Two new things in my life....

I can't believe I forgot to write about this here....
There are two new things in my life now...
Vouge India, and THE BOOK
Don't worry bloggy, I won't forget you... With you, I get to be on the world wide web! ;)

But seriously.... after french class, Vidhya, Smitha and me decide to walk to the Oxford Book Store. Primarily, the intention was to buy a couple of photo postcards or carte de postal,  for french class.
But if there's something that I can't stand, its going into a bookstore, and coming out without saying a 'hi' to the books... I mean, thats just rude!
SO we took a walk around the store. It was posh, smelled of books, had a small cafe on the mezzanine. My kinda place :)
We took a look at the poscards. I picked one of a stone sculpture in Goa. The other two got their picks.
Then we took a walk. God! Do I love bookstores! I was like a kid in a candy store!(I'm like a kid in a candy store even when I'm in a candy store! Don't blame me! I just chose not to grow up past 12!)
Food and Books. My two passions. Sometimes vice.
We took a stroll, commenting on each passing book that caught our eye. There were so many, that we were running around saying 'Hey! Look at this...hey! look at that!'

Thats when I picked 'The BOOK'.

I've always wanted to have a single book, to write in. OK, that sounded stupid.
Let me try again.
I've always wanted a book, to write my special thoughts. You know, the ones that transpire out of special moments?
I dint want to get a normal notebook for it. That book was going to have a part of me. It's got to be me!
I finally found it.
Hard bound, black, tied with strings, hand crafted out of recycled paper.

I'm a GO GREEN kind of person. Ask anyone who's met me. I never let people litter the streets with wrapping paper. I always use recycled paper, and 'urge' as in 'force' people to do the same, spend an extra 5 mins, switching off all the monitors before leaving work... the words!
I finally found my book. I'm just wondering what should be my first entry.
I was thinking I should write my first poem in it. I wrote it in the 8th grade. My English teacher, for a class activity, gave us a set of 8 words, and asked us to frame something, write a poem out of it. That sparked my writing interest. And now, I just can't stop.

I also picked up this month's edition of Vogue India. I've always wanted to buy a fashion magazine. Never had a chance. To me, fashoin, means Vogue. Coz when I first learned the phrase 'in vogue', I associated it with this magazine to remember it.
I loved it. I was so engrossed reading it first thing after I got home, that I totally forgot about lunch. I had lunch at 5 pm, after I finished reading it. I'm going to subscribe for it from next month.

Today, was a good day.
:)

I wished that you'd never leave

I WISHED THAT YOU'D NEVER LEAVE .....

STANZA 1
It''s cold. It's silent.
Colors gone, all faded away.
I'm standing in a crowded place,
Yet, I'm all alone...
People shouting, running, laughing
but I don't feel a thing
I know I'm alive, empty inside
Can't stand it no more

CHORUS
I wished that you'd never leave
not today, or never
If things that were did not change
We'd be still together
I just hope that when you come back
you'd never have to go
so far from home again....

STANZA 2
Time goes, as always
Tomorrow's here, just the same
I'm waiting for that day to come
when you will be here
Until then, each day, that goes by
will find me here all alone
They see my smile, pain's all inside
hidden away....

BRIDGE
How could you leave me here like this
Without you life is just like mist
No matter how many times
I try to grab a hold
it slowly disappears....

A story in the sky

The most amazing thing happened to me the other day.....
I was in the bus, on my way home from work. Headphones in my ears, the wind in my hair and a song in my heart.... (too dramatic?? you'll see why...)
I think it was 'Nobody wants to be lonely' by Ricky Martin and Christina Aguillera playing.....
It was a starless night, with a tiny crescent moon, growing dull with each passing day....
I was admiring the sky... I've always been a cloud watcher.... I'm always conjuring up images in them... an occasional fish jumping out of the sea.... or a doughnut...
But what I saw, or witnessed, today, was something so breathtaking!!

Nothing can stand equal to actually witnessing this... I'll try my best to describe it...

There was a HUGE cloud, that was shaped like two people standing side by side, joined at the shoulders. In the centre, on the line joining the two 'people' was  clear space, shaped like a heart!
Every time I see images with heart shaped clouds, I always think 'pshhh! photoshop!'.... Guess I was wrong....
If you thought the story got over there, you're wrong....

Coz what I saw as I sat there in the bus, spellbound, wasn't an image in the sky. It was a movie...
In the next few seconds, I saw the wind 'turn' the heart upside down... !
I know it's hard to believe... but trust me... I wasn't dreaming, and I don't drink!
Then the wind got strong, and blew the clouds apart, such that, the separation happened like this: the space that the heart was, grew and grew, making the void bigger, seeming as though, the two people were drifting apart.
Slowly, the heart was gone, and the two clouds were almost apart. I say 'almost' because, they were still joined together by a streak of 'cloud' that looked like the two 'people' were holding hands....
Then the wind kept getting stronger, and the 'hands' began to part, and this looked like the two lovers, holding hands, had to part.
A few seconds, and the clouds were apart, drifting away into the cold, dark night.....

W.O.W!
It was an inspiration in itself, and I wrote a song
Coming up... on my next blog entry....

Life's what you make it.... So let's make it rock!

Long time.... since I came in here!
So thought I could drop in a say a quick 'HI!'...
Lots are hapening in life now....
Lets talk about the best part... I've joined french class at Alliance Francaise! FINALLY!
I've always had an eye on that place since school( ofc, I always wondered how the name is supposed to be pronounced. Now I know!)...
But after school came the burdens of college and I never had time. I now do.
Lots of it.
Suddenly I'm all up for livng life.
I've always been different, in a weird way....
I dont like the world I live in. And by world, I mean the society.
Life is so monotonous... One day you're born. Then before you know whats what, they push you to school with the rest of the whiny kids. And unfortunately for me, I joined school when I was 2 1/2, coz both my parents were working. So I've always been the youngest in class. ALWAYS!
Then when you're just begining to get past the shock, make 'best friends' there come the public exams. All the exaggeration, all the pressure... phew!
Then you come to the last year of school. Which according to me is the best, and yet the worst!
On one hand you're trying to face the fact that tomorrow, you're out of this cozy place you made a home out of, out into the cold dark world. Then there's the cruelty of parting with friends. They've been your sisters for what, 12 years... and now suddenly, you've got to make 'plans' to meet them.
Finally, theres the part where you work your butt off trying to score higher in the board exams.
Talk about conflicting emotions! Yet, school was the best thing that ever happened to me!
But don't even get me started about college. Most people I know have had better fortune than I did. College was such hell for me, that I didn't even go for the convocation, which I hear is a big deal.
My parents were so mad with me.... But I didn't want to go at all. I'm not going back there... ever!

Finally, I'm on my feet, and I get to choose what I do. And I'm not going to work my butt off, stay home weekends watching TV, then drag myself to work Monday morning.
I will not live life like the others do.
We get just one shot at life, and from now on, I'm playing by my rules.
I made this list of things to do before I die.
Suddenly, I'm so aware of the fact that one day I'm gonna die. And when people come for my funeral, I dont want them at a loss of what to say about me. I dont want to be normal.
Live. Die. Be forgotten.
I wanna be different. I wanna be ME.

This phase between college and marriage, is really special. Coz, now you have no commitments. This time is all about you. I'm not gonna loose this. I dont want to wake up in bed when I'm 70 and wonder if I could have made life different. Coz life's what you make it. ok... I borrowed that from Hannah Montana.... but who cares...it's still true!

SO I'm ticking things off my list. And now that I've begun, not only does the list keep growing, time seems shorter.
I'm loving French class. After this language, there's Spanish and Japaneese to go.
Then I have to go bungee jumping from the highest platform in the world.
Then there's watching the Northern Lights in Norway. The Aurora Boreallis. I've always loved physics, and this is one physical phenomenon that I've always been fascinated with. I've got to witness it.
For those who don't know what that is, in brief, near the poles, North and South pole, the magnetic field come in contact with the atoms in the atmosphere. And for those who remember high school physics, electrons when energised, go up to the excited state, and when returning to the ground state, emit the energy they absorbed in the form of light. Now, each atom has a characteristic colour, and the result is, the sky is a canvas. Air moves, so the lights seem to dance. It's amazing! Watching it, will be like being bound by the most amazing spell ever.
Since the air around us, is 90% nitrogen, most of the northern lights show is green. Eerie, but magical...
I think everyone needs to see it. Makes you admire God's work. Reinstate that lost belief.

Well, thats just to name a few.
I'm loving life in a way that I can't explain.
I go to church every sunday, and I begin to pray for something, ask God for something to happen... But all I can say is 'Thanks!'.
That kind of fulfillment, is in explainable. I want nothing.
Except for finishing up that list, I have nothing more I want.
I am undoubtedly the happiest person alive.
I just wish everyone feels that way. That way, we wouldn't have to worry about the Armageddon. It'll be just another journey, long over due.

Live every moment....

I heard about this incident and i knew i had to share it with everyone...
My friend pavithra told this to me while coming back home and i'm still shaken....
Her brother has a gang of 6 friends. They hang out together, always... very close-knit group it is...
every saturday, they go out, come back late...
but last saturday, was different...
pavithra's brother couldn't go, because of his father's illness...
the remaining 6 went on 3 bikes, two for each bike.
they went to a feast in a church in Besant Nagar, played in the beach, and had dinner at a restaurant.
On the way back, a rider in an Apache bike raced past them. For 21 yr old guys, that is perfectly unacceptable.
So these guys raced after him, trying to win the unspoken race.
At one of the street corners, the Apache guy who was in the lead, skid a bit. skid, but dint fall.
hearing the screech of the brakes, the guys in pursuit hit their brakes.
the two riders, sumesh and yogesh dint realise that they were halting on a speed breaker.
they lost balance, and the pillion(guy sitting behind the rider)  was thrown up into the air.
in the fraction of a second that followed this, the rider, yogesh, trying to catch the flying friend, caught him by the leg.
he did this only with  good intention, coz otherwise, sumesh would have hit a tree, and with that force, would have died. but when he reached out to grab sumesh's leg, his hand spurred the accelerator in an unconscious reflex. Now yougesh had added accessories to his bike, so normal speed on his bike was 150. When he gave the full throttle, although done unintentionally, he was dragged to a nearby Transformer.
he got hit on the head, with such a speed, that his skull split in two.
the other guy, sumesh, smashed into the tree, a branch pulled his eye out, and he died with multiple injuries.
yogesh, with head split, bleeding, though thankfully unconscious, was still breathing.

all of this happened in a matter of a few seconds...

the friends knew that sumesh was beyond help, rushed to  yogesh, tried to patch his split cerebrum, but it was so spongy, that their hands started sinking into it. they tied him up with a piece of cloth, rushed him to a nearby hospital, but was refused admittance because accident cases need to be booked in the nearest police station first, before treatment. the only other option was to take him to the royapettah general hospital, but that was on the other side of the city. It would be too late.
But thankfully, yogesh passed away, in the arms of his friends on the way.

What really affected me was, we all know we are all going to die someday. there's dying, and then there's dying so gruesomely...

i still haven't gotten over this story.... i have a brother, and i'm looking at those two guys as my own brothers.

Also, i dont even blame the guys now, for going on a silly race. even if they had been walking, the same could have happened to them.
It was destined that they were to die that day, that minute, but fate could have written them a better ending.

It was customary, that when these guys went out, they never had dinner. They only ate little little snacks and fast food. But that day, this guy, sumesh said, that he really wanted to have dinner with all his friends that day. when the others laughed at the idea of breaking tradition, he said solemnly, that he really wished it, in fact, that could even be his dying wish.
The other guy, yogesh, earlier during the day, had said that the 6 of them are always together, and are definitely the envy of all. He said, that they keep riding together so much, that he wished he died on his bike.

irony.... each guy got what he wished for.

And when both of them were at the scene of the accident, dying, they reached out to each other, and held hands.

All of us live lives, without actually ever living it.
We never know what's gonna happen to us in the next second.
we could be walking on the road, and get hit by a bus. Or climbing stairs, miss a step, loose balance and fall to death. Anything can happen. That's the mystery of life.
So let's take a moment, and think about all the times we grumble, about traffic, about elevators under repair, or about taking time to drop a family member who missed the bus. You are lucky to be alive.

If you wanna eat that pastry, eat it now. Who cares if you gain a few pounds.
If you wanna get a dress that you know isn't meant for you, get it... wear it... flaunt it. Who cares about everyone else.
It's your life.
It's your moment.
Live it.

I know the saying used to be, "Live life everyday, like there isn't going to be a tomorrow".
I wanna re-write it now, and say, " Live life every moment, like there isn't going to be another".
Coz you never know, this moment, right now, could be your last.

Crrrraazy Divya!!!

It's been such a long time since i've been here.. it's good to be back!

It's been two months since i joined Wipro(FINALLY!!!!)

met a lot of people... but as always, there are always the eccentric ones... this time... it was Divya.

I first heard about her through my friend Tanny(name disguised for privacy purposes :P), and the only thing hat she told me was that, there is a character straight ou of a hindi movie 'Jab We Met'. I should probably write another article on that movie, but not for now...

The first time i saw her, she seemed confident, full of 'attitude', but nothing like the Jab We Met kind.

Well, like i said, that was just the beginning...more than out of a movie, she's more like... out of this world!

I've never seen a more carefree, happy-go-lucky person in my entire life, and I must say, i've met a LOT of people in the last 22 years.

We spent a little over a month together, and all we did was LAUGH. just that. OK. FINE. we also ate like crazy.

i must have tried at least 50 diferent things in the last one month, and i'm not a very experimental kind.

and while i talk about Divya, i must mention a new character called Lakshman. As always, name has been disguised, not to protect identity, but to safeguard me and divya.

He was not eccentric, but more... weird!

He's the most zombiest person i've met. absolute zero.. uh huh! nothing on the face...
he's like... let the world crash before my eyes... i'll still be unfazed!
when the class is going on... he's typing on a keyboard, looking at a turned-off computer!! i mean... dude! wats wrong with ya?
he gave us quite some laughs....
preethi, divya and me... laughed all day...
we then ate to kick up our stamina... then we laughed more...

and need i mention the swine flu crisis? i think i do.....
Divya got paranoid about the swine flu...
whatever precaution she read, she exercised it...
first up, she tied a hanky around her wrist packed with camphor and cloves. seems it was supposed to 'repel' the flu virus.
then, she drank lime juice like crazy. vit C boosts up your immune system. not so crazy. ok.
But then.... she stopped breathing everytime some foreigner walked past her. that grew into stopping breathing everytime someone waslked past her.Crazzy!
she washer her hands like a million times a day. MADE us do the same.
wow! she made swine flu so much fun.

and then... theres her unique trilling of the 'r'... like the spanish do.... ai currrrummmmba!
it wasn't crazy. it was crrrrazy! everythign was crrraaazzy!!!  everytime...

then there's always the food bonding us... the pastries and the puffs... we ate lunch, waked right to the pastry counter and ordered one. everyday. we went to the canteen like 7-8 times a day. the stall keepers sure made a lot of money, betting on how long we'd stay out of the canteen.I know. Quite embarrasing for normal people. Not us!
we ate and ate. we laughed and laughed.
i so loved being with her....
it felt so light... not weighed down by our situation at wipro.
she made everything seem so easy...

love you so much divya... can't wait to see you again....
let's pray they put us together in some project... although... then... they might actually have to SHUT down the project...because of us...

My new phone!

HEEEEY!!!
Guess what??????!!!!! I got a new mobile yesterday!
I made enough money on Amazon Mechanical turk. I know, it wasn't easy, writing billions of articles, answering surveys, re-writing text in 2 different ways, etc. But hey, it was fun, and it made money, during my otherwise, boring and wasted time. I would even recommend mturk to people who are bored. Well, it you're bored, you might as well make money out of the drag. ..
I know I could have taken a pic of my mobile itself, instead of stealing this pic from the Sony Ericsson site, but i'm not good at taking pics and no matter how many times i tried, I couldn't get the glare out. One day, when I get good at taking a decent pic of my mobile, I'll replace this pic with mine, ok??????????? :)
Well, yesterday, the 26th Jan 09, was a very eventful day in my life. Just wanted to make a note of it on my sweet blogger.
I love my phone, it's like carrying an invisible wand!
I'm a little worried though. I'm extremely careless, and I've NEVER brought back home a hanky. I always misplace it, forget it, etc. I'm scared that I'll leave the mobile like that too. This thing is so damn light, and so damn small, I almost sat on it today. I love it. Its so cute!
I'm not really a techy person, but before buying the W302, i read, and re-read a million reviews, all over the world, and most weren't that good. But I still went ahead, and bought it, and it's so sooo good. It doesn't have Megabass, which means it doesn't exactly have the 'THUMP', which I really really wanted (I fell in love with the walkman phones the day SE put Hrithik on it's ads and he said, "thump!") and ever since that day, I've wanted to have a Walkman phone. But it's ok. Like I said, I'm not a techy person, and it's all about the music for me, so my new phone is perfect. I have absolutely no complaints, yet. :)