Slices of my daily life

*Pardon the ‘art’ I've observed this so often. I wonder why parents mostly hold their kids’ hands like this. I think the parent’s hand as well as the kid’s hand would ache less if held like this. Any idea why ?

…making detailed plans to begin a long-due personal project. Long ago I realised that there is no better time than the present to begin self-improvement projects. Finally today I am actually acting upon my realisation. We keep making excuses. Something or the other is currently taking up most of our time and energy and hence we plan to begin this project after the current hectic phase ends. This hectic phase never ends…and if it does, it is promptly replaced by another very important-urgent thing. And so we keep delaying the project since it is absolutely ‘unfeasible’ right now. But truth be told, we do not want to embark on, what we clearly realise as, tremendous hard work. Most of us do things when they become imperative. I’m no exception. But for this project (I’d like to believe) I’ve taken it up before it has become a ‘no-other-option’ situation. So, hold your breath, I have finally begun (what I assume is going to be a long and tedious) journey towards weight loss through exe...

I have been reading Ai Ling’s blog for some time now and gradually I got curious about her name. So I asked her whether it was name + surname (last name / family name) and which was which or whether it was a pseudonym she had taken for the blogging world. So in response she wrote a nice detailed post that not only gave me the answer to my question but also gave me some information about pronunciations of Chinese names. What it also did was, it inspired me to write about name conventions in India. So, here's a little bit (as much as I'm aware) about the Indian names convention. Whenever surnames are used, they have come about from either the name of a place or the occupation or a title bestowed on a person in the family and then carried on as a family name. Some surnames come from castes or sub-castes. There are some surnames whose origins I am not entirely certain about. In India, in the Central and Western region, the convention is usually name + surname. On official doc...

From 9th December 2010 till 8th January 2011, I successfully completed 31 posts in 31 days i.e. the NaBloPoMo challenge :) I am feeling so relieved. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to do it. Consistency isn’t one of my big qualities, you see. But I have done it. So I am feeling ‘phew’ ! And ‘Yaaaaaayyy’ for the same reason…I successfully completed a task that I had set for myself. Actually, only initially did it seem like a task. Later, however, I was eager to write. All day I would be observing things and thinking of subjects, I would be mentally composing posts and couldn’t wait to find time from my work schedule to put up a post. I shall continue to write, though perhaps not daily, but very often. Perhaps I might even do another NaBloPoMo later…this time starting on the first of a month :) I am now officially hooked on to writing :)

When we are children, each of us gets asked this question, "What do you want to become when you grow up ?", and, depending on whatever has taken our fancy at that moment, our answer changes. Just like everybody else, I went through a lot of 'things I wanted to be when I grew up'…and for sometimes funny and sometimes strange reasons. My earliest wish, if I remember correctly, was to become a teacher. I would always gather the children in the society and make them students and teach them all I had learnt at school that day. Naturally, in that phase of mine, I wasn't a very popular girl :) So sometimes I had nobody to play with and yet I taught…to an empty class…such was my dedication :D In one long phase I wanted to become a veterinary doctor (remember Dr. James Herriot ?) and cure all the little doggies. I wouldn't have minded being a conservationist either, like Gerald Durell . I was even serious about being a zookeeper…or in the least a caretaker of elep...

Warning: This is not going to be a profound post…if you are expecting something like that after reading the title. As I sat down to write, my mind was crowded with thoughts of things I need to do, I want to do, but I can’t do, presently, for several reasons. I just couldn’t focus on any particular thing to write about. So, I thought, why write something contrived ? Why not simply write about what’s on my mind right now, this very moment ? So here goes… These are a few of the things I am longing to do… Sleep. And wake up only when I feel like it. Only when I feel completely rested. I think this item would be on everybody’s list, if they made one :) Finish reading those three…um…wait, it’s four…actually no, those five new books. Take a vacation. Somewhere serene and beautiful. And not get antsy on the last two days of the vacation with the thought that it is getting over. Finish writing that story I have begun. Drive on my motorcycle to Kokan. For the uninitiated, Kokan is abou...

I was speaking to TH a little while ago. He was telling me about how he had made up a game to teach a very difficult history lesson. It is a very interesting game and will ensure that history doesn’t remain just names and dates for the children but becomes something alive. It got me thinking about innovative teaching methods. In India, the usual method is to memorize things and reproduce it in the exam. So, most of us don’t understand concepts or their applications. We just remember information…only till the exams are finished :) I remember TH telling me that he had a history teacher who would either narrate history lessons as stories or get the children to enact them. TH knows history so well because of this method. I used to have a professor who taught a dry subject like accounting in a very animated manner. He would give a lot of examples of real situations and enact almost all situations. To this date I remember each and every thing that he taught. I remember that his was the o...

Many of us lack the ability to say ‘No’. Actually I wonder why…since, as children, we are quite proficient in the use of that word :) Apparently we lose that skill as we grow up to be adults. It is only recently, that is, a couple of years ago, that I have become comfortable with saying ‘No’. Earlier I used to feel much pressurised if somebody asked something of me. The more politely they asked, the more difficult it would be for me. I would usually end up saying ‘Yes’. There would be a lot of stress accumulation due to this. I used to worry that saying ‘No’ would offend that person so much that it would definitely put a crack in the relationship, if not end it altogether. Also, I was confident that I would never be able to say it in a way that the other person wouldn’t be offended. I also used to feel that they wouldn’t believe me even if there was a genuine reason to say ‘No’. Gradually I have come to a point where I can politely but firmly say ‘No’, but many times, in fact most...

This is what I’m feeling right now. Yesterday, exactly at this time in the evening, I was frustrated at a co-worker whose irresponsible behaviour caused a lot of trouble to my boss, who then, knowing well that I wasn’t responsible for it, took out some of his irritation on me. I didn’t react at all to my boss or my co-worker…it was no use…the former would cool down eventually and see that he unnecessarily took it out on me…and the latter would never admit that he was irresponsible and find somebody to blame. I came to office this morning in a depressed frame of mind…thinking that the sincere one always gets loaded with work and that would happen to me today too, like yesterday. The morning too was a repeat performance of irresponsible behaviour from my co-worker. I plodded on. The boss was out for meetings all morning. Post-lunch I decided that enough was enough…I had to get out of this frame of mind. So I just started a completely new task for which I am presently receiving traini...

An incident that occurred today prompted me to think about how, when and why people blame others for things that they are responsible for. In my opinion, the most common reason why most people blame others is, to cover up their mistakes. Such people are afraid of the consequences of the mistakes but not careful enough to avoid them in the first place. I understand that sometimes mistakes do happen. In that case, according to me, the right thing to do would be to own up, apologise and make amends. Some people blame other people or events for things because that makes it easy to feel good about oneself. Sometimes it is useful in gathering sympathy. I feel that cowards blame others. The people who can’t take the responsibility for their actions or those who don’t have the courage to face, fight if required and overcome adverse consequences blame others. The first time you make the choice of dealing with the consequences is the most difficult one. After that it gradually gets easier t...

I promise. I'll not post about any more animal incidents for a while…ok ok…a long time. But this one's really worth sharing… A couple of years ago, I had gone to a beach in Kokan for a vacation. We were staying in a small resort whose back gate opened on to the beach. There was a semi-circle of five hut-shaped rooms which housed my extended family and I. Early one morning, I went to the beach alone for a walk. The sun was just rising. There was a cool breeze blowing. The sea was calm. I was feeling serene. As I walked along the beach, I noticed a really tiny pink shell. The colour was fascinating. I picked it up and put in my pyjama pocket. Further I saw one more and I pocketed it as well. As I went along, I found many more and I picked up all of them. A  little further, I felt something prick in my pyjama pocket. I ignored it and continued walking. But again, there was a little pricking. So I stopped, dipped my hand in the pyjama pocket and located one shell that was pric...

I spent a lovely New Year's eve at a friend's recently re-decorated place which, by the way, looks absolutely stunning. Actually TH and I had decided to spend the evening in having a quiet dinner by ourselves.   Suddenly in the morning, said friend called and invited us over for a quiet dinner with just a few close friends. So off we went in the evening to the friend's house and met up with some old friends, some we hadn't met for long and one we made yesterday :) Delicious food was had (finger-licking good chicken biryani, superb salad), excellent wine was consumed in very little quantity (but strangely that wasn't minded one bit) and an interesting little card-game involving major strategising was played. All in all immense fun was had and this will count as one those great New Year's eves that one always talks about years later. I had a great start to my new year…how about you ?