and saving the best for last - December 2011

And Calvin’s version which I subscribe to ;0)

For November 2011 - are you going to finish strong?

Man! did i really need a wake up call this month!! This link did it for me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOlTdkYXuzE

For October 2011 - Go Not To The Temple

For the last couple of months, instead of writing my own articles and muses, i decided to post those that have made an impact on me the most, one for each month starting from August 2011. Here is one for October

For September 2011- Let Go

Which line is your favorite from the post below? I like 'em all but loved the last one - to let go is to fear less and love more which i am still working on!:)

To let go does not mean to stop caring, it means I can't do it for someone else.

To let go is not to cut myself off, it's the realization I can't control another.

To let go is not to enable, but allow learning from natural consequences.

To let go is to admit powerlessness, which means the outcome is not in my hands.

To let go is not to try to change or blame another, it's to make the most of myself.

To let go is not to care for, but to care about.

To let go is not to fix, but to be supportive.

To let go is not to judge, but to allow another to be himself.

To let go is not to be in the middle arranging all the outcomes, but to allow others to affect their destinies.

To let go is not to be protective, it's to permit another to explore himself.

To let go is not to deny, but to accept.

To let go is not to nag, scold or argue, but instead to search out my own shortcomings and correct them.

To let go is not to adjust everything to my desires, but to take each day as it comes and cherish myself in it.

To let go is not to criticize or regulate anybody, but to try to become what I dream I can be.

To let go is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the present moment and the future.

To let go is to fear less and love more.

For August 2011 - BITCHOLOGY !!

BITCHOLOGY !!

When I stand up for
myself and my beliefs,
they call me a
bitch.

When I stand up for
those I love,
they call me a
bitch.

When I speak my mind, think my own thoughts
or do things my own way, they call me a
bitch.

Being a bitch
means I won't
compromise what's
in my heart.
It means I live my life MY way.
It means I won't allow anyone to step on me.

When I refuse to
tolerate injustice and
speak against it, I am
defined as a
bitch.

The same thing happens when I take time for
myself instead of being everyone's maid, or when I act a little selfish.

It means I have the courage and strength to allow myself to be who I truly am and won't become anyone else's idea of what they think I "should" be.
I am outspoken,opinionated and determined.
I want what I want and there is nothing wrong with that!
So try to stomp on me,
try to douse my inner flame, try to squash every ounce of beauty I hold within me.
You won't succeed.

And if that makes me a bitch ,
so be it.
I embrace the title and
am proud to bear it.

B - Babe
I - In
T - Total
C - Control of
H - Herself

B = Beautiful
I = Intelligent
T = Talented
C = Charming
H = Hell of a Woman

B = Beautiful
I = Individual
T = That
C = Can
H = Handle anything

FORWARD THIS OR…..

1. You’ll have bad luck for X number of years
2. You won’t have any money for “__” period.
3. You’ll never find love in life
4. You will have “_” and “_” and “__” happening to you in the next (time range can be anywhere from next 36 seconds to 10 years!!)
5. You will die.

Sounds familiar? I am referring to the chain mails and messages that land in your in box (and who hasn’t been a victim of one of these!).

Mails and messages that come up with stories ranging from needing money to prayers to horror stories to what ever that can play on your emotions and if you don’t…..

The operative words here are if you don’t…

I hate, abhor, detest, dislike, can’t bear, can’t stand, loathe, and despise chain mails. And these words aren’t enough to describe how I feel about them, especially the ones that speak of bad things happening to you “if you don’t.”

Even worse is when they come from people I’ve known for ages, who do know that passing it on will cause as much irritation/anxiety/negativity to the person receiving it.

So what is it that makes people get the mails forward this to their friends? – Blind superstition? (We have a lot of those going around)
Why leave anything to chance? (Oh come on, shit happens, life goes on anyways)
Hope that if I do, I may get something? (Yeah right!),
For Fun? (GET A LIFE!!)
Fear….? (methinks this is the basis for a lot of those mails).

Whatever is the reason, when people I know send such stuff, to me it translates into just one thing

“I do not value you as a person.”

And that’s not a pleasant feeling.

Earlier, I used to get upset, rage at the person sending it, feel shifts in my mood once I read them and experience a wide range of emotions – none of them productive.

Today I deal with it better. Whenever I get a chain mail or message, I just send one right back saying,

If you send anymore chain mails or messages to me, you will be cursed with “___” (add curse here and boy! Have I been creative with the curses I’ve sent back.;)

Result? No more chain mails or messages:) and peace and goodwill on earth (that is until the next chain mail/message from someone else).

Note to readers: Anything you want to comment on this, you are most welcome. Just don’t ask me to pass them on or else...:)

Picture that left me speechless!

Mothers - what would the world be without them!

Ask me what I think of the whole theory of “love at first sight” (or nearly) and I’ll probably say bah! Humbug! Its absurd how one can instantly feel strongly for a person to a point that
Your very interaction with them makes or breaks your day? That you go through emotions that you can’t define, that you crave to be with the person, suffer separation pangs even when you hardly ever know very well? That if the person isn’t in your life, something in you simply dies? - I dint write this – books, movies and people have told me :) and I always say, Bah! Humbug! :)

Love between people, according to me, needs to be built over time (make that a very, very long time) for it to be really called love.

What I didn’t know was I had just tickled god’s goofy sense of humor and naturally something was waiting to prove me and my cynical thoughts wrong, like it usually happens in life.

I got ready to start the day (ugh! Monday) like any other. Wake up, clean up, dress up and get up (rather reluctantly) and get going to (double ugh!) office. You got it. I suffered from the Monday blues like most people.

Just as I stepped out of my house, I noticed a van parked opposite to my house. “LION PACKERS AND MOVERS” it read. “New neighbors” I thought to myself “and let’s hope there is an interesting male I can meet” *grin to myself* as I hurried off to office.

After a rather hectic day at work, I get back and I did notice that there was indeed a male in my neighbor’s house. Only he was just about four months old. The tiniest, sweetest, cutest, most adorable four month old baby boy. I couldn’t take my eyes off him.

They stood at the gate every morning, grandpa and grandson. What I can say. It was love at first sight for me. Without realizing it, I showed all the symptoms – the craving to see the kid everyday, waiting for me to give me a toothless smile and if I dint happen to get it, it resulted in me being a lot less cheerful during the day, the two minute encounter where I waved or smiled and got one in return gave me a high on my way to work. Like some people do with caffeine and others who look forward to little daily gestures from people they love, I was unable to kick start the day without my customary wave and smile to the baby.

Days and months went by with not more than a “hi” or “bye” exchanged, never interacted beyond the smile and the wave. Baby boy, whose name I got to know, “Abhinav” made progress from a little soft bundle that needed to be carried to watching him take his first step, to uttering sounds to actually lisping words. It was sheer delight to watch his every developmental milestone though it was all watched from opposite my house.

Life went on and I went about my daily routine, wake up, dress up, get to office and work, work and more work, get back evening, rest a while, have dinner and hit the bed, except to add to the routine was the two minute encounter with Abhinav that happened nearly every day on my way to office.

Work demanded that I go out of town for a week to attend a corporate training program. I went. Details omitted here. All I can say it all seemed very clinical to me. I couldn’t wait to get back to home, to my routine.

Or was it something else I was missing back home?

When the training was over (finally!), I reached my city late in the evening. I prepared to go to work the next day. I woke up, and after the usual morning rituals, set out of home

And stopped short!

I saw a van “LION PACKERS AND MOVERS” standing in front of Abhinav’s house. Abhinav and his family, who I never got to know, were moving out. (Later, through the neighborhood grapevine, I got to know that Abhinav’s father had been transferred to another city).

From the time I spotted the van, I wanted to scream and tell them…well..what could I say? Don’t go? That I needed the two minute interaction with their baby? That he made my day with a smile better than any substance that could ever give you a high? That he remain the same age with the same toothy smile and wave I so looked forward to? That I want to stop time and freeze that moment forever? That I regret not spending enough time to stop, play, and get to know him better?

Who said that one does not suffer from separation pangs unless you know some one really well? All symptoms listed above, I felt it.

I stood staring at the van for a long time, then hurried on, though not with the usual bounce in my walk.

I was getting late for work …….

“A good friend is a connection to life – a tie to the past, a road to the future, the key to sanity in a totally insane world.”


When I was a little kid, I was introduced to a man I never met but adored all my life, who in turn introduced me to two friends I never spoke with and they became my best friends for life!! (Stranger things have happened eh?:)

I am talking about my friendship with Tinkle and Amar Chitra Katha and the man is the legendary Uncle Pai.

All my life, these two friends have won my unconditional loyalty that I have never felt towards any of today’s comics. What I learnt from my friends:

Knowledge: From “meet the animal series” to “this happened to me” written by readers, to Tinkle tells you why, from learning about the Mughal empire (Believe it or not, I studied for my degree history exams from Amar Chitra Katha –text books be damned!:), to mythology (till date, I can credit my love for indian myth to Amar Chitra Katha), - to take the tag line right from tinkle “Where learning meets fun” - Never has learning been more fun!!.

Journeys: From kings and kingdoms to fairy lands, folk tales across the world, magic and beyond, I have traveled with them all and as a result, a whole new world was born within me.

Traits: about greed, spite, kindness, loyalty, humor, wit n wisdom, persistence compassion jealously, happiness, health – I learnt more than what any human could have ever taught me.

Comfort and support – from Suppandi to Butterfingers to Tenali Rama to Birbal – hours of fun and giggles have never failed to cheer me up. Even today, if I need to change a frown to smile, I know where to look.

Skills: Things to do with from making cards out of dal to science experiments, to contests and many do it yourself activities – million little ways to think, do and made life more interesting. Slowly and surely, these friends have influenced me in more ways than one, like many good friends do over time.

And to top all that, my friends have always been there, cheery, colorful, well within reach, so I can enjoy their company many times over and never get tired of them.

Books have always been my best friends and in the comics category, Tinkle and Amar Chitra Katha tops the list!

Can you suggest a title for this story?

As it is with all stories this story also began Once upon a time, long, long ago, in a far off land, there lived a king in a land that was filled with sunflowers. The land was called, the land of ….yes, sunflowers!! You will find sunflowers everywhere, in fields, in the gardens, by the roadside, any patch of land that had some space to offer people grew sunflowers, unlike these days where any space is occupied by buildings.

These sunflowers were no ordinary sunflowers. They were the best in the country, in the whole universe. Their petals were a shining, bright yellow and each sunflower was as big as dinner plates. In fact, if you were a bird and flew overhead, they would look like big golden discs to you. Needless to say, there were lots of birds that used to come and eat the sunflower seeds. Birds love them, you see. The royal garden also had sunflowers amongst other flowers. People loved and cared for every single sunflower that grew in their land.

The people of sunflower land were like sunflowers –bright and cheerful and jolly and did I say it before? They loved sunflowers!!. The king was very jolly person and so was his son, the prince of sunflower land, who was also very jolly. Overall, they were all a very jolly lot. They used to sell sunflower oil, the flowers themselves, cook their food with sunflower oil. The women folk applied them as face packs and no wonder everyone in sunflower land were very healthy and happy.

The sunflowers had a life of their own. After their morning ritual of turning the face to the sun, they used to talk amongst themselves – “good morning, how do you do? Nice weather isn’t it? oooh! I so love the breeze today,” and so on and so forth. When you walk by, it seemed like they are just nodding to the breeze, but actually they were carrying out a conversation.

It so happened, by some oversight, there was a patch of land that didn’t have any plants at all on it. Nobody knows why this happened. One day, some people passing by looked at the dry patch of land and thought, “oh no! This won’t do” and so they immediately rushed and grabbed handfuls of sunflower seeds (they always had loads of seeds handy) and scattered them all over the land.

It rained, first slowly, plop, plop, plop went the drops and then faster and faster and the land became wet. Over time, the seeds sprouted and the stalks began to grow. Soon there was a bright yellow burst of sunflowers all over the patch of land.

And there - Right in the middle of the patch grew a sunflower, which stood taller than the others. When it opened its petals, it was a bright…..GREEN!!!


Now who’s heard of a green sunflower? Not me and bet you didn’t either. The other flowers gossiped amongst themselves. “Just look at greenie here, how different, she’s not one of us, she doesn’t belong, let’s ignore her, she’s so out of place, what an awful color, look at us and look at her and so on and on it went.

The green sunflower was very sad to hear all this, its petals drooping. “What’s wrong with being green?” she thought, “I am just as jolly as anyone else. I can’t HELP being a different color and said so to the other sunflowers, but nobody cared to listen and none of the other sunflowers would be friends with her.

That didn’t stop the people of sunflower land from caring for the green sunflower. They loved and watered it and cared for it as much as they did to the others, though they did puzzle over its color at times.

There came the next bit of excitement in sunflower land. The sunflower prince was getting married to a beautiful princess of the neighboring kingdom. The neighboring kingdom was called rose land and predictably, they grew roses. They had a king called the rose king and a bee-yoo-ti-ful princess called the rose princess. The princess was not only bee-yoo-ti-ful but reputed to be very jolly. There was a lot of whispering amongst the people and birds and the bees and the animals and the trees. Everyone thought it would be the perfect match. The royal family from rose land came to visit the sunflower land. Amid all the blowing of trumpets and hugs and kisses, the families embraced each other.

The sunflower prince and the rose princess took one look at each other and fell instantly in love.

The fathers had their own issues however. The princess’ father (rose king) wanted to know what the sunflower king had to offer in his kingdom.

Sunflower king: I can give you the best of gold and diamonds.

Rose King: Pooh! We have loads of them already. In fact, the walls of all our houses are studded with them in our land.

Sunflower king: I can give you pearls and silver.

Rose King: Pooh! We have so much silver and pearls that we don’t know where to keep them.

And on and on it went. The sunflower king offered the best of riches but the princess father (rose king) was unimpressed and boasted that whatever sunflower land had, rose kingdom had it too. After a lot of arguing back and forth, the sunflower king began to speak of the land’s rich produce, that they had the reddest of tomatoes, the best of brinjals, the amazing apples and so on. The Rose king just said, you guessed it, pooh! and said that rose kingdom had them too.

Then the king spoke about the beautiful sunflowers, their bright yellow color and how they were the size of dinner plates. The rose king said “Big deal!! What’s so special about your sunflowers? All it takes is a few seeds and we’ll have them too. But the king didn’t stop there. He went on about the beautiful sunflowers, their bright yellow color and how they were the size of dinner plates. The rose king thought for a moment and said, “Okay, this is getting a little silly. Let’s take a tour around your place and see what you have to offer.”


So the royal chariot was brought out and the two kings (sunflower and rose), the princess and the prince (rose and sunflower) all took a tour around the land. They passed through the golden discs of sunflowers. They came to the spot where the green sunflower grew.
All this while, the Prince and the Princess did not utter a word to each other, all they did was to steal glances at each other. Then the rose princess suddenly glanced up and cried out Stop! Stop!! Stop right now!! Stop right here!!

They stopped.

The princess rubbed her eyes and squeaked, “Is that a green sunflower?

Sunflower prince: “yeah, it is…well…”

Rose princess: “Guess what my favorite color is?? Guess? Guess? Its green!!!. I love green. I have loads of green dresses, green jewels, I wear green all the time, my room is painted green, my bedspreads are all green, I eat broccoli for breakfast, I eat spinach…ooh! I sooo love green…

Sunflower prince: “Yeah me too. I love you….I mean I love green too.”

Rose princess: and I’ve never seen such a bee-yoo-ti-ful green sunflower before.

Rose princess then tells the prince: “You know what? Let’s get married right away. Let’s take this bee-yoo-ti-ful green sunflower and plant it in our royal garden, just outside my bedroom window, right away!!.

The sunflower prince couldn’t say anything except nod. He got what he loved the most.

The fathers didn’t have anything much to say after that too, except nod their approval.

So took the green sunflower and planted it in the royal garden. The sunflower prince and the rose princess (now officially called the sunflower princess) had a grand wedding and an even grander honeymoon and like it is with most stories, they all lived happy ever after.

What happened to the other sunflowers?
They had learnt their lesson-never to make fun of anyone different.

Note: This story was created by me in a matter of hours as part of an assignment and presented, when I attended an Indo-Swedish workshop at Kathalaya (a story telling organization in Bangalore). After the presentation and the compliments I got on my story and presentation, I felt bee-yoo-ti-ful…just like a certain sunflower :)

Books are Medicine for the soul. ~Inscription over the door of the Library at Thebes

This is not a book review. Rather it is how much a book can leave a mark on you and one such book is Beautiful Child by Torey Hayden - Child psychologist, special education teacher, university lecturer and writer of non-fiction books based on her real-life experiences with teaching and counseling children with special needs.

Have you ever read a book by an author only to find by the end of it craving to read up all books ever written by the author? That’s exactly how I felt when I read a Torey Hayden book. I read just two of them – Beautiful child and Twilight Children. Both the books have made me search frantically for the rest of her books to chew and digest, which unfortunately I have not been able to lay my hands on here in Bangalore, India, but I won’t rest till I get hold of them!.

The books have a dozen reviews all over the internet so I wouldn’t elaborate them here too much. It is the impact of reading such books is what I want to talk about. Also, to come across a person like Torey, even though I haven’t met her and may never will, it's great to know her - even if it is only through words and maybe an occasional picture.

There is a saying that books are extremely dangerous and the BEST books should carry a warning that says, “This book could change your life.” I felt like a totally new person and learned lessons just by reading Torey's books – on patience, on expectations, on children, their endearing spirits, on teaching, on love, on experiences that needs to be read to be understood and on the complexities of human mind. Reading Beautiful Child, I was transported into Torey’s classroom and lived each moment page by page.

Beautiful Child: “Venus never spoke, never listened, and never even acknowledged the presence of another human being in the room with her. Yet an accidental playground "bump" would release a rage frightening to behold, turning the little girl into a whirling dynamo of dangerous malice. Of the five children in Torey's classroom that September, Venus posed the greatest challenge-though the other four had serious problems of their own that could not be overlooked.” Sources http://www.torey-hayden.com/

Torey walked in and worked with all the children, gave them hope and a future when the rest of the world would have walked out on them. In my opinion, if Venus was the beautiful child, I would say Torey is the beautiful woman.

Reading this book not only made me appreciate about how well it was written or how good is Torey’s work with children, it went a lot deeper than that and I found myself really grateful to have a pair of eyes so that I could experience the joy of reading such a wonderful book.

Very few books have the power to sell you a whole new life and Beautiful Child is one of them.

CADE – A BOOK REVIEW

Amid a plethora of 50, 000 plus books in my local library, what made me pick up “Cade” by James Hadley Chase? Is it the author’s reputation for writing thrillers? The short title? The preview of it behind the book? Whatever it was, it was one of the most gripping, “unputdownable” (if you’ll excuse the grammar) book I have ever come across.

Cade is a famous, sought after photographer with a weakness for a drinks and woman. Juana – a beautiful Mexican woman known to be fatal to men. Cade has everything a human would wish for, looks, charm, wealth, talent, fame, friends and a kind nature until one fine day, the gods decided they needed a laugh. Into Cade’s life entered Jauna who stripped him of everything that he had till he was reduced to a mere nothing, to be pitied and eventually ignored.

The author in his own way does a wonderful job of pointing out subtly the human flaws in all of us. Not all of us may possess the same weaknesses that Cade has, but flaws we do have for sure and that makes it so easy to identify with Cade. The mistakes he makes are similar to ours in the sense of its repetition. How many of us actually learn from our mistakes and not tempt fate? How many of us give in to temptation easily enough? How many of us struggle with our own values when it comes to making life or death decisions? How many of us also at sometime or other counted our blessings? How many of us get into a situation knowing fully well that it would lead to trouble, and yet just can’t stay away? Anyone who says he hasn’t been through at least one of the above questions is superhuman. Cade does go through all this and more which makes it easier for the reader to identify with the character though not all of us may meet with the same fate as Cade.

Philosophical aspects apart, the setting of the story in the Mexican theme makes one want to visit the city itself and witness the bull fighting, so vivid are the descriptions that one can actually visualize the entire scene without ever having been to Mexico. The author also highlights the brutal aspects of racial discrimination and the world’s apathy to it, bringing into focus once again how a human flaw, if not improved upon can eat into a person’s soul so deeply that one loses the ability to discriminate between what is important and what is not, even comprising on values to the lowest possible manner.

One can enjoy Cade as another novel of fiction or make one's own interpretations. It would be apt if the reader can take away subtle learning’s from the book that is not evident overtly. Cade is definitely worth a read for anyone who loves a good book.