Oh! Those Sunday Evenings!!

In many science fiction movies we come across references to portals that take us from one dimension to another. Sunday evenings are just that for me. It is a constant reminder of the two different persons inside me. I wonder if I will ever figure out which one is ME. The one who wants to spend her whole time taking care of the H's in her life - Husband & Home? Or the one who wants to make a place for herself in the big wide advertising world?

I know the easy solution is to be a bit of both. But how is that possible when they behave like two rivals trying to dominate me from within? They just don't seem to be adjusting with each other. Its been a while since I started this so called journey to find out which one is ME. But I don't think I will ever come up with an answer unless I am willing to be a bit more open to circumstances and meet obstacles with a more strong and sober attitude. I will have to redefine the word "COMFORT"in my dictionary.

Just like RJ says, you can't have everything and be all that you want in one lifetime. So I will have to simply choose the path I want to travel. For the past so many years of my life, I just let the paths choose me and now I must do the choosing instead. My mother would say I am being what she wanted me to be - if she read this. She strongly believes in a persons capability to control his or her life. I never believed it very strongly. But if I don't believe now, there is no point in believing later.

Just wish me luck.. will you?!?!

Another Start????

I don't really remember the last time I published a post. May be more than a year. In between so many things happened or rather changed in my life. Every time I type a post I promise myself to be a regular blogger, but somehow I am never able to do that. It is not that I am out of subjects or I am out of words. Its just that, I am lazy to type and click. This time I have promised to RJ that I am going to be a "Serial Blogger".

* * *

Just as I was finishing the last part I heard my colleagues talking in raised voices outside the office building and I went outside to see what it was about. It was then I realized they were simply having a nice relaxed time. That is very rare in our office. Most of the days the conversations that we have are confined to the phone calls we receive. Most of the calls are of short duration and consists mostly of monosyllables from our side. And the rest of the 10 hours we spend staring at our computer monitors, fingers flying over the key board or clicking away on the mouse. So today's relaxed time was a good thing, even if it was for a very short time of 10 to 15 minutes. So I am back again and now I have to think of something to write about. Of course I have to make sure that my writings are not harmful to anyone or even me.

Of course, today we are a bit relaxed, so I am able to type this much from office. Next time onward I will have to do it from home. Now I need to make a few phone calls. See you guys later.. Chao...

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Ok.. I am still alive. Its just that all this time I was thinking of being a great writer and never wrote more than a page. The best thing I can write about is my life and believe me, if I write the whole thing, Ekta Kapoor is going to grab the rights. But then how can I do it when my life is connected to the lives of so many others who wouldn't want to lose their privacy. May be I will write something down and keep it hidden and it can be published after my time.

Other than that I can't bring myself to write in malayalam. But I want to write in English, I am very particular about the theme and surroundings and I want them to be in harmony with my language. So I think my forte should be non-fiction. Thats what I did all this time. I came to a decision that I am going to write something that will make a difference in this world.

But all this is possible if and only if I get to think straight, without any major distractions. Now a days my major distraction is the fact that I am still not a mother. And the only person who will understand my explanation is my mother, who will never try to justify her daughter in front of others in matters that are trivial. Sometimes I am forced to believe that the main aim of any human being, both male and female is to bring children onto earth, and give everything to them.... I don't think like that. But I do want kids.. I would love to have more than one. But I am not desperate and I don't want others telling me when to have my baby. If it wasn't for my PC Ovaries I would have had kids by now.

I don't know how people fix their priorities. Because almost always it goes wrong, because one persons priorities seldom match with another's and human beings are social animals, so always there is a possibility for priorities to clash.

If I go on writing like this, it will be never ending. But I have to make kadala curry and wheat puttu. So gotta go.. See you guys some other time.

From a Hindu.

Hindutva or Hinduism is not a dogmatic or structured way of religion or culture or God worship. It is not a way of narrow-minded restricted living. Hindutva is a method to search for the ultimate truth or spirit. It is the most original and ancient way to reach God. Every other religion has something or the other that is originally not theirs, but being a Hindu means being an original.

Religion is not something that you are when you are in your mother’s womb. It is something that is given to inherit from your parents. So if you are born to parents of a particular religion, then you you belong to that religion by default. It is supposed to guide us through the blacks and whites of our life. But Hindutva is not a religion and is a way of living, so it can be a part of your life even when you are deep inside your mother.

Every religion has a God and they have to believe in that one God irrespective of their likes and dislikes. Many believe in God because they are scared of being punished. But in Hindutva you can choose your God from among the many and the fear factor is restricted to a few forms of God. In most of the religions it is believed that they will obtain salvation only if they follow their particular religion and God. But Hindutva never speaks about saving Hindus. It speaks for the whole of the mankind or rather the whole of the universe. Every living and non-living thing is the same in the eyes of God.

May be Hinduism, if it can be called a religion as so adamantly insisted by many, is one among the very rare religions in which there is no fixed evil. In Hindutva there is no name for the evil one, because, there is no devil. Good and evil are two things that co-exist in the universe. If that is so, then how can Indian culture be good and western culture be evil? When God sees Indians and Americans as the same, then why would he put forth different standards of Good and Evil?

But before that we must understand that there is no White or Black as such in Hindutva. Everything is in shades of grey. You can belong to a darker shade or a lighter shade all according to your actions. Like any other religion or practice Hindutva also urges to fight the evil. The evil that is mentioned here is not a separate entity like a different country or culture. The evil resides within all of us and we have to fight against this inward ugliness to reach a lighter shade of grey. To fight this evil we have to recognize its existence within ourselves and experience it. Without experiencing evil one cannot fight it.

Every religion or mythology or epic mentions about Holy wars. A holy war is not fought against someone else. It is not a war in which a few people fight against some others with weapons. It is a war that each and every one of us has to fight against all those factors within us, which are distancing us from reaching the ultimate truth of life. So the greatest war was not the one between the Pandavas and Kouravas, it was the war that Arjuna had within himself. To fight or not to fight. And Lord Krishna showed him the way. Mahabharata is not just a story. It is a lesson and the most important chapter is the Geethopadesham. Any Hindu who has understood the Bhagavath Geetha will ever behave like the Shiv sena or the Ram sena.

In all the epics and mythical stories that lay the foundation of Hindutva, there are only a few things to learn.

One
No man or woman is good or bad by birth, it is their Karma that makes them do what they are doing and whatever they do, it has been previously decided by God almighty. No one can do anything against the will of God.

Two
Everything that happens, happens for a reason and no one can stop it from happening and if anything is stopped at all, it is because it was meant to be stopped.

Three
Man is a simple creature in comparison to God and man can be closer to God only by fulfilling his karma and dharma.

Four
Above all, Hindutva is all about respecting, humbleness, simplicity, love, understanding and broadmindedness.

(To be continued...)

There it goes....

Sometimes I think I have matured so much. Sometimes I think I already know what all the philosophers in this world conveyed as the secret to a happy life. But then sometimes I simply lose all the control over my temper. Those are the times when I feel ignored or taken for granted. But before going into all that I would like to tell my readers that I was not blogging for the past few months because I got a part time contract based job and I was busy like hell managing the job and home. Now the contract is over and I am free. By going for the job I realized two things. One is that if I want I can start working anytime and I haven't lost touch. The second is that I hate to work. I simply hate it. I do love the fact that I get some money for the work I do. But I hate the fact that I never get to keep it. I hate the fact that I am not able to find time for myself. But then I am the only person who is bothered about me. My mother sent me a message and it said that the whole universe helps us to fulfill our dreams, no matter how stupid or silly it may seem to those around me and only we ourselves know the pain it takes to fulfill those dreams. True...... very true. I have been discouraged so much or guided so much through other channels that, now I am reluctant to share my dream with anyone else. So back to my temper. I hate lies, false accusations, buck passing and broken promises. How can people be so petty and so selfish and so carried away? It hurts when someone so close to me fails to make me feel special. Everyone knows they are not special. But the people who claim to love us are supposed to make us feel special. Buying something expensive or a candle lit dinner may not do the job. It may be something as simple as "I will make you a coffee" or "Today I am not going with my friends, I will stay with you and we will do together all those things that I do with my friends" and so on. I often see men spending money for their wives, but they forget to spend some time with their wives. How about holding an umbrella while she is doing some outdoor activity and telling her he doesn't want to ruin her complexion? Do I sound filmy? But take my word, it works. It works miracles. Oh Oh!! By the way its my time to work miracles in the kitchen and there goes my ............. Damn!! So TATA BYE BYE

The Way to Victory

The new Golden boy for us Indians is Abhinav Bhindra. They say it’s the first ever Olympic gold medal for India in an individual item. Also this Gold medal was the price for India for waiting for 28 years, since the gold medal in hockey in 1980. Everyone is happy and so am I.

But there is something that we conveniently forget. Why is it so, that India had to wait for such a long time to achieve such a victory? The reasons that any one will put forward can be varying. Some may say that because of lack of funds or infrastructure or proper training. Or the authorities can simply state that Indian sports persons are just not Olympic material. Then there will be another group of ardent sports fans who may say that it is because our kids are not given the proper encouragement, at the proper age. I admit that it is all true.

But I think above all, what we lack is the heart to win. I happened to see the women’s archery competition. It was a qualifying round and when I saw there were only three more shots to fire. There was a contestant from Korea called Kwon Un Sil and the contestant from India called Pranitha Vardhineni. Two shots were fired in the order that the Indian fires first and then the competitor. The second shot of Un Sil was much better than that of Vardhineni and naturally she got a better and louder applause. After the second set of shots the point status was 99 for India and 96 for the competitor. But our contestant visibly lost heart after the second shot, probably by seeing a much better shot by the opponent that she fired the last shot without confidence and it turned out to be the worst among the three, while Un Sil did better than both her shots before and won the qualifying round. At that time the camera focused on our girl as she was packing her bags and the heaviness of her heart could be clearly seen in her eyes.

So that is why I said, what we lack most is the spirit in our hearts to win. If the true spirit is there almost anyone in our Olympic can bring home a gold medal, for all of them are equally talented. So it is not the training alone that matters. No amount of funds or training or even the state of art infrastructure can by a Gold medal, if you don’t have it in your heart to win. Our main problem is that our spirit is like the carbon dioxide locked down in a soda bottle. When the bottle opens there is a considerably good effervescence and after keeping it open for some time, there is not even a single bubble even if you shake it.

Our sports people, be it cricket or hockey or football or any other form, lose their heart with a single defeat or one wrong move and simply give up trying. It seems that we just decide that we can’t win. Some times it is as if we have taken it for granted that only China, Australia, Russia or USA can win matches and medals. We are a nation having the one sixth of the total world population and still we think that others can out so us. It is so funny, isn’t it? How can we forget the history of our nation where many of our forefathers never looked back or thought twice before walking in to the cross of fire of the British? How can we forget the spirit of people like Bhagath Singh and Mahatma Gandhi who never lost their heart even when they were tortured and beaten up? How can we forget the everlasting courage of our nations leaders who tried and tried till they got us what we enjoy today, our freedom? Where is that spirit of ours which makes us hold on to Kashmir? Where is that heart of ours which gives us strength to uphold our values and culture? Why do we have to lose more than win when it comes to sports?

Once I heard in a Page 3 News report that Tom and Katie Cruise was stuck in a hotel room in France for more than three hours due to a traffic jam caused by the arrival of Shahrukh Khan, that too at a time when their marriage had given them huge publicity. If a Shahrukh Khan can do it in the field of entertainment, why isn’t there anyone to do so from sports? Of course we do have Sachin Tendulkar, Sania Mirza, Vishwanathan Anand and now Abhinav Bhindra. But is that enough? So, what I think is, may be we should start the preparations from the psychological level. The encouragement to try without losing heart till a victory is achieved and to maintain that victory after that must be given to kids at a very early age, so that it helps them in whichever field they choose to follow.

As for sports persons, the true inspiration is believing in oneself. Just remember the dialogue in Chak De before the final match, “ Today I am not going to tell you how to play, you have to play your own match. You have to go out there for that seventy minutes and play. Once played, not even God can take back those seventy minutes. So go out there in the field and play your best and make yourself proud for that seventy minutes for the rest of your lives.” Happy Independence Day.

Being Bean and Ok with it.

I love to watch cartoon network and POGO. Apart from my favorite cartoons like tom and jerry, loony toons and woody woodpecker, I religiously watch Mr. Bean. Although the episodes have been repeatedly telecasted over the years, I still love to watch the show. I don't like the animated version, because Mr. Bean can be enjoyed only if portrayed by Rowan Atkinson, not animation.

I know many people who doesn't like or even hate Mr. Bean. But I love to watch him because in today's world you seldom see people with that sort of openness, innocence and ignorance. And it is ok to be among the very few like Bean.




Just watching him gives me an assurance to remain what I am. It is just so good to see him so happy being himself. He may seem nerdy or awkward or foolosh to those around him. In the show he is shown as someone who doesn't have any friends, but he is contended with the one friend he has, his teddy bear. Even that teddy is note as cute as other teddies. But he is different.

I am not forgetting his girlfriend Irma Gobb. Irma seems to love Bean, but he sees her more as a companion rather than a love interest. In one of the episodes she leaves him, when he fails to propose to her. Rowan Atkinson himself had once said that "Bean is a child imprisoned in a man's body". Like that he is happy with the child in him. He thinks he can do things in a better way than others. He is so systematic and tidy. He is a do-it-all-yourself guy and unfortunate enough for others, he often disrupts them.

Most of he times I feel as if he is watching us through the TV, seeing us laugh at him and I feel as if he is laughing at us for what we are, similar to one another, while he is so different. People are not always dashing or ravishing. They are not always intelligent and talented. Not all of us have enough common sense. But we try to hide our true selves and project ourselves as someone else. We want others to admire us. We want to be the best, the popular and the fairest. But we conveniently forget the truth that there is a Bean inside all of us and when we laugh at him, it is satisfying, because in a way we are laughing at our own inner selves.

Some times we try to work on some gadgets or repairs and we fail. What do we do? We give up and say "its not for me". But we never admit the fact that we want it badly and its not for us because we can't get it going. But Bean? He tries. He tries real hard. May be we laugh at his efforts, but they make him unique. His difference from all of us makes him really Special. He dares to be different and stupid, while all of us tries to impress one another and be like some one else. He is impressed by himself and he himself is the only person he needs to impress. Just look at the way he parks his car. Everytime he does it, he overturns or crashes another vehicle. But he is always happy by the way he parked his car and it is nice to see the proud smile on his face, when he secures the car door with a rope.

So, ask me, and I would say, it is not just OK, but its great to be Mr. Bean. No matter what you are, you will feel happy and contended and above all like there is no other Bean, there will be no other you or me.... Don't we always wish to be some one totally different from others? Now is the time, Be yourself and Be different.