She got up in the fairly early in the morning with the sunlight flooding her room with white brightness. She saw the gentle clouds wafting past, and the bright green tree swaying gently, with all its leaves fervently vibrating in the breeze.. The scene outside beckoned her and she responded by leaping out of the bed and jumping out of her white framed window. Her life was helped/saved by the window being situated on the ground floor of the cottage.

As she started walking on the soily path outside, she wondered where she would go. Where would this scene lead to? Suddenly she spotted/saw a white rabbit hurrying in front of her. 'This is just like Alice in Wonderland where Alice encounters the rabbit who falls into the hole! I wonder if any such thing would happen to me', she thought, though not really believing that her story can go parallelly as alice's. Too much of a co-incidence as well as plagiarism. 'Well, that's too bad, but maybe I'll have something interesting happen to me in the next paragraph?', she hoped as she walked, enjoying the birds chirping and the breeze's wafting, which were beginning to become quite passé nowJ

So she reached the next paragraph, and as soon as she arrived she spotted a big gang of armed militiamen running madly and aiming at her with their guns! O god, Ive entered a horrid video game I think!!! Oh no!!!! she groaned, and ran for it. Her life that (it) is. She heard a zwaiiing, and a bullet flew past her ear and hit the tree ahead, which burnt and coughed with smoke and fell to the ground with a thud! 'That could have been me!!! ', she exclaimed!!!

Oooh I see a safe cave, but I hope I don't get trapped there, god let me enter the next level, or give me a trick key!!! And a miracle happened and suddenly the militia converted into an angry village mob who were shouting and still running after her, only their guns were now tomatoes and bullets the seeds! 'that's not half as dangerous', she heaved a sigh of relief.

A tomato flew past her, which hit the dahlia plant ahead, and the plant changed into a lizard and started flying. It sang a song as it began flying which was as follows:

What I was I am not now

What I am I will not be

Should u be sad my alice dear

Or should u laugh hee hee hee hee..

Should I answer such lizards who were plants once she thought, well believing her alice identity now, still running away from her followers!!

As she ran, she noticed she was running faster and faster, and suddenly she was running so fast, that everything was going past her in a blur. The trees were like dripping water color painting, and flying birds seemed to have stopped in the air, and the croak of the frog sounded like a slow motion deeply trapped in a bog sound! She felt she was evaporating, and her hands, her legs, her face could not keep up with the speed of her running. Everything was left behind and she got the feeling she was only some cloud which was whiffing/spurting away!! ' Oh noooooooooooo, I don't want to vapourise!!!!!!!!', she moaned as she ran!!!!!

The right in front of her, she spotted her own dear little cottage!! I'm home!!! She cried with joy, the sense of safety and security overcoming her, but could not slow down!! She realized with horror that she would ram into her own cottage walls and get smashed like the tomato that was aimed at her! What a bad end, she brooded!

As she came closer to the door of her house, she saw it was open! Good she thought and then as she spun in, she spotted the living room wall!!! Moments before the final collision, her house suddenly evaporated, the solid walls and confines all vanished into thin air and she was in the middle of nowhere. Just empty blank space. And then suddenly she realized that she also disappeared!! And then there was no one to realize.

There was nothing there, no her, no house, no trees, no clouds, no earth, just empty, blank, white, space.

What would life be if there were nothing my friends?J

Wah, sometimes a stream, sometimes a breeze, other times just a train speeding away on its steel tracks.. i remember there was a pink floyd song, shine on you crazy diamonds, that had a poetic way of describing those rails; let me look it up..

You were caught on the crossfire of childhood and stardom,
blown on the steel breeze.

Ok, so my memory couldnt stand up to the test against facts, but this is how i remember the steel breeze part.. the guy rushing on the tracks a bit too fast, much like a train whose brakes have failed and is unable to stop..

But where was I? Oh well, doesnt really matter... Now I think I will go and see if there is any work I can do in the house!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

REALITY STRIKES!!!:) (and above was reality on strike)

At work too, my sweetness streak continued. But now I found I was genuinely liking the people I was working with, somehow everything changed at work. i wonder how, because it is the same kind of students who go to engineering college who end up in a software company, but now i didnt find my colleagues to be selfish or irritating or shallow. they were interesting, funny, even caring, intelligent, (though one must admit, the college crowd was intelligent too..), and I had loads of fun chatting and exchanging views and jokes and work was fun inspite of overworking and working with terrible bosses who gave a normal good rating for backbreaking or atleast finger crunching work.

then I left work and volunteered for a social service organisation. Thats when I met my sort of people I realized. I had been in the wrong field all along! The people, mostly girls somehow (or women rather) were sharp, intelligent and believed in something. Though I dont know if I have the courage to stand up for my rights or those of others, there are things I hate and some things that move me or make me angry/sad, etc. Here were people who left their careers in advertising to join an ngo just so they could do something 'meaningful'. The fact that they were getting frustrated here too is another thing. Then there were people who spoke out loudly and bravely in lunchtime discussions about oppression against women and ills of patriarchal society, and chauvinists in family, the absurdities of brahminism and I would wonder if I could ever have the courage to be bold like that- take a stand and shout - And try to take action. Working or volunteering there also brought me in direct contact with life's negatives. I visited orphanages and met orphans, all smiling and bright and cheerful and I wondered how to deal with their unfortunate and unfair position in life. Also realized that the idea that I had to deal with their sadness was absurd and pompous. etc etc.

Then I went back to work again, in the software industry in Singapore, and loved it initially, the rush of doing what I had been doing for almost 5 years ( and enjoyed too ) actually lasted me for some time. then i got irritated with the way work demands more and more out of your life and time, and got frustrated seeing my weekends and weekdays taken away from me - for what? (I also came in contact with a lot of housewives in singapore, family types and was terrified when the idea of kitty party was floated and was invited to join..)

Then I went back to my first love writing and tried my hand with chillibreeze and earned some money 'repackaging travel articles'. Very creative that is.!

Now I am in London, writing horrible blogs and wondering where my flair has vanished.

and why am i writing my career history on this blog:) just to write I guess:) practise makes one perfect.

A) Because they did not like washing their dirty lenin in public!

I have to declare that this joke has been invented by me, so if anyone is planning to use it, please memorize the following statement. "This joke was invented by Anuja"

It was the year 1955, and the times were such as I can only imagine them to be. Sheila was only 5 years old and was happy to be enjoying independence earned by her country only a few years before she was born. Her life was simple enough, made simpler by the lack of a television, a radio even, and electricity though in existence, wasnt in regular supply for lightbulbs and fans to be a common sight in the night. And lightbulbs and fans, however useful, cannot entertain anyway. So life was boring, with the only entertainment being the games of flash or flush or teen patti in hindi played away for hours together in the afternoon by her mother, uncles and elder brother. And of course the cinema! In fact, food had become a form of entertainment in her life, sometimes chaat programmes were made, other times there was samosa and jalebi, all piping hot and fresh from the nearby halwai for breakfast. dinner was made more fun by thick rabdi or kapoorkand.

Sheila, though only 5, wasnt very happy growing up in this environment. This plain (though tasty) atmosphere was just not for her. She dreamed of people who spent their afternoon hours not in sleep or gossip or cards, but in more intellectual pursuits. We dont know if Sheila knew the meaning of the word intellectual when she was 5, but her instincts craved for a more purposeful existence.

Life goes on, and so did hers, with more food and gossip till one day she grew up. Now she had forgotten about her earlier misgivings and had stopped dreaming.

How to continue?:)

******************************

"Why didnt you come yesterday?"

"Miss, the alarm didnt ring"

"The alarm didnt ring, or you didnt set the alarm"?, the classteacher asked with an amused smile.

With an honest pleasant ex-pression Nitya admitted, "I set the alarm, but forgot to switch it on". She wanted to explain the technicality of her alarm clock, but the teacher was not interested and simlingly replied with the typical,"You dont forget to eat your food, how can you forget to set your alarm?"

Nitya of course had no answer to this one, and these questions are, as we all know, rhetorical ones, and attempting to reply to them is hazardous. Like when you do something because your friend asked you to and the teacher says, "If your friend asks you to jump in the well, will you jump in the well?"

I really dont know what is the origin of this question, but it must come from a time and place when and where wells were quite a common sight and there were friends who asked their friends to jump in them. But it is a favourite of teachers and you cannot reply to it.

Nitya knew she was spared because she was a relatively good student, and the teacher had a good opinion about her.

*******************

I am talking to you,

or am I?

All these people and minds on this island

It is my land,

a me and i land,

we need to connect and find happiness

or satisfaction

writing to a dull diary will just not do anymore

our thoughts are out for sharing

and those that cant be

are shoved back into the deep corners of our minds

and what is this that i am writing?

what kind of criticism am i inviting?

will it be harsh, unkind and biting?

i am far from a poet

as far as a materialist is from God

though I cannot say the same about atheists

and i am digressing again

which is something I do quite naturally

but now i am warming to this pattern

or anti pattern and anti verse

it helps me feel free from the boundations of good writing

and very soon I shall start breaking grammar rules too

punctuations and articles will all be thrown out of the window

the browser window i.e

and what will be left is pure nonsense

that nobody will want to read

much less appreciate

and I will have faced a fear

though not the worst

about writing horribly and losing esteem

in the minds of those I respect

and now I am getting serious

and will move on to other safer trivial zones

let me end with a joke I had made when I was younger-

What will you call a very good integer?

Excell int

all computer folks who do programming

atleast in java or c

will appreciate the horrible pjness of the attempt

i have bored plenty of colleagues

as many as I could spring my joke on

its not a practical joke

but not an impractical one either

just a nothing - neither here nor there

ok enough of ths nonsense

this should not go up on my rediffiland but it will

japanese have a word for it

hara kiri

but anyway i am curious to see

the non-reaction this evokes

its just 11:54 at night and i have nothing better to do

the sproutings of a lukha mind.

no flourising ending, and a meaningless beginning

So what do I write? Topmost on my mind is the fact that today we went for my baby boy (Varun's) 1st immunization. The nurse, after some deliberation, since he is not quite 8 weeks old, 3 days remain, decided to grant him his injections, and he received 2 - one on each leg. Yes he cried, but not much. But now at home, in the middle of his sleep he is waking up crying with pain, bringing tears to my eyes and also my mom's. You really dont want to see him cry like that, it makes you sad, even though all kinds of leaflets and doctors and nurses and relatives have been telling you from experience that immunization leaves children feverish or cranky or listles or unhappy.

Anyway, UK! My mother is very impressed with this country and the way they seem to charge absolutely nothing for the medical services rendered! After seeing me have a free of any charge delivery, and 1 year free prescription, and baby's all medical services till I think age of 16 absolutely free, she feels that a child born in this country would proudly feel that he or she truly belongs here. The country seems to be taking amazing care of the child, making it feel wanted, that it belongs, and the the whole nation, is willing and wanting to take its responsibility!

Summer! British Summer! I can see bluish grey skies at 3:30, by 4:30 dawn strikes. By 6:00 the surroundings are flooded with bright sunlight, the kinds you probably see at 8:00 in India, atleast Mumbai/Bombay. And then the day goes on and on. At 8:30 pm one sees the clock and expresses surprise at the kind of light one sees outside, by 9:00 or 9:30 the sun has set and the transition time has arrived. By 10 its dark. Above 24 degrees people start complaining of muggy weather, the ideal room temperature for babies is advised as ranging between 18 and 21 degrees, and we are accused of overdressing and overheating the baby by visitors!

Now on to some masala! I read my dad's blog yesterday in which he wanted a new religion for new times to be created. This is not a very new idea, since that is what has been happenning over the centuries according to his blog, or my understanding of it. I skimmed through the comments, since the comments seem to be more interesting than the blogs when it comes to him and his circle of intellectually driven friends, and in one reply he mentioned that this religion will not be for people like him, but for people who need to believe in something - probably people like me. I would like to give my requirements for this up and coming religion.

It has to be based on facts. I dont want maybes. I want existing religion and its claims to be convincingly proven as false. I want to know for sure that Ram and Sita and Krishna and various other Gods are figments of a brilliant mind's imagination. I dont want stories about stories. I want to know that truly there was no time in the past when there were 'udan khatolas'. I want telepathy explained. I want all ghosts stories and claims explained. I want miracles explained or revealed as magic tricks.

Ok more later. Baby has woken up:) What a contrast, I dont need to bother about the above questions right now.

A child in Jaipur

Since the only thing I have done enough to write home about is travel, I am thinking of writing about it. I am sure my travels have been quite modest, and have no illusions about the depth or thoroughness of my travels too. Still, simply because it is me who has come into contact with these places, I feel I should write about them.
My earliest memories of traveling are when I was 8 or 9 years old. We had traveled to Jaipur, Agra, Fatehpur Sikri, and I can still remember some moments. The heat, afternoon sun, the pain of the elephant's hair pricking on my skin when I sat on its head for a ride, the shock and dejection I felt when a monkey snatched away a kulfi from my hand as I was walking towards some temple, the emotions come back and become one with the memory.
So much is stored in our heads. So many colors, sounds, feelings, impressions imbibed and seeped into our being. I wonder what difference has the trip to colorful and vibrant Rajasthan made to me? Would I be any different if I had not made those childhood visits?
We went to Hawa Mahal in Jaipur, the red building was full of windows. I remember someone pointing out a balcony, on which queens of old times would sit and enjoy the 'Hawa'- breeze. I too got myself photographed on that ledge. The beauty of traveling when u are a child is that u enjoy the essence of every ambience in all its purity. There are no worries to distract; all the inputs are absorbed like a sponge.
We went to Sheesh Mahal, and saw halls with rounded ceilings, purple, blue, green, red, yellow, orange, white cool and warm colors reflecting sunlight, gentle ripples of shadows, or thousands of round sunbeam shadows dancing about on some other wall.
I saw quiet courtyards of red sandstone houses, sometimes a door half open, inviting me to peep in and drown into the carved mystery of the place.
I also saw forts, huge and spread out, overlooking a scenery that was barren, mostly brown, with shrubs growing intermittently. There was a huge cannon; and stories about when it was used, and more stories of some movie starring some famous hero/heroines having been shot here.
I guess I enjoyed Jaipur to my maximum capacity. I do believe that children are really intelligent and enjoy the stimulation and beauty and knowledge showered by the world around in fullest measure. They don't judge much, and simply enjoy. They don't think like adults, and have enough blank moments to dive deep into each moment and be fully absorbed.
Recalling as much as I do about Jaipur, I certainly feel children should be encouraged to travel and experience the world. They may not be intellectually fittest, but instinctively and emotionally are at a much superior level than their parents.

On Sunday 30th March, at 1am, the time suddenly changed in London from 1am to 2am. This is a phenomenon, (this word must be Mallu!:)) that human beings in London and UK indulge in to save their daylight. This changed time is called daylight saving time, and the time now instead of being GMT is DST. (guess the abbreviation.) or even BST - British Summer Time. This concept was invented by some Mr. William Willette (if my memory supports facts, readers really concerned about their facts can visit wikipedia) in 1907 because he thought human beings waste the precious daylight, sunlight sleeping, when they should be up and about enjoying the beauties of nature and its possibilities. The establishment of this change in time has been controversial right from the 'time' it was proposed with many people wondering if shifting time forward during summer really benefits economics (that is the underlying concern for most changes), or if its just a time pass gimmick that creates more confusion than anything else. So during the 1st world war time, Germany adopted this shifted time (I am guessing during spring and summer months) and before the war ended most countries did too (both friendly and enemy), and I wonder what led all of them to take up something started by Germany. That my wikipedia didnt tell me, and I didnt research it either.

Anyway America, though it adopted this DST thing during the war dropped it too, like a hot brick, and didnt re-adopt it till the 1960s. The British kept on debating about when and how, and Australia too took up the DST at some point in history.

So now instead of a difference of 5 and 1/2 hours between UK and India, its only 4 1/2. On Sunday and Monday, I was busy comparing the actual time as it was 2 days back and the light at that time of the day with time as it is now and the daylight one sees. It was amusing to see darkness take over the skies at 8:00 instead of 7:00, and waiting wives would feel less angry with their husbands working late with more daylight engaging them.

In late October, time would shift back again. But I dont understand why that needs to be done. I mean, the sun sets at 3:30 during winters in London. If time hadnt shifted back to GMT, the sun would have set at 4:30 and that would have meant more daylight isnt it? Maybe time just needs to move forward and stay there.

Till I read Wikipedia I thought Daylight saving would have a more scientific basis, somehow tied to solstices and equinoxes and mean something more. But now I realize it is just a way of enjoying more sunlight at a time more conventient. This shows how tied our brains are to the concept of time, and how meaningless it is too, when you try to think more than you can or should. For I remember in Singapore, 6:00 am was dark every day of the year, and the sun would start rising only at 6:45 to 7:00. There was never any sunlight before 7:30 or so. For them, 6:00 am is tied to darkness, while in India, 6:00 is dark during winters and it means lots of light during summers, and it is different in the mountains. In Britain, till the shift in time, right from mid-March there was light at 5:15 or 30, though now that happens after 6. And I wonder by what concept of time light of day was Brahm-Muhurat invented, that Hindu concept of the time when mind is freshest and one can feel the quiet vibrations of nature and quietitude.

But birds and nature doesnt follow and track these humanly time changes. Birds will sing and awaken and sleep when they see fit and not consult any mechanical device that keeps ticking and guiding them away from their natural instincts.

Now it is 2:00 pm and I am off to have lunch, which by the way is Aalu parotha, dahi and palak paneer, lovingly made from maa ke haath.