changed and it actually resonated with me, the whole scenario did.

I loved that line ' ye vo var hai jiske liye taras gayi thi varmala' That is beautiful, isn't it.

when you are sick

When you are sick what you want more than anything else is health.When you get better, you forget how bad it was.

Not forget entirely but you put it out of your mind so to speak.

For the first two days you are very grateful for the return of your abilities, to be able to taste food, drink cold water, sit up without hurting, sleep without waking up fifty times and so on.... but slowly it wears off, and you start taking it all for granted again. Come to think of it that is how it should be too, if you keep thinking about your sickness what good is it to be well again?

I am sick right now. Have been for many days, and I am hating it.

My brain is addled up mush, I cannot think straight, I don't sleep - I drift in and out of consciousness, I have crazy dreams where people give me lectures on how to fertilize a rose bush and I wake up begging them to stop filling my head with data I really do not need, really I just buy the ready made rose fertilizer and hope the manufacturer knows what ratio the Nitrogen and Phosphorous need to be in, I do not need to worry about it, but in my dreams I do.

I keep telling myself that if I can get two good paragraphs of description out of this then that will be something. I can use that in a story where I can make someone fall sick.

What? Waste not want not...

And that is the worst of it, I cannot. I have not been able to put in words how horrible I am feeling right now, how desperate to feel like myself again, how frustrated at not being able to do anything about it.

I am actually missing not being able to do stuff like cooking and cleaning.  That tells you how bad it is.

These days I actually eat things based on the ease of throwing them up, like its easier to throw up roti than chawal, they stick in places, shoot am I grossing you out! sorry I am just all messed up. Its all twisted in my head.

and i am up again.

yep! but I did sleep. I am not feeling too well, and I dislike that. I am not the kind of person who makes a good invalid, it just gets to me.... I pity the people who have to take care of me.

The worst part of this recent bout is the taste in my mouth and what that does to the taste of coffee.

I actually had to throw away some very good coffee coz it tasted horrible. ugh!

Which brings me to the problem that I can no longer say I like coffee, I like the taste of coffee when I am feeling well, everything must be qualified.

 But that perhaps goes without saying, because there are no absolutes in life.

It is like saying I love you, I love you no matter what.

Well, not true. You will not love him so much if he turns out to be a chauvinistic, abusive, wife-beating kind of a man.

You might still stay with him - for your own reasons - but I don't think you would love him the way you did when you claimed you would love him no matter what.

There are no unconditional promises in life, or very few can make and keep them at the least.

There, I feel much better having to throw away my cup.

I made a choice

Today was the first day in my life that I had coffee without sugar.

Generally, I would rather not drink coffee, and I drink a lot of coffee so...

I guess at some point you have to choose between health and taste, and I for one always make the wrong choice, only today I said, wait let me try this, and you know what, it was not that bad.

Okay I must be honest I ate some amazing kesari bhat along with it to compensate but really, it was a big step for me.

As my mother loves saying, jo apni zuban ke dono functions control kar le vahi sant hai. Swad aur shabd. Soch ke bolo, soch ke khao.

Right!

To us definition se ji main to bilkul sant nahi, na soch ke bola na soch ke khaya. par vo kya kehten hain bachchanji... koshish karne valon ki kabhi haar nahi hoti. to koshish kar leten hain - kadvi coffee peene ki.

I want to stop writing, or do it my way only.

I finally wrote my first short story., and two people read it. they both liked it, sort of, they are friends, I have to give them 20% discount.

There are things I need to do and I know that now. I don't know when I will do it, but whenever I can I will complete it. I will share it with others when I think it is complete, not before that. But.... I am mad that there is this issue now that people will think it is me.

Whether I show it to someone or whether I do not, I do not want the reason to be the fear of what they will think. My whole bloody life, I did not share my poems with people because of the fear of what they will think. I finally want to grow up, I finally want to stop caring about what anyone thinks.

I am so mad, I did not sleep well last night.

okay let us take a look at this. no body pays me to write, I don't show most of it to people - so not like I am getting an ego boost out of this, no body gives me extra time to do this, I write between making sabzi, running errands, and cleaning up. I think of an idea, I will fret over it while driving and then come home and pour it out, I stay up nights to do something and I still get up in the morning and it is business as usual. I am not taking anything away from anyone to do this.

What about the rest of my life? what do I do? I do not really enjoy doing dishes, but I do it, because I have to, I do pretend I enjoy cooking, but really day in day out, incessant lines of lunches dinners, no I do not enjoy this gadha - majduri ka kaam, but I do it, because I have to. Yes, I yell if anyone else does the laundry - not because it was my great ambition in life to do endless loads of laundry - but because "people" spoil my laundry, so I would rather do it myself, thank you very much. I do it because I have to.

My entire life, 90% of the things I do (and I am being conservative here) I do them because I have to, because I do not see a way around them, so I shut up and learn to enjoy doing them, I cope. Maybe I fool you, but I don't fool myself. I know what I am doing. I am existing. I am cutting time.

That was the one thing about writing something, I did not have to do it. It was not my job. If someone is going to tell me what I should and should not write about then I am not going to do it. Period.

Fine, take it away from me. I will not even fight it.

But if I am going to do it, I will do it my way. I will write about whatever it is that catches my fancy.

If I want to write some racy, steamy, fog-up-your-glasses-kind-of-a story then I will write that, if I want to write about some socially relevant woman's lib issue no one wants to talk about I will write that, if I want to write a star crossed, intense, love lorn poem I will write that. So help me God, I will.

After thirty one years of living my life compromising this is where I draw the line. This one time it is all or nothing. You don't get to say to me, कि तेरी भी मर्ज़ी पूछ रहें हैं हम. मेरी भी नहीं मेरी ही.

ये खडूसपना है तो ये खडूसपना है अब.

I am not refusing to live my social life, I will still cook and clean and do everything else, it is business as usual but after I don't know how many years I have felt this strongly about something.

And I think we are getting ahead of ourselves here, its not like its getting published or something, and even if it does what is the big deal?

I don't know. फालतू भेजा ख़राब कर दिया मेरा।

In fact, I have a very good mind now to never write a foreword, why? why bother explaining anything of why I wrote what I wrote. You don't have to read it if you don't like it, and if my topics make you unhappy then

बहुत सन्मान पूर्वक नमस्ते है जी आपको।
अब कोई खुश हो या कोई रूठे... इस बात पर चाहे हर बात टूटे...

indian unclejis

okay something happened today, i was at one of those places where you put a quarter to get a cart, you know those, so i was walking towards the carts and this woman offered me her cart, I gave her my quarter and she walked away, fine and dandy, then, when i was coming out, i barely unloaded my cart and this indian unlceji came out of nowhere and took my cart, I kinda felt good that unknown people can have that camaraderie, I take your cart you take my cart kind of something, he did not even ask me if he could? and he just gave me his money, i felt slightly bad, he gave me two dimes and a nickle, fine it adds up to 25 cents but I don't know, it don't make no quarter. He took my cart because he did not have a quarter and he did not tell me he did not have the right coin, bata ke karo na, main aise bhi jaane deti yaar, arre, main paise bhi nahi leti, par bina bataye kiya, achha nahi laga.

I guess he thought he was doing it to some indian auntyji, who did not deserve an explanation, that's the part i did not like, don't judge me for how I look. I don't know leaves a bad taste, indian men they do nonsense like that. for example they don't take directions from women. What? If you needed someone to read a map to save your life, trust me, i am your go to guy. Not to brag or anything but I can read a map in any language. I was in Holland for a week, all maps in dutch all street signs in dutch, I was on foot and taking buses, and I did not get lost once. But if you looked at me and thought, is aunty ko kya dutch map samajh aa raha hoga, to theek hai, socho, more power to you.

spring is around the bend

It was a nice warm day yesterday, plus 17 or something, the day before was minus 12 or twenty, so ofcourse every one was outside. I cannot tell you how nice it felt to be able to wear real shoes! instead of the clunky snow boots or the runners, actual heels, they change the way you walk, its so prominent a change you cannot help but notice it. You have a waist!! it is almost a surprise.

And then there were kids - teenagers - putting up basketball hoops and wearing shorts. umm... loons! the snow! its coming back, it hasn't left for good, this is just one warm day in the middle. अब रामजी ने दिमाग नही दिया, तो that is a personal tragedy, उसे जगजाहिर करने कि क्या आवश्यकता है?
Okay sorry, wrong person to be asking that question I guess.

relatively warm day

I am very glad to live in a city where a high of -3C is cause for celebration, its a warm sunny day!! I come from a city where a low of +3C would have been called bitter cold, so I find it amazing that on days like these, I of all people cannot stay indoors, I have got to get out, its a nice warm day out there, and I should enjoy it. Considering how few of those we get.

All I really need to know

This is a huge poster down at my doctors office, I love it.

All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sand pile at school.

These are the things I learned:

• Share everything.
• Play fair.
• Don't hit people.
• Put things back where you found them.
• Clean up your own mess.
• Don't take things that aren't yours.
• Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.
• Wash your hands before you eat.
• Flush.
• Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
• Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
• Take a nap every afternoon.
• When you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.
• Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
• Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die. So do we.
• And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned - the biggest word of all - LOOK.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.

Take any one of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your family life or your work or government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm. Think what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world - had cookies and milk at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had as a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.

And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out in the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.

[Source: "ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN" by Robert Fulghum. See his web site at http://www.robertfulghum.com/ ]

aaye tum yaad mujhe

I don't know why, par kal se mujhe ye gana bahut yaad aa raha hai

aaye tum yaad mujhe, gaane lagi har dhadkan
khushboo laaye pawan
mehka chandan

I tried listening to it on you tube today, but lord, is it a sad song or what. I can not take it, I had to close it. It has to do with his singing, because the words are not that sad, aaye tum yaad mujhe to khushi ki baat hai na, but look at this guy, listening to him makes me want to cry. And I cannot afford to cry, so I am not going to listen to him. Period.

If something is going to torture you, then even if it kills you, you must go out of your way to avoid it. Wait, that does not make any sense. tch. But, you know what I mean.

It is strange. I used to love Kishore Kumar, and then I just completely went the other way, I did not want to listen to any KK song. Ever. Amazing how you cannot tell why your brain works the way it does. Does that happen to you? You form a knot in your head or heart or whereever about something, and then you can't stand it, and you can' reason it out, you can not open it, its just annoyingly there, till the time something heals you out of the blue and it dissolves, on its own, with no credit to you? Happens to me a lot. I guess I will just have to sit this one out, and wait for this KK knot to dissolve....