The late late, very late almost morning post

It’s been a while since I found myself awake and sleepless so late into the night, to be precise its 4:21:46-47 a.m EST. I never paid much attention to time zones before, but here I am specifying which time zone I am in. It makes matter complicated especially when a country has three time zones and the time changing in every 6 months. We international student have hard time calculating the time back home, especially when you have to remember which time zone you are and then know if it’s day light saving or daylight wastage time of the year. Why to make your life more complicated than it already is. Or then again they are just trying to scare away Mexican immigrants by their complexities of time system. That said, summer is here, I must say it is a respite from the night is dark and full of terrors (you do get to know the actually fears of winter after staying through the most mildest of all winters in a 100 years) but I swear to god I probably smell like a freshly fried beacon the moment I step out from the safety of my damp apartment. This comes from a mumbaikar who has faced the stuffiest of summers and monsoons in more stuffed train locals. Summers in which you actually felt like carrying condensers only so you could breath (nerd joke alert) and also spending some really long and complaining summers in Kolkata, I have been born and raised in humidity and I find it unbearable in here.

Change of topic: pokemon go.. seems to be quite a thaang right now, eh.. (yeah catching on the accent yo,) it has divided the whole of the 7 billion (is it?) into 4 categories.

     1.     Pokemon go craziers- people whose life’s purpose is to be the pokemasters , potentially everyone who plays it dreams about it .

      2.       Pokemon don’t carers – what? When? Bleh……

      3.       Pokemon non getters – people who are a fan but have an incompetent phone. (me!)

      4.       Pokemon wanna bes, pretendzees ( i am really getting the hang of american vocab huh!) – people who know zilch about pokemon but want to join the crazy herd.

The power that pokemon go has harnessed is incredibly freaky. It just proves that a certain “something” is edging towards world domination. This might just be a test trail for the real thing to come into operation. You will blame the heat for my crazy conspiratorial talk, but don’t tell me you didn’t feel the chill go down your spine when you saw masses of people running about crazed in parks and sidewalk when someone claims to see a rare pokemon, or when you hear weird stories about people leaving their jobs in conquest of being the pokemon masters. (no this is not a talk out of jealousy either). Actually I got a pretty interesting idea for a story right there. May be I will publish for the generation which comes after there is a revolution and world domination comes to an end ( a book named, "told you so!", nothing sells better than an obnoxious self gloating title!) 

wake up world!!! 

I really don’t know why staying up late makes my nose an oil field! It will save US lot of trouble to just harvest the oils from my nose than meddling their nose into others affairs. till then PIKA PIKA!!!

Oh and a very interesting theory on the world of pokemon, check it out if you want your happy pokeworld to shatter http://9gag.com/gag/a7dDxQw?ref=fbp

Just can't get enough of pikachu gifs! :/ 

Kolkata footnotes :the probashi feels:

DISCLAIMER: The following content doesn’t describe the best places to eat or any tourism related content. I might write something about digestery (no such word) adventures.

On my last day of my unplanned extended so called vacation i finally sit to write something down after a heavy push from my high inertial self (surprisingly!). To begin with “Kolkata Footnotes” the term footnotes came into my mind for the want of less clinched and less bollywoody wanna be hollywoody use(hint: Dairies, no end to those!) “footnotes” has a simple explanation. We have been famously known as paye chaka deva (translation: wheels on feet) as far as my memory goes, i have been travelling to a new place almost every year since i was a few months. Each place is a sub chapter and Kolkata is footnote seen every now and then.

My stays in Kolkata have usually been short(very short according to dimu, no one can satiate her in terms of staying back at kol). Every visit is first welcomed with a short illness of some kind followed by irritated dad running around with a topping of fussy mom. A fast recovery of a day or two and then starts the relative visiting ritual. A probaashi bangali (NRB- non returning bong) or not, relative citation is a must. My visits are usually strenuous and tedious on the stomach muscles. Every relative one meets one has to devour a series of mishtis(Sweets) with a side plate of bengali samosas, beguni, neemki, teele bhaja, fish fry, mutton cutlet, kochuri, moglayi (drools). Even though while listing down my mouth waters, but when you have been made to sit through all this with minimum of four sweets, and have to go atleast three more houses and been offered food fit for a regiment and assumed to have an appetite as that of descendants of “kumbhakaran”, even a fist full of gelucil and digen won’t come to your rescue. Apart from the usual relative stuff, of whom she looks like and how small you had been there is nothing more to list down.

Coming to the city, i find Kolkata a small bundled up city, more like an ant colony seen at cross section (might be my Mumbai perspective). The city is dominated by narrow lanes and often will make you feel an outsider for the lack of knowledge of its lanes. The air of past hangs heavily over it. This time the whiff of nostalgia settled on me and i took to rampaging of old photos and dusty junk. Finding black and white photos, age stained photos, photos of high end parties, of gentlemen in suit and horn-rimmed glasses with whiskey and cigars, of ladies with elegant silk sarees and highbuns. I even found records of abba and boneym of old hindi songs and some Bengali too! Oh! How i wished i had a gramophone! The city i have always imagined with horse carts and vintage cars. People with suits and gowns with their little fragile umbrellas, people drinking tea with their little finger sticking out. What contributes more to the heavy air of nostalgia is the still existing trams, and hand rickshaws even cycle rickshaws.

Every street will have a tale of your grandparents or parents telling how they ate at that place or shopped on that corner. For me Kolkata is a city of tales, i relate places of this city with tales of others. When i was small people thought it amusing to ask me which city i like most, Mumbai or Calcutta.. even then i was more diplomatic than my age and i would sweetly answer both. But if you ask me truly i would ask you back, would you question whom you love more your biological mother, or the one that raised you? 

turmoils

there is only so much a man can take
but i give up, for once i wished i didn't have watsapp.. for once in the many times i wish i was in an era of letters. where people took no liberties of staying mad forever, or where there was no space left for misunderstandings, or where feelings meant much more to dash them away.. i wish..
why my post.. i have had a tough day and a night emotionally taxing.. trying to save friendships , apologizing to people.. why i do? i don't know.. cause i care? i guess.. i do.. no matter how much i try..
does the time spent hold no value? does caring for some people whom you hold dear, not enough?
i am emotionally exhausted and spent.
seas are never smooth.. but when they are rough.. often the ship wrecks. the ship, the crew, the timbers all washed away swept to be never seen or found.. perhaps a few debris sweep up the beach.. painfully reminding of the once majestic ship with a crew of many...
friendships are similar... built with love and care the timbers.. the memories the crew.. whole together the ship.. once shattered is never placed back, never glued back.. and someday when you are sitting on a beach and sudden memory flashes by.. and you are painfully reminded of a once friendship, of a bond that once was so dear.
and when there are three ships sinking together at the same time.. its hard.. its more like a 100 typhoons raging over, howling but you are there trying to stire clear of it.. tugging the ropes hard.. holding on to the ships.. but will the hold stay? shall you see a new sun?

Why should chapattis be gol (circle) ??

Why indeed! Why cant they be some random shape... may be a country or a smashed face..or a bird flying or diamond shape.. that needs talent too! Why my question about chapattis??  Does it have a geometrical aspect to it, or an aesthetic one? Or just one of the many never-asked-never-answered questions?! Well, every Indian household with a daughter(s) when reaching to a certain age have to sign in into Indain-culinary classes (creating the perfect brides since time immemorable)... so without knowing you are made to prepare for questions like “sasural wale kya kahinge” which is a rhetorical question.. if “sasural wale” indeed ask something act dumb (as written in page 23 of “Q and A of sasural wale”)

Case 1

Sasural wale: Beta, do you know to make rotis?

Beta : uhmm, of course aunty.. good round fulka rotis..

Sasural : (she hesitated, too much information, probably a show off, definitely doesn’t know to make rotis) :stamps REJECTED on the photo:

Case2

Sasural wale: beta, do you know to make rotis?

Beta: :stares at the wall:

Beta’s ma: of course she does, makes rotis everyday..! almost like Ma Annarpurna has blessed her rotis!

Sasural: (thinks: good obedient girl, let elders ans,her mom is very truthful,no reasons for her to lie)  .. she is prrrrrreefect! :ties the mangal sutr around her neck herself:

But as soon as she presents her sasuralwale with a bird shaped roti, she would be probably handed divorce papers conjured right out from thin air.. would it matter if they are edible? NO! The roti needs to look good, even if it means to be crushed into a plum and dissolved into a sludge with more horrible looking acids...

Atlast everything comes down to looks..even a roti has to pass the judgmental eyes of people. Checking out its shape, colour, texture, contours.. you are damned to make pokemon rotis, its a 109% no no for the grey hairs, though will make you real famous with the kids! ;) and yes my roti shaping skills suck! Too free minded to make circular rotis (thats what i like to believe, i-got-roti-making-dyslexia)

HO HO HO!!!!!!

And the fat old man with beard as white as snow zooms through swishing and flying snow all the way.
" i won again you hapless carrot nose"
" me carrot.. huh! look at your's... button nose!"
"uffff... atleast watch what you are talking, you guys are on TV!! " the cameraman elf said
this Christmas thing is killing. these new age kids.. man! now i have to shoot for the reality tv. hmmffff!...

mean while in the toy factory elves were hard at work with the continuous down pour of emails sorting them, packing, labeling,  it was whole lot of work. And the gifts with naughty children were marked with a black "X" .. A sudden shout from the IT cabin followed by shouts of "i am coming! i am COMIN!!!!" by the tech maintenance guy with the thickest glasses ever seen.. the mail had crashed once again.

Going over to the old white haired elf who seemed to be as old as santa said.
"huh! it was so quite and peaceful so many letters got lost in the post. now ever single one comes! blah!!"      : may be i should edit this part :

Soon all the packed goods were being loaded in now hi-tech sledge with in built GPRS locator and power boosters. The presents seemed to be less bulky and more of slim rectangular shaped, most having ipods and tablets and laptops and xboxes. sigh! tastes keep changing.

All the elves, the toy-makers  the packers, the IT department were together standing around the huge Christmas tree with Santa and The Snowman and the reindeer something about Christmas never changes. With a booming "HO HO HO!" Santa mounted the sledge with his cousin Snowman and zoomed into the stars of north pole... little did he and others know he was being tracked by google!

Long or short?

It’s an eternal question of doubt ever since Eve had hair. The length is pretty important. Too short may make you look too boyish or too long may make you look like a lice ridden long jata of the beggar.

SNIP SNIP!

When we were children never bothered about hair much. I remember sitting in a stool in front of baba as he masterfully snipped off hair to a perfect “bati chaat” (bowl cut) it’s like those monk cuts except for the bald patch in the middle.

A few years and i started to yearn for long hair just to tie a tiny ponytail perhaps. But nah, too troublesome for a daughter of both parent’s working again i didn’t bother.

A few more years and i started to grow it. With a lot of pride i showed it off to my friends but as ever it was shunned saying “cmon that’s not long!” but my pride just thought “ huh! They are just jealous!”  But 5 months into growing it long and i was fed up already and cut it short. Short very short. I wonder how rapunzel ever managed to even comb it everyday!  

FYI: longest hair record is held by Xie Qiuping (China) at 5.627m (18 ft 5.54 in). It’s almost like growing hair is her super power!

People make a lot of fuss about hair. After my daring act of chopping of the mane, i got so many reviews about it. Some said “oh god your long hair!” (like i lost an arm!) some complimented rest disgusted. It’s like a taboo having short hair. Like it’s to own to being disciple of satan,  to have short hair. It’s a conservative and dogmatic  society. Refusing to see the logicality of the concept.  No wonder hair products have such a huge consumer all over India. So much hair does require a lot of shampoo and conditioner.

Bare with me. After effects of environment education exam and not to mention exams OVER! A whole 5 semesters blinked away! 

reasons of today..

Sitting beneath the  boundless skies

I wonder and frown on butterflies...

As the wind gently combs the grass

Swaying to the tunes of wind

Creating waves of  grassy sea.

The little girl makes toys of grass...

The tree shades the child as the sun smiled upon

She lost herself in the entwinement of leaves ..

In the surge of creativity...and childish wonderings

Such was her childhood...

A childhood of dreams and play...

Where reality had no say...

Such is a childhood we all dream of...

But alas! the kids of today are nomore the kids of yesterdays

Lost is the innocence, lost is the sparkle....

for the reasons of today...
the kids are nomore the kids of yesterday

Tales of the rain..

A mumbaikar would have the best of the stories to offer to you about rains. And here is one from me.

As litres of water poured over us with raindrops the size of bucketful of water it rained. It was like the monsoon had just begun at the end of the official end of rains. Overjoyed people danced and wet themselves in this blessed shower. All where smiles until the waterfall from above continued and people’s smile wrinkles shifted to the temples to worry wrinkles.
 But we college folks live in our own world. As the lecturer chattered on people had him on mute and stared out of the window to the rain. After an hour of watching this usual silent movie we all rushed out  of the class to hear the inevitable news that trains are late or blocked or stuck and so on. Immediately there were plans of staying at friends place or round about ways of reaching home. So anyways all anyone needed was an excuse to bunk. A mass bunk declared all set off for the mission “reach home”. With some fortune we got a train bound home.
Picking up a friend on way, off  we went braving the rains. After a struggle which equals to like getting water in desert we managed an auto from station. Some  higher power thought it was too good to be true and our auto got stuck in calf deep water somewhere in the colony no nearer to our home. So descending down the muddy water(thanks to the hills all around) we trudged through the water. And the thrill! It looked like hot chocolate oozing from all around!(reminded me of willy wonka’s chocolate factory!) Sloshing through the gutters into the sidewalk and road.. seemed like river flowing  all around. With heavy rains pouring all over us and cat wet  to the skin atlast reached home like a soldier returning from the battle.. my sweet ma is just too sweet to greet me with pleasantries. She was  suspicious of me jumping through all the rain water and river lutes (i am not denying i didn’t!) But i had this smirk of victory which was probably the reason for all the steam off. Cons of all this was my bag had become a water storing camel hump wetting everything inside. And its a pain to dry it all. But hey! It was a hell of an experience!

PS: always follow your instincts if it says wear sandals and not shoes. Do so! Cause its going to rain on that god damn day and soak everything!

that my dear friends, is how it rains! 

The Moment

 Click clack click clack. Oh! I got to finish off with the story! Ding dong.. ding dong.. “for heaven’s sake NITA! open the door!” Great! Nita has gone off to aunty’s place... clambering off the bed spewing off packets of chewing gum and biscuits. i glanced at the messy bed ,ma’s gonna kill me for this! “coming!” opening the door i find nita glaring at me like i made her watch the rerun of twilight!

“You lazy creeeature! Why haven’t you got ready?!” Whaat? Ready for what?
Dang! I had forgotten about something important again! So i put up a brave act..
“Of course i know!The very very important day! just a minute i will get ready”
I put up a apologetic grin the hurried off into my room before nita starts off with her chaw-chaw again...

Staring out of the taxi window clueless about the current situation.I look around to find ways of finding out about this “day of extreme importance”. So I played around with things like so how is the plan coming.. She answered  monosyllabically .So instead i ask her about ma and baba.. She gives me the “hopeless for eternity look” tilting her head to one side and says “shouldn’t you be knowing that?!”  so i shut up and waited for the journey to the unknown to end..

“Bhainji,  80 rupees hua hai”..
I could say Nita was going to wage the battle of waterloo with the taxivala for the absurd meter. So i swiftly paid the man now cowering under Nita’s glare and dragged her out before she would blast into a volley of complaints. So, we were standing in front of a party hall.. looking side ways i saw her grinning.. with dread i concluded may be its one of those far off weddings of unknown people with plastered smile (they have my deepest sympathies)..  man! I was so much better off at home! “Are you taking revenge for that twilight rerun?” she just laughs and drags me in.. “die you bitch!”

So i put on the most blank expression altering with utter pain and disgust.. (yeah may be i should try acting) anyways being dragged in by Nita i hear a blast of noise and screams and pats and smiles and balloons and streamers... and then taking off my mobile i notice the date.. “oh its my bday”  it was a surprise party! I blinked SYSTEM OVERLOAD!Relatives I have never seen come and hug me so does ma and baba. And Nita kept hitting me for no reason.. probably because she pulled out a trick on me flawlessly..  food ,cake, music ,all was a party and i was surprised that my family was so sanguine that i did forget my bday..!

After all ended and people couldn’t move anymore either from too much dancing or too much food there were goodbyes and hugs.. As we all slopped home and i lay on bed amongst all the rubbish and the incomplete story which is possibly going to stay that way, dad comes in for the usual father-daughter banter sessions. Suddenly he asks me “so, mini... what is life?”  This is “THE MOMENT” .I am suppose to come up with real philosophical lines putting up metaphors and quotes of famous , to look like i have really grown up vision of what all it is. Alas! i fail.. i end up with  couple of uhmms and you knows, disappointed baba left .Lieing  back, recapping  today’s frenzy, seeing happy faces enjoying ,uncles stuffing  up as much food they can while it lasts i concluded .....
life is living...   (if only baba heard me then i am sure it’s the most impressive answer i have ever come up with, pitiable i know! :D)

everybody, even a coyote has his day!

a land of disappointment...

To start with, there are ample no of things one is disappointed about ,it might be as huge as the book about understanding woman (which is seriously absurd, but nvm, that's a topic to chatter later about) .. i for one have constructed my topic of disappointment to the degradation of vacations.. 

Thinking back to the time of school days, the word “vacation” in itself made all kinds of ideas flood in.. and no, it had nothing to do with mobiles, facebooks, going to malls,etc..  known as the “kuda vali (garbage collector)” of the house due to a quirk of picking up and keeping boxes, bottles, pieces of thermocol, cardboards.. all had a purpose behind them.. the ultimate utilisation of their existence during vacation time. (inspite of ma’s valiant attempts into invading my room and clearing off my precious collections!) sitting down amid this weird garbage collection i planned my vacation around them.. many times my projects were failures and in the end i used to end up making black stringy things out of pieces of thermocols and with a hot knife and burning myself.... but it was a swing at creativity.. if not spending time on the wealth from waste agenda (which almost all the time was uglier from waste) there used to be grand planning of a picnic with friends(though, it was about a flimsy bedsheet  tent which was adamant on flying off with the glorious wind)

My disappointment comes to the part that somewhere in the growing up part those innocent creative surges have been lost.. now, my vacations are mostly spend on summer trainings and studies, at times i sneak off some minutes just wee seconds before sleeping for some reading for that's the thing which somehow makes me hang by the pinky finger by the cliff which was the land of “let the hand fly and there shalt be a picture”. The part where it’s no longer thought well enough for going on these make and catch the bedsheet afternoons is a whole lot of sadness..

 A voice for the kids of now.. who i never see enjoying these hols by going off for picnics nor for a morning fresh air cycling.. see the world out of the window and you shall never regret the days you spend down with the sun..

p.s: It might sound full of self-pity. But i do hope that you see past it and see the way bigger picture i am trying to show..