I’ve been wondering….

Lured at last - Yes, been hearing about WordPress from a very good friend of mine (You can find his blog here)... and even when he moved from Blogger to WordPress, I really didn't bother. Unlike him, I would continue to use Blogger - I like Blogger, Picasa and a lot of other Google stuff. They are good. So, what am I doing here at WordPress? Yesterday, another friend pinged me his blog and ya, it was WordPress. I succumbed to temptation - I thought I'd create a new blog to see how things are out here .... and then sat for a li'l over a day wondering what the purpose of this blog should be. (I should mention, I have a tendency to create accounts on every other site) I have blogs for my pictures, I have a web album on Picasa too; I also have two blogs I write: one for myself, one for the world to see. And now, I've created this third one.

What should I do with this one? I am thinking of writing about the world around me - my other blogs have been around my life...so, here is my attempt to talk about the world at large...

Today’s Theme

You thank me
I thank you
Let's thank each other
And be happy forever

Forever??

Is it?

Is it possible to inspire people around you without any inspiration within? Yes, it is!

Shantaram

I picked up this heavy book a couple of weeks ago - at my regular book shop in Chennai. Quite an interesting book - yes, a life of someone who escaped prison and was willing to live in Mumbai's slums and then work for mafia dons.... has to be interesting, right?

One of the few books that have humour and profound thoughts in equal measure - complimenting each other.....

http://www.shantaram.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shantaram_(novel)

What would you do?

What would you do what would you do if Jesus came to spend some time with you
If Jesus came to your house to spend a day or two
If he came unexpectedly I wonder what you'd do

When you saw him comin' would you meet him at the door
With arms outstretched and welcome to your heavenly visitor
Or would you need to change some things before you'd let him in
Like to burn some magazines and put the Bible where they'd been

Oh I know you'd give your nicest room to such an honored guest
And all the food you'd serve to him would be the very best
But what about your family conversation would it keep up its normal pace
And would you find it hard each meal to say a table grace

Would you be glad to have him meet your very closest friends
Or hope that maybe they'd stay away until his visit ends
Would you be glad to have him stay forever on and on
Or sigh of great relief when finally he'd gone

You know it might be interesting to know the things you'd do
If Jesus came in person to spend some time with you
What would you do what would you do if Jesus came to spend some time with you

My old-fashioned notebook

13.3.
It was there in my goody bag – spiral bound, logo at the bottom of every page – looking real neat. Ya, that’s the notebook am talking about. I got it the day I joined Google and it has been with me ever since…. I’ve written, scribbled, and loaded it with a bunch of papers – brochures, prints, write ups… in fact, there are so many papers, the notebook is double its size…it’s been with me to umpteen meetings, training sessions… it’s been with me each time I visited Chennai…each time I traveled some place…
Whenever I researched something online or heard about something I wanted to research….well, you know where you’d find them…

…and I lost it this morning…

I walked in with the notebook in hand because I didn’t want to forget what I wanted to do, walked into the café on my way up, and left my notebook there. It was about 2 hours before I realized what I’ve done, and I’ve been searching since then. Haven’t found it yet… been asking the security guards all day…no luck so far….

Will I ever see it again?

14.3

Yaayyyyyy.... I found it... :)

God only knows how much I've missed it!

Have you ever….

Well, it has been ages since I had the urge to post something …but something changed this week…it is that feeling you have when the statistics becomes a gruesome reality…when that one more accident on the road happens too close home that it is not a statistic anymore….
This week began on a pretty good note – a lot of people were celebrating the valentine’s day; I was asked by umpteen people about my boyfriend (the one am yet to find), the number of roses I got (which was zero!) and so on. But for me, it was just another Monday.
After such a Monday, I woke on Tuesday to find a freaky accident in the newspaper – it was about a lorry that had hit and killed a couple (who had incidentally got their daughter engaged the previous day and were on the way to book a wedding hall), the police had got another driver take this vehicle to the nearby police station after the driver had fled. But, on the way to the police station, the driver had lost control, hit another vehicle and fatally wounded another.
I read this with a sad heart, but then it was time for me to get ready to work, so got myself going. But then, at 10am when the cab should have come home to pick me up, the travels guy calls up and says there has been an accident, you take an auto and get to work.
I presumed that it would be a minor accident and got to work. I reach Tidel and even before I get to the office, I meet one of my friends and he asks “did you know about the accident?” and then I get the details.
The vehicle, in which I had traveled till the previous night and the same one that should have been at my place that morning, had met with a nasty accident that morning en route to our place to drop another colleague…the driver had rammed into a stationary lorry and both of them were taken to GH and then shifted to Apollo. The driver was unconscious till that afternoon and was supposed to be in a critical situation but thankfully started to recover in the evening.
I did not realize the intensity of the accident till I saw the crashed vehicle myself. The Ambassador, supposed to be one of the sturdiest on Indian roads was reduced to a crumpled mess. The entire front portion was smashed, and the top was completely gone. All that remained was that back, every other part of the car was a mess.
Seeing the car I realized that they were really lucky to get alive out of that car.

Srisailam

It started in a conversation that was going anywhere and nowhere...yes, I was chatting with Llewellyn ....and then, he asked what's up for the weekend and I said ...nothing...

In the next few minutes, we had zeroed on Srisailam - pending our 'illustrious' Imtiaz Bhai's confirmation... After that, I scourged through the net for all that I can find on Srisailam and ran home.... I had plans ...but dozed off.... until I heard 'your 20 minutes start now' ....well, it was Llewellyn’s call….all I could manage was ‘make it 30 minutes’ and rushed to get ready…
Half an hour later, I was at the KPHB main road…I was 11.15 pm and we set off towards Golconda where Imtiaz Bhai joined us…we were on our way and reached Mannanur at 2.40 am….. we had to wait till 6am – coz vehicles aren’t allowed in the night…. So, we parked and went to sleep….not without joking about Imtiaz Bhai’s polyphonic snoring (a lil later I got to know what that meant!) ….
I got up around 5:40….the place was filled with vehicles of all sizes….small carriers, lorries and trucks, cars and so on…. And people were pretty casual….only until they heard the vehicle at the beginning of the line start – a lorry –…. At the sound of that engine everyone hurried to their own vehicle and started…and soon that place was like a starting line of a race…. Everyone testing their engine ….and raring to go….
The moment the gate was opened, it was a free for all…blaring horns, noisy engines, and flying dust replaced the quiet and serene environ…wish I had a video of that few mins…the change from the calm and quiet morning to the blaring horns….

We let everyone go by,….and started off at the end of the line….as we went by, we found peacocks grazing…we stopped by the road to watch the sun rise below the sizzling power lines….after a few more stops, we reached the first view point…went through the bridge and then up to Srisailam….
After breakfast at the Punnani restaurant, we were hoping to get on the ropeway and the go to the dam…unfortunately, ropeway wasn’t working ….quite a disappointment…so we walked down to the dam – the 650 steps, at least that is what they said - went boating and by the time we got back, we were quite tired…. And since Imtiaz Bhai had refused to come with us…we told him there were a max of 350 steps….to which he asked ‘one way or both together’!!!!!
I got to say it was quite a sunny day….not a day where you can stand out in the sun for long…in spite of all the water around, the place was dry and hot….so, we started on our way back…. A lot slower because of the umpteen stops….
At one place, we went beyond a gate at the viewpoint…and got some wonderful pics of rocks and the dam…all the close-up shots of those rocks and trees growing from them are from this place…
Then we stopped along the bridge….and again it was a good place for some pictures…and ya, some of these pictures show you vast land – the kind of vastness you don’t expect to find all that often…
Another great place was this dam on our way back…it was post-lunch…after a lunch where I couldn’t help laugh at some of Imtiaz Bhai’s gyan to that hotelier….and the way he did it…
After we got out, we came across this kinda dam we had crossed in the middle of the night when we were going to Srisailam…while the two of us wanted to go up and check the dam on the other side, Imtiaz Bhai wasn’t all that enthusiastic…. I don’t knw why….but he refused to do any climbing or walking that day….
So, he stopped and asked an old man who said there is no water at all….but then, we found steps leading to the top,….insisted he stop and went up….and was it beautiful…it was wonderful…and I wont forget the way this guy got on a plank and went all the way, paddling with his hands….it was amazing…time and again, makes me wonder, how big is man? Often, we tend to forget that man is like a small speck on the face of earth…. So let me end that gyan now….
From there it was a series of stops and we reached Hyd after 6….by the time we came to the other end to our homes, it was close to 9…. And that was the end of yet another traveling weekend...

For pictures, please visit http://picasaweb.google.com/christelle1804/Srisailam

CHRIS REA - "Tell Me There’s A Heaven"

The little girl she said to me
What are these things that I can see
Each night when I come home from school
And mama calls me in for tea
Oh every night a baby dies
And every night a mama cries
What makes those men do what they do
To make that person black and blue
Grandpa says their happy now
They sit with God in paradise
With angels' wings and still somehow
It makes me feel like ice

Tell me there's a heaven
Tell me that it's true
Tell me there's a reason
Why I'm seeing what I do
Tell me there's a heaven
Where all those people go
Tell me they're all happy now
Papa tell me that it's so

So do I tell her that it's true
That there's a place for me and you
Where hungry children smile and say
We wouldn't have no other way
That every painful crack of bones
Is a step along the way
Every wrong done is a game plan
To that great and joyful day

And I'm looking at the father and the son
And I'm looking at the mother and the daughter
And I'm watching them in tears of pain
And I'm watching them suffer
Don't tell that little girl
Tell me
Tell me there's a heaven
Tell me that it's true
Tell me there's a reason
Why I'm seeing what I do

Tell me there's a heaven
Where all those people go
Tell me they're all happy now
Papa tell me that it's so

The weekend that went by – January 26-29

This has been one of the best (if not the best) weekends in Hyderabad. (Click here for pictures) I've been in Hyderabad for about a year and I've never traveled to so many places in a single weekend. At last, I find someone who walk, talk and travel as much as I would. Well, I think he has traveled a lot more… but, it was a pleasant surprise coz I'd almost given up trying to find someone willing to explore the places around Hyderabad.

With the long weekend approaching, I was raring to go someplace….and we (Llewellyn and myself) started off with the Parade Grounds, Secundarabad. For what? Well, it was Republic Day and we went to see how it is celebrated Hyderabadi style. We walked to the grounds after parking nearby, clicked a few pictures, watched the parade, watched the crowd,… then Vishal joined us and we headed towards Shamirpet lake. By the time we reached the lake, it was mid-morning – it was a sunny day – not the best time to be walking around the lake…after a few pictures, we made a move …. It was a nice and quiet place…wish there was some shade…

We went further down the road hoping to come across some interesting place…we were out of luck…so, we turned around and returned to Hyderabad, finished our lunch at Secundarabad and went to Durgam Cheruvu – a nice lake near Hitec city with a restaurant named 'Something Fishy.'… wonder if they catch the fish from the lake!!! It is a great place to relax – to just sit back and watch the birds, the duck colony (the Quackers family!), and the patterns on the water left by the frolicking fishes… Quite unfortunately, AP Tourism allows motor boats – which left quite a jarring note in the otherwise peaceful place…and ya, how can I forget to mention the family that turned up a little later – they either wanted the whole world to know their story or they considered each other deaf!

In spite of these, I did enjoy the afternoon there – thanks to the birds. As we were leaving, I fould a little boy fishing…and were they getting hooked!!! I didn't have to stay long to see his catch!

That was the end of day 1 – January 26

The next day, I left around 6am and we headed towards ICRISAT, missed it, and found it on our way back. The place was beautiful…a lovely place – with mist rolling in…it was a wonderful early morning walk – feeling the warmth of the sun chase away the chillness of the morning…

After breakfast, we went towards Golconda, where Imtiaz Bhai joined us, and then we headed to Warangal. I would rather call him the 'illustrious' Imtiaz Bhai…oh my, I'd never forget his running commentary…thanks to the fact that he grew up Warangal, we got to know all the places en route – and also, the places you'd reach if you had turned left or right, instead of heading straight to Warangal! Even after all the stories I'd heard from Llewellyn, he didn't fail to amuse me… in fact, by the end of the day, I was finding it hard to listen to him with a straight face. Once we reached Warangal, we got to know all the colleges, theaters, hospitals…and how can I forget the excitement in his voice when he took us by the hospital where he was born! I really wonder what would it be like…and how will I react if I go there after more than 2 decades…will I be excited and thrilled, the way he was….I don't know….I don't even know if I would ever get to that place again…

After a sumptuous lunch – now, if I could eat 4 pooris and rice with all the curries, curd, and sweet that came along, you got to agree …it was a good meal…. – we visited the Thousand-pillared Temple. Though I didn't find so many pillars…with quite a few on the ground marked with numbers that seemed to fit a puzzle….'Renovation,' said Imtiaz Bhai…

From there, we went to the Warangal Fort….a lot of ruins…and as if they weren't ruined enough, one could see them ruined by the people. It was quite disheartening to see the lack of maintenance, to see the carvings chipped away…

By the time we left Warangal, it was 8pm… and it was past 11pm when I reached home… exhausted but excited…excited about the way I'd spent this weekend…instead of sleeping through my weekend….

Nazarébaddoor

People started squinting at Nazarébaddoor with that mixture of suspicion and admiration which human beings reserve for those who can foretell the future. The path to her cottage began to be well trodden, by lovers asking if their sweethearts would return their love, by gamblers wondering if they would win at cards, by the curious and the cynical, the gullible and the hard-hearted. More than once there was a campaign against her in the village by people whose reaction to abnormality was to drive it away from their doorstep. She was saved by her discretion, by her refusal to speak if she didn’t know the answer, because the visionary indolence which allowed her to push the future in the required direction could not be conjured up; it came when it pleased, and her own will seemed to have little to do with it. Only when she was sure of her ability to ensure a happy outcome would she gently murmur the good news into a supplicant’s ear.

As she grew into womanhood, her power began to filler her with doubts. The gift of affecting the course of events positively, of being able to change the world, but only for the best, ought to have been a source of joy. Nazarébaddoor was cursed with a philosophical cast of mind, however, and as a result, even her innate good nature could not avoid being infected by a strain of melancholy. Difficult questions began to nag her. Was it always a good thing to make things better? Didn’t human beings need pain and suffering to learn and grow? Would a world in which only good things happened be a good world, a paradise, or would it, in fact, be an intolerable place whose denizens, excused from danger, failure, catastrophe, and misery, turned into insufferably big-headed, overconfident bores? Was she damaging people by helping them? Should she get her big nose out of everyone else’s business and let destiny take whatever course it chose? Yes, happiness was a thing of great, bright value, and she believed herself to be promoting it; but might not unhappiness be as important? Was she doing God’s work or the devil’s? There were no answers to such questions, but the questions themselves felt, from time to time, like answers of a sort.

In spite of her reservations, Nazarébaddoor continued to employ her gifts, unable to believe that she would have been given such powers if it wasn’t okay to use them. But her fears remained. Outwardly, she continued to behave with happy, outspoken, flatulent ease, but the unhappiness inside her grew; slowly, it’s true, but it grew. Her greatest fear, which she shared with nobody, was that all the misfortune she was averting was piling up somewhere \, that she was recklessly pouring out Pachigam’s supply of good luck while the bad luck accumulated like water behind a dam, and one day the floodgates would open and the flood of misery would be unleashed and everyone would drown. This was why the pot war affected her so badly. He worst nightmare had begun to come true.

Have you ever wondered about the need for pain and sorrow? Have you been 'cursed' with a philosophical cast of mind? A mind that can't help but wonder about the greater cause in life, a mind that can't help but look beyond the obvious.... God’s work or the devil’s? have you thought about all the thoughts that race across your mind?

Shalimar The Clown - Part 1

I read this book and it had quite a few interesting passages. The story itself - one that deals with the repercussion of one's actions in the lives of people around them - is quite interesting. Yes, there are times when I felt the narration is complicated, but the rest of the book quite easily makes up for it. Here is one such passage, something I found really, really interesting...

And when you’ve made it ... you must persuade the skeptical crowd – the envious, impotent crowd! – that you have returned with everything you wanted. If you don’t, you’ll be marked as a failure forever. -- this is one of those sentences that quite simply states what life is all about. Have you ever wondered how often everyone needs to convince everyone else around that they are doing what they wanna do, get what they want and so on?

Here is the passage for you:

His bedtime stories, told on those unpredictable occasions when he had been at her childhood bedside, were not stories exactly. They were homilies such as Sun Tzu, the philosopher of war, might have delivered to his offspring. “The palace of power is a labyrinth of interconnecting rooms,” Max once said to his sleepy child. She imagined it into being, walked towards it, half-dreaming, half-awake. “It’s windowless,” Max said, “and there is no visible door. Your first task is to find out how to get in. when you’ve solved that riddle, when you come as a supplicant into the first anteroom of power, you will find in it a man with the head of a jackal, who will try to chase you out again, if you stay, he will try to gobble you up. If you can trick your way past him, you will enter a second room, guarded this time by a man with the head of a rabid dog, and in the room after that you’ll face a man with the head of a hungry bear, and so on. In the last room but one there’s a man with the head of a fox. This man will not try to keep you away from the last room, in which the man of true power sits. Rather, he will try to convince you that you are already in that room and that he himself is that man.”

“If you succeed in seeing through the fox-man’s tricks, and if you get past him, you will find yourself in the room of the power. The room of power is unimpressive and in it the man of power faces you across an empty desk. He looks small, insignificant, fearful; for now that you have penetrated his defenses, he must give you your heart’s desire. That’s the rule. But on the way out, the fox-man, the bear-man, the dog-man, and the jackal-man are no longer there. Instead, the rooms are full of half-human flying monsters, winged men with the heads of birds, eagle-men and vulture-men, man-gannets and hawk-men. They swoop down on you and rip at your treasure. Each of them claws back a little piece of it. How much of it will you manage to bring out of the house of power? You beat at them, you shield the treasure with your body. They rake at your back with gleaming blue-white claws. And when you’ve made it and are outside again, squinting painfully in the bright light and clutching your poor, torn remnant, you must persuade the skeptical crowd – the envious, impotent crowd! – that you have returned with everything you wanted. If you don’t, you’ll be marked as a failure forever.”

“Such is the nature of power,” he told her as she slipped towards sleep, “and these are the questions it asks. The man who chooses to enter its halls does well to escape with his life. The answer to the questions of power, by the way,” he added as an afterthought, “is this: Do not enter that labyrinth as a supplicant. Come with meat and a sword. Give the first guardian the meat he craves, for he is always hungry, and cut off his head while he eats: pof! Then offer the severed head to the guardian in the next room, and when he begins to devour it, behead him too. Baf! Et ainsi de suite. When the man of power agrees to grant your demands, however, you must not cut off his head. Be sure you don’t. The decapitation of rulers is an extreme measure, hardly ever required, never recommended. It sets a bad precedent. Make sure, instead, that you ask not only for what you want but for a sack of meat as well. With the fresh meat supply, you will lure the bird-men to their doom. Off with their head! Snick-snack! Chop, chop, until you’re free. Freedom is not a tea part, India, Freedom is a war.”

Aren’t we like is?

From Nature

fragile and surrounded by the unseen....and we go along...spinning the web of life...

At times, we are happy about the way life goes...happy in the web we've spun around us...

At times, life freaks us out and we run around like crazy....only to realize we are stuck in our own web....

At times, we leave the web and venture out on a solid wall.... to realize there's much happening beyond our boudaries... we might find another web - just like us, we might find others, willing or unwilling to talk to us.... to invite us in....

At times, we find our friends vanish overnight... did they really care all the while? or was that your assumption? You may wonder and never know the truth....

At times, we find that with one sudden, clean swipe the world around us is shattered and gone forever...

At times, we find that we can create a new web all over again...

until.... the end of our web brings our life to an end ....

Mark Lowry

I was watching a Mark Lowry video last night. There were a few thoughts I thought were worth pondering....

"Even if you don't see a miracle, you can choose to believe"

"My faith is a flickering light - I just have to remember what I saw in the light and keep walking."

There were some songs witn interesting lyrics...and here are some I could find...

Some things never change...

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-XSgfzwlag">

Home where I belong...

Image in real life….

For the past few days, this thought has been at the back of my mind... and last night, well it was 3am this morning...when I lay down in bed, I could not sleep ...wrote it down before I went to sleep...

The comparison of what I am today with what kinda person I wanted to be when I was a kid.

When you were a kid, did you ever create an image of yourself - the person you'd like to be when you grow up? I am not talking about your professional life, we all do that when we are kids...I am talking about the personal life. Have you ever thought of the values you'd hold close to your heart, the principles you'd live by, and the kind of person you'd be at the end of the day? If you did think about these things, what do you see now? Are you living up to that childhood image of yourself? Are you better or worse?

I used to think about this when I was a kid and I had this strong image of the person I'd be - a person of strong heart, living by my values and principles, seeing the world in black and white, changing the world one day at a time, living the kinda life that inspires people, adopting children, and stuff like that.

Now, when I look back, I find that I have achieved some of these, gone wayward in some others, and yet to try some others. Honestly, I don't think I would be a perfect fit anymore. For better or worse, I don't think I can ever be the person I thought I would be.

What about you?