Coffee...The Ultimate Companion

Its 3’o clock in the morning and I am savouring my favourite indulgence, coffee. Thanking God for creating these wonder beans, the only ones who love to get crushed just to tickle our taste buds. My mother often warns me over keeping my consumption under control as it may lead to caffeine addiction. But I am not addicted to coffee as it is too virtuous to get addicted to. I am just head over heels for it. There are times when I am too lazy to work, or it’s too much work giving me a head spin, or my mind is brimming with 10 thousand reasons to be sad, I know where to turn my head. Coffee.

  Nobody in my family drinks coffee, the typical Indian one swearing by tea for every other occasion. But I had to find some other refuge.  I got acquainted with coffee about 4 years ago when I was preparing for my 10th grade board examinations which required me to study through the nights. Though I have always been a night bird since the time I was born and my mother still sighs about the fact that she hardly slept through the night in my growing up years as I refused to put my eyes to rest. So as I matter of fact I didn’t require any dose of coffee to push the mark on the clock. But one day after an appalling defeat by trigonometry, I made myself a cup and fell in love at the first sip.

  That day, the brew must have been far from the perfect one I have learned to make in these years.  But I still remember it as a teenager who remembers her first date throughout her life in spite of knowing that she was all fingers and thumbs.

I Don't Have Any Title For This...

What happens when a frog that has spent his whole life in a well of 1m radius is suddenly asked to swim in a lake? What happens when a butterfly, accustomed of flying with the flies thrown to fly with birds? What happens when Lewis carol himself wakes up to the wonderland he creates for Alice? Sheer amusement, discomfort, bafflement…but why I am asking these questions? To give you people a sneak peek into my heart.

  It was a very usual day for me as I geared up for “just another interview”. Camera, pen, diary, documents and I were ready. But nothing could have made me ready for what I stumbled upon in the hours to come. I felt like someone on a desert safari is asked to swim in the ocean. Completely unprepared, unrehearsed and ill equipped.  But I didn’t panic, instead chose to drown then to swim.

  He didn’t show me the ocean but the desert devoid of knowledge I was living in and cursing for years. He didn’t ask me to come up to the surface but took me down into the kingdom where nobody else is capable of ruling. He didn’t give me answers but questions, questions which I was timid to ask myself. He made me feel dumb, yet managed to dignify my presence.

  I can go on and on but I would like to conclude this by saying, I have found my calling.

Lets Just Be Human Beings

Few days back while I was jostling inside a book shop, not knowing enough where to rest my hands and eyes. I settled for book from the feminism section, “Reading Lolita in Tehran” by Azar and made my way towards a secluded corner. A voice behind me stood up and asked, “Are you a feminist”? To which I replied in the most callous tone...I am just a human being minus the various adjectives.

I was first introduced to the term Feminism about 6 years back when i heard a college professor called herself a staunch feminist and asked on national T.V,” why is history His Story and not Her Story? I find the question really out of proportion and felt people like this women responsible for the ill fate of women across world. I left the question back then as there were much important issues to be taken seriously( that new guy still hasn’t noticed me, my nose is too sharp...will tom cruise ever marry me). But that whiff of anger and rage I felt that day came rushing back to me when the question of being a feminist was put up in front of me.

I think the women race has been the worst victim of differentiation which makes me baffle at this race’s love for sets and classes. How can we ask the humble male race to treat us equally when we ourselves have failed in doing so miserably? We have continued to divide us into class, sets, and beliefs and then reaching to the limits of hypocrisy by fighting for women’s rights. But have we authenticated the right to project ourselves as one...I am  not attacking Feminism per se but the whole system of divisional  system. If we want our societies to function in unison we should try treating ourselves as one human race differentiated into males and females, Nothing more and nothing less.

 Let’s promote individuality and nurture the beliefs and thoughts without undergoing the pain and burden of giving in or giving up to any precedence. 

Save Us From Sexual Disorders!

Are all the advertising agencies suffering from a sexual disorder? I have no other option left but to ask this question load and blatant as I am closely keeping a watch on the era of logical and mind boggling advertisements losing grounds to sex selling video clips! Where are we heading people...towards a country of desperate men, ready to buy everything if the seller is dressed in a skimpy bikini?
I take great insult when I watch those deodorant ads portraying women nothing less than meager desperate animals, running behind men just to give in to their olfactory senses. Why don’t these people think before turning towards these stale concepts? Or our Indian men still stuck in an era where they hallucinate about womens production happening just to meet their virile desires? A humble request...GROW UP GUYS!
Now I completely know that these nothing but superfluous ads are not completely on the agencies shoulders revering to the system of demand and supply. What is there to be understood is left to Indian masses who I believe have gathered enough stature to say no to a useless commodity even if it is sold among bikinis and maillots.

Terms of Losing....

It took me more than 4 months to get back to this space. This sabbatical was the difficult of all as it was meant to heal an irreplaceable loss, as they say...time and tears washes away everything...but some stains stay there forever!!!

I was skimming through the books for my exam scheduled in the afternoon on 1st march, 2011. Still in the hangover of getting into another year of my relationship and struggling through those illogical chapters, I tried settling myself in the hostel’s mess for the lunch and my phone rang flashing my mother’s number. I thought it odd of her to call at this time as I never pick up during my college hours. I picked up her call with a cheery “Hi!”

I heard my younger sister on the other line sobbing, as if our world was torn apart and she was gathering courage and composure to share those broken parts with me. A litany of thousands possibilities ran through my mind. But nothing could have prepared me for the words she finally spoke. My brother Monty was killed in a motorbike wreck the last night. I wanted to smash away the phone to wake up to a bad nightmare but certainly it was nothing but reality. The eldest of us in our maternal family, Monty got married a week earlier. Just two days back me and my cousin had wrapped up the wedding extravaganza and left for our colleges, wishing the newlyweds all the happiness. Who knew we would be called this sooner.
The days that followed were a haze of unreality. We all stayed together at that time and clung to each other for support. I remember watching my mother crying in a corner away from her sister’s eyes. She told us once that it’s hard to decide what hurt worse; the loss of Monty or watching her sister act bravely when we all knew that her world was shattered.

It’s been 4 months since Monty left us and changed our lives forever. We have all tried our parts coming to terms with the loss but are still trying to learn...how to live incomplete lives???

Are We Developed Chameleons?

After a long period of time I had a chance to experience rains. Though February is not generally considered to be fit for the water spell, but due to the revival of my spirits I will leave these worries in the heads of the meteorologists only. I stood in my balcony and looked outside for a long while. The more I was there the more I felt happy and confident about myself. It said that that your liking reflects your mood and we human beings are known to pick up objects to show their inner sanctum. And we have been doing it in quite a lot of ways. From seasons to regions, from shades to days, from skies to flies we have not left any commodity untouched with the emotions and have used them for ones naked camouflaged display. The human being is a social animal and defies any form identity discomfort. It always (I used ‘it’ to emphasise on animal) seeks solace in merging itself with the outer ambience like a chameleon.

   There are days too when this chameleon loses its virtual skin and gather the courage to look beyond the comfort. That is the time when it doesn’t feel as a part of this creation. It appears to be more as an object placed without any notion of rhythm balance or coherence along the symmetry and monotony of the world. Its senses falls short to experience the pain and the pleasure, the emotions are dwarfed with the raging tornado inside the mind, the words it requires to speak seem to get vanished from the dictionary of the language it thought of knowing, and all the ties binding it become a part of a large net choking it down to death. But it is afraid to die and comes back to being the chameleon again!

Has it ever happened to you? If yes, share it with me.......

What's there in the name...."home"?....EVERYTHING!

A very happy and cold new year to everyone. I wanted to send out warm wishes but the mercury is just not allowing me do so. All I am yearning for is just a steaming cup of coffee which is not even looking like a distant reality by the virtue of being away from home. I came back to my so called ‘Second Home” yesterday after a cosy and WARM new year at home. It’s not even 24 hours of being here and I have already started succumbing to the very thoughts of home. Though I feel quite comfortable at the hostel after the initial hiccups (remember my first entry after coming here?) but I am still reluctant to bestow the title of home to it.

I am all wrapped in my blanket as I am writing this with my packed bags are still lying in front of me but are refusing to command any attention. Among all the things I do unpacking after coming from home will surely find its name in the worst ones and packing for going home in the best ones. The very thought of going back brings an instant smile on my face as if it’s some kind of a reflex action. Many a times when I am getting hysterical about going back, my parents offer to come here and meet me but I have always refused. Meeting your loved ones is just a part of homecoming. What comes before and after are the things to be treasured forever.

 It takes me around 5-6 hours to reach Delhi and the train usually arrives at 5 in the morning and believe me that no other man in your life can be more beautiful than your dad standing with open arms to give that hug which you have been wanting for all those days you were away from him.The roads taking you towards your destination makes you fall in love with your city all over again. The twists and turns about which you complained earlier seemed to have grown overtly friendly these days. The hurry to open up the door and march in is evident from the consecutive doorbell rings. The door opens to reveal the view which can never be framed. The whole house is filled with the smell of some dish you must have liked in my junior years. Your mother greets you with a smile on her face and you wonder if she is aging at all? Because she still looks the same as she has been for years and the additions of wrinkles and lines have made her more perfect (because you can’t improve on a classic). You step into your room to discover that your favourite book rack is taken by the two pirates sleeping in their rooms. You run into them with the ever loved chocolate chip muffins (they won’t ruin their sleep otherwise)....



And finally you meet the part of you which knows no other place to reside but..............HOME!