O is for Open mindedness

P.S: This is my make up post for yesterday when my sleep took over me and I could not blog.

"Education's purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one".

- Malcolm S. Forbes

But I tend to disagree with the above quote. Because I don't think only education is the medium that opens up your mind. In my journey so far, I have seen so many highly educated people, yeh with their thoughts and thinking so limited and closed. And have also come across folks who cannot be tagged as "highly educated" and yet have changed their ways and opened their minds to newer ideas and thoughts like no one else could.

How can a father, who 

- fights with the entire army of relatives and known by, just so that his daughter can  go and work in a completely new and different city after completing her studies because thats what her education is meant for, 

- trusts her daughters and gives them the liberty to take their decisions about their jobs and career

- Gives them the freedom to travel anywhere within the city at any time of day

- Questions the practices of his own religion and shuns the one which do not make sense or do not seem practical in today's times

be not an open minded person? That too, when he has changed a new leaf from the times when he restricted his own sisters from going to movies with the family in anything other than "traditional salwar suits"?

On the other hand, consider the so called "highly educated folks" who:

- Would not let their daughter in laws go anywhere without them escorting them to the rickshaw/bus stand to "protect" them.

- Make the smallest of decision for their kids, heck even what they should want to eat (and trust me, this is absolutely true, I have personally seen this happening)

- Have double standards openly followed in the house - one for their own daughters and other for  the daughters they married their sons to.

- Blindly follow the traditions and customs of religion, without once questioning them or reasoning them.

Sorry, they may be educated officers or what not, but in my opinion, they are the most closed minded folks out there.

PS: Sorry, if the tone of my post seems like a "rant" because it actually is. 

N is for Na Jaane Kyon

Remember this song from the movie "chhoti si baat"

Na jaane kyuun, hota hai yun zindagi ke saath

Achanak yeh mann kisi ke jaane ke baad

Kare Phir uski yaad

Chhoti chhoti si baad

And isn't it so true !! We do not realise the importance of some people in our life as long as they are in front of us. We take them for granted.Only after they are gone, do we realise the void they create in our lives and we become aware of what we have lost.

But then sometimes, it may be too late to change the things back to how they were. What's gone may be gone forever.

Savour what you have in life today and do not let what you treasure get lost. sometime, it may be all you have; you just may not be realising it today.

I have lost many friends in this journey of life; some due to my own misgivings; some due to situations. Could I have done something then? May be, I don't know. But I do know that I do remember them in every small things related to them. In the virtual world of social media, I do see them everyday, but I just cannot muster up enough courage to try to create those links back. 

Cherish your today. Treasure the loved ones you have.

Kya pata, kal ho na ho!

M is for mirror

Mirror mirror on the wall
What do you see when I stand in front of you
I'll tell you what I see when I stand in front of the mirror

I see a very tired mom who is yet to get a full night's sleep
I like to work in the late hours of night when everyone is sleep and it is so quiet.
So I end up going to bed the last. But I still haven't been able to get out of the habit of waking up in the middle of night. So I'll wake up a little after midnight, walking through the house like a zombie and checking each kid to make sure they haven't thrown away their covers or rolled off the bed. And then in the morning, I'll wake up even before my alarm rings just to get a head start on the day.

I see a very guilty mom who is trying to get a handle on the mile-long pending to-do list hanging over my head. Guilty of all the promises I have made to the kids to get so many things done but realizing soon that there are only 24 hours in the day and you can get only so much done in those 24 hours. Helping the older kid create his own email , helping him on his piano lessons, helping the younger kid make her cards for the upcoming teacher's appreciation week and so much more.

I see a very anxious person who is trying best to prioritize several things in life but somehow not everything is falling into its place.

I see a very homesick person who sometimes thinks about leaving everything and going back to where she belongs: her home with the loved ones.

It's just one of those days when we I am not liking what I see in the mirror there.
Either need to change the mirror or my own perception to look at it.
The ultimate choice is mine.

L is for Love Stories

Love stories – we have all seen them in movies, read them in novels and books, some of them we ourselves starred into.

But the ones I am talking here are the ones I saw them unfolding and blooming over course of time.

 For my graduate studies, I stayed in a girl's hostel for 3 years. Those 3 years away from home in a very conservative town taught me a lot of new things. I made so many new friends, faced so many setbacks and learnt so many things about relationships; most importantly that not everything is what it looks like on surface.

As I jot down these stories here, I need to say that in no manner, am I trying to judge any of the folks mentioned here. I was not in their shoes, so I cannot even imagine what we're the circumstances that led to way finally those stories turned to.

A close friend A, right from the first day claimed his unrequited love for a girl from his neighborhood. Always bought gifts for her when went back home. But finally ended up marrying someone else and the reason was "the girl wanted to be a working professional. And I didn't my mom to be cooking in the kitchen even after having a bahu in the house" and the funniest part, ever since he got married, he never stayed in his home town. He has been travelling for his own work with his family while his parents stayed in the home town.

Another friends S & R, whose love story seemed too filmi and too dramatic to be true, they made it against all the odds and ended up being together. Seeing their pictures, married and with cute kids (thanks to FB) reminded me how we used to make fun of their hand holding, hour long talks outside hostel gate and all the cute gifts in girl's room.

Another friend M, who was the most introvert in our group and whom we last imagined to have a great, fell flat into love, that too at first sight with the girl he met at a relative's wedding. Even years after they have been married with 2 cute kids, I still remember the day he told us and we all coaxed him into going to meet her to her place. That too with her parents and her brother and sisters in the house.

These are just some of the stories I watched happening over a span of time. Many more happened, some with happy endings, some with not so happy ones. But in the end, life just keeps going on. 

K is for karma

Do you believe in karma? I do and that too very firmly. I have seen situations in life proving that what goes around, eventually does come around. So when I find myself in a situation, helpless at the selfish and calculating behavior of someone I trusted, those are times when I have to sit back and wait for karma to show its effects sooner or later.

A MIL who never treated her daughter in law well, leave alone respect. Made her life a living hell. Sure enough, when the younger daughter in law made an entry, she didn't even give the mil a chance to treat her anyway. From day 1, she turned the tables onto her and put dear mil on the receiving end.

Or the lady in my neighborhood who never stopped gossiping about every person on the street and passing judgment about every decision made in any family. Few years down the lane and her own daughter decided to marry outside of her community and outside of the caste too. All the neighbors and relatives who had "earned" her feedback spared no opportunity to offer their detailed advice, gossip and criticism to her.

Some people may dismiss karma as a way of just accepting the things just the way they are and not doing anything about it. But that uncertainty happens in so many other aspects of life. So why not just change the perspective of looking and dealing with that uncertainty.

J is for jeene ke ishare

This song, which I love so much.

P.S: Today is just one of those days when I am dead tired, yet I didn't want to out of schedule on the A to Z challenge.

I is for the ink pen

So do you like to write? With what kind of pen? Wait, before you brush me off as someone crazy asking crazy questions, hear me out.

Remember, in school as you graduated from 8th grade to 9th grade, all of a sudden you earned a new privilege: that you could do you school assignments in pen. No more hassles of keeping sharpened pencils,an eraser and a spare pencil sharpener in your pencil box. You could be the "cool kid" with a fancy pen to show off.

But wait, the very first day of school supply shopping, mom rolls out the policy: "Those fancy gel pens and ball point pens make your handwriting go bad. So you'll start with an ink pen". What??????
All those dreams of finally getting one of those colorful reynolds pen for yourself is gone?
Yes, dad gives you one of the basic ink pens and your shelf is also stocked with a bottle of royal blue Camlin ink to start your day at school.
The first day you come back with blue ink smeared all over your hands, your copies, even your school uniform. And you absolutely hate it.

But as you continue using this new writing tool, you start loving it. The way it writes it seems as if the  words are  flowing out and just arranging themselves on the paper. You start loving the little stain it leaves on the inside of your ring finger.

And then one day, dad opens up his collection of the finest Chinese ink pens that he had been collecting and asks you to pick one. With the elated feeling, you choose the sea blue colored one with a shiny golden cap. You treasure it more than anything and write with it with more pride than what any Governor General would ever had (I am not kidding, I used to think of myself so special as a kid, obviously in my imaginations)

And since then, I never hated those ink pens or those ink stains. If given a chance today, I would prefer to use one today too. I still like to maintain a paper journal with a pen in my bag. But, ironically, too much technology (storyboards) and convenience have taken prominence in our lives.

H is for home

Home - In dictionary, it may be just a 4-letter word but it encompasses the warmth and love of whole world.

It is where you feel at ease and comfort and can be yourself.

No matter what part of the world I ever travel to, at the end, home is where I'd want to crawl back to. And this feeling of home is not related to any physical location or a particular house only. I get that feeling when I crash at the end of the day on my side of bed with a book and my mug of hot coffee.

When I go to India, even after being married for 14 years, I do not get that feeling of comfort while I am at my in-laws place. The minute I reach mom's place, the feeling is to kick off my shoes, touch and feel every little thing in the house, then pick up something leftover from the kitchen and lay on mom's bed.

When I was away from home for 3 years for my studies, the first year, my hostel room felt like a prison to me. It felt cold and stranger and so uninviting.

But slowly as I settled into that life, the same room became a second home to me.

I organized it, decorated it (with SRK posters, that’s a different story) and loved coming back to it and felt sad when I was leaving it.

And now staying in this country, even after being here for almost 10 years now, it never gives me a homely feeling.

I still struggle to say that it is my home country and yet it is my home now.

G is for Grandparents

This Friday is grandparents day at my son’s school and the kids’ grandparents are invited to the school for a special program. And there would none of the grandparents to visit my son at his school.

Because they are all in India.

It’s on days like this that living in this country kills me.

For the last 2 years, I have been dual capping as his parent and his grandparent at school

So that was the plan for this year too.

But then the school at the last minute turned me down, on the pretext of space and crowd management.

Being a Christian school, there will be senior sisters and nuns to “act” as grandparents for kids whose grandparents cannot make it to the event.

But obviously he'll miss showing the picture of the bank he drew for his Babaji showing him seated in the manager’s chair

He'll miss showing the family tree he created and specially selected the picture of his Nana where he stole his pen from his pocket on his first visit to India.

He often asks me to tell him stories about my childhood and was always laughed at the part when I said that we used to have a fight with my nani every time we visited her

Because she would get all 3 of us in a rickshaw and get us a haircut the day we used to land in Delhi.

And he is always fascinated by the story of my babaji making Diwali sweets at home and specially making the “bura” (which he loves) at home

During my last visit to India, I showed him pictures of one of my Mamaji’s wedding and in there showed him my Nanaji also.

And in there, I also showed him his own Nana (my dad) with lots of hair on his head.

And whenever I scold/discipline him for something, his immediate first question is “Did Nani/Amma used to do the same to you guys?”

I feel proud that he is so much interested in learning about his roots and wants to stay connected to them.

It’s the times like these that leave me feeling clueless and upset.

F is for Forwarded jokes

Yes, I am talking about all those jokes and so called trivia information people like to enlighten each other with on various social media sites. Earlier it used to be the race to forward these material via emails. Then cam orkut and everyone was in a race to grace the walls of their friend circles with the freshest jokes first. Then came FB. Same story again.

Next in the line is Whatsapp. I am (have been forced to be a part of) at least 10 different Whatsapp groups consisting of school friends, college friends, cousins from mom as well as dad sides. And all I can see happening on those groups is just jokes being forwarded to  each other. Have we really forgotten the art of having a conversation with someone? 

I was willing to give that group consisting of my cousins a break thinking they are of a different age group. However, imagine my surprise when I saw the same thing happening on my college friends group as well as in a personal conversation I myself initiated with a friend who used to live in the same city and now moved to a different city. 

People, if anyone from those groups is reading, when I accept to interact  with someone, I am looking for a real conversation and some interest in me. For comedy and laughs, I have "Modern Family" and "The big bang theory" here.

E is for the envelope

That envelope containing that picture and the hand written letter that I used as a bookmark for the book I was reading
That envelope that got returned to the library when the book was returned
That envelope that even got to the different library from where the book was loaned
But then someone saw the envelope, probably read the letter too.
And so they guessed how much precious it may be for someone
And they brought it back the library
And made sure I received it intact
I never knew who the kind stranger was, but can never thank that person enough
Because that envelope is all I have left of you.

D is for the dance teacher

When I was growing up as a kid in Ranchi, we used to live in a very close knit neighborhood.

Our nursery school was just round the corner from our house and just across the street was the huge villa of our dance teacher, Mrs. Bhattacharya

She was a teacher at our school and she also was the dance teacher for me and my sisters.

I remember I was always so mesmerized by her house.

A typical Bengali house, with a huge garden with so many flowers, her own garden facing the road had a huge fence and it was all covered in little purple flowers..

An elderly cook, with white dhoti and kurta, one maali whom I always saw watering the plants, in the garden as well as tons of money plants inside the house.

The smell of fish  and rice always lingering in the house.

Mrs Bhattacharya’s mom, an elderly lady, always clad in white, busy doing puja and always had a white teeka smeared on her forehead.

In her room, which we crossed while going to the practice room, that fragrance of mogra and raat ki rani flowers, plucked from their garden

And decorated in the room, big picture of Ma Kaali with fresh flower offerings in front of her

Huge painting of Rabindranath Tagore hung over her bed,

Her bed, made to perfection and surrounded by the mosquito net hanging on all 4 sides.

So many musical instruments in her room: you name it: table, harmonium, sitar

And then her little almirah with glass doors, where she had hundreds of figurines decorated.

Little dolls, animals, various gods, even a mini doll house with each room clearly visible with the miniscule beds, sofa and rocking chairs.

And Mrs Bhattacharya herself, always clad in a crisp cotton  saree, black rimmed glasses on her nose and always welcomes us sisters by saying:

“Tum log aa gaya, jol khabee ke?”

The 3 shy sisters would just nod the head and follow her to the practice room, all the while whispering to each other and giggling.

We would put the ghungroos on our feet and start the practice with the beats “1-2-3-4; 4-2-3-1; 1-4;1-4”

And then would come the performance night in our colony.

More than the dance performance, the dressing up part was the fun.

Several days before the event, we would make the paper jewelry using craft paper.

We would cut stripes of colorful craft paper, and then needle through it and twist it to give it a flowery look.

She would dress all 3 of us in white sarees with red border in traditional Bengali style.

Put a side bun on the hair and then put all those paper jewelry.

And then she put the red alta on our hands and feet.

During the performance, she’d sit in the front row, lip syncing the song, doing actions with her hand and escorting us out when it was all over.

All of this is from about 30-34 years back. And as I started writing it, it all came back like a flash movie in front of my eyes.

It has been so long that we left Ranchi.

I don’t even know what happened to her or where she is.

Wherever she is, I hope she realizes that she made a great impact on 3 little girls.

C is for the candy crush

Yes,  the game that I have my crush on these days is my blog topic for the letter C.
Initially when I downloaded this game on my phone, it was just to try the ongoing buzz around this game.
But then I was hooked, levels after levels after levels.
(And for those interested, I am currently stuck at level 125 for the last 3 weeks)

I like the game and keep coming to it, but I wouldn't say I am addicted to it.

With limited lives available in the game, limited free available on my hand, and so many more things in the world to spend my money on, I get just an okay dose of this game.

However, here is a list of some interesting things about this game, which took me by surprise:

1.Currently, there are roughly 93 million active daily users averaging around 1.085 billion games per day. This means that each player is averaging a dozen games every day!

2. If you combine the time spent by all the users to have ever played the game, it totals to around 120,000 years of playtime.Of all the players who play the game, 69% are women, 30% are men while the remaining 1% are UNKNOWN! Proof that aliens do exist!?

3. The most common name among all the players is Maria, with around 300,000 players sharing the name.

4.  The Candy Crush craze knows no boundaries and has left no area in the world untouched with 3 players from Antarctica also having played the game. I didn't even know they had access to the internet there!

5. Candy Crush brings in roughly $990,000 per day, without advertising! King generates revenue through their in-app purchases.  In most mobile games you see many different advertisements.  King decided they were making enough profit off of in-app purchases, allowing them to remove their advertisements.

6.  A 14 year old boy became so obsessed with the game that he purchased $4,300 worth of boosts and extra lives in game.

7. In the United Kingdom, a special residential rehab facility was opened to help people overcome their addiction to the game,

8. There is an entire Etsy page dedicated to Candy Crush items.  Fans of the game have decided to create their own inspired merchandise to sell.  The page has everything from Candy Crush inspired clothing, to earrings, to coffee mugs.

9. People can actually purchase the Candy Crush candies now.  The famous New York candy store, Dylan’s Candy Bar, created actual Candy Crush candies for people to purchase.  They created ‘Chocolate Color Bombs’, ‘Jelly Fish Gummies’, ‘Mixed Fruit Gummies’ and ‘Sour Fruit Gummies’.

Huh, pretty neat, isn't it? May be next time I need to do similar research on the games I grew up with like Ludo, Checkers and Housie.

Information source: 
http://muzzster.hubpages.com
http://candycrushworld.com

B is for Birthday Girl

She is someone who can light up the room with her spirit.

She is the one who sprinkles droplets of laughter and happiness wherever she goes, no matter when and where

Her laughter is the reason mom calls her “jhunjhuna” of the house

She can lift up your spirits when you're down

She can make you a sliver of light when you are stuck in the darkest of the despair.

She is the one who has my biggest pillar of support and strength; when I was away from home from studies; when I am away in this firangi land

She  has been the bestest of my friends

So, on your birthday, my sis, I wish you the happiness of whole world

I wish every single wish and dreams of yours to come true

I wish that all the things that you are struggling with right now, may you have the courage and strength and audacity to cross every barrier and achieve everything that you want

Because you have worked so hard to deserve all that you want.

And on this special day of yours, I also want to tell you how much I love you and miss you

Because we don’t say that often to each other

But remember, you are always in my thoughts and in my wishes

And always close to you

A very happy and loving Birthday, Sis!!

All that matters

This is my first post (Letter A) for the A to Z Challenge. As I try to get back to blogging, this post is more as a note to myself. 

No matter how others see you or think about you, all that matters is how you treat yourself and what you think about yourself. 

You are the one who is responsible for your happiness or even sadness

You are the only one who can take care of yourself best

No one can hurt you without you giving them that right. 

No one else can make you happy if you cannot be happy in your own company.

You cannot change or influence what others think about you if you yourself do not have the capability to accept and appreciate who you are.

Each person is different and so are the circumstances surrounding each one of us.

So instead of looking at glass as half empty, try to change the perspective and look at it as half full.

And this new outlook will change the way how you experience and embrace things in life.

And do this, not for anyone else,but just for yourself

Because again,

All that matters is YOU.

A to Z Challenge - Lets try

 With all that life has been throwing at my side, packaged as kids home work and school projects, work deadlines, severe mood swings and tantrums from a 2 yr old (Can you even believe that?), this baby of mine aka blog has been severely ignored. I come to look at it every single day but haven't had the energy or time to make myself to write something.

However, writing is something I love and this is my way of getting things out of myself.

More recently, this has also become one of the mediums for me to communicate with my closest ones. I talk to them on the phone, but all that, that could not be expressed or told on the phone, all those sentiments that I feel everyday, this is their way to get a peek into that side of me. So, it is all the more important for me to keep up on it.

so, I have signed myself up for the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge where I'll (try to) blog every day. After such a long gap to writing, blogging every day will be a challenge. But I wanted to push myself. And so I did.

I haven't chosen any theme for the challenge. So it can be anything random under the sky. So Stay tuned.