Jal Pari

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuHFHlHPhzY

I can't ever get enough of raving about Coke Studio, with all my gratitude for Nabarun Bose remaining intact ("This is the best music education for you!"). This one's a current favourite.

Thanda podchhe thanda! Get your MON-key caps out!

One of the things I've detested most the last few years of being in college is the insanely long vacations we have. It's a boon/bane of being associated with the Calcutta University, when most of us sit at home making plans to meet and spend time, even if college isn't on, just so we could waste our time. What ultimately happens is we all send sluggish texts to each other saying we're busy or make up some random rubbish. All so we don't have to drag ourselves out of our homes. It gets worse during the Autumn break. There's a slight nip in the air and our beds get dearer, as does the hot cuppa.

It's that time of the year again. I can feel my voice going dry rather frequently and I've already hosted a very warm welcome for winter by suffering from the worst bout of cold in a long time. Now that the weather goes a little easy and the clothes go thicker by the week, you'd think I'm bothering lesser about my weight loss plan but NO! I'm walking every evening and, if I lose my will some evening thanks to feeling lazy, I have driven two girls crazy who drive me out of my house. In fact my clicking-fingers-angrily-when-you-get-slow has caught on too! Speaking of driving people crazy, I've managed to get another How I Met Your Mother fan on board. That's a neighbour, Bonnie, who's a kid in high school. I got him so addicted to the Sitcom that he's finished watching 5 seasons in a matter of 6 days.

As of now, I've finished watching all the episodes that have been released so far and have absolutely gotten rid of any other pending work. That leaves only one thing for me to do: studies. I made the special effort of dragging myself off the couch and cleaning up my table, making all the preparations, even keeping a scented unlit candle on my table so I can lure myself into sitting down at the table, but nothing seems to be working. Just as well. 2010 has been the most jobless year of my life. Glad only two months of it are left.

It's taking me time to recover from my Pujo hangover :(

This year, unlike the last, I wasn't sitting on top of some hill and guzzling Champagne. I was in my favourite city, only guzzling vodka-pepsi. That's been my new find this Pujo: I admire Abhay Deol more now for introducing me to the brilliant combo of Vodka and Pepsi (remember Dev D?).

I also got my current favourite gadget: my new digital SLR Fujifilm camera! *applause* It was blissful when I captured images this season which look stunnning. This is my best shot this pujo-

Shubho Bijoya to all my readers!

When I was a child, my life was so much more secure, and change for the worst never threatened my day to day living. I knew that moving up from one class to another every year, buying new clothes and books, going for little outings with mummy, even to the tiny Safari Park was what kept my little life going, and always made me happy.

Things change so much as you grow up. This is an oft repeated line but I've started understanding it further today. One grows grave not just by age, but by the knowledge one acquires about her world. A world, that is tied together by such fragile strings, that happiness is too light a word to keep everything intact.

I'm upset about a lot of things, not JUST one. Till today, I've never had the reason to contemplate about death and understand the lives of others to continue after it. Despite the festivities in which I've been sucked in, my mind remains absent from the merry, thinking about what will happen a few weeks, or even months, from now. I could never even imagine in my wildest of dreams that my almost perfect world will be threatened so suddenly, and something I held so dearly to my heart, and almost taken for granted, might disappear someday. All of this, without informing me. Without taking my permission. Without saying even a silent goodbye.

I've never felt so helpless in my life. So out of place. So powerless, to make things right with the stroke of a wand. So much of disbelief and reasoning clouds my mind, that my tears are evading me.

Feelings

There's this person I've been trying to avoid for the last 3 months or so. Reason? My escapist attitude. I know there's a wee bit of horomones playing up on the other side, so I stopped taking calls and brought down contact to the minimum. It was he who (how shameless is he!) caught me online on Gtalk two days ago and asked, "Hey! How're you?". No reply. "So, where are you? DSE?".

Ugh. It was like taking a bullet.

Everytime I log onto the Internet these days, I somehow steer towards Coke studio. It's been the best music I've heard in the last few days. Coke studio for me isn't a very recent discovery (thanks to Nabarun), but of late, I've been listening to the sessions a lot more than usual. I love the Urdu verses and the music setup on the whole.

It's liberating, to say the least.

I've been having the worst possible sin-curve patterns of emotion. Last night, the much needed unburdening took place with K. I wasn't up for it but it so happened that I started feeling much MUCH better.

I have a feeling a year from today is going to be eventful.

Conjunctivitis is in the air, quite literally. Whenever I see an infected person (which is one out of five people I've been meeting everyday) I immediately reach for my hand sanitizer and keep my hands in my pockets so they don't go touch my eyes without my conscious guiding. I'm being more compulsive with this weather growing muggier and hotter. Suddenly today it seemed the sun was shining too brightly. Maybe the Sun is coming closer to the Earth. Or maybe the buildings in Udita have been painted too white.My eyes are threatening they'll turn a funny pink colour.

Maybe I'll escape the CPM taint this time too!

Many dreams, many lives (part 1)

I'm one of the very few people in this world who likes going to cafes alone. I, of course, have a purpose behind it. In general I love being alone and eating my food in peace, which is especially applicable to me when I'm in a foul, pensive or procrastinating mood. Today was one of those days. I was feeling jobless and I had the time to pause at Coffee World for a salad and a lemon ice tea (thanks to the heat).

I was sitting peacefully on my couch and just thinking of nothing, staring into space and sipping on my tea almost involuntarily when my mood got pepped up. The table opposite mine had just been occupied and I sat up almost alarmed for the conversation that ensued. I was sitting innocently in my couch and then began the race of my thoughts.

He was divorced and she was a lonely woman caught between her parents and her rather demanding job. I'm a pro when it comes to eavesdropping, I confess. It's a bad habit that often makes me squirm when I'm in such a situation myself and suspect others will overhear a particularly personal conversation of mine but you know about temptations...you'd rather devour the chocolate cake and relish it than regret when you see those extra pounds on yourself. That's a bad example to illustrate my point but you get it. So I listened to this rather nice guy telling his date how he's ready to put up with all her laziness and unwillingness to cook on sundays and other unreasonable demands. You'd say that's common in men: they promise and then forget even their wives' names, let alone their promises. I may be and untrained listener still and unable to pick up hints so soon, but something in the voice of that man told me he was being earnest. He was willing to put up with all the tantrums of that girl. He just needed a yes from her. Well he didn't exactly say he needed a yes but he said, "what's the harm in trying and giving it a chance?". My heart almost melted. Yeah yeah I know I'm quite gullible but you see, there's one important thing we all often forget. We forget to loosen up and try what we get. We're always so uptight in our lives and think, rather ironically, that things will chart their own course, that we often forget there are issues with us we need to sort out ourselves.

I felt things were going to be just fine between the both of them. Or I may have been very badly mistaken for all you know, but for that very moment, my heart went out to him...a guy with a heart and self proclaimed adjusting capacity of a nomad, who was ready to tell his date about his wife (the tramp?) who left him and give her the clear picture and about how he was ready to give life another shot.

I took one last sip of my tea, paid my bill and rose, taking just one look at the couple. She was busy digressing from the topic, talking about various insignificant things in her life while the guy looked at her simply. I wished for once I got to stay longer. Well I guess life's about keeping some suspense which you tend to forget ever existed later in your life. What's the significance of these little brushes we have in our lives that we forget about later? Isn't it important,then, to have a witness to our lives?