Happy Hour ... and Me

One evening my 3 year Rayaansh was sitting on the sofa. Day dreaming and eating grapes while I was sipping tea by the dinner table. The door bell rang. Me “ Rayaansh, can you get the door please”. I knew it was the baby sitter, who had gone down to buy something. Rayaansh nods no. Me, this time little firm “ Rayaansh, cmon please open the door”. Rayaansh “No, you go”. Me, “ I am having tea and you are done eating your grapes. Please open it. Someone is waiting.” Rayaansh, “ Someone can wait. I will not open” I was transported back to decades when the exact same conversation took place between my brother and me. We decided then that the person at the door can wait as neither would budge.  It was dad who went all mental ringing the door bell and gave us both a good dressing down for it. P.S. – Both the time I relented and opened the door

Have you seen someone walking on a rope and balancing their way through? Well, I was very amused when I saw it the first time and still continue to be. Its skill of maintaining balance   and using a balancing tool to be centered. According to me now, that summarizes life. Its always about striking the balance . We are either walking the rope and a plank whose width changes as per situations we encounter making the act of being centered either easy or challenging. At 2016 ends, right now I feel pull in different directions or rather the feeling of being torn between competing desires. Relationship v/s freedom . My dreams v/s someone else’s dreams and happiness. Shall I uproot what seems stable to venture into unknown territories? How do I know if I love or hate something unless I try it?  Will I be able to discard dreams and stay happy When driving home after thanksgiving ceremony, the husband and I were wondering that does it take a crisis to see how out of sy...

Sis-in law  "Dada I am going to Europe" Dada whose listening capacity is diminishing by the day "What!!" Loud enough that the neighbors can hear it  " I am going to Europe". Dada "Where??" Pretty much screaming into his ears "Europe Dada.  Europe " Still clueless.  My 2 year also decides to  chime in with little effect and some other family members come to rescue. Me "Please say it like a gujju." "U rope Dada" Dada "Where?  Surat?" Now hopeful and Louder "U ROPE,  U ROPE" Dada " U ROPE? When?  " Woo-hoo!!! Bingo!!   Once a desi, always a desi either by force or choice or hearing capacities.

A relationship is like a house.  When a light bulb burns out you do not go & buy a new house. You fix the light bulb.

Tuesday, 31st May 2016, at 6.10 pm, I was walking my husband’s grandfather Dada into the ICCU. We knew what was around the corner and he wanted to say bye one more time, while I wanted to be with him. Just then my husband came out and softly announced that she’s gone. Dada and I continued moving inside the ICCU, when we saw her. She was peaceful and seemed like she was in deep slumber.It was display on the monitor that conveyed a different message. “Wait for me in Vraj (Heaven), I'll join you soon” he said touching her softly and just like that companionship of more than 6 decades ended. 'Ben' as she was lovingly addressed, was my husband’s grandmother. She lived a full 80 years and nurtured 4 generations. I had this opportunity to share few words during her prayer meeting and here is what I said, well almost because emotions said few other things. We all lost a wonderful lady. No matter how hard I try, I can never do justice to what talk about her...

Last evening I had  few meetings to attend around dinner time.  I usually try not to work that time of the day because it really confuses my kid. It's our play time you see. Nevertheless, it was one of those unavoidable days. I was deep into a conversation with  colleagues from across the globe on how best we could mitigate risks for particularly challenging services that we were getting into. We were almost concluding, when my 16 month old aimlessly strolls in.  He casually comes near my table and starts his high decibel protest cry for me to pick him up and in the bargain obviously disrupts the discussion. I apologize for the ruckus and quickly put my line on mute, lift him and hand him over to his care taker.  It annoys him because he was looking forward to hitting my laptop keypad and pulling out a few keys under the guise of hanging out with me. He is now howling!! The mother in me feels sad until the brain switches back to risk mitiga...

Little Rayaansh just got vaccinated and the doctor had given me a heads up on the discomfort that was to follow. I was ready with meds and things to do in order to comfort him. And from my earlier experiences I felt more confident to help my little boy through these next day. The following day we had monthly thanksgiving ceremony, so I offered a prayer and took off. He did well most of the ceremony but at the end the pain seemed to have kicked in and he yelled his guts out but within minutes of giving the meds, I had him calm and smiling in my arms. But something happened that night which will stay with me for a long long time to come. I was getting ready for bed and was in the shower while Mihir was playing with him. All seemed to be going well as I was hearing happy giggles. After few minutes Rayaansh started his fake cry  ( yes I had categorized his cries as well). I didn't bother much as I knew his daddy knew what to do. He'll sleep off in sometime or so I thought. ...

I can see you fidget in the cradle from the across hall when I am doing my best to swallow my break fast. (Swallow.. Yes .. eating chewing etc can wait till I can recall what relishing food means). I can hear you grumble and cry in your clear loud, no very loud voice. Just then I manage to shove the last morsel of upma in, and I dash across to start moving your cradle. You immediately stop grumbling and give me a faint smile. Within minutes you are asleep and this time I didn't even touch you. May be it's my voice and as some research articles say my smell.. Awww. Then a fear hits me. In about 2 months time, I'll resume back work. What then? I wish you get comforted and this transition is easy for you. I know you are a rock star and you'll do a super job. But will you forget me? Will my voice and touch still sooth you? Well if not now, but in a few years you'll be all grown up ,  pretty much  managing things yourself and may be even advising me. Even then...

6th July 2015 This Saturday morning Rayaansh my 1 year old was in the middle of his “waking up” process. We have a morning drill where usually he’ll wake up disoriented and while he tries to establish his co-ordinates,I’ll ask him if he stretched? His face will brighten into a faint smile and he’ll give a lazy stretch. Then based on how hungry he feels the crying routine will follow. I then ask him about his dreams while I kiss and caress him. Some days he begins to fill me on his dreams in a language I wish I could comprehend while the rest will be spent on inspecting the eco-system. It’s our happy mornings. So this morning, he is having an animated conversation with me when my FIL walks towards my room calling out my son’s name. My FIL had just returned that morning from a 2 week long business trip. Instantly I see Rayaansh stops his stories and his smile just vanishes. I was surprised, as I had expected him to be excited on seeing his grandfather. With an urgency, he ...

While aimlessly surfing TV during lunch today, I landed up watching few scenes of ‘You've got email’ and came across a nice dialogue from there. " People are always saying that change is a good thing. But all they're really saying is that something you didn't want to happen at all... has happened"  . If you look around, this actually holds true.Over the last couple of months, I have actual seen this so closely around me. Whether its changes happening on work front or alterations at the home end, change seems synonymous to resistance, irrespective of whether it will do you good. One gets so sore everytime one is displaced from the coziness of the comfort zone, especially the older ones. The older you get, the more you want your bets to give the same outcome as what you desire.Even if there are experiences waiting to take you to a better place, you would vehemently resist that. Therefore, I feel this so called 'Steady State' in IT terms in personal liv...

Recently, IDEA Cellular's been coming with interesting set of advertisements, carrying a catchy tag line “What an Idea sirji.” So their recent AD features an idea to combat the increasing population of India. They suggest that, couples should get hooked onto 3G instead of each other. Now the ad was very humorously done and is likeable, however on the hindsight, we all know that technology which is meant to get people closer,has actually also pulled people away in its own way. This pulled me back an incident that happened few years ago, when the electric switch board of my building caught fire.Resulting which, we had to spend about a couple of days in absolute darkness. So after dinner, all our doors, windows would be opened and everyone would gather together into groups and chit-chat the night away. Even though living without electricity made me relate to my nomad ancestors in a very special way, I actually started looking forward to the evenings, when we would spend time ...

Recently, I was watching a documentary on ‘Save the Tiger’ campaign. This campaign has gained a lot of popularity in the recent few months, with hoardings shouting out the number 1,411 and celebrities’ popping up in your television screen urging you to join this campaign. I felt it was effective to gain attention, as I saw many of my friends who usually don’t care too much about things actually join this movement. So kudos to the effort. However, I have my doubts about how my contribution especially the monetary one is going be of any help as poaching business in India is deep rooted, highly corrupt, and widespread, far worse than what we can imagine. So coming back to the documentary, apparently it said that the Government of India had increased the imprisonment duration from 7 years to 10 years if found guilty conducting poaching activities. I found this extremely amusing as its said there hasn’t been a single person who has been booked under this law or suffered any form of imprison...

It’s after a long time that I got back to writing. Not that I wasn’t writing or anything this while, infact I was writing more than ever. However they weren’t any blogs, but lots of infra solutions and RFP responses. Anyways, after a really long time I had the weekend to myself where I didn’t need to take back work with me. So I did what I loved to do on a lazy weekend, watch some movies, snuggle up with a book and endlessly surf through the television channels. When watching TV, I stopped by some of saas-bahu serials that have been on our usual Star,Zee etc. Initially I got a little confused that had the usual Star,Zee etc got changed into some Bhojpuri channels, as all the programs seemed to be based in Bhojpuri. Then I discovered that these channels seem to have the following type of shows, either Bhojpuri background or village based, or based on some child protagonist or child protagonist in a village set up or Bhojpuri village child based. Period. This is what most programs revol...

I have been meaning to write this blog for a while now but somehow got caught into a series of events. Anyways, about a month ago one of my roomies, Swati left for her hometown for good. Over dinner, a common friend of ours who has been struggling to get a transfer out of Chennai, congratulated her and jokingly said “Tere paap dhul gaye aur tu Chennai se ja rahi hai” meaning that your sins have got erased and so you are leaving Chennai. We all laughed at this statement, but I quietly wondered if Chennai is really that bad. I distinctly remember how scandalized my friends were I broke the news that I had got my posting in Chennai. Some of them actually told me that I was out of my mind that I agreed to go to Chennai. Most of their concerns were actually revolved around the fact that after living all my life in a city like Mumbai, it would be exceedingly unimaginable to stay in Chennai and suspected that the place and its culture would be harsh on me. Honestly, in a way it scared me a bi...

I have been off and on following the Indian version of a popular American show ‘Moment of truth’ called ‘Sach Ka Samna’ on star plus. Well, when I watched some episodes of “Moment of truth”, I never imagined that this show would actually work with our Indian audiences. We Indians are so inter-wound to the society fabric, that most decisions of our lives are taken considering the impact it would have on the society that we live in. However, now this show actually got people to come up on national television and without any hesitation confess on extremely personal issues This business of honesty is a little tricky, as there are some grey aspects of life for the sake of your loved ones you may want to keep it locked partially or entirely. And let’s face it, not everyone can live life in pure play manner. What baffles me is how much people are willing to put on stake to make some money out of. People have confessed to have cheated on their spouses, slept with women younger than their daugh...

Last time Imtiaz Ali made a movie called Jab We Met, it entered my MBA class as a case study for memetics. Before starting the case study, my professor told us that he selected this movie as a case for memetics cause it’s a movie that has been watched and re-watched ‘n’ number of times by most people in the class, making it easier for a majority to pick minute nuances from the movie. In short, that was the kind of impact that J.W.M had, and personally for me, it’s an all time favourite and can watch it any number of times. That movie simply makes me very happy. So naturally just like many others I too eagerly waited for Imtiaz’s next movie to release, which after weeks of its release, I finally finally managed to watch it. Now, as far as Love Aaj Kal is concerned, I liked the way the story-telling was done and the excellent grip that the movie had on its screenplay. What was also refreshing was the bluntness the dialogues had. ‘Less is more’ concept was put to use effectively, ...

My horoscope today said “Smile, that’s all” and I wondered if it’s something “that’s all” type simple.Coincidentally few days ago over a cup of tea I was talking to a friend of mine and I mentioned to her that one of the first things that people would notice about her was her smile. Then she told me something interesting that she had actually done a study where she observed people travelling with her and found that almost everyone has this very serious expression on their faces all the time and people hardly smiled. I found this very interesting and for the next few days I saw that, yes people around me have a default non-smilie expression. Smiling is one of the simplest things to do but yet it’s one that most forgotten and most taken for granted activities. Yet its one the most beautiful things created. Just imagine that toothless grin of a little child. Doesn’t it fill you with an endearing feeling? The way your heart does a summersault when that special someone smiles at you. That’s...