Livinghigh

Virulent

2008-02-15T11:00:00.002+05:30

Virulent

I have it again. Yikes. This is the second time my laptop got attacked by a virus, and of course it's my fault again. I knew I shouldn't let my libido control the mouse. :) Too many clicks and that's what I get. A Trojan. And not even the good kind, the kind that makes pigs fly. Naa, what I get is this.

Used to study them back in high school, for biology. Wriggly little pests. And then we learned about HIV. Bummer!

I got sidetracked from the topic of my computer virus, though. Damn.

Mr. Bean

2008-01-17T13:26:00.000+05:30

Mr. Bean

I have a coffee-maker at home now. Yikes. Which basically means, it's 3.02 am Eastern Time right now, and I'm up. Not particularly tired. watching youtube videos, interspersed with catching up on my reading. O, and blogging.

Did I say yikes back there?

I have a work-thing tomorrow (today, technically) at 11.30 am, and I am so not going to make it. The beans won't let me. I love my beans. Perhaps I need a new brain. New sanity. Like new clothes. That might be nice.

*sip*

All work and little play...

2008-01-09T10:56:00.000+05:30

All work and little play...

The start of a new semester, and the book list frankly is a bit daunting. I'm not supposed to feel so (ummm...) daunted, but I kinda am. Yikes. Each of the new classes involves way more work and readings and tests than the ones I had last semester. My teaching responsibilities have also increased. I have to write two academic papers for conferences in March. I have to explore the options for publishing/ presenting another two papers I wrote last semester.

Am sure it will all look great on my CV in a year's time, but right now, I'm pooped.

*sigh*

Cheater-cock

2008-01-07T22:09:00.000+05:30

Cheater-cock

It's simpler to cheat in a test, rather than in real life. You don't spend the minutes leading up to it, breathless and nervous, looking out of the window, looking at the phone... Even though, when you're actually cheating, you don't feel a twinge of remorse, you're flying in the moment, you're shutting your eyes and smiling because it just feels so fcuking good...! Despite all that, when it's done and you're alone, with hours to kill before life returns to normalcy, you're left pondering and blogging, and you talk to yourself even as you reach out for a chocolate chip cookie, even as you let the dog out, and you tell yourself that you're not really as nice a person as you give yourself credit for...

You could hurt people. You're dangerous. And the high is no longer there.

*sigh*

Shop Till I Drop

2008-01-05T11:12:00.000+05:30

Shop Till I Drop

I'm a shopping fiend. I like malls. I like walking through their shiny halls, stopping to look through glass windows at glitzy displays, sniffing in the breath of free samples, and wondering how a fashionable piece of furniture would look in my home. So, after finishing my Emergency Winter Shopping yesterday, I'm quite at a loss now as to what to do.

Ticked off on the list:

Midnight blue down jacket, with fur-lined collar, (courtesy Hollister) for those terribly windy cold winter nights that are expected in the next few days.
Black boots, (courtesy JC Penney) for walking in the snow.
Smart black knit hat, (courtesy the Gap) to replace the earlier smart knit hat which I lost on the way back from Chicago.
Stripped tee, full sleeve, (courtesy Hollister) that will be returned shortly - *sigh* horizontal stripes are evil.

The good news is, since I did all my shopping post Christmas, I got all the stuff at throwaway prices - all of the above, at under $150!

Twisted Fate

2008-01-03T05:17:00.000+05:30

Twisted Fate

There was a terrible car accident yesterday, and two girls whom I'd met briefly passed away. Thankfully, a close friend of mine, who was in the car, scraped through with some minor stitches on his head. But this is horribly spooky... and a terrible way to die. Both girls were here only for the first semester, and so it seems like a terrible waste. It all seems especially macabre to me, since I was worrying about my own mortality last night... and then I wake up in the morning and hear about the tragedy. But this is not about me. And the only reason I mention this, is because... well, I hate such terrible coincidences. Death is a terrible thing. Somewhere in some movie, I remember a character saying, "In life, there are no coincidences", and that to me, actually seems chilling now.

I'm sorry it happened this way.

Whites?

2008-01-02T02:48:00.000+05:30

Whites?

I'm a white wine person now. Not that I'm one of those terribly discerning types who can sniff and tell what's groovy and what's not. Quite the opposite - I think most white wines are groovy and so am not very discerning at all. :) No, what I do is this: pop a bottle and sit down to watch a movie with my babe. And I get happy. Not terribly tipsy or high or drunk. Just... fruity happy. And that feels nice.

To write a new post here, after ages. Perhaps it's the New Year thing. :)

Wireless

2007-08-18T01:05:00.000+05:30

I looooove unsecured wireless networks.

:)

It's probably illegal - but if they're stupid enough to do it...!

*giggle*

Time Machine

2007-08-16T04:08:00.000+05:30

Time Machine

I started this blog in a computer lab very much like the one I'm in right now.

Deja vu?

Social Me

2007-08-02T00:49:00.000+05:30

So I tried this out from Viewer's page, and I'm supposed to be...

You Are a Social Blogger!

Your blog is more of a semi-private affair for your friends.
It's how you keep in touch... sharing stories, jokes, and pics.

What Kind of Blogger Are You?

That's actually kinda true, so I won't really dispute it here. But here I am, sitting at my desk while the Mama and the Papa (I love California Dreamin') are snoring away to glory in the next room. On this blog though, I don't really talk for an audience, totally for myself, and that's why there seems to be so much fun in maintaining the two blogs - cuz I have two separate intentions for them. Not very sure how long it's going to remain feasible, the double effort thing I mean, what with class beginning soon (from next week,) and so I'm going to use that hateful phrase that so many talentless TV journos use to end their voice-overs: time will tell....!

*barf*

Jobless!

2007-07-26T01:02:00.000+05:30

Jobless!

Unemployment felt great this afternoon. Woke up at 12.45, and that too, only because I had three missed calls and four sms' waiting for me. :) Quit the job only yesterday, said all the teary goodbyes, and here I am, waiting to get things ready and packed in a couple of days.

Frankly, I hate moving. Terribly involving and exasperating. Too much organizing demanded, and the rewards aren't really all that great. And here I am, packing everything up, getting rid of many of the stuff I really like(d), having a 'Moving Sale' - going back home.

Still Seeing Shiny Disco Balls...

2007-07-22T12:51:00.000+05:30

Still Seeing Shiny Disco Balls...

Came back home this morning with a definite hangover. Collapsed at my friend's place after a night of heavy-duty partying, with my contacts on, and the damn things started irritating me early morning, so I woke up by 10 am. Damn, no usual Sunday-sleeping-till-one this week.

O, but the party was fun!

Screamed my lungs out. Danced my butt flat. Maybe I lost some weight? Better not to hope for toooo much, now! *snigger* Drank tonnes. Five drinks. I get drunk after two, remember. So I was sloshed. *giggle*Happy me. Happy, happy, happy, happy me.

Super Troopers

2007-07-17T01:22:00.000+05:30

Super Troopers

Uploaded a 4 CD "Best of ABBA" set on my iPOD finally, and have been listening to a whole bunch of old favourites. And it struck me, that despite all the "happy happy" image, the group have tons of not-so happy songs. I mean, apart from the all-too-famous "Dancing Queen" and a coupla others, you have songs dealing with:

waiting around for the phone to ring from that person wringing your heart
having a last dance, even though the love has gone
"pick me! pick me!" happening in a crowded dance floor - Take a Chance...
guy/ gal going away and you're left crying your heart out
How winners take everything and losers are left... ummm.. singing.

Of course, now that I recall, ABBA was composed of two couples who later split up, so maybe all of that was just a symptom, chiqitita...? :)

LOL

2007-07-14T14:53:00.000+05:30

LOL

Laziness is a state of being. Lolling in the bed, too. My best friend says, I do too much of that - lolling, I mean. And he also thinks I'm a lousy employee. I retort, he's a Hitler.

Laziness is a state of art. Saturday afternoons, and you don't really are that you haven't had lunch. Lovely weather outside, but instead of going out, you open the verandah doors and let the cool breeze refresh you. Walking seems so mundane right now.

Not when I have my bed to lol on. :)

One lump or two

2007-07-11T22:56:00.000+05:30

One lump or two

Cups of tea at the Tea Centre. Old world charm and just plain laziness. Afternoon saw me with the Hot Buttered Apple Tea and a half of the Mad Bawi's Truffle Cake, while early evening found me there again, sipping Lemongrass Tea this time.

O, and I left my umbrella behind, but went back and fetched it. Cups of tea at the Tea Centre. Not too bad, really, but not a patch on Flury's. :)

Crumpets?

2007-07-09T16:15:00.000+05:30

Crumpets?

Saw The Queen yesterday for the second time. To be fair - the first time was on DVD, and this time it was in a freezing movie hall, with nice seats that make you (almost) think you're sleeping, with caramel popcorn to hog and your friends to steal.

So... yes, it's different.

And Helen Mirren is simply superb in the movie. Brought back memories of the time Diana died. I remember, it seemed like such a big deal at that time - my Anglo grandmum still has these ties with England, and she still goes gaga over the Royals there - and yes, Diana was a favourite, surprise, surprise. But while the Brits went on screaming bloody murder against the Queen for not 'being human' at Diana's death, I remember how my own grandmum was quite supportive of the monarch. And this movie also shows that. Behind all the publicity churning and all the clever taglines ("People's Princess"), it was easy to forget that the Queen was not really used to all this, and thought of all of it as quite a meaningless and annoying affront to a personal moment.

Mirren must have been tongue-tied over that brief cup-of-tea invite. :)

This is a funny city.

2007-07-07T20:40:00.000+05:30

This is a funny city.

Sometimes, I think it's dead-weight, at the end of its cycle, time to roll up and die, nothing really works, everything's pretty much falling apart, it's all just mouldy now, whatever goes up must come down, and that it's time to leave.

And then, everything feels great, nothing else really matters, clockwork is what I have, exhilaration can be found no where else, and I'm sad that it's almost over.

And then I tell myself that it's not over till it's over.

Apparently...

2007-07-06T16:01:00.000+05:30

Apparently...

Your Dominant Intelligence is Spatial Intelligence

You've got a good sense of space and how the world around you looks.
You can close your eyes and "see" images. You have innate artistic talent.
An eye for color and shapes, you're also a natural designer.
Since you think in pictures, visual aids and demonstrations help you learn best.

You would make a good navigator, sculptor, visual artist, inventor, architect, interior designer, or engineer.

Of course.... I'm sure my friends don't buy into it...!

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

Sniffle

2007-07-03T22:56:00.000+05:30

*Sniffle*

I had a great holiday, but I picked up a cold. And that cold has now turned into a full-blown flu. *sniffle*

So, the kiddo in me kicked in, after the meds prescribed by best friend failed to work and older brother was unreachable on his cell, and I called Mum. She heard me patiently, chided me a lot, told me "I told you so" at least a hundred times, and then called up the family doc to get back with the meds I should have. Have an important interview the day after, so I need to be shipshape. So it's ok to bawl like the baby I am, and ask Mum for meds. :)

O, yay, I'm running a sweat now. :) Fever going? *fingers crossed*

I prefer cake, too

2007-06-27T11:07:00.000+05:30

I prefer cake, too

I saw this silly movie last night. Wanted to see it because it was so obviously going to be camp and flouncy plus I have a weakness for period dramas. The best thing about this one was the costumes. And the ditsiness. This was the ditsy blond version of Marie Antoinette. Straight from the weird neon pink credits at the beginning, reminiscent of a 80's porno flick, to the weird rock music they used in the film (o, except for Fools rush in, where angels fear to tread, which I looove!), to the ridiculous American twang that all the supposedly French characters throw around.

But Kirsten Dunst is pretty here, Much prettier than in Spidey.

Little Johnny?

2007-06-25T16:13:00.000+05:30

Little Johnny?

Raining cats and dogs these days in Bombay. And here I was, sometime back, thinking, O I'm going to miss Bombay's mad rains!

:)

I must be mad to actually venture out in these showers for a movie. Crappy movie also. Whjatever happened to the Yash Chopra style of English love stories? Infidelity is depressing. Makes the monsoons appear depressing too, although it's not really supposed to be that way.

So what happens now?

2007-05-16T11:24:00.000+05:30

So what happens now?

Another suitcase in another hall
So what happens now?
Take your picture off another wall
Where am I going to?
You'll get by, you always have before
Where am I going to?

Or...

2007-05-04T23:53:00.000+05:30

Or...

The funny thing is, I don't have much to say here. It's funny, because everyone says I'm loud. And that I talk a lot. Incessantly. And that I eat a lot. O, yes. And I should have a huge pot belly, instead of the (comparatively) small one I posses now.

So I don't really have much to say, and I do quizzes that tell me I'm the Wheel of Fortune, and that my friends are Devils (*grin*), even though I wondered whether I should talk about finally moving into my new place (o, but I already did that), or the uncertainties of a new dating game (o, how I hate calling it the 'game'), or the excitement of (possibly) a new phase in the US (o, but isn't it way too premature to talk about that now?), or how I'm looking forward to getting that fatter pay packet after the Appraisal is finally complete (o, but it's work stuff, and who wants to talk about that, outside of bitchy cigarette and coffee breaks, anyway?), or how I thought about finally catching Mira Nair's The Namesake (o, but everyone knows I'm Bong, so I'm going to wax eloquent about it, and that I liked Tabu's authentic Bengali-fat-arms very much), or how I would sooooo love a vacation in Goa (o, but it's terribly hot there now, so a June-July trip is a better idea, and o, can we perhaps do Kerala instead, no offense to Goa?), or how I'm quite jobless this weekend and I'm wondering whether I'll be going out (or staying in) with the new dating game partner (o, but I whine about that stuff all the time, so no use in crying wolf here now, is there?), or...

When's recess?

Took a quiz... again...

2007-05-01T13:27:00.000+05:30

Took a quiz... again...

So they say, I'm... The Wheel of Fortune

Good fortune and happiness but sometimes a species of intoxication with success

The Wheel of Fortune is all about big things, luck, change, fortune. Almost always good fortune. You are lucky in all things that you do and happy with the things that come to you. Be careful that success does not go to your head however. Sometimes luck can change.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

A Wadala Sunday

2007-04-23T01:46:00.000+05:30

A Wadala Sunday

This week and the last one has been a bonding exercise, of sorts, with darling brother. Living with him till my PG thing gets finalised, and so here I am in the back of beyond, Wadala. Aaa, it's not that bad really, seeing that it's just about 5 stations away from VT and 3 from Bandra, and its technically South Bombay, given the only-taxis-and-no-autos rule, but then my friends refuse to hear me say so and threaten to boycott me if I persist in calling Wadala 'South Bombay'!

:)

So, last week, went to see this weird Hillary Swank starrer The Reaping. The usual Exorcist-style Hollywood horror flick - coming of the anti-christ, 10 plagues on mankind, angel come to save mankind, scary kid doing the spooky eye routine, yadayadayada. :) Bro hates scary movies and would rather have gone to see this inane action flick called Shooter, but personally I prefer horror flicks - even though I'm quite the coward myself. Not as bad as bro, though - he actually covers his eyes and sits through much of the movie like that, or pretends to be messaging someone furiously on the cellphone! :)

But I must confess: I was glad that I was sleeping with him that night! *grin*

Today has been Exploration Day or sorts. After yesterday's plan to visit (and photograph) Lower Parel and Dadar Five Gardens was shelved on account of the horrendous Bombay heat, I resolved to do the Haji Ali dargah this afternoon, post-lunch. So we caught lunch at O Calcutta's, fish Bong-style and all, and after that I set off on my own. Walked across the thin bridge and did darshan at the dargah, then clicked snaps of the coastline, and hailed a cab to Marine Drive where I took some more snaps. Wanted to check out the museum also, but it was much too late, so decided to take snaps of the Afghan Church at Colaba instead. That was a great decision, and I topped it off by a solitary viewing of the 7 pm show of Bheja Fry. Great comedy, really, and I recommend it for anyone. :)

Back home at 11 pm, to be greeted by gooseberry ice cream, courtesy bro. :) Nice Sunday.

Singing in the (T)rain

2007-04-13T10:39:00.000+05:30

Singing in the (T)rain

Hardly as romantic as Gene Kelly here, tripping on lamp posts and skipping (!) in the downpour. Picture terribly crowded suburban train of Bombay at peak office hours. People grappling, jostling, shoving, shoved up against each other as sardines in a can never got to. And that's when this group of sopranos unsheathe their dhols, cymbals and hoarse voices, and start singing. Bhajans usually. Something to do with Jai Maharashtra also, at times.

It happens on almost every office hour train. I usually ignore it, and as soon as the carriage with the musicians rolls into the platform, I walk ahead (or behind) and clamber onto the carriage ahead (or behind) it. It's bad enough traveling to work every day all shut up like that - listening to tone-deaf wannabe Fateh Ali Khans doesn't improve the train journey for me.

But that's my opinion. And a lot of Bombaywallahs don't share it. A lot of them, smile and nod their heads, eyes closed, and hum along to the song. And today was the first time I actually witnessed a guy who had just fought his way onto the train at Cotton Green station to suddenly start spouting a hoarse song of his own, which was quickly picked up by the cymbal-crashers nearby. Soon, there was a regular concert happening, and despite myself, I couldn't help smiling.

I didn't turn to look back when I got off, but I'm sure they were all exchanging numbers with the new entrant. :)

Crash Course

2007-04-11T23:09:00.000+05:30

Crash Course

Crashing in with family again. For awhile. It's nice, in some ways. 12th floor of a highrise building. Poolhouse and gym. Gateman who salaams you when you walk in/ out, and yes, I'm an awful person for liking that (yawn). Ordering in grand food every night, or going out to free fancy dinner.

But....

And no, in real life, it's so colourful as that. I hate my imposed re-virginity. :(

Doubles Match

2007-04-08T23:33:00.000+05:30

Doubles Match

On one of my last days at Calcutta this time around, I roamed all around Park Street and Middleton Row and ended up at Flury's for a late lunch. And after ordering my Club sandwich and my cold coffee with ice cream, I settled down to fiddle with my digicam, which had been busy all afternoon. There were these two guys at the table next to me, and they were talking pretty loudly about being back in Calcutta, and how land rents had spiralled in Bombay and Delhi to alarming heights, and various business propositions one of the two had received. Very clipped fancy English, very La Martiniere or Xaviers schooling, about thirty-something old, both of them, and I could tell one of them was from Bombay and the other from Delhi.

And it was clear that the Bombay-walla was at least leaving Calcutta on the same day that I was, as he informed the other fellow that had he left a day earlier, he would be able to make the Shakira concert scheduled for that evening at Andheri.

And the Delhiwalla nodded in sympathy, but then was very offhand with the waiter when he was informed they were out of scones. :) It was clear, these were old-guard Calcuttans like me, who had left the city ags ago.

Anyhow.. I stopped eavesdropping once my sandwich and coffee came, as they 'hogged' my full attention.

***

Till... Sunday evening when I'm leaving Calcutta. I deposit my luggage for check-in (horribly slow line!), collect my boarding pass and then stand in another long line for security check. My flight is due to leave in 15 minutes, but I'm still in the line, and then when there's just two other people left ahead of me, I realise that I don't have my boarding pass with me.

Utter panic!

After talking to one of the walky-talky toting people milling about there, I rush back to where I got my boarding pass to ask for a duplicate, and that's when the girl there looks irritably at me, and hands me the original: I had forgotten to take it from the desk! And who should be there standing at the counter, in front of the girl, when I arrive breathless and nervous but - the Delhiwallah! I flash him a look, and I think he recognizes me too, but then I grab the pass and run.

And when I sit down at my seat on the airline, I chuckle to myself about coincidences.

Just when I'm thanking my lucky stars that the plane is delayed, and then I'm wondering why it's still delayed now that the errant passenger (me!) is on board, in walks, yes, the Bombaywalla, with his suitcase. He's much too late to catch Shakira's concert, and he's here on my flight!

No, I haven't seen either of the two here in Bombay, and it's been about three weeks since I cam back. :)

Back From The Red

2007-03-29T17:15:00.000+05:30

Back From The Red

So, I'm back from Calcutta, and thought I must list down my Loot.

Ransacked my dad's cupboard and fished out two great-fitting coats - in black and grey - and a really nice suit-piece. So, there I am, all ready to get well-dressed! *shucks*
Also, got Mum to buy me a niiiice blue shirt from Fabindia, a coupla tshirts from Pantaloons, and one from Shoppers Stop.
And while this cannot be officially be termed as 'looted', I also brought back this cream silk churidar kurta I had stashed at home, and some neat brown formal shoes I can use for the workplace.

Other things I did:

Visited my old college - St Xaviers.
Finally did the tour of the Victoria Memorial Hall - I always thought it was a palace, and it actually turns out to be a glorified exhibition hall!
Rode the Metro again. :)
Hogged on Bong sweets, Calcutta confectionery, street-side rolls, my fave Honey Chicken at this chhottu Chinese joint and other stuff that has resulted in me gaining 3 kilos over this week.
Saw Alisha Chinai at close quarters, as my friend did an interview with her.

For ore, gossip, visit the photo-blog.! :)

Soul Fried

2007-03-28T13:12:00.000+05:30

Soul Fried

Back home in Bombay, and sometimes I wonder if that phrase I just used is true. 'Back home', I mean. Daresay, it sounds terribly cliched and world-weary of me to say that, but gosh, sometimes I'm really not sure where I feel most at home. Calcutta, Delhi or Bombay. Not Chennai. Never Chennai. Chennai never entered the scheme of things, as far as 'homely' status was concerned. It's always the hot and wet place with the gorgeous fort (St. George).

But here in Bombay, as I'm back after a week-long sojourn in Calcutta, it fees like... home. My little wrought-iron bed here, and then I think of my (not so much bigger) wooden bed in Calcutta, with the bolsters and the mosquito net, and I'm at a loss as to come up with a definitive answer as to which one I love the best. That's what I get for being an unabashed sleepyhead - a bed anywhere feels like heaven. (Anyone's bed, for that matter.... *grin* )

... And I might be hitting Delhi next week on a short work trip. A place whose wide open roads and relatively smaller rentals add soooo much to its charm. No hunting for cramped little apartments, through crowds of teeming people, like it is here in Bombay. And yet, this is where I am, Carter Road and Marine Drive and Lower Parel and all. :)

***

Popped out for lunch today at this brand new restaurant at Fountain - an offspring of Bandra's Soul Fry, we have Soul Fry Casa. Very Goan look and feel inside, and the food is great, even though the service isn't very quick. They still haven't bought covers for the cushions, which are all crinkly under the plastic wrap. :) O, and Mad Bawi says that the solkadi is actually spicy - something that I have never heard of. I had a nice fish caldine, with pav bread, and was quite satisfied.

For once, not a Parsi joint! :)

Retro at the Sports Bar :)

2007-03-16T00:42:00.000+05:30

Retro at the Sports Bar :)

D.I.S.C.O
D.I.S.C.O
D.I.S.C.O
She is disco

She is D delirious
She is I incredible
She is S superficial
She is C complicated
She is O oh, oh, oh

She is D desirable
She is I irresistible
She is S super sexy
She is C such a cute
She is O oh, oh, oh

D.I.S.C.O.
She is disco

She is D disastrous
She is I impossible
She is S super special
She is C crazy, crazy
She is O oh, oh, oh

She is D delightful
She is I incredible
She is S sensational
She is C sweetest candy
She is O oh, oh, oh

D.I.S.C.O
She is disco

- Ottawan

Confide in me?

2007-03-13T11:38:00.000+05:30

Confide in me?

While in this relationship last year, I often faced the complaint that when I was privy to unpleasant matters (professional insecurities, financial troubles, emotional bewilderment, and the like) I wasn't very good at reacting to them. It was alleged: I was very much the sweep-under-the-carpet type. I tut-tut and say nice things about how things will get better and while I try to understand the problem and am a sympathetic enough listener, I offer very little usable advice. Hmmm... not very nice feedback from someone I planned on spending the rest of my life with.

Later on, when I thought about it, I realized that what the said individual required of me was a strangely morbid acknowledgment of how baaaaddd things really were, summed up in the end with a perky "o, but I'm sure things will get better, so don't worry", which completely belied all the worrying that preceded it. and I found that silly. But learnt to deliver on that score because I was in love, and thought, o, why not!

And then, the other day, my best friend calls up with the blues, and we're working on cheering him up. And I wonder: am I really any good at this thing? I mean, this whole Emotional Florence Nightingale thing - is it simply beyond me?

I mean, I'm this weird combination of a cynic and a mush-pot, a comic and a pokerface. When people tell me how things are bad and I think they have it REAL good, I usually tell them so. I usually tell them that they're giving way too much importance to all this temporary shit, and the really big thing is Themselves. That's your typically egoistic Leo advice. And yes, I do tend to give examples from my experience, if I've been through something like that. We all have phases, I say, and this one is going to pass soon, too.

But does this sound silly? Does this sound excessively simplistic, like I'm trivializing the whole issue? Honestly, even while saying stuff like "Things will get better", I'm acutely aware that it's a terrible cliche and I find it funny. But then, what's the alternative?

On the bright side: my conversation with said best friend seemed to have a positive impact on him, and he sounded much better when we spoke again later in the evening.

Pictures Speak Louder Than...

2007-03-12T17:25:00.000+05:30

Pictures Speak Louder Than...

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

Saturdays at work

2007-03-10T13:44:00.000+05:30

Saturdays at work

The Livinghigh Logic: if one must indeed work on Saturdays, then one might as well go laaaaaaaaaaaaate in the day (afternoon) to the office. So in I stroll at 12.45 pm, after grabbing a nice frankie roll at Churchgate station, and I say a 'hello' to my boss. And I explain to him, very nicely, how it's much better if I come in late and stay till late in the afternoon, when everybody has left. That gives me peace and quiet, boss, I argue, and he pipes down.

It also affords me the leisure to listen to great songs on the computer while I blog. Aaa, come on, there's hardly any work on Saturdays anyway - just some silly ego massaging on the phone if dimwit clients require it, and some jotting down plans for next week. I'm a glorified secretary on Saturdays, and I may as well pop some bubblegum now.

:)

Copied some nice songs from a friend over onto my computer here. Old style Phil Collins and John Denver and some Elvis Presley. :)

Super Stomach

2007-03-02T13:04:00.000+05:30

Super Stomach

Mad Bawi told me the other day, "My god, at the rate you eat, it's a surprise you're not fat!"

Well, personally I think I am fat, but that's not really stopped me so far from hogging it over the others. Come lunchtime every day, I peek over the Bawi's cubicle and ask her what her mum has packed for her - and I usually poach one of the two chicken cutlets, one of the four salami sandwiches, some of the akhuri she has, and so on and so forth. And yes, my waistline has not been the slimmer for all that.

Met a friend today for lunch at Ideal Corner, and I realized that I've ventured into all the famous Parsi restaurants in the area. There's Ideal, which is my staple, then Military Cafe near the Stock Exchange, Piccolo which is also behind the BSE, Cafe New Excelsior right opposite the movie hall of the same name, Brittannia of the famous Berry Pulao at Ballard Estate, and most recently, Jimmy Boy's at Horniman Circle.

That makes me some sort of a surrogate Parsi of some sort, surely! :)

Necessary Things

2007-02-27T01:27:00.000+05:30

Necessary Things

Gosh, I need to throw a party soon. Just been way too long since I've done one of those. A real wingdinger - do people still use that term these days? Something quaintly yummy about it - that and 'the bee's knees'! :)

Aaa, but the party will be fun. Eclectic and fun. Blaring crappy Hindi film stuff, including Himeshbhai's fare, and then also the Material Girls (Kylie and Madge) and also Salam-e-ishq-ishq-ishq....!

And finger foods. Lots of wine. Port and white, both. Maybe red, also. Bibinca sliced with ice cream and tossed with melted chocolate eclairs, dripping with caramel. Maybe some fish. Yes, probably some fish. The sas ni macchi today at Jimmy Boy's was fun - loved the yummy white sweet sauce, even though I have no idea what it consists of and the Mad Bawi could not really shed much light on that.

But a party is necessary. The last one was ages ago - shucks, August seems like eons away. So a mad, ballistic party is in order. Clean up the flat. Ghost of Monica Geller, arise. :)

Other thing to definietly do soon: Goa. Maybe this monsoon. June or July. Again, necessary.

Saint Shiv's Day

2007-02-17T03:54:00.000+05:30

Saint Shiv's Day

Three day weekend (or something of the sort, since everyone knows I don't take Saturday workdays at all seriously!) and suddenly I'm a major Shiv Bhakt, all thanks to Mahashivratri that earned me my day of rest on Friday. A lovely day of sleeping in late, shopping leisurely, a coffee date over loads of caramel and conversation, and a great dinner out with friends to a restaurant I haven't been to in ages.

That's the second 'festival', after a more high-profile Valentine's Day on the 14th. A foreign friend of mine remarked today, how surprised he was to see all the usual V-day mumbo-jumbo in India, via cards and banners and posters and ads, when he always thought it was such a (*grin*) Western concept. Aha. I guess the Bajrang Dal guys would be glad to hear the NRI talk, and might even send him a draft to join the party! :)

Anyhow, V-day was spent at a friend's Red Party (soooo imaginative!), and it turned out that nobody really cares for all the hoopla anyway. Even as the 14th began, I got an sms from a friend moaning: "I hate this day! They should have a Random Fcuk Day instead!"

I tend to agree. :) Especially since we didn't get a holiday off work on the 14th!

Now you know why I'm a good Bajrang Dal boy, and loooove my Mahashivratri! :)

Little Bombays

2007-02-05T23:11:00.000+05:30

Little Bombays

Every city has a festival or two to its name. But not like Bombay. Not like this. Not just the sweep and the scale of organization, more the spirit is what I'm talking about, however corny that sounds. And even though I usually find the Mumbai Festival a bit too farflung and a bit too (erm) pedestrian for my taste, I completely love the knickknacks they have for the Kaala Ghoda Arts Festival. And even though I think the Mahim Fair and the Celebrate Bandra festivals cause way more traffic jam than they warrant, I still think that's a swell idea. And even though I've never been up to watch the folks over at Hamara Juhu sing and dance, it feels nice all the same. I have been down to Kotachiwadi for their little festival, though, and that so completely charmed me. The fish-framed mirrors and the hot vadas with chicken curry, and all the other yummy things I stuffed my face with....!

And yet, the Bombay festivals are not just about the food. Ever since I got the digicam, I've become quite the camera freak, and my friends reprimand me for toting it around whenever we go to any event/ place that could be deemed touristy, cuz they know I'm going to whip it out and dilly dally for pics. And I love that...

But I digress from my theory of Little Bombays. Tiny portions of a city that are all so completely proud to mantain their own identity, however completely fused they are to this great big teeming megapolis. Sometimes, you need to be an outsider to notice these things. Sometimes, you need an outsider to shake you out of your reverie and appreciate some of the sillier things. And sometimes you just have to have a camera handy.

To capture all the Bombays, one after the other. Discrete bundles of joy.

Going By The Book

2007-01-28T21:42:00.000+05:30

Going By The Book

The Strand Book Fair wins hands down over other book festivals, whenever it comes to town. The good part for me is, the store is bang next to my office, so even when the sale is not on, I can just walk over and get all the best books Strand can offer at their mandatory 20% discount. When the Traveller was in town earlier, he wanted some weird book on Nirvana-or-whatever and couldn't find a copy anywhere in Bombay, predictably enough - till he hit upon the only copy for sale in the city at the Strand. :)

Anyway, so I hit the fair this evening with Vahed, and picked up four books, three for myself and one for a friend. And yes, even though the prices are REALLY marked down, I'm officially broke again (in proportion to my mingy salary), but I'm justifying the expense as a once-in-a-year thingy. :)

So now I'm the proud owner of:

"Love in the Time of Cholera" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez - comes highly recommended from all quarters, and even though I found Marquez' "One Hundread Years of Solitude" terribly dreary to read, I decided to risk him again. Think, maybe I started with the wrong Marquez book.
"We were the Mulvaneys" by Joyce Carol Oates - picked up Oates' "I'll Take You There" from the book fair last year, and I quite liked it, though it was kinda vague at the ending. This book is supposedly her biggest, and comes recommended by (gulp) the Oprah Book Club, so I picked it up.
"Lasher" by Anne Rice - pure pulp fiction! *grin* I've looooved Rice's vampire and witch series, and this one is the second from the Mayfair coven series. Complete with all the swashbuckling and undying love drama that is sooooo much fun when one doesn't want any serious reading. :)

And I picked up a Virginia Woolf for the friend. I completely adore her style.

Year of the Pig (OINK)

2007-01-25T17:29:00.000+05:30

Year of the Pig (OINK!!!)

While in Delhi, Sharon and I pored over Elle magazine to decipher our fortunes in the new year. Predictably, it said I didn't realy have stable love in sight, but it did mention that my career graph looks set to zoom. There was stuff about new challenges - 'nothing that you cannot handle, though' - and great accolades, and post-September, a 'free soaring', which I hope means that I get the scholarship I've applied for. But it's still January; September is many many months away, and I'm handling all those 'new challenges' that I've supposedly handled before.

1. Badgering Clients.
2. Results season.
3. Spoilt bratty journalists.
4. Bosses who expect you to be superhuman.
5. Intermittent flirtations with melancholy regarding singlehood.
6. O, and did I mention Badgering Clients. Bold and Underline that, please.

But in a way, the forecast (if it can be called that) was right. It's not something I haven't been through before. Thankfully, I don't have inertia holding me back, and thankfully I'm geared up to treat Q3 more aggressively than I did earlier. So I don't get all excited, and I stroll in after an extended 2 hour long lunch break (ok, I agree that's a bit much!) to glide over to the telecon chair for a conference call. And the most important part is strategy: I'm glad I'm able to strategize much faster and better this time around. More independently.

***

Last night, I hit The Ghetto after ages. The first time I'd been there was during the CNBC years, with Mallu and the gang from office, and after that so many times with Sharon. The great big drawing of Jim Morrison is still there, as green as ever in the garbled light, even though some of the other drawings have changed. And the atmosphere still remains as college-world as ever. So I glugged beer (two pints) and conversed about the similarities between Hinduism and Ancient Greek religion, and no, it wasn't all that farty as it seems. :) This is The Ghetto - farty is not allowed.

Back From Delhi

2007-01-22T16:39:00.000+05:30

Back From Delhi

So it took me more than a week to finally upload all the snaps from my Delhi-Agra trip, but they're finally online at Pixelated. An exercise of labelling, photoshopping, blogging and uploading, and finally relabelling and rechecking. Whew.

And I thought, getting a digicam was easy work.

***

On Sunday, instead of hitting Zenzi for some salsa practice, I joined a friend for a Western Classical Music concert at the NCPA. Involved a stocky Polish pianist and a gorgeous French singer (mezzo-something). And even though I really didn't get a word of what she sang - French, you see - I could (for the most part) get the thrust of the song, cuz the singer was so completely involved with the crowd.

With each of her songs, she adopted a new persona and played with the crowd - playing up the hurt or the anger or the love or the flirting or the sorrow or whatever emotion was dominant in the song. The best was the last song, their encore, in which she enacted this funny (I take it) song about being high and tipsy. Ridiculously funny.

Saddi Dilli

2007-01-13T18:49:00.000+05:30

Saddi Dilli

The hiatus in blogging is due to my Delhi trip. The trip is about to get over, though, and I hit Bombay late tomorrow night, godwilling fog doesn't play the spoilsport. Have had loads of fun, and will post about that shortly. Had three days exploring Old Delhi and Agra with a friend, and even though he wasn't very impressed with the Taj, I was.

Immensely so.

So, while Stephen groaned and moaned about how the Taj was overhyped, and yes, the smell of feet in the inner sanctum was a deterrent, I kinda... fused with the place. I felt all weird and mushy-gooey... and it was really great. I told him later: maybe I needed him to rant on and on about the place as much as he did, because it allowed me to breathe in its intensity. It wasn't all about Shah Jahan and his 'n'th queen... it was so much more important. The idea that through the centuries, so many lovers have wandered under the arches holding hands... can all that love ever be anything but beautiful? :) I jokingly call the Taj the world's greatest Erection for Love, and sometimes that may seem cynical.. but it doesn't have to be.

And it's about the way we are. I realised something that day, as I told Stephen - I'm madly in love with my country. There we were, on the platform of the Taj, the monument was looking splendid by the light of the setting sun, and from somewhere across the river there wafted in this beautiful tune being played on some primitive stringed instrument... it took me a while to realise that the tune was from a recent Hindi film song, and that was just so amusing that I started laughing. Stephen was surprised, but I couldn't find the right words to explain why I found it all so amazing. The then and the now, the building and the rebuilding.

More on Delhi and Agra, and loads of pictures to upload... will come soon.

Players - The New Story on Gabbles

2006-12-31T20:36:00.000+05:30

Players - The New Story on Gabbles

What was I thinking of when I wrote it? A conversation with a close friend. So many days spent at the coffee shop observing people. And many more conversations overheard around me. There's an ideal there: the player with the balls, Hindi cinema's celebrated harlot with the heart of gold. :) But I hate excuses. I hate making excuses for people, though I seem to be so adept at making them for myself.

My favourite excuse: not any of the stuff that the players use in the story, nothing silly like that, but something much more deep-rooted and stolid: this is how I am. This is how I am, deal with it. You can almost hear the gavel hammering down then.

Too eager for love? This is how I am.

Too laidback to overtake life? This is how I am.

Too satsfied in who I am? This is how I am.

Absurd, isn't it?

Watching the players unfold their play is a more entertaining option.

Seasonal Highs...

2006-12-23T12:47:00.000+05:30

Seasonal Highs...

... and of course Christmas is the highest of them all. Might miss cold weather at times like these, but it doesn't really matter. The other day, walking through Crawfod Market, the Traveller was saying how crass and commercial the season has become - but frankly speaking, I don't care. It's all about colour and parties and feel-good factor. And gifts play a huge role in feeling good! *grin*

I used to compile this great big Xmas list for mum and dad right till I turned 17, but even though I don't list out stuff I want (WANT!) for Christmas anymore.... it's always a thrill.

What I do miss the most is doing up the Christmas Tree...

I wonder if there'll be a tree at either tonight or tomorrow's parties.... !

Touring Again

2006-12-20T21:51:00.000+05:30

Touring Again

Today, I went to lunch with the Traveller, and we talked about loads of things. While he promised he'd add me to his blogroll, he also accused me of not writing in as much as he does. And even though my first inclination was to deny that, I realised he was saying the truth. And the truth is, I've been wanting to blog, but not really sure about what. The fun stuff, the eating stuff, the movie stuff seems silly to blog about, especially since a lot has been happening in my personal life that I was worried about - and then I also didn't want to write about the personal stuff, because I didn't want to dwell too much on that. So the result was: nothing.

And the Traveller's words made me see that. And want to blog again. We met up for lunch at my all-time favourite Parsi restaurant and pigged out on Dhansak, sipped ice cold coffee at CCD, and then ambled over to Crawford Market. My first time inside there, and I was kinda wishing I had my digicam along, and was clicking pictures as enthusiastically as the Traveller was. (yes, yes, even though I teased him repeatedly about it, saying he needed sunshades and a cap to complete the Jap tourist look)... and it was fun. I had a great time playing City Guide.

Work was a scorcher, though, and I wonder why I don't shoot my clients straight out. I remember asking the Infatuator in Delhi, to send over hitmen to kill off my whole coterie of clients... and then reality sinks in, and I realise mine is a commission-driven job. No clients = no money. And that means, no shopping and walking around Crawford Market carefree.

So, it doesn't matter that the Love is gone. Here's to more carefree walks in Bombay.

The I-word

2006-12-04T22:03:00.000+05:30

The I-word

Suddenly I find myself swamped with Infatuation. I'm the teenage boy again, hooked onto something that feels like his first crush, and I love the feeling. Love hoping I'll get a call, thinking about finally gettting that kiss on my lips, about maybe a grope here, a touch there, a long sigh exchanged after spending four hours together walking by the ocean. And it's Infatuation.

An explosion of chemistry, and I'm not certain how it came by. That big bad ka-boom that somehow eclipsed the uncertainty and melancholy that I've been reeling under for the last couple of weeks - and for that diversion, I'm happy. I'm happy that the Infatuator has come into my life when I sorely needed diversion and resuscitation. What I'm scared about, is that the Infatuation has suddenly become my reason for smiling and fantasizing. Whatever happened to Love? I fear Infatuation may be trying to kill it...

And I fear that I'm not putting up a strong enough fight. I'm giving in. I'm liking giving in. It's helping me avoid uncomfortable questions like: why is there no phone call? is this going to work? is there still faith? And instead, I'm happy thinking bubblegum thoughts, drinking coffee and flirting across the table, showing Marine Drive, slurping ice cream, kissing in an ATM vestibule - a hurried kiss that mangled brains and thoughts and racing pulses and lips and tongues, but that seems so beautiful nonetheless. Conversations from a cell phone, when a flight is three hours late... and I'm thinking... how long does Infatuation last?

And I hope I don't find out too soon. Not... too soon, please God.

Maximum City

2006-12-02T00:09:00.000+05:30

Maximum City

Ok, so its not really new that Bombay's now got this reputation/ image as the jumping-back-from-the-brink-of-disaster place. Yesterday when fresh riots broke loose in the far eastern suburbs, Mad Bawi was quite panicky, and stood glued in front of the television set. I commented, that she should be used to it by now. It was a bit strange, coming from someone like me - a resident of around two and a half years. But it's true. In the last year alone, we've seen horrific rains, riots, bomb blasts and riots again.

Ho Hum.

So after some time, Mad Bawi, Scatterbrained Colleague and I sat down and chattered about what we'd done last year, July 26th, on the night of the infamous deluge.

SC: "There was this colleague of mine who had to spend two whole nights at the office because he lived in Vashi!I stayed the first night over, myself."

MB: "Yea, and the office gave us food to tide us over for the night. It was so weird, wearing the same stuff, sleeping on the couch and the floor... what did you do, LivingHIGH?"

LH: "I crossed the road and went home to sleep."

Bit of an anticlimax? Well, that's the best part about living where I do. Not too far, and not too close either. But, yes Bombay's recent status as Danger Zone does seem a bit unnerving at times. I keep wondering what would happen if the train I'm travelling in were to explode - when would word get back to the people I love? Ok, so that's a morbid thought. And Bombaywallas have this newfound rep to uphold about the 'indomitable Bombay spirit'. That comes in, when you gape at the crowds hanging out of the trains the very next day, on your way to work. And that's when you think, all said and done, this city is mad, yaar... and you love it!

Resumption

2006-11-27T01:02:00.000+05:30

Resumption

Strange, the things I haven't done in a long time. I haven't written a short story in ages, and I wonder why. I'm reading this great book currently, called The World According To Garp, and it's all about a writer's life. The last time I read something on this line was Mrs Dalloway (though not strictly about Virginia Woolf's own life), and that so influenced me, I ended up writing this longish short story about love and life in Delhi. Part autobiographical, but then Garp says that autobiographies are just lazy fiction, so I'm not sure whether what I wrote was excellent or just 'lazy'. When I read now what I wrote, a part of me remembers what I felt then, and how strange and thrilled and sad life was. And then I wonder, is life really any better now?

Is life really any better now? I'm supposed to be older and wiser. I'm supposed to live my life in a guard, a strange kind of guard. I tell myself that I'm not going to let anything destroy me, or circumscribe the way I feel and love, and then I go ahead and give into a desire that I desperately tried to quell. God, I sound like a soap opera queen, and I want to pull the plug on the script here. Right here.

Mrs Dalloway. And Garp. And livingHIGH. Not sure exactly how they all tie in. I need to meet publishers. I need to finish my stories and my plots. There's this character in Garp, Alice Fletcher, a person who starts great things but never finishes anything. And I thought to myself, while reading the book, am I like her? I have two novel plots in my head, so why haven't I finished them? Chapters one to three are finished, but I don't really like them and want to work them over, so why the hell don't I do it? What am I waiting for? The exams are over, the preparations are over. So write, dammit, write. There are some kind people who read your blog and tell you, you've got talent. They tell you, you should write a book. And while you feel secretly proud, you don't actually resume the book.

Stop the drama and write.

About To Burst

2006-11-18T21:29:00.000+05:30

My head feels like its going to BURST now...!

That's how you get when you're dying to hear some word, some news... and you get none. Calls, sms', emails... and there's no reply. What's going on, where do you stand, are you driving yourself crazy, and there's no answer to any of that. Voice of reason somewhere deep in your brain tells you not to panic, not to over react, that no news may well be good news, but that teenytiny voice is gagged in the chaos pretty soon again... and the terrible thumping of drums resumes in your head and your heart.

Was it supposed to feel like this? Friends tell me, never give up on Yourself, because that's the most important thing you have. Give it time, if it requires time, but never bend so far and so low that you give up on yourself... and while I nod and agree and tell myself that in the mirror, and admonish myself while crossing the road to quit the drama... I'm about ready to burst.

That one phone-call could end it all. And I'm scared. What if it does END it all? What do I do?

How did I end up getting so dependent? I hate this needy me. Yet, I am this needy me.

Announcing Pixelated

2006-11-14T00:01:00.000+05:30

There's a new blog out here -->

I decided to give in to the lure of having labels and all that extra jazz on my blog, and made a new Beta account - courtesy my brand new digicam, you now have Pixelated - the livingHIGH photoblog.

:)

Squawkbox

2006-11-12T19:31:00.000+05:30

Squawkbox

I've got an uninvited and completely unexpected guest in my flat. Actually, there's two of them. Swooped in all aflutter the other day, no hellos, no warnings, no nothing. Just came right in, as if she owned the damn place and settled into her spot. Refused to budge, even though I cussed a great deal. Departed for awhile when I charged, but then came right back when I wasn't looking. And now, my stoooooopid conscience has kicked in, and I'm afraid I don't know how to ask her to leave.

So, instead, I took a picture of her, and put it in my offline album called 'home'.

*sigh*

She's settled on top of a wooden crate I have on my *sort of*verandha-*more of*-clothesline, and the last time I shooed her away, I noticed she'd arranged a whole lot of leaves on the crate. Made a mental note to tell the bai to get rid of the crate and the leaves, but of course I forgot, and tended to ignore the pigeon flutterings outside my window.... And this morning, my impertinent tresspasser was very ballsy about not fluttering away when I wanted her to - so when I climbed up to investigate, I see a single, shiny white egg.

EGG!!!

Yikes!

I groaned to myself and begged my flatmate to be the ogre and get ride of the crate and leaves and egg, but of course she got all "I can't be a Pigeon Saddam", and refused to carry out the hatchet job. Ditto the good-for-nothing bai, who gets up there to string up clothes for drying every two days or so, and still doesn't manage to notice the damn bird in the damn crate with the damn egg.

And, while I may mutter expletives to my uninvited guest outside every now and then, and talk aloud about how tasty scrambled eggs are, I know she's already won the damn battle. I feel like the Bombay Municipal Corporation, blackballed by the damn slumdwellers. I'm just hoping that I don't find pigeon poop on my freshly cleaned clothes now. *boohoohoo*

Does anyone know how long it takes pigeons to hatch their eggs?

Food For Thought

2006-11-09T21:26:00.000+05:30

Food For Thought

I talk a lot about food, and Mad Bawi told me this afternoon, while walking back to the office post-lunch, "Going by the way you love eating, it's a wonder you aren't fat!"

Wanted to hug her then. Not fat. Not FAT. NOT F-A-T. Now I know how Eliza Dolittle felt when she twirled to I could have danced all night...!

Thanks to the Mad Bawi's finicky eating tastes, our staple lunch joint these days is this Parsi place called Ideal Corner in Fort. It's got a charming ambience, busy waiters, cutesy little wall lamps and the most de-lish Parsi cuisine. Before getting hooked onto Ideal, I used to be a regular at Cafe Military behind the Bombay Stock Exchange and Cafe New Excellsior near the lenegdary Sterling Cinema... so yes, I know a thing or two about Parsi food.

Like, how to eat the yummiest dhansak (pictured above) and soak up all the dal with extra pav, when the portion of caramelised rice is over. I love the different kinds of bread Ideal and Military offer - the former has the usual Marathi pav bread, while the latter has the old-world baked loaf variety. And if you thought that dhansak is all there is to Parsi food, you're sorely mistaken: enter chickan salli boti (chicken masala with fried chips), dhan dar patia (gravy with dal and rice), keema fry and of course the all-too-famous patra ni macchi (which almost reminds me of the good ole Bong paturi style of cooking!).

Ideal also serves up these amazing desserts, ranging from the yummiest bread and butter pudding, to the caramel custard (down there), to the divine chocolate mousse that the Bawi swears by.

And so far, I thought it was only Gujjus and Bongs who had the Sweet Tooth Syndrome - Parsis come in the list too.

Talking about Gujju's, the other day we were stuck without electricity in the office for a freak two hours, and we all decided to go try some authentic Gujju thali at Chetana's, on Kaala Ghoda. As a bonafide animal-eater, I found the price of Rs 250 for a veg thali exorbitant when I paid the bill - but then, I had no idea that was what it cost when I decided to eat - and I'm glad I didn't. The food was awesome - and by the end of the meal, we could hardly walk - I must have put on at least two kilos after that meal!

It's a whole ceremony, really. First, enter the chhaas or the aam sharbat. Next comes the chilli-milli (a dhokla-kind of snack - very tangy and tasty), followed by some samosa-looking thing. Papad and salad of course, and then come the little bowls full of veggies - mixed veg, corn, and potato, and the two bowls of dal (sweet, of course!) and the kadhi. The rotis are served piping hot, dripping in liberal amounts of ghee, and there's also rice and khichdi to boot. And when you're done finishing this mammoth course, there's dessert - piping hot gulab jamun and creamy custard with fruits.

*burp*

Halloween Freaks

2006-11-02T01:04:00.000+05:30

Halloween Freaks

Even as I read about Casablanca buying a DSLR, I splurge by example and buy a digicam. And yes, BUGSY is courtesy my new toy. Been less than a week since I bought my brand new Sony, and I've been lugging it around with me for my Sunday lunch with bro, and my Saturday night out with the Boys, and snapping pictures of my room, et al. Hehehe... experimenting with lighting modes and all that jazz. Forwarding pics of myself, my laaaarge glasses and my swollen head to the Love.

A digital camera is the perfect Happy Halloween To Yourself for a narcissictic freak like me.

*grin*

And, at the office, work has just been a complete rollercoaster. That's what happens when you work in a financial public relations firm, and it's the end of the second quarter results season, and most of your stoooooopid clients expect you to work miracles and get them extensive media coverage on a day when the RBI Credit Policy is being announced. Apologies for the excessive use of financial journo jargon. In a dumbed down version it means: clients are retards.

Period.

BUGSY!

2006-10-31T01:14:00.000+05:30

BUGSY!

:-)

Candy Floss

2006-10-23T11:22:00.000+05:30

Candy Floss

Trying to do a Carrie Bradshaw and talk about matters relating to, well, relationships here. Everyone knows that we all love the sugary phase in the beginning of a relationship. We love sending/ receiving flowers and chocolates, the looong phone conversations which serve as a bedtime story before drifting off to sleep, and the dates spent just... gazing into each other's eyes. And we all know that these things rarely last. After the honeymoon is over, it's time to get down to the grisly business of, well, Life.

I remember reading a blog post somewhere sometime back, where the writer was complaining how her significant other refused to let the romantic sweet-somethings die down, even after two weeks of mutual admissions of love. The blogger complained that too much of a sweet thing is simply too yucky to bear, and all relationships should come with a well-declared caveat that after Week Three, all chocolate deliveries should stop. Period.

It's not exactly strange. A lot of people can't stand chocolates. Most people feel that making much ado about something is simply unrealistic. And then there was that episode in SATC where Carrie muses about the Russian's penchant for romance: have NYC gals become so hard-headed and used to 21st century life that poems and chocolates and gifts and having doors opened for them simply become... cheesy? The thing is, that's a question not just for New York gals - it's something that people all across the globe have begun to identify with.

And yet... and yet, there's the part in the beginning of the relationship, when we hanker for something that may not be there. A glance here, a word there, a gesture here, a smile there - could they all mean (possibly) something that wasn't intended? In the first flush of excitement, every little remark gets magnified a 1000 times, and it's OK then if the person is being mushy - hell, you're praying fervently that the object of your affection lets loose a bit of mush... so then, two months later, what happens, when you suddenly think that the person is clingy for calling you three times a day and telling you he/she loves you?

Admittedly, I'm part of the mush brigade. But recognising that everone isn't, I've had to tone down. I'm the kind who can see Notting Hill and DDLJ any number of times. I'm the kind who would call up for no other reason but just to say I'm feeing marvelously in love. I've been scared sometimes that the Love doesn't see things quite like that, but I think we've both adjusted to each other, adapted to each other now - touch wood. But it's still funny (weird funny) to see how the whole rigmarole plays out in my friends circle. When I see A rejecting B, because B talks too much/ calls too much, and A would earlier moan to me how B probably means 'I love you' when he says "I want to visit you'... I'm not sure how to respond to that. Am I just an old fashioned stodgy ass, who thinks that love can remain a mushy-gooey candy mess for ever? Or just a hopeless romantic who refuses to grow up?

Diwali cum Psyche-Cupid

2006-10-18T23:40:00.000+05:30

It's time to wish everyone a Happy Diwali. Weekend's coming up close, and though I won't be having a great five-day long holiday, I am looking forward to a fun time. (Punctuated by some studying, of course, but we shall try to ignore that for now! *grin*)

Meanwhile, away from Diwali and all, I've been meaning to write about the Greco-Roman fairy tale-cum-mythological tale of Psyche and Cupid for some time. Have always been a major afficiando of Greek myths, and this particular parable is as fairy tale as you can get. Starts off like Beauty and the Beast, and ends into something like one of those Indiana Jones movies with all the quests! ;-) Ridiculous to compare the old Greeks to Spielberg, of course!

This morning, while giggling at the workplace with a friend, I manufactured a truly horrible way of looking at Beauty and the Beast. It started off, when the Mad Bawi commented that looking out through the windows of our basement office, felt like being trapped in a cave.

Livinghigh: "Aha. Kinda like those cases you read about, about all those silly US-Canadian teenage gals being kidnapped and held for years and years in the cellar, na?"

Mad Bawi, shocked: "You're demented! Did you actually say that?"

Livinghigh, proceeding happily, unfazed: "If you think about it, it's kinda like Beauty and the Beast - the new modern Stockholm Syndrome. That must have probably been what made Beauty fall in love with the Beast!"

Mad Bawi, attempting biting sarcasm: "Yea, right. A very modern version of Beauty and the Beast."

*Sigh* Sometimes, I can be such an ogre, na?

2006-10-17T22:28:00.000+05:30

Not exactly hair-raising, but...!

Last Saturday, I decided that enough was enough, a haircut was in order, and trooped into one referred to me by a friend, right opposite Churchgate station, on my way home from work. To tell the truth, it looked like a Hair Factory. A haircutting, facewashing, bodymassaging factory where time is money and money is time, and if you can't make up your mind about what you want the miracle workers to do for you within the first ten seconds of walking in, then you don't really deserve any of the nicer things in life and you can go hang - or at the very least, go to the end of the queue.

Ok, so it wasn't quiiiite like this, but I love this silly old pic from that great 0ld Western in the sky, so I used it. Instead, imagine two long rows of barbers and their charges, and in the middle, there's a long seating area for you to sit and wait your turn. And all the barbers are snip-snipping away - all twenty or so of them. Sweatshop meets Snipshop!

But, of course, as I walked out after paying a paltry Rs 55, I decided to come by some other time - my usual place in Bandra charges around Rs 85. Actually, even that is a step down from my very first salon/saloon in Bombay - in Khar, charging around Rs 150. And while some of my well-coiffured friends would argue that Rs 150 is negligible for a good haircut (I know of a place in Lokhandwalla that charges Rs 350 for one!), I decided to go easy on my wallet.

After all, consider what I came from:
Cost of a haircut in Delhi - Rs 50
Cost of a haircut in Chennai - Rs 30
Cost of a haircut in Calcutta - Rs 15

In Economics Theory, we call this the Law of Diminishing Returns

Operation Conversion

2006-10-11T15:32:00.000+05:30

Operation Conversion

Been thinking for quite some time on whether or not I should switch to Blogger Beta, but since I realised that I have to start a whole new account, a whole new blog, etc etc etc, I decided it was simply not worth all that trouble to just get in a couple of 'categories'. Category viewing is undoubtedly fun, but then, I can just imagine sifting through all the archives, hunting, hunting, hunting.... back-breaking stuff. Gaahh!

But, when my colleague announced that she wanted to start blogging, after watching me spend at least 2 hrs of my 8 hr workday blogging/checking out blogs/ commenting, I decided to open an account for her on Beta. Let her have fun with those 'categories' if she wants to. So then, we sat down, poring over possible blog names and account names, and even though she hit on a pretty catchy sounding name for her blog, she can't decide on a user name. Her real name is just too popular, and she hates the idea of having a user name like archana8206 or something like that, which makes her seem like a pretty obsolete robot. So, we were stuck - we are stuck - and the new Beta account never got made.

They say that of all the millions of blogs out there that do get made, most of them are abandoned by their owners pretty fast. That's not to say that only the techno geeks maintain regular blogs - hell, even the sorry-ass whiney kinds like me do it. But, most, however, get bored or disenchanted or use that silly old line: "I have nothing to write about". Some people hate writing about what they consumed for breakfast and some people don't eat breakfast in the first place - no, I'm not a diet per se, just never had the time to indulge in breakfast when I'm dashing late to work in the mornings - and so that blog usually ends up being... to use a culinary metaphor, half-baked.

Of course, that's not to say that I'm the most prolific blogger in the universe. Nach! But it feels funny to realise, after a point of time, that the guys you started out blogging with have kind of slackened and don't post much anymore, ("much" = never), and that most of the links you have at the side of your page lead to blogs that saw their last post in December 2005.

And that makes you bug your colleague over and over again, even when she's not that enthsiastic, to come up with a proper user name she can employ.

Director's Cut

2006-10-03T13:57:00.000+05:30

Director's Cut

It's been a movie packed weekend, starting from Wo Lamhe on saturday. Not too bad, and though the actress is a mite screechy and wayyy over the top, she's quite a stunner. Her waist is so tiny, Scarlett O'Hara of the 17'' fame would claw her eyes out, and her face looks really great without makeup. Shiney Ahuja, the hero, is (as usual) fantastic. The guy apparently never uses glycerine for his sobby scenes - and the way he cries regularly in the movie, complete with shuddering face and eyes squeezing out trains of tears, is quite... amazing. I was tempted to sneer 'pansy', but then, got a pinch from the die-hard Shiny fan I was sitting next to, when I attempted. ;-)

Mahesh Bhatt is stupid and worse, evil, if he wants the world to believe Parveen Babi was such a complete nutcase.

Sunday, I planned to check oput Lage Raho Munnabhai, over which the entire city has been going gaga. Barely a day passes by in Bombay, when the newspapers don't have at least one edit piece/ middle/ art of living article/ city beat story about how the city has embraced 'Gandhi-giri'. Fun movie, decidedly stronger on the heartstrings than its prequel was, and I had a blast. Vidya Balan is pretty like hell!

When we came out of the theatre (Eros), we saw a group of guys selling Gandhi autobiographies for Rs 30, and they were being mobbed by the people coming out from the movie - we have pictures on the cell phone to prove it! ;-)

Was hoping to catch the night show of brainless chick-flick John Tucker Must Die then, but since everyone bailed on me, I decided to go back home and watch a couple of the Flatmate's CDs. Picked the Rahul Khanna-Lisa Ray starrer Bolywood/Hollywood, which I hadn't seen before. Total time-pass: cheesy humour, weepy mother I wanted to slap, bad English accents that were meant to be that way (I think and hope), and a long drawn-out Bollywood-ishtyle ending. Rahul Khanna was so thinnnn here!

After the pav bhyaji that I'd ordered with Bollywood/ Hollywood finished, I decided that I wanted something else to nibble on, before movie no. 3 for the day. The so-called 'nibble' turned into yummy prawn biryani, and the next change in the CD Rom was one of my fave Disney's of all time, Beauty and the Beast. Cutesy stuff, and great songs. Realised later, that Belle and the Prince bear a remarkable resemblance to Jane and Tarzan in Disney's later production. It's obvious that Tarzan and the Beast are related, then.

;-) ;-) ;-)

Shoshthhee, Shaptami, Ashtami, Nabami, Dashami...

2006-09-29T15:11:00.000+05:30

Shoshthhee, Shaptami, Ashtami, Nabami, Dashami...

Durga Puja came yesterday, with mahashoshthhee, and I trekked all the way to Santa Cruz, to visit the Ramkrishna Mission puja, like I did last year. RK is eminently preferable to the traffic and human snarls of the bigger pujas at Lokhandwalla and Vashi, and I convinced Aristera to come along with me. The funny part was, I kinda forgot the precise location of the place, so I called up my mum in Calcutta, who knew exactly where it was!

The puja itself was quaint as usual. Felt very weird, assuming the role of Expert on Bong Myths, holding forth to Aristera, explaining the concept of Mahaloya and 'baaper-baari', etc. Cutesy stuff. Even attempted a kind of synopsis of the battle with Mahishashur, but Aristera looked bored at this point, so I stopped short. He was quite shocked when I suggested that we sit down in the hall there and gupshup - "One sits and prays here!" - so then, I had to explain how Durga Puja for Bongs is more Community Catching-up time, rather than Fervent Worship time.

As we headed out, though, Aristera realised that somebody had nicked his new Nike floaters. Ahem, ahem... serves us right for not depositing them with the shoe-keepers. Aristera put on an affected air, proclaimed it was all part of his 'boraat' (fate), that the goddess had taken 'dokkhhinaa' (offering to the deity) from him, and then we retreated for a hoity toity dinner at the Lokhandwalla O! Calcutta -

- barefoot!

;-)

Framed!

2006-09-28T01:02:00.000+05:30

Framed!

Finally got tired of having people tell me I look old and seventy-five in my glasses, and decided I need a new pair. A pal told me, rimless was in. The storekeeper however said, they were not advisable for guys with high power like me. So then, the next suggestion came: try chunky with loads of colour. A colleague asked me to try something like her black-and-orange ones. Though I admit I used the same scheme for this blog, I balked at wearing the Livinghigh combo atop my nose. But I did like the idea of 'chunky'. So I went along with her.

Tried on the blues and the greens and the reds and even the yellows. Loads of greys and blacks fringed with colour. Discarded the metal ones, cuz they scar one's nose. Finally alighted on one.

The perfect one. Retro look. Very posh, very in. In dual shades of black and silver, black sticks with silver criss-cross patterns. Me like very much. ;-)

And , of course, my customary Impulse Buy: have been lusting after one of these over-sized babies for a loooong time.

Calorific Value of a Sunday

2006-09-24T17:47:00.000+05:30

Calorific Value of a Sunday

Lazy Sunday morning and I've got a terrible headache (engendered by a terrible cold) and a terrible hangover (engendered by a terribly great party last night). Potent combination. But I grinned through tandoori chicken and mutton khichda this morning because food, after all, is what we live for, and I hogged through the kulfi-falooda and the gelato that came after that as well. O, well, gelato at least is supposed to be 94% fat-free.

Note to self: must stop counting calories.

Larger note to self: Are ya kiddin' yerself, moron?! Have ya looked at the mirror lately?!

Schizophrenic brain battles between the bulge and the beautiful, even as the papers go haywire on the topic of Spanish models not allowed to be stick-thin anymore. They say, it's all about propagating the right values. So, you wouldn't want your daughter/ son to look like a dead tree, about ready to collapse from its own (negligible) weight. But then, you also wouldn't like him/ her to look like the typical obese American. Move over McDonalds and KFC, Hello 94% fat-free gelato. At least, that's what Mumbai seems to say.

... cuz the truth is: there's no such thing as low-fat Indian food. Was at the Hilton recently on an event and, as usual, I hogged on the potatoes and the paneer and the kaali dal and the chicken and the mutton and the chocolate mousse and the rabdi, and during the pigfest, I turned towards a colleague and wondered aloud, how much weight I'd gained after getting this job.

That's when the imbecile puts on a worried face and says, "Actually, I've lost weight after getting this job." Aaaa well, what does he know ? - silly flunky who jumps around when orders are barked at him - he's supposed to get stressed out and lose weight.

I just realised, I sound like a horrible human being in the last para. Looks like I'm not losing my touch after all! ;-)

Cab Chat

2006-09-20T11:23:00.000+05:30

Cab Chat

Hurtling through traffic this morning on the way to the Hilton, Nariman Point. Was supposed to pick a client up at 8. 15 am for an interview, and I woke up at 7.39 am, so you can understand my panic. The little yellow-and-black cab is shaking on all four wheels, but my cabbie is a gem - silent and strong and forceful on the pedal, as I like my cabbies to be.

As we take the turn behind Azad Maidan, he twists around in his seat, and says: "Sir, today you came very early in the morning, na? Your regular driver, Patel, hadn't arrived yet."

I mumble something, a grin as well - it feels heartening to know that taxi drivers stalk my moves when I leave my buiilding. I didn't even know I had a 'regular' driver.

He continues: "You must be a in big rush, eh? I see you leave every day in the morning. You know this area well, eh? I'm not very sure about the hotel you mentioned - I know there's a big hotel in Nariman Point - don't know it's name, though."

Yes, yes, I'm in a rush, yes I come to this area regularly, I reply in my broken shards of Hindi.

That spurs him on further: "So, you look like you're from UP - are you from Lucknow, sir?"

Stumped!

Having never been mistaken for an UPite before - though I've had my share of being labelled Marwari, Bangalorean, Konkani, Tamil, even Sri Lankan - I decide to take it in my stride, and hasten to inform him that I hail from good ole Calcutta - whereupon he doesn't have much to say.

Until - "Your regular driver, Patel, is from Kanpur."

;-);-) ;-)

Meals for One

2006-09-18T00:40:00.000+05:30

Meals for One

Some people just can't eat alone. As simple as that. The old flatmate was quite a terror at it. As soon as lunch time would come calling, he would amble over to the cubbyhole where I used to sit and suggest lunch - even if I'd already eaten. Just come and sit there, na, he would whine, and I would usually agree - cuz I'm nice and sweet and yadayadayada. ;-) Living with the gyaaneshwar has been an experience, in more ways than one!

Cut to present time - current Flatmate buzzes me on the phone this afternoon: Where are you? Still at Phoneix?

Nopes, I'm in town, I reply, what's up?

Naaa - I was wondering if you could have them pack this great dish I had at this restaurant there and bring it home - I really wanna eat it, but don't wanna go there by myself.

Ummmm.... why not?

So flatmate pouts and professes that for all her splendid views on the sacred feminine, she's quite chauvnistic in these matters and still feels that women going to eat at fancy restaurants are branded 'pathetic'.

But what about when men do it? I ask, smirking to myself.

No problem there at all, she declares, and I can't help hiding the smirk. I'm a chauvnist myself, and make no bones about it.

But one thing I do do all the time is eat alone. Especially for lunch. At the Fort, there are just too many alternatives for lunchtime, and you can't always depend on your boss or colleagues to share your gastronomic tastes - so the best thing to do at times is go solo. Egg bhurji from the roadside, Parsi food at Cafe Military, plain old Bhaji Pav, Fish thali at Gomantak, Chaats at Pujabi Halwaii, and so many others that I've stumbled onto.

Diet? What diet? *innocent face*

Tee To Tall?

2006-09-16T13:54:00.000+05:30

Tee To Tall?

Had a thought this morning: maybe I should rechristen this blog The PR Diaries. But then, I gave the thought up on two counts, primarily: 1/ I'm going to get bored with that after a while, and 2/ I'm liable to be fired if I write some of the really juicy stuff. So, since I value my Rs XXk a month paycheque, I'll stick to snippets here and there.

Like the do last night. A social thingy, organised for jittery clients. (Most of the clients are jittery - otherwise they wouldn't be clients.) And as I was talking about it later on the phone with a friend, the comment I got was: "Your job involves so much of entertainment and partying that it's no wonder your diet is off track! There's just too much fun in your life!"

To this, I retorted, "What entertainment? Where are the exotic dancers then? Just a bunch of stodgy old men around!"

"I can be an exotic dancer for the right price!" came the reply, and I burst out laughing.

But when I thought about it later, some of it made sense. Especially as far as my socialising habits are concerned. This morning, a co-worker asked me how drunk I got at the do last night, and I realised that I never drink more than a glass at these shindigs (an Archie Andrews word!) - at the most, maybe two. That manifests itself even when I go out partying with friends: I would much prefer a great dinner at a great restaurant, rather than go boozing at a hot pub. When another co-worker bemoans the fact that he hasn't had any liquor in two weeks, I don't really identify with his need for booze. It's all ho hum for me, and no longer any hic hic hurrahs!

***
Yes, and everyone thanks for your appreciation of the new blog skin. I really like this one, even though its soooooooooo orangeeeyyyyy! ;-)

Picture Perfect(?!)

2006-09-10T20:22:00.000+05:30

Picture Perfect(?!)

So I got tagged by Ma'amselle Chamique here, and that means I expose the sillier part of my existance... ummm.. of the many silly parts therein, I mean. This is by far, the funnest me-me I've done, by the way. Everybody's supposed to upload some silly pic of him/herself on their blog.

So, ahem ahem....

Actually, maybe I should make that one the title picture of this blog - lol. "Live high and dance like Travolta, my son, and you will prosper....!"

Exhibit no. 2 below is what I like to call the 'pimp photo'. Taken just before going out to a party - and yes, at the very last moment, I got sensible and ditched the shirt! ;-)

... Which brings us to the last one - Gangsta Wannabe Snap. Self-explanatory, actually. I thought, either 'gangsta snap' or wannabe Moulinrouge hustler. ;-)

Who's tagged? Everyone who commented in the earlier post - Xara and Mizfit. And anyone else who reads this blog and would like to have a few laughs! ;-)

Blowing My Nose

2006-09-06T23:24:00.000+05:30

Blowing My Nose

Strange how it's been such a long time, and Himess-bhai still rules the charts! I remember, how on the Goa trip, wherever we went, we could hear that nasal voice of his everywhere - bus, breakfast, beach shack, shop shack, nightclub, hotel. Aaarrrgghh!

It reminds me of that silly song he wrote (which has quite a catchy tune, mind you!): 24-7, I think of you...!!!

***

So my dance classes should start soon. Am really looking forward to this. Have been completely fascinated with ballroom dancing since forever, and I finally decided to take the plunge. Of course, it also helps that the wallet size has increased a bit, allowing me to indulge in my little whim. I'm planning to join a pokey li'l outfit called Farida's School of Ballroom Dancing, and I have noooo idea what Farida looks like, whether she's old or young, a women or a she-man. Ok, that last part was silly and gruesome. Betcha, Farida would not like to read this blog post ever as a testimonial to her school. Eeks.

***

Talking about gruesome, I have a horrid cold, and that's why I'm to be excused for all this bunkum here. Head feels like there's a chainsaw in there, aching to get out. And that explains also why I saw this horrendous movie called My Super Ex Girlfriend. Yeee-yikes! Uma Thurman is scary - but not as scary as the numbskull Luke Wilson who plays the (if you can call it that) lead. Of course, I died laughing during the crappy movie, but everyone knows I have no taste in movies. ;-)

Steam

2006-09-04T00:47:00.000+05:30

Steam

Sitting up way past my bedtime, surfing through blogs and filling up my application essay. There's a song from some Hindi movie I don't recognize playing in the background on my computer. Kylie was crooning earlier, but now that's over.

The concept of Space. I never had much use for it earlier, except as far as it concerned my own. Learning slowly that space and love are both two-way streets. How strange that so many people think I'm the happy-go-lucky creature 90% most of the time. People fall in love sometimes because of that, people worry about uncertain futures sometimes because of that. I can't really comment much on this - what should I say? Just because I'm the happy sort, that means I never take anything seriously? Balderdash. I'm venting here. Strange, because I thought I already did it face to face.

Apparently not.

An Elephant Walk

2006-08-28T10:11:00.000+05:30

An Elephant Walk

Walking back home from the station, and I happen to live in a Maharashtrian dominated neighbourhood. That's why Ganpati is such a big deal here. The train was deserted, thankfully, it being past 11 pm, but as soon as I came out of the station, the lane was swathed in lights. There was a pandal with its lights just a couple of paces away, but I decided to turn away and head home. No sooner than I do so, though, did a small mound of a pandal rear up in front of me, relatively dark, and that's why I suppose I missed it at first glance. I peek into the dark pandal - a large Ganpati sat in repose, without illumination, just a hint of a red glow from one of the neon shop-signboards from across the street. Beautiful, I sighed, and then left.

Mumbaikars love the fairy lights that hang like tiny golden flowers from overhead for their decorations. The lane which leads to my house was draped completely by these tiny blinking flowers, top, right and left, and I couldn't hep but smile. Beautifully delicate. There was another chhotu lane here leading into the alcove where Ganpati sat in all his splendour - this time, completely lit up, a golden halo all over the pink pot belly, but I gew lazy, and decided not to venture in, and so continued on straight. I'm the perfect lazy disciple for the perfect lazy god. ;-)

I just went over to last year's Ganpati post, and there I'm cribbing about how strange Ganpati feels in comparison to Calcutta's Durga Puja... and look at me now. Now it's quite obvious that the two are different. That the two have their separate charms. Now I'm eager to see Lalbaug ka Raja in a way I never was last year, even though, I was much closer to the place then. Life is an open arc, screw the full circle!

;-)

But some things don't change after all: nostalgia, being one of them. While leaving my golden Ganpati pandal and walking on towards my building, I passed this group of poor-looking sods by the roadside talking loudly in Bengali. And I smiled: You'll always find us everywhere! I briefly flirted with the idea of going over there and asking, dada, durga pujo kobe, jaanen? (brother, do you know when Durga Puja is?), but I didn't. I'm still not that liberated. So I walked on, feeling happy for no apparent reason, walking away from the fairy lights, and quite determined to visit Lalbaug Ka Raja before the night is out.

Ganpati Aalaa Re!

The X-factor

2006-08-23T23:22:00.000+05:30

The X-factor

Sitting at home and listening to 107.1 FM, Aakashbani - they play English songs at night, the only FM radio station nowadays that plays it, since GO 92.5 FM turned into its crass avatar Radio One (hit pe hit pe hit pe hit - feel like SMACKING them hard!). Nice songs, actually, but the RJ 's completely incompetent. Sounds like she's reading from a second standard children's text book in class.

She probably is.

***

OK, so here's the bomb: I liked KANK. I cried. I'm a moron, I admit. I can't help it. Karan Johar always makes movies that excite my tear ducts, and before you know it, you have all these copious tears running down my face. *sigh* And while everyone in the world cried themselves hoarse saying that the movie didn't make sense, that there was absolutely no frikkin' reason why SRK and Rani would leave their respective perfect spouses, I beg to disagree.

I understand why they did it. I may not like the characters, but I empathise. I mean, the first ten minutes of the movie, I totally hated SRK's character - he's just mean and crabby and takes it all out on his kid - o, wait a sec, I don't like kids either, and besides, SRK's kid in the movie is a complete retard from some farflung galaxy that should have remained undiscovered - and Preity is just so completely fuck-all as the Power Babe. Aaaa, but then, even if I didn't like his character in the movie, I realised that that's what he's supposed to be. That's what both of them are supposed to be - lost, sad, distant, incomplete with their spouses - and somehow, fulfilled, with each other. That's what KANK is supposed to be about.

And what the fu** makes them complete, I hear the cynics mutter. Well, to put it simply: Passion. I hear people say all the time, "There's no reason for her to leave Abhishek - he's perfect!", but then, haven't you ever done that? Haven't you ever left someone because you just didn't feel the... zing in it? The so-called X-factor? Or don't so-called adults, reeking of Maturity, do that? I know I have. I know I've agonised over it. Wondered why on earth I had to leave so-and-so when it was going so... stable... and then I realsied that Stable just isn't good enough. I wanted the BAM. Isn't it permissable to look for the BAM in your love anymore?

The only thing I felt was weird, was how both SRK and Rani tell their spouses about the affair - but then, add that they're willing to work for the marriage now! I mean: WHY??? They've already tried so hard to work on the marriage - recall the face-gloop and the S&M episodes - so WTF were they thinking of, when they added that little caveat in their confession?!

Johar slipped up on this one. Methinks, some silly concession to Weeny Li'l Indian Family Values.

;-)

All said and done, I lurrrrrrrved the part where Preity slaps SRK when he comes clean to her.

***

And while on KANK, this is hilarious. Nutty, sad, strange and hilarious!!!!

Fusion Foodie

2006-08-20T01:44:00.000+05:30

Fusion Foodie

I'm a foodie who likes to experiment with food. The funny thing is, I'm mostly surrounded by people who're not. So the other day, while calling over some people for my birthday bash, I served up some raspberry flavoured grape spritzer to go with the vodka, which inevitably drew comments like 'why raspberry flavoured, if it's grape spritzer???', and I just found it too hard to explain that the concoction smelled of raspberry but tasted of grape, and how there were many other important reasons behind the existance of the drink, besides. Guppie wrinkled his nose in distaste, and handed his share of the spritzer-vodka mixture to Aristera, who actually liked it. But then, Aristera served vodka with hibiscus extract juice at his birthday soiree some months back, so that wasn't a great surprise.

Other experimentations I tried out at my li'l party:

Bought vanilla ice cream, melted the whole thing; cut Goan bibinca into tiny pieces; bought chocolate eclair toffees; mixed the bibinca pieces, eclairs and ice cream together; refroze the concoction and served chilled. I loved the result immensely - the bibinca was yummy with the ice cream, and the eclairs had frozen into hard and gooey pieces, and the whole mixture had this yummy caramelly flavour from the eclairs!
For starters, apart from the usual chips, also ordered Malwani vade (local bread, like small North Indian kachoris) from the local sea food joint, and served them with Thai Spicy Rrd Chilli dip. Tangy like hell.

This afternoon, I had a conversation with my boss, where I admitted that I liked to try different types of food and play around with it, while he said he was a staunch conservative

Livinghigh: "Boss, you bring cold coleslaw and carrots for lunch everyday from work but inevitably order in food when we do so. What's the use then?"

Boss, chomping into his chola-bhatura: *something unintelligable*

Livinghigh, chirpily eating uttapam: "So, hey, what kinda food do ya like? Do you like mixing and matching stuff?"

Boss, alarmed at what kind of a freak he's hired: "Umm... no. I stick to the tried and tested. Don't have the constitution for that stuff."

Livinghigh, mixing sambhar and chutney together: "You ever tried sushi?"

Boss, turning green: "Do you mind? I;m trying to eat here!"

Of course, I'm not a great proponent of sushi either, but then I like to jerk people's chains now and then a bit. Like when I suggested to my flatmate that if she's fed up of the Bengali dabba she gets everynight, she could opt for a Maharashtrian or Gujarati one. To which, my staid ole flattie gets all nostalgic and says: "Nooooo.. I hate Marathi or Gujju veg food! I only love my veggies Bong style. And only potatoes and lady's fingers please, for me!"

But then, there's hope for her yet. Just when I thought that she will live forever on her diet of potatoes and lady's finger (cooked Bong-style) till the day she dies, she surprises me by smearing pineapple jelly on some of the left-over Malwani vades from my bday bash, and proceeding to chomp on it.

Blogs Don't Lie ;-)

2006-08-15T20:18:00.000+05:30

Blogs Don't Lie ;-)

Birthdays always have me feeling like a kid, despite the dire predictions from friends that I'm aging. ;-) Birthdays have me jumping around the place, seeing that the flat is clean, that the booze is bought, that the dishes are done, that the music laylist is ready, that the food is delivered, and that I look gorgeous. What's not to love about birthdays?!

Simplistic and materialistic way of looking at things, I'm sure, but that doesn't bother me. Am sitting at home now, listening to the great CDs that I got as birthday loot, and I feel happy. Lunch was a grand affair, starting with the grilled platter and ending with the biscuit pudding. There was a proposal to have dinner out, but I'm just feeling so completely lazy that I turned it down. Home and my computer and my music.

Perhaps I need to switch on Shakira now, just to wake me up. ;-)

***

Like what I've done with Gabbles. The new layout is nice. Now, all I need to do is write new stories for it! ;-)

Dichotomy

2006-08-12T00:32:00.000+05:30

Dichotomy

The birthday's coming up fast next week, and someone made a silly remark about it being "one more year closer". 25 years old, and yet you only feel that way at times. At times, I feel as if I've just moved out of my parents' home in Calcutta. Then, other times, when I'm this great 'senior executive' at work, I feel like a relic. When you don't get the sexual attention you expect you would, that's also another time when you feel like a relic. But by and large, you really don't have any of that. At least, I don't.

I replied, to my friend, "Well, I've already had my quarter life crisis. And realised one important thing: that all those quarter-life, quarter-and-X-decimal-point-life crises keep on coming."

They just don't stop. Thankfully, neither do you.

;-)

Got a lot of things planned this year, and I'm just hoping that they work out, in succession. The first seems to have worked out so far - my new job. Something which I enjoy doing, despite the occassional heartburn and all-too-real stress. Am going on a work trip to Rajasthan soon, and I'm looking forward to that. The other two are my exams - the GRE and the CAT. Down memory lane again, I said to my flatmate the other day, showing her the CAT bulletin. She understands; she's been there, done that. Whereas me, I've been there, not done that.

But I'm not going to make lists of to-do things. Somehow, I'm beyond that. I don't have the patience anymore. That could be both good and bad. Right now, I'm perched happily on the fence.

White picket fences, naturally. ;-)

Phone Love

2006-08-07T23:30:00.000+05:30

Phone Love

My phone, unfortunately, is not God. Its silver finish is peeling off, it's getting a bit cantankerous these days and hanging a bit too at times, so it's definitely not omnipotent. And it's memory is no great shakes, either. Which is why, after a strange exercise three months ago, of storing some special sms' in blog-form so that I could free up some operational space on my cell, I find myself doing the same again.

I think of them as fragile footsteps in the sand, in the journey we've taken by the ocean? Corny? Terribly so. But then, I'm made that way. I come in no other version. ;-)

13 May, 9.43 pm: Yum mua
25 May, 6.36 pm: Just got the messages. lv u
28 May, 12.24 am: I luv u
30 May, 12.08 am: Aww i luv u
1 Jun, 8.44 pm: Luv u mua
2 Jun, 2.49 am: Luv u
3 Jun, 12.17 am: Mua
4 Jun, 6.26 pm: Hi figurd thts why i couldnt get thru miss u
6 Jun, 6.09 pm: Tried callin on my way 2 work will call tomo mornin now luv u
7 Jun, 8.59 am: Ya tried im so sleepy now have a very early mornin, i will call on my way 2 work. luv u. couldnt email. its been a long day nite!
12 Jun, 6.18 pm: Love u. tried callin. no answer. miss u
23 Jun, 12.35 am: U r my shinin star
25 Jun, 10.00 pm: Luv u. ur talkin 2 much is the essence of my life. ur bubbly voice energizes me
29 Jun, 9.29 am: Happy anniversary luv
30 Jun, 7.56 p,: Luv u
3 Jul, 5.44 pm: Aww. hope u r ok. luv u
4 Jul, 6.23 pm: Luv u. have emailed.
6 Jul, 6.14 pm: Luv u 2
13 Jul, 5.42 pm: I luv u loads. u bring energy 2 my life
13 Jul, 9.48 pm: Thinkin about u
15 Jul, 9.45 pm: I luv u
22 Jul, 1.12 am: In another meetin. tired. luv u
23 Jul, 5.40 pm: Luv u 2
7 Aug, 11.10 pm: Luv u

It's ok to be maudlin. Especially, when you're in a long distance relationship. Especially when you wish things could have been easier, but honestly would rather have it any with Love, rather than no way at all.

;-)

Does that make sense?

Out and About

2006-08-01T23:51:00.000+05:30

Out and About

I've spent a week out of town, touring the hinterlands of Andhra Pradesh. Most of the people I told about my trip couldn't understand why I was so excited about it, since I wouldn't even stay over at Hyderabad. I was excited because I would get out of Bombay. A holiday-not-really-holiday, since it was a working tour, but it would be nice, anyhow. There would be banal clients with me, who I would have to babysit and pander to, but what-the-hell, there would be the ocean at Vizag.

And it was amazing. Not the 5 am wake-up calls, or the three-hour long drives. But the stay. The wide expanse of ocean. The pillows all over my bed. The excitement of being waited on, hand and foot. The pampering. The late night dinners reading a book and munching on Thai starters.

The chocolate ice cream.

***

I was supposed to sit and write a short story tonight. Something not complete in my mind. Just the threads. The meat I would fill in later. Just the feeling of the protagonist in my head. Sitting and waiting. With ice-cold eyes. And a terribly warm, molten heart. Perhaps, it would be terrible to be born like that: pale and unloving to the outside, but if only people knew how fragile you were on the inside, how much you wanted to give and love... Perhaps it would be a curse. I'm not optimistic enough to think that it would be a boon.

Does drifting out of love feel lethargic? Is that what my protagonist should do?

Or should my optimism prevail, and realisation dawn? Effort is what is needed. Does my protagonist with the ice-cold eyes and the molten heart have Effort?

Ban Bane

2006-07-20T00:54:00.000+05:30

Ban Bane

The question which most of my blogger buddies and friends who know that I blog, ask is: doesn't the government understand that this ban on blogs is a serious contravention of our Fundamental Right to Freedom?! Evidently, the answer is not. This is the third straight day of the ban on blogger and other blog-engines in India, and the Delhi government is still to come out with a proper statement. The government still insists that only 20 or so 'religiously extremist' blogs have been censored, while the ground reality is a total blanket ban.

So what's with these jokers?

Time to look into the mirror. I've been the goody-goody guy for as long as I can remember. The only time I seriously broke the law was when I was in a car speeding along the East-Coast Road outside Chennai, drunk like a fish, and doing some pretty bad (on hindsight) making-out in the backseat. So I got scared when the police pulled us over then. Today, it's different. Today, there's outrage. And honestly speaking, it still hasn't sunk in completely. I was arguing with a friend yesterday when he suggested that blogs were banned and that's why I couldn't access mine - I told him, it was idiotic to think of that drivel in India - and barely five minutes later I had to eat crow.

They say that mainstream media has been following up on the Blog Ban. Well, evidently, they haven't had that big an effect. Maybe, when push comes to shove, they look at the statistics: as far as population figures go, how much do bloggers actually compromise, anyway? And in looking at the numbers, that's where they slip up and fail to realise that they've compromised on the Fundamental Rights for all. The way I express my fundamental right may be different and more advanced technologically than the method adopted by a voter from a village in North Bihar... but my rights are no less important, no less sacrosanct than his. And that's something that the mainstream media seems to have forgotten in its tame coverage of the blog ban, and something that the government doesn't seem to care about at all, in this age of Reservation.

There are more kinds of terrorism than just bombs in a train.

Just another Manic Monday...

2006-07-17T23:40:00.000+05:30

Just another Manic Monday...

Yesterday, I came to know that someone I'd interacted with passed away in the train blasts here in Bombay. It was strange to realise. As I told the Love later on the phone, it brings the blasts all that closer to my doorstep. Earlier, even though I was scared and shocked, it seemed like: "O, it's happened on the Western Line, but I travel on the Central line..." It's just not that way, anymore.

Tushit Shah used to work at a firm called TAIB Securities, in Worli. I used to talk to him on the phone at times, asking for inputs on what was happening in the stock markets, what sectors look good, and other shop-matters. He would always be nice on the phone, and never treat me like the pesky journo that I was. And he would be nervous about coming in front of the camera, but would graciously acquiesce, nonetheless.

Thank you for everything, Tushitbhai, and may God bless you.

***

And on a different note, I must confess that I'm liking my new job. Must confess that I had some misgivings before I started. Didn't want to be a toady to anyone. ;-) Was it all those classes in ethics in ACJ that I snoozed through? Maybe, maybe not. But I didn't want to be a toady. The good part is, I'm not. The good part is, there's so much scope here for taking charge and improvising. Of running things in a disciplined way. I wonder if I'm a harridan at the office. I can be bossy at times. (Poor A!)

Oops, I also know that my current boss knows where I blog, so David, if you're reading this, I'm gonna ask you to let me go for that Andhra tour.

;-)

Clockwork City

2006-07-13T01:41:00.000+05:30

Clockwork City

It all happened like clockwork. I sit down. The train lurches forward, a jerk, another one even sharper, and I'm chugging along. And my eyes scan the overhead luggage rack. Clockwork orange, red, blue, green, yellow, purple, vibgyor.

It's been a little more than twenty four hours since news of the bomb blasts ripped through the city, perhaps even more piercingly and with even more deadly effect than the blasts themselves. I was lucky: I saw the whole thing unfold in the relative safety of my office, watching the TV channels unfold their stories. So much confusion: seven blasts or eight, seven stations or eight, handmade or RDX, Srinagar or Pakistan, dead or alive? Questions simply didn't have any answers, and since going home with the city panicking around us was out of the question, the only consolation (it seemed) was walking over to the Press Club for a spot of whisky. But after the whisky finished and news came in that the Central Line was working fine, trains were running, people were going home, it was time to trudge back to that imposing Victoria Terminus, Living World Heritage like the city it belongs in, and stand on the platform, waiting for a train. I sit down. The train lurches forward. I look up sharply at the luggage rack.

Like clockwork.

A friend drives his car over Peddar Road, and listens to me patiently, while I explain how I felt travelling on the train last night and this morning, after the incident. How I was scared with this strange feeling of uncertainty, which was in a way even more discomfiting than knowing (but then, that's such a cliched thing to say, isn't it?). He shrugs and replies, "It's all Fate. You can't worry about that. Hell, anything like that can happen right now, if it's meant to - " and he swerves dramatically on the road, to prove his point, "You can't stop it if it's meant to happen."

"Is it really all that simple and easy to explain?" I scowl, refusing to believe that that's all there is to it.

My friend nods in agreement. "Yep. O, you'll have the TV channels interviewing people, and the people will say that the government should have warned them in advance, and the Opposition will demand the government's resignation, and all of that will carry on for a week. After a week, you'll get used to it. You won't even bother about the train."

"I haven't bought my First Class Pass yet," I reply, "Think this was an omen not to?"

He shrugs and grins in reply.

I have nothing to say to that. After that not-so-enlightening conversation, I took the train again to come back home, and once again, like clockwork, I looked up at the luggage rack, at the bags, umbrellas, tiffin cases, satchels, briefcases there, and silently prayed that none of them was a bomb in disguise. Perhaps my friend is right. Perhaps, a week later, after all the TV interviews are over, after the CBI or whoever takes the investigation into its shady recesses, after the Opposition has gained enough mileage for the forthcoming municipality polls, all of this will indeed be over. Dawood and Shakeel have flown away. We may never even know who the perpetrators of these blasts were. A week later, as Bombay resumes its clockwork pace, we may simply be rushing foward and backward to work again, not sparing a look at the luggage rack, not caring, not fearing, not hesitating.

A week later, perhaps. Not tomorrow, at any rate.

Magg-num Opus

2006-07-11T09:38:00.000+05:30

Magg-num Opus

The idea behind World Peace and making a good batch of Maggi noodles is much the same: patience and good stirring. Sitting at home the other day, and was making Maggi on the microwave. Tear packet. Heat small amount of water in micro for 1 minute. Break noodles into crumbly little piece and Dunk, Dunk, Dunk with your fork. (Imagine umpteen little Nice biscuits being dunked into tea and you'll manage.) Sprinkle Masala evenly on top. Reheat concoction for 3 minutes in micro. remove and stir and mix with said fork. Place bowl under fan for 1 minute to cool, and then guzzle.

This was the first time I'd made Maggi using a microwave. Admittedly, there are stranger ways of cooking that 2-Minute Noodle that revolutionsed Indian snack-foods as we know it. Once upon a time, I knew a strange Punjabi who would soak Maggi in lukewarm water, crush the crumbly bits till they got softer in the water, mix the Masala in it, mix some more, stir, stir, stir and then stire some more. Eat and pretend to like it. We didn't have a stove that worked in those days, you understand. And since Maggi was cheap in those days, and we were poor, the nutty Punjabi made it his staple meal.

With people like me who don't know how to cook, Maggi comes as a lifesaver. Rather, as a facesaver. I don't know how to boil rice or make tea - considered the essentials of Living Alone in A Big Bad City. All I know in the culinary department is to mix cornflakes, whip up a neat Maggi and.... no, that's all.

Favourite style of having Maggi: Cheese Maggi, though that may not be very conducive right now, with my jogging avatar. ;-)

Maggi Style not tried out yet: With fried egg on top. I've heard loads about it, and am pretty curious to try it. Only problem: still don't have a stove, and you can't get a fried egg via the microwave.

Washed In

2006-07-04T10:39:00.000+05:30

Washed In

Rain, rain, Go away
Little Johnny wants to play

Welcome to Bombay. The place where it rains insanely. Caught a firsthand glimpse of that last year, and it looks like this time around it's not going to be any different. So yesterday, I tramped into the new office, soaked to the skin, cursing and ranting, and telling the receptionist, "Hey, How are you? Horrid day outside, isn't it? O, and I'm going to work here from today. Who are you, again?"

;-)

Well, not quite that rude, but you get the point. Today, I bought myself a blue umbrella in the subway opposite VT. My stooopid black NIKE raincoat is in a bedraggled state and isn't protecting me anymore! Aw, shucks. So, I buy this light blue, pansy-looking one for a hundred bucks. pansy, but cute. I love the colour blue. Stooopid vendor asked me whether I was looking for a gents or a ladies' umbrella, and I curtly said ladies' to him. Ass. So what if I like blue on my umbrella, instead of drab black? I've seen guys with pink umbrellas - and I don't even own a pink shirt, which is considered the epitome of Metrosexuality!

In the meantime, I sit in a half-deserted office, with one late Kate limping in every half-hour or so. And I'm chatting online on msn (now called, Windows Live, by the way), while blogging. It's a PR guy's life, I suppose. Am catching the ropes fast!

Hey You...

2006-06-30T23:48:00.000+05:30

Hey You...

My bout of joblessness ends this week. Come Monday, I'll be walking briskly into another office, dressed in stifling formals, on the dot at nine a.m, and hoping to leave work by seven p.m. The grasshopper has had his fun, and now it's time for the ant to kick back in. I hate being a schizo.

But this time has been great. Had the major upset with having to postpone my GRE-TOEFL sked, but I got the chance to catch up with some close pals. Had an impromptu party with Scribbleamus and The Scribe earlier this week, some delicious red wine over old pictures, topped up with seafood at a chhottu Dadar restaurant.

The trend of catching up with old friends continued, with an extended sms conversation with Gyaaneshwar who seems to have fallen off the face of the earth. Had loads to talk about, mutual insecurities and hopes, job prospects and no prospects at all in some areas. Aaa, it wasn't really all that negative as I make it sound. Nor all that braniac. Just some chilling, and I remembered that time he and I went over to Pizzeria on a Saturday afternoon, got wasted on pizza and chilled beer, and then bought books from the pavements at Fort.

He hates Bombay, hates the poor life he had to live here, and he doesn't want to come back here. Anywhere but Bombay, he said, and I don't blame him. I remember all of that. I remember the Maggi noodles in lukewarm water and no stove, the tiny loo smaller than what you find in an airplane, the tiny bedroom that had no inch of space left beyond the not-so-big bed two people had to share, the forced train rides back home in the dead of night after so much revelry when walking was the last thing anyone could do, and most of all, the terribly long hours at work. Bombay makes worker bees of you, and Gyaaneshwar can't come back to that life. Even though his life would probably be much better now if he did return, than those early months, the memory of those days holds him back.

And there were those other meetings, movies, impromptu lunches with other friends. Coffees by the seafront. Rushing in the train with the rain lashing outside. Standing at the window, in my home, watching the sky turn golden, and the water rush down faster than that silly overcrowded train could ever rush forward. Got my laptop finally fixed, after ages of fretting over it.

So I'm soaking up this Friday night, late 11.30 p.m., and even though I'm sitting at home typing, and not partying the night away, I'm not fretting too much. Dancing to a catchy song sometimes, that plays on the radio. The mirror is a great companion for that.

*grin*

****

O, and yes, I've written a new story. Mellow one, about love and romance. Enter The Dancer in Paradise. One of the happiest things I've ever written, the most hopeful. And the customary excerpt:

"It's not more," chimes in friend no 2. "They come and they go. Non resident idiots are fun to screw. Screw him and get over it. Nothing more. Don't screw yourself like this now."

Reason shines through, and fights with the heartstrings. But... "He dances divinely."

"He'll dance right out of your life," comes the reply, fast as lightning, I'm not sure from which one.

Feet fetish

2006-06-25T22:27:00.000+05:30

Feet fetish

Was sitting with someone I'd met lately at JATC and that's when I bump into someone I used to know well a long time back. So we chatted up, exchanged notes about what who is doing, where he's doing it at, who with, and yadayadayada to boot. It was fun, I suppose, but I felt as I was playing a part. The highly social person part, not something I'm completely at ease with. I'd told the Love once, how we're so completely different in that way: put the Love in a roomfull of strangers and within 30 minutes they'll all become good buddies, but I'm in my best element dealing with small groups, twos and threes. So here I was, chatting with this old friend, flashing my pearly whites and talking about mutual friends and acquaintances and wishing that he would soon go away. Not that I hate him or anything - just felt stranging, putting on this silly act.

Tired of acting, after awhile.

So, today, while driving back from lunch, brother darling answers a phone call from someone at his office, and when this chap aplogises for calling on a Sunday, bro answers magnanimously "No issues!" - only to mutter "Jackass!" after the phone is switched off. I grinned and accused him of being a hypocrite then, and a game of Tickles ensues in the car. Hypocrite, eh? And hey look, who's poised to enter the sexy world of PR now! ;-) Sometimes, I wonder whether I think at all before I open my big mouth wide. Tasting my own foot has almost become a habit these days.

Quitting my job today...

2006-06-20T14:50:00.000+05:30

Quitting my job today...

Going about, tying loose ends here and there. Is it my imagination, or are the people I work(ed) with going ahead, without involving me at all...? Have not done anything at all since I arrived today. Nothing on the desk or otherwise. Boss was going to send me for a stake-out, but I opted out, saying I came in for the day only to quit. Hate to sound/seem unprofessional, but waiting under the hot sun - ok, fine, clouds right now, but in Mumbai, that's even scarier than the sun! - is not my idea of a nice way to spend my last day.

No use denying I'm going to miss this place. For all the ahem, ahem, complications... I had a blast. Got some good experience. And I can't deny it. Everyone was a bit surprised when my resignation letter was so nicely received - perhaps, none so more than I! ;-) Maybe that means they think they're better off without me! *guffaws*

Was reading my GRE and TOEFL prep stuff yesterday, and needed to leaf through a dictionary, so I took out the small one I'd picked up in Chennai. Two years back, in Chennai, a July evening, and I walked over to the corner store and picked it up: scribbled on the front cover: To myself... a New Journey... no floundering allowed! How naive I must have been to think that you stop floundering after you've taken a decision. You keep changing your mind all the time. You keep changing your life - and though it's not so frequent, it can be quite diametric. I've told myself that this is not necessarily a final goodbye to journalism, but then, I'd be lying if I said that I felt a lot of zeal in what I said.

It's just another drift.

Critics' Bane

2006-06-14T20:38:00.000+05:30

Critics' Bane

I've been writing. Or rather, I did some writing last week while we were at Saputara, and I've posted them on cyberspace now. This is just some cross-posting publicity here! ;-) Some little part where I get to act the great big author and write what I thought about while making those stories.

Indulge me!

Number One is this piece called The Fairy Catcher, which is there at Caferati, seen through the eyes of the protagonist and a secondary character, the obligatory and anonymous friend. The story of a man who loves and loves and loves and loves, and makes no apologies about it. How mired in reality is it? Aaa, well, that would be kissing and telling, wouldn't it? But I would be lying if I didn't say there's a part of me in this silly protagonist who falls in love with fairies, and never tries to hold onto them when they flit away from his grasp. And then, perhaps, I've reversed my fairy-luck of late, and found love? O, yes, I've found Love. *grin*

And so, here is the obligatory excerpt:
The fairy is sitting astride me now. Looking at me with cat eyes in the dark. The lake is a short distance away. The grass is scratching my back and bum, and I'm vaguely aware of the discomfort, but they don't really compare to the anticipation of this - the fairy sitting astride me.

"You'll destroy me," I tell it, but the fairy never cares. Never does. Fairies are cruel creatures.

"I'm not cruel. No more, no less, than you are. I flit. I float. I sit. I ride," and the damn thing grins. I fall in love with the damn apparition when I see the grin. The most beautiful thing in the world. Ethereal.

Number Two is a touch of idiotic dialogue I had great fun in concocting up: Giving The Boot. That's why I didn't presesnt it to the Noble Minds at Caferati - it was so silly, writing this down, so much throwing arrows in the dark, a weird bantering with four imaginary friends. But perhaps I will submit it to Caferati at a later stage. What spun this whole tale? Quite simply, a song that was playing on my laptop at the moment, and I thought a silly adolescent discussion should and must take place on this. Does the narrative actually go anywhere? Well, that could be anyone's guess, really. If you were to be highbrowed, you could say that it's a discussion on sexual rights and sexual interpretations... or maybe something like a study on youth or some such drivel. ;-) Or , you could call it, quite simply, Drivel. ;-)

Sample:
Appy, mutters to herself: "I like S&M. I like kinky."

Part of me is listening to what Appy said, and feels happy cuz she's really hot and sexy, but the other part of me is distracted by Sid the Fag’s sudden outburst: "Straight men are morons! They run after chicks canoodling themselves and can't stand it if gay men do it! Double standards! EFFing double standards!"

Snatches:

2006-06-08T16:31:00.000+05:30

Snatches:

1. The word snatch is slang for the female vulva. Remember coming across it the first time in a Hadley-Chase novel. Yes, I used to read that stuff ocne upon a time.

2. Computers are fickle creatures. But some of my friends are worse. There's a friend who turned all slutty one day, then decidedly polished, and then finally, completely chaste with the evil intentions still simmering underneath the surface in case a younger person comes ambling along. And then there's the other friend who used to be gung-ho on design, but is now embarking on a job of sales, but secretly wants to go in for PR.

3. I read the newspapers for sleaze these days. Rahul Mahajan is interesting to read about. The President going WHEEEE!!! on a Sukhoi is fun. Ronaldinho's girl friend posing in teeny weeny swimsuits for the World Cup is cute. The Ambanis can go jump in the pool, for all I care.

4. Too many files and papers around me. Applying to US colleges is a horrible chore that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. And yet, for the sake of Love, here I am.

5. I love seeing myself on TV. I'm an egoitic prick. But hey, I'm also a lazy one. So I hate the idea of rushing out to do a package at 4 pm, which is supposed to run between 6-7 pm, and rush from one department in the office to another, getting this cut and that done... Watching the final product on air is satisfying, yes, but WTF happens to my shooting blood pressure?!

6. I'm a greedy glut. I love fine eating and fine dining. I also love going to these cheesy little joints when I'm in the mood and gulping down something that you would not find anywhere else. Like paranthas at Delhi's Chandni Chawk. Or faloodas at Mumbai's Crawford Market. Or Honey Chicken at Calcutta's Krystal Chopsticks. Or chocolate mousse at Chennai's Sweet Chariots. Love calls me motya.

7. I've never used a fire extinguisher. I would like to, some day. At no personal risk, however. Always be careful what you wish for.

8. I'm actually a sex maniac. Not many people see me that way. Not many, except the people I sleep with. I'm grinning now, wondering what this flamboyant little nugget is doing here, tucked away as no. 8 in this otherwise silly post. Freudian slip? But then, I'm hardly that stupid.

9. I haven't written stories in ages. But then, the other day, I sat at home with my laptop and punched out a couple of what you could call short stories. I would call them 'dialogue' instead. I prefer dialogue to life. A story seems dry without it. Dialogue can also be impersonal, without quotes. I prefer stuff like that. People can be sucked into following a dialogue, that's because everybody is a voyeur. But then, if that dialogue doesn't lead anywhere, people tend to be more disappointed than they would have, in a story without the dialogue trail.

10. I decided to write only ten snatches here. My mind is mad. But wait, that could only be my humongous ego telling myself that I'm mad. M-A-D.

KA-phut?!

2006-06-01T14:31:00.000+05:30

KA-phut?!

Have a bomb to burst. Much worse than popping the question. To be honest, I never had to pop the question - except once. Always had the question popped at me. ;-)

(Conceited ass.)

So with the bomb ready to burst, I'm just wondering when to do it. And then run for cover. Have called friends all day, looking for cues. Experience counts, or so they say. They don't know very much though. You never know quite how to do it, till you walk in and open your mouth. Hopefully, I won't put my foot in it. Expecting a storm, of course. Wind and fury. Shock and awe. That's called Strategy.

I'm very vague these days in this blog, I realise. Except when I battle and argue on the reservations issue. And then, someone tells me that the tone of the blog is more aggressive. What a tightrope I walk - vague and airy-fairy, to aggressively militant.

(Five cups of coffee so far.)

BLACKOUT!

2006-05-22T19:47:00.000+05:30

BLACKOUT!

Switched off lights at 8 pm to mark Black Day. Say NO to quotas. Someone asked me that on my orkut group today, what my stand was on reservations. I was surprised she needed to - didn't all the tags on my orkut page and my blog say enough?

Reservations only on economics. Don't propagate caste by dividing along caste.

Was watching a special on the Quota issue the other day, and there was this sociologist asking a YFE spokesman whether he had ever encountered caste problems in his life. He had not. The sociologist went on to say that while, he or I or any of us in the city may not understand what the big deal about caste was, it was a reality in India's villages. Hence, the need for quotas. Sometimes, people speak such bunkum. Caste is a reality in the village - so how will booking 50% in India's cities' elite colleges help them? Does the sociologist imagine that all the OBC/SC/STs newly 'educated' will then return to the village to spread the gospel truth of castelessness? Naive ass. No one ever returns. Alright, judging from the Swadesh experience, very few return.

Caste is a problem in the village, so why not tackle it at the grassroots level? Take teachers to the villages, organise special schools, organise morchas at the district level where the problem is really so deep. This is Bombay. Here, people don't have the time to check their watch while rushing to work - you honestly think they have the time to check the caste of the person next to them? Watch a Bombay local train: everyone hangs together, pushes together, stays together. Screw caste.

So tackle the problem where it is important. Not where you screw hapless innocents.

What gets me the most, is that you stick up for your gumptions, you are automatically labelled as an autocrat, someone who doesn't believe in equality. Just because I don't want quotas based on caste, they say I'm someone who doesn't believe in equality. Screw you. I believe in equality. That's why I hate the idea of reservations. The damn politics can go hang.

***

Grey clouds over Bombay yesterday. Amazing sight. Makes me think of Delhi, for some reason. And no, not just because of the quota controversy. Would be so amazing to have it rain soon. O, wait, it did. It rained last night. Late last night, just before going to bed, and there was the rushing noise of rain. *wide grin*

I'm a kid at times. I wail like one. I complain like one. I love like one. I smile like one.

Rang De Whatever!

2006-05-17T13:16:00.000+05:30

Rang De Whatever!

I think, labelling the Reservation protests as an outcome of the Rang De Basanti effect is pathetic. It trivialises an important movement. Screw RDB.

Going through the net and found out some important links. If anyone is interested here, please do join up and help out over here.

YOUTH FOR EQUALITY - MUMBAI

YOUTH FOR EQUALITY - NEW DELHI

There is also another website you can catch up on events and background info here.

SAVE BRAND INDIA

On May 20, Saturday, students in New Delhi are organising Solidarity Day. Mumbai is also gearing up for the same. You can find out more about all this here.

YOUTH FOR EQUALITY - ORKUT COMMUNITY

ANTI RESERVATION ACTION FORUM - ORKUT COMMUNITY

Doctoring Dreams

2006-05-15T10:47:00.000+05:30

Doctoring Dreams

I feel strongly about the reservations issue. I've spoken about it before, before it snowballed into such a huge thing over the weekend. Lathi charging doctors. Amazing. So many of those policemen will go for treatment to those same doctors some years hence. That's the funny part. Would be fun to see if the docs then tell them to FCUK off. Then there's the other possibility that the government would sack these medicos and hire a whole lot of OBCs in their space, and then it would be amusing to see what kind of treatment the cops really receive!

A couple of things jumped out at me, though, from the newspapers this morning. One, was how the reporters proclaimed that the spirit of Rang de Basanti had fired up the students. Hilarious, really, when you consider how all of this comes just a coupla weeks after Aamir's fashionable stand at Delhi. And I can't help but wonder where the hell the great Khan was, when students were getting caned. Aaa, well, perhaps he can't be blamed. Reservations are much more controversial than displacement is - it fires up many more people than displacement does, despite poor Medha's protests. And poor Aamir knows, standing up for/against reservation will earn him many more brickbats than anything concerning a dam.

The second thing that struck me: an editorial in one of the papers that argued, the possible loss of standards due to reservation is an Acceptable Price to pay in order to bring them in. I wanted to throw something at the author. Honestly, how daft can you get?! This is the age, when industry and policy planners are going gaga about India in the World order. The same paper has a story where the PM is talking about opening a new institute, so that bright young people can be induced to stay and study in India, rather than flee elsewhere. (Fat chance, with quotas coming in - I hear the UK colleges are already rubbing their hands in glee, expecting a mass exodus to their campus!) And he says, it's an Acceptable Price. It's easy for him to say that, since he's not the one who has to pay it.

The third thing was of course, that ass Arjun Singh. And that other ass, Rahul Gandhi. RG is touted as the face of GenZ. If the reservation issue becomes that big, I would bet on anything that most of those disenchanted would vote for RG, hoping he would be able to do something for their cause. And I'm equally game to bet on anything that RG will do zilch. Simple thing, really, and we're all to blame for it: it's the OBCs who vote. Striking medicos don't. Bitter bloggers don't. Malabar Hill residents don't. So RG and that ass Arjun Singh will sit on their arses and push through Mandal II despite all our anger and protests. They will order the lathicharges, and then they will simper to the media of how it was overzealous cops who did it, and an enquiry will soon be underway.

As for us journalists, this is Big News. For someone like me, who wasn't old enough to understand Mandal I, when it happend, this is a chance to understand Injustice, firsthand. A valuable experience.

I think.

Nothing much, but love

2006-05-11T19:46:00.000+05:30

Nothing much, but love

The idea of having a blog is about deliberation. Confessions, also. Soothing oneself. Telling oneself that you're quite ok. I'm a hopeless sycophant of myself. I tell myself, it's ok to be that way when it's your blog. It helps when there are not too many people around, and you can indulge yourself as much as you want, without looking/seeming/reading foolish.

So that's what I do.

Wear a clown cap or a white sheet and weep. Not always that dramatic. Sometimes, quite ludicrous. Sometimes, I feel helpless. That's when I write some drivel like this that doesn't make sense to anyone but me. That's the best part about making something completely about YOU. That's the best part about reading messages from a cell phone that are meant only for MY ears and brains and comprehension.

30 Dec, 11.42 am: Thots of u mk me smile muah
31 Dec, 12.22 am: I miss holdin u sleepin without u will b weird
1 Jan, 2.17 am: i m fallin in luv
1 Jan, 7.25 am: i miss u crazy cant imagine how i will survive once i go back i m very serious about us
1 Jan, 7.34 am: As long as we remain focusd and patient we can mk this work
1 Jan, 8.36 am: My cousin just askd me how come i have a glow on my face babe u r always on my mind muah
5 Jan, 1.42 am: I can't be away from u can we spend the night 2gether
8 Jan, 7.28 pm: I want u 2 b a part of my life 4 ever
10 Jan, 8.02 am: Mornin babe I luv u 2 i missed u by my side day is just startd openin my eyes with ur msg is nice luv u
10 Jan, 8.07 pm: U r silly u r my sexy sizzlin sweety i miss u crazy luv u
11 Jan, 2.49 pm: U r on my mind i miss u bad luv u lotz i m stayin till the 29th i miss holdin u and seein ur smile u r beautiful
12 Jan, 8.40 pm: That must have been fun we will mk our own music when i get back
15 Jan, 2.26 pm: I luv u 2 miss u and cant wait 2 b in ur arms and mk luv 2 u
18 Jan, 7.51 pm: Sat we will stay in a hotel in colaba
20 Jan, 12.48 am: U r the reason behind my smile luv u lots
22 Jan, 1.19 am: U r my world i luv u
23 Jan, 7.20 pm: Miss u crazy luv u madly
25 Jan, 11.13 pm: I luv u 2 miss u crazy
27 Jan, 9.25 am: I luv u crazy
1 Feb, 1.27 pm: i luv u
5 Feb, 7.16 pm: I luv the way u get excitd and adore u u r my life
5 Feb, 7.21 pm: I luv u madly it is a nice movie miss u
7 Feb 5.42 pm: I luv u alot ur call made me smile muah
12 Feb, 11.43 pm: Awwww love u
14 Feb, 8.03 am: Happy valentines sugarplum tried callin but no ans I am online now
14 Feb, 11.04 am: How you doing! Haha i remember you like this phrase. I will say it in personwhen i meet you. Well, i'm studying hard, so don't worry. Love you to eternity
14 Feb, 11.08 am: Off 2 bed miss u u r my shinin star
14 Feb, 10.11 pm: Hi sweety i luv u in a meeting miss u
24 Feb, 9.08 am: Luv u
28 Feb, 2.58 pm: Please tell me u r jokin babe i will call ur nite time
28 Feb, 3.05 pm: love you mad
2 Mar, 1.03 pm: on plane bk home luv u
3 Mar, 8.47 pm: Luv u 2
3 Mar, 10.46 pm: We will be together
4 Mar, 10.48 am: My comps batt died can't get online sorry read my mail good luck with the interview luv u
8 Mar, 12.49 am: Love u more than i can say
8 Mar, 12.56 am: U make me wanna jump & dance u r laughter gives music 2 my life the kisses u planted on me felt passionate ur love is what makes me luv u crazy
9 Mar, 12.13 am: Love u
9 Mar, 8.17 pm: Everythin ok?
12 Mar, 10.06 am: Nite nite love u crazy
13 Mar, 8.50 pm: Luv u 2
15 Mar, 10.22 am: happy holi sugar i m online now
15 Mar, 10.45 am: I luv u alot will call tomo when i get a card
16 Mar, 8.59 pm: She hasnt noticed it
19 Mar, 8.32 pm: Luv u
21 Mar, 8.54 pm: I wont be able to talk chk my mail luv u
22 Mar, 12.47 am: Luv u 2 heart throb
25 Mar, 11.24 am: I luv u 2 death
27 Mar, 11.55 pm: I luv u too muah
30 Mar, 12.43 am: I did send u a msg earlier luv u motya
30 Mar, 12.44 am: Muah i m enjoyin my chkn marsala
2 Apr, 8.45 pm: Luv u 2 2 2 2 2
10 Apr, 5.48 am: That was so sweet i m urs 4 ever
11 Apr, 9.48 pm: i m busy cant call now will email later i luv u
13 Apr, 12.21 am: U r my world and i truely luv u lots
13 Apr, 12.26 am: Still in meetin i will call ur morning time S is still wid me and we r 2 hours from home luv u loads
15 Apr, 7.53 pm: wantd to wish u a very happy new yr i have emailed u cant use phone 4 long as its roamin and costin alot luv u
24 Apr, 6.50 am: Phone card over. lv u
24 Apr, 10.07 pm: No sugar meetin S and my prof after that sorry luv u
28 Apr, 8.36 pm: Will try we luv u 2 mua n lick

Yes yes, I know I'm pathetic cuz I actually wrote them down from the phone. But being in love is a marvellous feeling. *grin*

Climbing every mountain, and quite sick of it!

2006-05-03T20:44:00.000+05:30

Climbing every mountain, and quite sick of it!

God is misguided. Chiefly, because he allowed my beautiful new child, my labour of love and money, Laptop, to get a virus, when there're soooo many other inferior laptops that don't get infected even when they operate ages and ages without an antivirus.

As a result, I'm screwed.

Got the nice guys at the office IT department to reload my Windows XP, but now the damn drivers are a pain. Downloading them from the net and all. Boohooooo... and now, they also tell me that getting a bloody anti-virus will cost me a coupla grand! HORRORS! I'm poooooor, so poooooorrrr - doesn't God, misguided though he is, understand that?!

***

Saw this really crummy movie the other night, Darna Zaroori Hai. Aaaa, ummm.. ok, not that crummy - just crummy, considering that I'd wanted to see Ice Age 2 or Pink Panther. Stooopid bro went off to see PP on Sunday without me, and when I went over to Bandra to catch IA 2.0, the bloody theatre was booked housefull. An energetic but bumbling friend suggested I approach 'the black man', but I desisted. Not my style. Petite prick that I am.

So, DZH is a sequel to Darna Mana Hai, and both are about six ghosty-wosty stories tied up in one. Pah! DZH has a scaredy cat granma and five irritating kids who I was glad to see killed off. I'm not a very nice person to know, sometimes. Especially, if you're underage. I made a concession for Karma, and now you expect me to make it 24-7?!

Hah! Fat chance!

*sigh* This is a horrid post. And I didn't even do the dumb quiz that Raghav tagged me with.

Reserve a stretcher for Mr Singh, please!

2006-04-27T10:51:00.000+05:30

Reserve a stretcher for Mr Singh, please!

am glad that there were disturbances in Delhi. Just the other day, I was musing to a friend that, this time around, it was only the newspapers and TV channels who were going hammers and tongs at the reservation issue. The general public, the student community, industry were all aghast at the news, but still didn't come out in the open with their resentment. It was as if, the failure to fight Mandal the first time around, had resulted in lethargy now - a feeling that whatever we do, nothing is ever going to come out of it.

And then, this happens...

Was it police brutality or were the students overstepping their boundaries? I don't care even if the students did go an extra mile. This is a vital issue. Vital for everyone, and anyone who doesn't see it is blind. Vote politics is evil. And this is as horrible and as prime an example of vote politics as it can get.

We are the future of the country, they tell us. Bastards. And then they try to remove our future away from us. Succeed? How are we to succeed if in the end, this is how they tie up our hands and feet and gag us? No, not 'gag' at any rate - not any more.

I wish someone would push Arjun Singh down a flight of stairs or something. And then get a quota doctor to treat him, a quota lawyer to fight his case, a quota MBA to manage his fund accounts for him to pay for his injuries and his court case.

It would screw him good.

Love - II

2006-04-26T22:29:00.000+05:30

Love - II

His name is Karma

Hare-brained

2006-04-21T11:15:00.000+05:30

Hare-brained

Every now and then, I feel like coming back to this space and talking utter nonsense.

Jack Sprite
Jack be nimble, Jack be quick
Jack jump over the candlestick

Trash. Now why on earth would any body called Jack, however sprightly and nimble he may be, want to jump over a candlestick? And even if he does, what's the great shakes in that?! I mean, it's not a giant candlestick or anything, right?

There's that theory that all these nonsensical rhymes-shymes (sigh, been missing Delhi like crazy lately) are based on some serious, and at times, even gruesome, issues/events. Like that silly old playground chant -

Ringa Ringa Roses
Pocketful of poses
A hush-a, a hush-oo,
We all fall down

- which is supposed to refer to small pox epidemics in Europe ages ago. Woof! Never thought about all that when you were happily whirling around in Montessori, hush-a-ing and hush-oo-ing now, were you?

Mary Mary
Quite contrary
How does your garden grow?

- Something about tinkerbells there.

Rang De Narmada

2006-04-17T15:33:00.000+05:30

Rang De Narmada

Sometimes, I think the media is biased, and then I think otherwise. The other day, Aamir Khan decided to renew his ties with Rang de Basanti, and sat in a dharna to campaign for the rehabilitation of those displaced due to the Narmada dam. Eyebrows were raised: another film maker politicking? TV and newspapers went overboard: on Sunday, four huge OB vans were parked in front of his residence at Pali Hill for a soundbyte on how he thinks, the people who disrupted screenings of RdB in Gujarat as a retaliation are "lumpen thugs".

But if you thought that the media was all soft and only wanted to show Aamir as the chocolate boy hero who's fighting for a good cause, think again. The very next day, after Aamir's dharna, while pictures of him sitting grimly near Parliament adorned the front pages, there were full length advertorials from notable industrialists and Gujarat politicians, supporting the Narmada project. The Ambani brothers, Birla, Mahindra, Essar, the who-have-you's opf business, with the leaders in Gandhi caps, sharing space despite the Congress-BJP divide. Much lambasting the Maharashtra CM for wanting the dam work to be halted.

Comical, at some levels, actually.

And then there was Ms High-and-Mighty Goddess-of-No-Things, Arundhati Roy, who proclaims that chocolate boy heroes who are brand ambassadors for Coca Cola Inc should not give dharnas for displaced victims, and this spot should be reserved only for unromantic intellectual authors.

Friday night and I'm booooooooooooooooooored.

2006-04-14T20:04:00.000+05:30

Friday night and I'm booooooooooooooooooored.

So blooody booooooooooooooooooooooooooored.

Did I say how boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooored I am?

O, I did.

*sigh*

Been on the computer all evening, after having run home from work. Good news: my internet connection is free for 3 whole months, and I can use it from absolutely anywhere in the country! Cuz it's a data card, and will work anywhere with Tata Indicomm connection.

The bad news: I can see I have a lot of temptation to put behind me, if I am to study hard for the GRE. *gulp*

Must keep on telling myself that there's Rs 25,000 at stake here. Ouch. OUCH.

Off to dinner now with brother darling.

But, no, I'm still boooooooooooooooooooooooooored.

Now, I'm hunnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggrrryyy too!

(Gosh, I sound like Desparado now! *shivers in horror*)

Psycho rants

2006-04-13T10:42:00.000+05:30

Psycho rants

Infosys is a psycho.

They ALWAYS release results on a holiday.

Which means, I ALWAYS end up working on a day when I could be...

snoozing blissfully
chatting online
seeing a movie
eating a lazy lunch
chatting up old friends
reading paperbacks
studying a bit (sorely needed!)
going for a drink (Love calls me bevda)
going to bed, content

Nandan Nilekani, a pox on you!

Clutter

2006-04-10T17:35:00.000+05:30

Clutter

Things break down for the silliest of reasons at times. Sometimes, for no reason at all.

My flatmate would agree, if she heard me. She'd think I was talking about her computer or her internet connection. ;-)

It's also true for relationships, however.

Scary shit.

I called up Love today, and asked whether it was true: the answer I got comforted me, warmed me, and made me realise (for the umpteenth time!) that I'm in love with a beautiful person.

By the way, I should get my own internet connection within the week. ;-) Got a Tata Indicomm data card free with my laptop (yes, I finally bought it!) and it should be installed by Friday. Free Of Cost. I love those three little words.

Love would kill me if I said this aloud. ;-)

Go(a) Forth and Multiply...

2006-04-06T12:24:00.000+05:30

Go(a) Forth and Multiply...

Himesh Reshammiya is the God of Goa. From the bus which carried us into Goa, to the numerous pubs/beach shacks/lounge bars we frequented, he was crooning in his nasal voice about aashiqs and aashiqees, that made us grin. A touch of Bombay in idyllic, easy Goa.

Was so much fun zooming down the highways, from Baga Beach where we stayed, to Panjim and Old Goa, to Calengute and Candolim beaches, to Anjuna Beach and the Saturday Night Bazaar at Arpora, to Fort Aguado and Sim-something Beach. I'm not making much sense here - it was liberating to zoom on the bike with my shirt open - like the t-shirt stall owner commented, when Desparado picked out a sleeveless T that is meant for women elsewhere in the country - 'Goa pe sab chalta hain!' (Everything goes in Goa!) I grew self conscious the moment we boarded the bus back to Bombay, buttoning my shirt back on.

;-)

I still haven't recovered from the Goa hangover, and neither has Desparado. Plans are afoot to visit the beach shack on Juhu this Friday, to recreate some of that feel and freedom. I shared candle-lit dinners with Desparado, and that's why it seemed so strange - we laughed and told each other, "No offence, I'm having a great time, but I wish I was in this dinner with someone else!" *grin*

I can't help not talk about the itinerary, however boring it might be for people who haven't been to Goa, or however much it may tease those who have... But even while I think of listing it down, day by day, hour by hour, all of it merges into one single mass, and it's quite impossible to tell them apart. Maybe that's how good memories go. *beatific grin*

The theme of this trip was so obviously food. Food. Food means pork vindaloo at Britto's on Baga Beach, teamed up with saana, this Goan sweet idli thing which was simply yummy, and loads of beer and port wine. Food means beef chilly fry at night, at Souza Lobo's on Calengute Beach, candles and one-man band playing Goan music and all, and a slice of yummy yummy bibinca. Souza Lobo's again the day we left, with sizzling bibinca teamed with vanilla ice cream, and no wonder I'm gaining weight. (All the freebie lunches at the Hilton and Taj ahead will add to the calories!) And Food means watching the ocean play below you at Sea Pebble, in Dona Paula, on the outskirts of Panjim, eating papads stuffed with prawn, whole tandoori baby kingfish, and prawn curry-rice. And then, there was also the fish thaali at the Ritz in Panjim, with fried fish and MORE prawns and clams. ;-) It's a wonder I didnt sprout tentacles anywhere. The waiters were carrying around these trays of squids and pomfret and shrimps, and Desparado and I kept staring at them.

Goans love colours. All those gorgeous houses on top of hills, bang opposite the oceanfront, in bright dual shades of red and white, burnt ochre and white, blues and white... etc etc... Yummy to see. There was Venite in Campal, in Panjim, grilled balconies with tables where couples were eating food. The Campal area is gorgeous... lined with old fashioned lightposts and shady trees, an old-world Marine Drive, but before you completely believe that, you see the Caravela, India's only floating (and otherwise) casino. The approach to Panjim is amazing - the bridge is huge and yawns over the waterways, and if you're coming at night, the lit-up ramparts of the Panjim coast, with the pleasure barges crisscrossing below, is amazing. Amazing to see all that when you're speeding across on a bike.

Anjuna Beach is also amazing, if for different reasons. Desparado's eyes popped open as all the hot babes kept peeling off their tops to wade into the ocean or just sun bathe. Loads of idiot men came around purposely to watch free boobies, but who can blame them, really?! It's not as if the gals were feeling very self conscious. But I guess, it's really all about how everything 'goes' in Goa. It's almost like another country - a place where you can simply let... be! And no one bothers or gives a fuck.

Wrong note to end the paragraph when I'm going to start talking about a Church.

*makes the sign of the cross hurriedly*

The Basilica of Bom Jesus in Old Goa, and that's where the mortal remains of St Francis Xavier are interred. 15 years of Xaviers' and all, so I was pretty enthusiastic to go see it. It's pretty amazing. Lovely gold vaults, and arches. Desparado and I went mad taking snaps, and Desparado tried climbing a pulpit for a pic, but was shooed away by a priest. We got the snap, neverthelss!

Go(a)n with the Wind

2006-04-01T15:54:00.000+05:30

Go(a)n with the Wind

So, I hopped on the bus and came away. To Goa. Sudden decision and a need for a break. So far, it's been good. All hot sun and walks down alleyways, good looking firangs and desis flexing bare skin and muscles under the hot sun. Cheap beer by the beach, and excellent pork vindaloo. Sweet sana and irish coffee cream mousse cake. Aaa, the good life.

I must stop sounding like a catalogue now, however tempted I may be.

Am not one of those who talk on the blog about where they've gone or what they've eaten - well, actually, I used to, but not anymore - so it all seems very silly now. Am not one of those beautifully feathered beings, either, though I'm wearing white capris on the beach now, and red ankle length socks. ;-) My travel partner giggled in disbelief when he saw the socks, and so did my brother, but I don't give a fig. I love them.

More about Goa. Things I want to do here, before my three days are up:

1. Flirt with a cute foreigner. Nothing more than that, mind you, cuz I still have my love in mind. (lol, my love will always be in my mind!)
2. Eat bibinca.
3. Party mad. (Though it's hard for stags with a limited wallet supply here.)
4. Read a book, listen to music under an open umbrella on the beach - that should happen in precisely 30 minutes.
5. Buy Goan port wine, prawn pickles.
6. Buy junk jewellery, crap shirts/kurtas
7. Learn to ride a goddamn motorbike. (We rented a Kinetic here.)
8. Flirt with a cute foreigner.

;-)