Feeling Blessed!

Tweet

Years ago I met this girl in school... I was drifting in a world of my own, not really reaching out to others, more acquaintances than friends until she changed all that. She became that one solid anchor that kept me grounded. A friend, a confidante, a soul sister perhaps. The one girl I could talk to endlessly, about any damn thing... from The X Files to relationships. The one person I could share my insecurities and my triumphs with equal ease. The one person with whom even after ages of no contact the break in conversations feels like we'd just hung up to answer the door. In spite of the miles between us and the years since we last met, there is no one else I am as close to... we have transcended the cliches of reading each other like open books... or even telepathy.

And today is her birthday... I celebrated with a cupcake and a glass of wine.  ;)

Happy birthday, Urmila!
Love you lots! Miss you lots!

A New Hue of Hope: Khaki

Tweet

My passport renewal has had me getting in and out a police station. Most normal people avoid the police station… it is an unfortunate place to be, whatever side you are on. But is it really that bad?

While I was waiting it out at the station for my passport verification, along with some 20 other people, I had a fine experience. This post is about that little meeting that happened that made me feel that Coldplay may have been completely right… Everything’s not lost!

When the 20 or so of us were twiddling our thumbs, looking anxiously at our watches, losing sensation on our bums or shifting our weight from one leg to the other while waiting for the cops to start the verification process… one of them came over and asked all of us to assemble in the Senior Inspector’s office. It was quite a large office with a typical, high level officer’s table at one end and the rest of the room empty… except it had been filled with plastic chairs and we were all asked to make ourselves comfortable. None of us had a clue about what was going on or what was about to happen.

There was a phone number in a large font stuck to one of the cork-boards behind the desk. The cop who ushered us in asked us to jot down the number. Soon, the Senior Inspector walked in… some of us stood up to wish him, most of us didn't... I didn't  ... but we all wished him a good evening and he returned the courtesy.

Then he asked us what we thought of cops, of the police in general. Now, that was a loaded question especially from a cop, in his domain. Of course, no one answered! He then went on to say that there is quite a distance between the common man and a cop… some of it is because of fear, some of it is caused by hatred and quite a lot of it is caused by our cynicism towards the cops. There are honest cops and then there are the ones that give the whole system a bad reputation… yet, we as common people never consider the majority of the cops who are honest people doing their jobs when we call the police system worthless. The Indian Police system is one of the best in the world and that cannot be without a reason… and especially not based on just the bad apples in the basket.

The inspector told us that he had a vision for his town… a safe and secure Nerul, and it was part of a larger effort of closing the distance between the common man and the cop. I am sure, like me the rest of us in the room were impressed and quite glad that a cop was taking the initiative for something good. But, that wasn't why he had called us in. It wasn't just to tout what he was doing for us… he wanted to tell us a few things we could do for ourselves and thus be a part of his vision for the town and in the process better our lives quite a bit.

In the half hour we were there with him in his office, he talked to us about some of the steps we as citizens could take to be alert and to ensure our safety and the safety of our immediate surroundings.

If we think about it, how many of us would take the effort to report a crime we have seen happen… nobody wants to be a witness unless forced to. We all would rather walk away from a scene of crime, totally blind to what is going on. How many of us have actually stopped a moment to think if there is something we could do to stop the crime from happening?  All we might need to do in most cases is raise some noise and attract the attention of people nearby when a crime is being committed by someone. That alone may encourage others to join in the noise making and perhaps cause the would-be criminal to flee/stop. In this age of mobile phones…we could even call up the nearest police station and inform them of what is happening. The police aren't omniscient and cannot be aware of every crime that is happening around them unless someone reports them. Isn't it better if we report it while it happens and while helping stop it in some way (I have seen an ad about a mobile in which two girls alert a constable about harassment in the same manner). So, it is not out of the ordinary to do so. We can do it but we choose not to… and then we stand aside to blame the police force completely for things we as alert citizens could have prevented.

After his talk… which was well thought out and not condescending in any way… at least the few people in that room would have returned home with a better perspective of the citizen-cop-criminal relationship. At least, some of us would understand that the growing distance between the keepers of law and the citizens is one of the major reasons for the emboldened criminal and hence the rise in crime.

Kudos to the inspector for taking time out from his schedule and educating at least the few of us who he could manage to get as an audience and trying to spread an awareness among them.  By his own admission, he does not get much of an audience… so he manages with the people who come in for police verification and rental NOC and such.

Yes, it is weird and somewhat unfortunate that nobody invites cops to any function to speak a few words… movie stars maybe, politicians even… but never a cop. The Inspector gave us his number and said that he would come to any building society which wants him to talk on security measures the occupants of a building can take to avoid break-ins and thefts and other such issues. His talk was not just about the disconnect between the system and people, but he had a lot of practical tips and ways in which we could all be alert and that much safer.

I think his tips require a post on their own… I’ll compile them and put them up later.

World Record Week

Tweet

The entrance to the pooram grounds (clicked by my brother)

The last week has been mighty hectic. It was also loads of fun. And I got myself in to the Guinness Book of World Records. Yeeaah!

To be a bit more precise… me and around 2700 other ladies literally danced our way into the record books. The feat was enabled by the Mumbai Pooram foundation which organizes a yearly Arts & Cultural festival, the largest of its kind outside Kerala in Bombay. This festival is based on lines similar to the temple festivals (pooram) of the state of Kerala… the most famous of the poorams being the Thrissur Pooram held on the temple grounds of Vadakkunathan Kshetram with the temples of Parmekkavu Bhagavathi and Thiruvambady SriKrishna participating. Although the main deity of the Thiruvambady temple is Lord Krishna, the deity participating in the pooram is Thiruvambady Bhagavathi. Bhagavathi is a representation of the Hindu goddess Parvati, the consort of Lord Shiva (the deity of the Vadakkunathan temple.)

Though, the Mumbai Pooram is a celebration of the pooram culture of the temples of Kerala… it is not a religious festival. It is a showcase for the art and culture of Kerala and a platform to unite the Malayalis who have chosen to live their lives outside Kerala. It is a festival that brings the colour and pageantry of the vibrant pooram right in to their busy city lives.

This year, the major attraction of Mumbai Pooram was the world record attempt by 2700 female dancers performing the Kaikottikali / Thiruvathirakali dance art of Kerala. This form of dance is performed by women on the occasions of Onam or Thiruvathira. The dance is performed with the lasya (beauty and grace) element dominating the movements and expressions of the dancers. The typical formation for the dance is a circle of women around a nilavillakku (a ceremonial brass lamp) or a pookalam (a floral design) or a combination of both. The hand movements are languid and the bodies sway in a fluid motion in clockwise and / or anti-clockwise directions. The rhythmic movements of the dancers are given more importance than the hand mudras.

On the 9th of November 2012, a bevy of around 2700 ladies gathered at the KDMC grounds in Dombivli to perform this graceful dance in a special, never attempted before numbers. We had the Guinness Book Of World Records’ officials presiding over the event to ensure that the dance met their precise standards to ensure a place in the record books. The performance was scheduled for 6:30 PM and all the ladies had reached the venue by 4:30 PM, decked in the traditional Kerala attire consisting of off-white handloom cotton sarees or set-mundu with gold brocade borders and red silk blouses, with hair tied up in buns adorned with fragrant jasmine blooms, with kaash-maala / lakshmi-maala (a long necklace made of gold coins) and gold bangles, earrings and anklets.

After a long wait of about one and a half hours whilst which we were served cutting chai, the Guinness officials arrived to start taking a head-count of the dancers. Arranging 2700 dancers to be counted within the grounds when it was already choc-a-bloc with spectators might not have been an easy task… though the organizers could have done a much better and faster job if they had tried a bit harder. The dancers ended up waiting until 8:45 PM for the officials to finish counting them… all this time, we did not have a place to sit and were standing barefoot on the gravely ground. Let me tell you, it is not a pleasant experience to be standing without any food except a few Parle-G biscuits for about 5 hours… with the performance still looming ahead. Quite obviously, with the kind of exhaustion that had set in a few girls fainted… and I think one of the girls could not even be part of the performance. After the officials counted us… we were guided into the formation which took another half hour. Finally by 9:15 PM we were all ready in concentric circles, 18 in number.

The Guinness officials had informed us that any dancer who gave up before 5 minutes of dancing or who rested for over 5 minutes while dancing would be disqualified from the record attempt and their count deducted from the total. It was a scary prospect because the 5 long hours had exhausted the women… some of whom were really old and all of whom were above 13 years of age. Once, the guru-vandanam started, we were infused with a bit more life even though the limbs of most of us were too stiff with the waiting. When the singers started the song… all pains and aches and stiffness was forgotten and we all danced… and danced with as much perfection as we could muster. The performance lasted some 20 minutes… and by the end of it we all took a bow full of hope and anticipation… which later became a bow of triumph as we were informed that we indeed made it into the record books… the largest Kaikottikalli performance in the world.

Since, I was one of the dancers, I had to leave the photography to the professionals. Here is a lovely pic of the formation just before the dance started taken by freelance photographer Veeraj Nair (you can see more awesome pics at his blog.)

That's me!

Here are a few pics of the event my brother clicked.

The Vashi group... can anyone spot me?

A decorative gopurams structure which made it into the Limca Book of Records

Waiting for the Guinness Officials

The gopurams starting to light up

Standing in queues to be counted

The ground being prepared for the formation

The gopuram now completely illuminated.

Still waiting as the head-count nears completion.

The dance

The dance... continues

A formation showing unity.

The final bow.

In preparation for the event, we had daily rehearsals. Small groups of women from various localities gathered at convenient locations to practice the dance on a daily basis for the last few weeks. Our group was the Vashi group and had about 70 women in it. On 4th November 2012, there was a rehearsal at the venue which saw some 1500 of us attending. A few pics from the rehearsal.

A snapshot from the Times Of India

Diary Of A ‘Casual’ Smoker

Tweet

7:34 AM | Kuwait

I play break-out with my lungs!

I am going to quit smoking. It is a horrid habit. Unlike the three thousand nine hundred and seventy four previous times I have planned to, this time I am quitting for sure. What quitting?… I have quit! (err… after this one which I have already lit is taken care of… no point in tobacco wastage… eh?!… I know, you agree.)

I am not a heavy smoker… No… I am a casual smoker. Why am I writing this in my diary? Well, when I am coughing my lungs out soon… I just want to make sure that everyone knows it is not ‘cause I smoke. This is just something I started when I was eleven or twelve years old… to add variety to sheesha / shisha and generally, being stoned.

And, mind you, none of the full-bodied commoners’ cigarettes for me… I prefer coating my lungs with tar in style… with ‘lights’. They are exclusive, designer cigarettes… and why I chose them is simple… to limit my smoking and be really ‘casual’. I don’t smoke much… just about 30-40 cigarettes a day… and not like I chain-smoke… or light one cigarette with the other and go on (I use a lighter… one that suits my mood from the large collection of designer & special edition lighters I have).

But, you see… I have quit… this is just my 5^th cigarette of the day… just to aid me in my post (which I am writing at around 7:30ish in the AM).

The smoke clears my brain and lets me think… it settles my mind… gives me my peace the world wants to destroy. The cigarette… the loveliness, the slender and smooth feel… the tenderness it fills my mouth with (nothing to do with possible cancerous cell activity)... there is so much selfless love in that wee little ciggie…

Seene ko jalaati hain toh kya hua…

Labhon se toh lagi rahti hain

(unlike my girl… jo sirf seene ko jalaati hain)

Yes… I am going to quit smoking. Last one for the day! Really! Uff… what just happened?... Did I just light up another ciggie (on autopilot)? I have to stop! I know… I am gonna switch to the pipe… having to stuff it over and over again… that might deter me.

Bas… ab koi kare toh kya?

Hum, HUM hain!

______________________________________________________________________________

*Note: This isn’t my diary entry… I don’t smoke ‘lights’… just Davidoff Slims!
Oops… I DON’T smoke. Period.*

*And…I definitely don’t have a girl!*
______________________________________________________________________________


Warning: Smoking is injurious to health. Writing about it... especially, someone else's diary entry... now... that could really be detrimental to life! :D

Enough, Mr. Khan!

Tweet

Shah Rukh Khan.

*If you want to be called SRK, then be prepared to have your name split to match the initials*

*No! I won’t put up a picture!*

Imagine the pull of the man… he has found a way in to MY blog. You would notice that unlike most of the times I mention an actor here, I have linked him to his Wikipedia page and not IMDB… he needs a lot more description and well, Wikipedia has a link to his IMDB page at the bottom.

The man is iconic. The Badshah of Bollywood, the King Khan… and many more adulatory sobriquets are showered on him by his crazy fans… more so when one of his many movies is up for release or is running to packed halls.

Why is he featured on my blog? Ah well… let me get this straight… If I could make rules and enforce them, I would bar him from making or acting in movies. Yes. The divine SRK would not (and should not) be allowed to be in movies in my ideal world. Now, don’t get me wrong… I think the man is a gem of a person… but I just can’t stand what he does onscreen in the name of acting. It is not the person Shah Rukh Khan I abhor… but his onscreen persona.

I really wish, hope, pray that he would stop acting. Retire and just be a good person… a good husband, a good papa and a very good friend to KJo!

I might get lynched for this post… but hey, this is my blog… and this is my opinion. Why I hate his work is simple… every time I watch an SRK movie… it seems that it is just a scene from one long movie… from Baazigar to Don-2… just one long movie. He is exactly the same in every movie. He is always SRK – the star… never the character. It is such a waste of talent… cause, the man has talent. Yes, he does. But, it is buried in his stardom. The only movie in which I could slightly tolerate him was Chak De! India. He was not larger than life in it… and that was a relief. Even in a movie as down-to-earth as Swades… it was not whatshisname character but Shah Rukh Khan that overshadowed it. My Name Is Khan was a big hit… but where was the character Khan? …it was just Shah Rukh ‘from the epiglottis’ Khan doing a weird act. Compared to that even Hrithik Roshan did a better job in Guzaarish (and that is really stretching it).

Every movie the man acts in has him playing himself… and never the character. That to me is a huge turn-off. From his Circus & Fauji days…I know the man can act. Wonder what stops him from getting that percentage of people, who can’t stand him, to be on his side by just continuing to act the way he did back then?!

I am all for personal opinion and right of choice and all that. But, I believe there has to be some limits set by logical sense or at least by common sense. The other day… a friend of mine (well, after what she said I’d have to rethink that position for her) had put up a status update on FB, thanking SRK for the wonderful, lovely entertainer of a movie called Ra.One. She even had the guts to call the music of the movie melodious (well, she needs to get her ears tested… naah… boxed!). People refuse to use their brains. How can you like a movie in which the whole plot revolves on a stupid mistake the director / scriptwriter made? The said error – The woman’s kid is in danger and given the option to escape… she decides to stay and suffer the consequences, endanger her and her kid’s life and expect some robot/android to save her while she is doing the chammak challo! So… it all comes down to the fact that people are in general zombie sheep… they just refuse to use logic… they blindly follow any damn fad. Anything SRK dishes out… bullshit though it might be (and always is, in most cases), people just relish it (like Nawaab Saheb always says… jaahilon se bhari duniya hain!). The cash registers at the box-office just do not stop ringing and the man continues to torture us with more of his movies.

Such an utter waste of talent!

People In My Life - A Series

Tweet

The people in my life… is a short series which showcases – as the title says – my friends, acquaintances and sometimes that person who in a short walk through my life made a difference.

There won’t be any names here… just personas.

Here is someone I have been extremely close to for the last two years.  It’s quite a short period indeed… But, some people leave indelible marks in your heart and/or mind. He came in to my life at a juncture where I was complacent… about my life and my loneliness. I did not even realize that I was alone until he happened.

With some effort, walls on both sides were broken down and a friendship formed… a strong bond that at the time looked quite sure of enduring eternity. Here was a guy with a quirky sense of humor, a knack of keeping you engaged in some conversation on some weird topic you wouldn’t normally care two hoots about. We had (still have) a lot in common... a love for books, music, travel and a creative bend of mind. A shared school life added to the fun… memories and incidents which to me had a story that was completely different from the stories he had.

He was with me much longer than I was with him. :)

The bond tightened and suddenly life was different. It was many times more delightful than before and I was no longer complacent.  Slowly, things changed… over the course of time, a crack developed… it kept widening and we struggled to close the gap. Physical distance turned in to an abyss between our minds… one which could not be bridged. At the end of two years we drifted apart… I moved on… He didn’t!

Here was a man with an attitude that made him stand out among the best. He was someone who lived his life on his own terms… even in the face of adversity. He would bend the circumstances to suit him… and they were all stepping stones to his ambitions. With strong opinions on everything he and I clashed many a time. Needs, wants, logic & reasoning and emotions bubbled and simmered and drowned the relationship. With it has sunk the ship of his willpower.

Now, it has left behind a lost man. I wish he would find his way again… stronger and happier.

Here’s to a new life! Here’s to you!

Cheers!

Yet Another Character Sketch…

Tweet

There is this girl I know, a crazy female.  Well… she isn’t exactly a ‘girl’… she is a woman… but the child in her still lingers. She is not immature but her attitude can drive anybody up the wall.

She is annoyingly stubborn, always has to have her way. She’d never listen to a word anybody tells her… even if she knows she is wrong she would not give in. She would fight tooth and nail for every argument she puts forward.

The crazy girl would be so naïve at times that you’d think she was born yesterday… but if you look closely you’d know that she knows exactly what she is doing. The naiveté is a mask… carefully worn, but coupled with her skills to seek out trouble in everything, she is not a safe person to have around.

My friends say she spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E! Oh, I would know, I have been at the receiving end quite a few times.

There is no grey in her palette… it is either black or white… or every shade of the rainbow. Not one to walk the middle ground… she is either fiery as fire or chilly as ice.

She does not think before she speaks… she does not consider the consequences of her actions. There are never any conclusions to her arguments… they are an ongoing conversation between her and her psyche.

Sometimes, I want to hold her by the shoulders and shake her up… tell her to grow up… but then I know she can’t change. That is the way she is… stubborn, headstrong, crazy, rebellious and not really immature but coquettish enough to use the child in her to her advantage.

She is vain, but I love her… and she is the best friend I have ever had.  :)

NAWAAB SAHEB

Tweet

Lord Raj

Some relations cannot be given a name… some posts cannot be given a title. This is such a post.
Yes, it’s been ages since my last post… my mind’s been bursting at the seams… too much going on in my head and around me. Emotional waves with a high amplitude, peaking and crashing in my head.
I am lucky that I have friends who care and that special someone who can be relied upon in any situation. Sometimes the ties are tested… pulled & strained but they always bounce back. But the stress is evident… sometimes depressing. Sometimes, you hit bed-rock… and have to languish there for a while.
But this post is not about any of that… this is about one friend… a special friend… a relation I cannot give a name ‘coz it cannot fit into any category. It is not platonic, it isn’t romantic, it is not fraternal… the closest is a link between two kindred spirits.
The surprising part is that I found this friend (well, I need to call him something) in the least expected of places… in Kuwait! The last few days have been like spring after a long, drawn out, cold and dark winter.
I feel I have been wearing a mask for too long… with most people am acquainted with the mask is a necessity… but it is painful, like the death mask in Saw! There are very few people I haven’t felt the need to hide myself from… in fact, until now there’s been just one such person in my life. Well now, I think I just added one more to the list! :D


I call him...

Nawaab Saheb

The title invokes a regal image… a richness of character, a colourful persona… but there is no limit to what this man has in him.

This is about the person behind the sobriquet. A self-made young man with an iron will. He is a great friend but you have to earn his friendship. And when he is your friend you feel you own the world. HE becomes your world.

There are many adjectives that would describe him… ARROGANT, opinionated, HONEST to the core, complicated, extravagant, an INTELLECTUAL, maybe even a genius. I dare anyone to run an IQ test on him… he would break records.

His arrogance could drive you up the wall… but, it is always righteous arrogance. His self-opinion is spurred by his need to excel… and I have never seen someone excel in anything he does with such ease. He is a simple man with very specific needs and wants… and he does not mind being extravagant to meet his exacting standards. There is a sublime power that sleeps beneath his cool persona. He is mysterious, intriguing… you’d want to know him, you’d want to explore the depths of his mind… but you’d only get entangled or lost in the labyrinth of his thoughts. He is a thinker… a worrier, but he is also a doer.

He NEVER  forgets anything… he may forgive you for a lot but he would never forget what you did and who you are. He never gets angry… he only gets furious. You’d never want to be the reason for his rage.

He is PASSIONATE and he is SENSITIVE. He would give you the world if you let him and he would set you free if he loves you. He would always be there for you… he would stand by you even when you desert him. There is a selflessness about him… he hides it well, though.

It takes guts and more to be a superhero… err… man like him.

He is a cohesive contradiction! 
He is spring after a long, dark, drawn-out, cold winter!

(Chotti Rani approves… :D )