I was on hibernation for quite a while & hence guilty of abandoning my little bloggie.I was awakened from my sleepy mode by this IIMBian & told to write 8 weird / arbit things about myself. So here I bare my soul ….
1.) I have this weird habit of talking in my sleep sometimes .And there were times when I had screamed out in my dreams & hence scared the living daylights out of my poor roomies :)This was much prevalent during my college days. While, I used to sleep peacefully throughout these episodes, my roomies had tough time getting back their beauty sleep :D
During BTech, at hostel, my bed used to be right next to the windows. Once I dreamt about a hand extending through the open windows & trying to strangle me. I screamed out … A few weeks later, this incident actually took place in the adjacent room, where a guy actually put his hands through the window & tried to flick the purse..
2.) Though I love hearing music, I don’t have an ear for English music especially the heavy metal kind. With a roommate addicted to Vh1 channel, I don’t have much of a choice. I call some of those songs utter “NOISE POLLUTION” :) Music lovers, don’t throw stones at me!!!
3.) I have very good memory about people & incidents. Recently, I got introduced to a colleague from another branch of our office. I instantly recognized her as my classmate in 4th standard. She was there in my class only for 2 years. And she didn’t even remember having heard my name, let alone my face :(
4.) I hate hypocrisy. Am allergic & repellant to people whose words and actions don’t compliment each other. I understand that a little hypocrisy is necessary to survive in this world. But I have seen some extreme cases. I can’t stand these people…
5.) I derive sadistic pleasure out of killing mosquitoes with the mosquito bat. I like chasing them with the bat & watch them attain nirvana…
6.) I take some time to trust people. Trust is not something that blooms instantly for me. So I take time to make friends, but once friendship is formed, it’s there to stay. I have friends right from my kinder garden onwards, with whom I still maintain good contacts with.
7.) I am an “attention seeker”, as far as my mother is concerned. So when I have a cold & headache, I like to exaggerate it & inform my mother that I have fever :) After all, nobody dies from all the extra care, attention & love showered on them.. hehee..
8.) Last weird habit about me is “I-won’t-ever-acknowledge-I-am-weirdo” hahaa….
People tagged to write 8 weird things about themselves:
-The attention seeker
-Toothless wonder
-Aths
-Minu
-Pophabhi
My growing up years were closely associated with monsoon. It was the season I used to love as a kid, the season which used to irritate me when I grew up, the season that arouses waves of nostalgia when I think of it now. I used to hate it because, I could no longer go out anywhere and had to stay back at home. Hence my moods used to be as cloudy as the overcast monsoon sky. There was a persistent damp feeling everywhere & dresses took forever to dry up.
Because of the sudden hartal in Alappuzha district, we had to take a train to Kottayam and from there 2 exhausting bus journeys before we could reach Poonjar. By the time it started raining heavily. Rain gods seemed to have no mercy on us and the sky was pouring out threateningly. We feared rain will play spoilsport on our trip. By the time the bus was climbing the long winding uphill roads of Poonjar, there was power failure. The whole village was enveloped in coal black except for the hurricane lanterns that flickered here and there. The heavy rains had caused some damage to the BSNL tower and we were literally cut out from the rest of the world. What a way to start our journey!!!!
At last we reached our destination. My friends uncle and his daughter were there waiting for us. And it was a long walk in the dark to reach their home, guided only by a torch light. We had to climb through the rocky path , cross a stream and a bridge to reach home. A worried aunty was there waiting for us (it was almost 8 pm. We were supposed to reach there by 6).There was nothing much we could do inside the house because of power failure. So we sat under the candle light sipping hot tea and munching chips, talking to our hosts . Aunty was an energetic sporty lady and soon we were plotting wild crazy plans. The power cut could not tone down our high spirits. We decided this was the best time to take bath in the stream. Soon, under aunty's leadership the girls army( including her daughter S) marched down the rocky tracks to hit upon the stream. The water was icy cold after the rain. S was a girl used to all the wild ways of nature and soon we found her dragging us and unsuspectingly pushing us into under-water pits. With a sinking feeling I found myself drowning & gasping. And for a brief moment, I had a glimpse of the happy life I may never live to see :-) With zero knowledge on swimming, I felt it was a wonderful creative game for people who are thinking of ending their life. But soon we turned crazy and was enjoying the drowning-game. We screamed and our voice echoing in the dark almost brought the whole village down there. In a way, it was good that there was no power.
After dinner, we were sitting out in the veranda. The first thing I noticed on reaching the house was the swing. It has been terribly long since I did swinging. And there I was swinging to my hearts content into the cloudy night sky. We played anthakshari. It was past midnight and the aunty surprised us by coming with glasses of black tea . She announced, "to keep you devils awake and croaking." Here was a lady who encouraged our craziness!!!! After we finished our activities and decided to hit the bed it was 3 am.
I had to literally pry open my eyes next day morning at 6. We went to explore the country side in broad day light. The streams looked beautiful set against the foggy misty hills . Our next destination was waterfalls in the nearby hill. There we trekked down the rocky tracks enclosed by dense dark rubber plantation.
The best part about the waterfalls was that, we had it all to our own. The waterfall was surrounded by rubber plantations belonging to uncle and hence was a secluded place inaccessible to public. It was our very own kingdom. Only the chirping birds & the dragon flies hovering over the water gave us company.We sat under the waterfalls, with the heavy splash of water drumming on our heads and almost intoxicating us. We splashed around the pool , tried the balancing-floating-act on water ,and even danced under the falls. Later we were sitting on the top of a boulder, drying ourselves in the sun & chatting lazily, when S came and started pushing us one by one. From the precarious edge of the rock, I fell, was momentarily air borne and then sank down into the stream below. It was an exciting adventurous feeling. We tried it several times later
For last 1 week I felt like being orphaned. Here is the turn of events that turned me into an abandoned soul.
A week back, I accompanied my friend for his wedding shopping to buy blazers & suits. Two gals accompanying a guy for shopping can turn catastrophic, especially when the gals in question are ‘shopping crazy’ ones, who vanishes when ‘ladies dress section’ is in vicinity. But since this was wedding shopping, we refrained ourselves with much difficulty :-)
The mega shopping started in Marathahalli brand shops . His specification of blazer was a gray one which looks ‘informal’, ‘unique’ & ‘different’. Since we gals didn’t consider ‘gray’ as a colour even worth mentioning, we brainwashed him to go for a cream coloured suit. Now, none of the specifications ‘unique’ & ‘different’ were met in any of the brand giants viz Allen Solly, Van Heusen, Giovanni etc etc. Finally decided to select the engagement shirt first.In between his fiancee called up. Both of them are my friends since college days.
She: Remember, I am wearing orange sari with yellow border. So his shirt should match with
that
Me: Ok done. How about a bright fluorescent orange shirt then? Heheee....
She: @#$*#@
She: And don’t select any full sleeved shirts. It doesn't suit him.
Me: Ok..i will try to convince him…
As soon as the ‘order from higher authority’ was conveyed to him, he dismissed it as absurd. So we did buy a full sleeved shirt. God save us!!!!
After lunch we proceeded to Bangalore Central. As far as I was concerned, all suits looked alike. They were either black/gray/blue/cream or 2buttoned/3buttoned. After hours of searching, we zeroed in on an ethnic looking smart suit. By this time we gals were really worn out. To rejuvenate our poor tired souls, we decided to go on a shopping spree of our own to ‘ladies section’, while he was left gaping. After having revived ourselves, we decided to search in main Commercial Street too, inorder to widen his options. We went to some 5-6 shops in vain. By this time, we were dead tired & couldn't even take another step ahead. The climax of the story happened when he called up his parents to tell about the ethnic looking informal blazer he has finalized upon. From the other end he got a lecture on ‘proper mallu Christian weddings’ and how you should only wear simple formal suit on the occasion. So that was the end of it. We argued with him but he meekly replied , "I chose the bride on my own; I chose the wedding card on my own; at least I should leave this to my parents.” Thus the shopping saga came to an end.
It was much later while I was returning that I discovered I had misplaced my cell phone. I had left it somewhere while shopping!!!!!!!!!!! Called up to my cell immediately , but it was switched off. That was the anticlimax. I felt sick , more because I was so careless. Hmmm..i was proving myself to be all the adjectives that my Amma sometimes lovingly :-) calls me – ‘careless’ ‘irresponsible’ ‘clumsy’ :-) To get over the feelings of blue, I slept the whole of next day.Felt much better after that. For next one week,I was out of contact with the world and felt orphaned. Finally I got my mother to send me my old Nokia 1100 . So finally no longer am I abandoned :-)
I remember Women's Day mostly when I see the glossy ads in newspapers. But , the memories of a Womens Day during my 3rd year Btech are vividly etched in my mind.It was the time when our bossy seniors were out of the college for project work and suddenly we found ourselves as the shakers & movers of the campus. Many of our crazy ideas materialized during this time.
The idea of celebrating Women's Day in a different way sprouted from our 'qool galz' gang. Soon we had our infectious energy & enthusiasm spread to the whole gals in our college. The idea was to host a fund raising Womens Fest & donate the amount to 'Thanal' , an orphanage near to our college. The fest christened as 'Unarvu' (energy) was dedicated to Kalpana Chawla. That was the time of her demise & so feelings and emotions were running high during those days.
The Fest had all entertaining ingredients - fashion shows, cinematic dances, music, stalls, all hosted by the gals. Alltogether, there were more programs than we ever had during our Arts Fest. So for a change, the guys sat back and enjoyed (meant screaming & cat calls) while we took the reins of the Fest. The most important task was to get moral support from the guys, since for a few of them, the very idea of celebrating Womens Day was like undermining the existence of guys :) So a committee of gals were roped in from each class, to win over the guys, collect funds and make it a success. But I must say, the guys were really sporty about it and helped us amass huge amounts for our fund raising. And they were also supportive to the extend that they threw only tomatoes at us the 'qool gals' when we danced onstage. I remember the tomatoes quite matched with our red colour dance outfit. hehee
It was a feeling of being at the heart of the event, because we took all the responsibilities like booking the auditorium, arrangements for stage, audio systems & event management.
In his welcome speech, one of our popular Sir raved like this, " So I dedicate this Fest in fond remembrance of an Indian woman who made us all proud - Juhi errr.. Kalpana Chawla !!!!" The whole audience burst into laughter and a few even cheered. Grrrrr... I personally think it was deliberately done by him :) And I proudly did the introductory speech on Kalpana Chawla.
We put up various stalls during the Fest for fund raising. As usual the 'dedication counter' was a runaway hit. It's where anybody can pay 10 bucks and have a filmy song dedicated to anybody else. The songs will be played in between the events, along with the dedication message. Then there was 'face painting stall'. It was quite crowded with guys because pretty gals sat there to paint faces. Then there was 'mehndi stall' put up by some creative ones. But the toughest job at hand was for 'secret message counter' , where the unfortunate messengers had to deliver anonymous letters even to the principal.
The event was a success by all means and we were able to hand over a good proportion of money to the orphanage. That was a year when I felt worthy of having celebrated Women's Day.......
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