Casual Contemplations

I love my life.

2010-03-12T00:37:00.000-08:00

Spring break is here! I'm halfway through my 4th semester in college. I'm almost a junior. Wow! How did the time go by?
As I sit back and watch my friends turn 20, one by one, my 18 year old mind vicariously lives as a 20 year old. I wonder if the time will continue to fly and the next time I look back I'll be 30...
The teenage years are supposed to be the time of experimentation and excitement, somehow counterbalanced with the time to decide and plan out your adult life. Now that I am at the extreme end of the teenage spectrum, I wonder if these years have been all that they were supposed to have been.
1) Fall in love - Check
2) Find my passion - Check
3) Discover myself - Does that ever completely happen?
4) Try illegal substances - Check (Though they aren't completely illegal anymore - that takes a little bit of the fun out of it, doesn't it?)
5) Be independent, think independently - Check, for the most part
6) Make lifelong friends - Check, very successfully.
7) Get a drivers license - Fail, working on it though!
+ A few other things that I would like to keep private - Check
Overall, I would say my life has been satisfactory. Hell, it's been awesome. I love my life. I think sometimes, how there is barely anything that I would want to change in my life. I must be either a really lucky person or a really satisfied person, and knowing myself it must be the former.
I have it all, inshallah. Love, happiness, security, trust and forethought - what more could a person want?
I have always had all this handed to me, and the thought that my luck my run out and all of this may go away certainly worries me, but I do believe I have the ability to survive in the absence of these comforts and part of me wants to prove that I can.

Don't take life seriously!

2010-01-05T03:46:00.000-08:00

I want the race to end. I want to be where I am - in the present. I want to believe that the future will somehow work out. I want to eat a slice of cake without thinking I have to run it off.
Well, the my last wish I already have. Or I almost already do, I don't really care about the pounds of unhealthy fattening food that I eat everyday, but my point is - I keep telling myself I should.
Why should I? Why should I constantly care about my midterm next week, getting into the honors program next year, getting a good GRE score, getting into graduate school, getting a job, getting married, having a family... You see? It never ends.
Even the little things - remembering to submit my time sheet tomorrow for work, to charge my phone before I sleep, remembering to turn in that English paper in the next hour... Life is about constantly figuring out what to do next, and next.
If I am watching a TV show, I remind myself in the 15th min that I only have 40 min to watch the 43 min show because I have to take a shower and get to class in 75 mins. I don't want to have to do that. I want to be where I am. I want to live in the present. Life is going to move along weather I plan for it to or not, then why must I make such an effort to ensure that every min is accounted for. Time is NOT money. Time should not be money. Money is money and time is time. Why can't we leave it that way?
My brother said something to me once about how everything we humans do in the time between our birth and death, apart from reproduction (which is a necessary biological process that we must engage in to propagate out species) is just entertainment. That's right, relationships, education, economics, health care and the rest of the 'vital' facets of human life are all dispensable. How does that make you feel?

Change certainly is inevitable.

2009-11-22T22:15:00.001-08:00

Its been almost a semester since I last wrote....less than a month till I go back home for Ranjan's wedding. Its surprising how life surprises you, no matter how many times it happens I don't think I will ever get used to it.
Being a Sophomore has been great so far. It is so interesting how much I have changed. It is strange but I feel like when I turned 18, a switch turned on and turned me into a more responsible person. I suddenly care about my classes, so much that I have been late only once to a class all semester. Unbelievable, isn't it? Am I the same person who holds a record for being late from 1st std through 12th std? The same person who skipped too many Martin Baro classes my freshman year and was penalized a grade for it? I fret about my tests and papers and actually work really hard on them. I volunteer my time. But do you know what takes the cake? I wake up at 8:30 AM twice a week to go to a class that is a waste of time, just for the attendance.
I don't know what to think about this new me. Its stressful, always feeling like I have to do the right thing. Taking on other people's work just because I don't want someone else who was depending on them to suffer. Challenging myself instead of taking the easy way out. Being a happier, more involved person in all aspects of me life. All these sound like positive changes, and perhaps they are when viewed from the general societal perspective. I however, am not sure if being this way makes me happier that I used to be as an irresponsible kid. It certainly increases my feeling of self-respect and self-worth, but do I wish I could change it?
I don't know and perhaps I never will, but I am going to have to get used to this because I don't think this is ever going to go away.

Those swines, the media!

2009-08-10T04:41:00.000-07:00

News updates flashing on every channel, running through everyone's mind, making my cellphone beep every 10 minutes - the swine flu is testing my patience. Yes, it has killed about a 1000 people out of the 6,706,993,152 people in the world, but how does that make it a pandemic?
The seasonal flu kills between 2.5 to 5 lakh(1 lakh=100,000) people each year, and it includes all the strains of influenza virus such as H3N2, H1N1, H5N1, etc.
Remember the avian flu? I do. I didn't eat chicken or eggs for almost 6 months! That wasn't a pandemic either, and yet that was 10x times more severe than the swine flu.
No, this post is not meant to be a source of information about swine flu. I don't see what information is there to give. The symptoms are same as the flu, which all of us have gotten. The treatment guarantees full recovery. Then why is it such a big deal? Why is the media prompting us to treat it any different from the regular flu?
I am not afraid to say that I am extremely cynical of the whole issue. I spent a whole month at USF listening to my friends cringe at the sound of a sneeze, reading e-mail updates about the effect of swine flu and watching people on buses and trains wear masks that matched their clothes! And now, 3 months later the hype has hit India. Barely 6 deaths and everybody is wondering where they can buy their triple layered mask. I may sound heartless, you may say 6 deaths is 6 precious lives but don't you see that SO many people die from the flu anyway, that is why this is called the flu season. Had the hype not been created about the swine flu, the ayurvedic doctor from pune and the 4 year old boy from chennai would never have been on the news. Their deaths would have still been a great loss, but all the schools in the neighbourhood wouldn't have shut down because one boy died of the flu. And people fail to notice that the boy was in and out of the hospital a lot, which is an indicator of his low immunity - making him a vulnerable target for any strain of influenza.
The swine flu is driving me crazy, I can't wait for it to fade away like all these pandemic scares always do.

Lovely Indian bureaucracy

2009-07-30T10:52:00.000-07:00

23rd June 2009 -
I went to the Regional Passport Office, Chennai. I wandered around for a couple of hours trying to figure out where I was supposed to submit my passport application and finally found the queue that was to be my home for the next five hours. Now those of you who have been in an Indian government office know exactly what I mean by a queue, but for those of you who don't let me define the Indian queue - People pushing, poondh-ifying(cutting the line) and pinching which inevitability results in you being aggressive, alert and argumentative.
Right, so after a fabulous day combating the queue, I reached the window of the harassed passport officer who wanted his lunchtime biriyani more than anything else. He took one look at my application and said - The papers are wrongly arranged, affidavit 'I' is missing, three address proofs of parents are required. Now, in a sane situation my response would have been - Why are there no instructions on how EXACTLY the papers are meant to be arranged and what papers are required?
Anyway, my mom(who had to accompany me - who also started most of the fights with fellow queue-mates - since I was a minor) showed him her passport which clearly prints our address and the guy goes "No madam, we don't accept passport as address proof."
Yes, we verified your address ourselves before issuing your passport but we are too stupid to trust our own system. I mean, come on! Anyway, after trying to and failing to reason with him, we headed home in very bad moods.
The next day, June 24th, my father and I went with all the correct documents, ID proofs, xerox copies, originals and we were lucky enough to be at the front of the line. Our papers were stamped with nothing but a minor glitch - the order of the papers was wrong again - and we were out of there before 11 am! Oh the sweet feeling of success......never lasts long.
My passport application being filed under Tatkal(emergency) was supposed to reach me within 2 weeks. Alas! 2 weeks later my online passport status read :
Following objection has been raised on Your file
THERE ARE SOME DEFICIENCIES IN YOUR APPLICATION. PLEASE CONTACT P.R.O. OF THIS OFFICE
Seems a simple enough instruction? Think again. They never answer their phones, EVER. Their inbox is so full of all the complaint mails that my e-mail bounced back. They do not explain what or who the P.R.O is and how one goes about contacting him.
With no other option, I stepped back into the palatial Sastri Bhavan(Passport Office) with a very stressed mother in tow, on July 14th. Now I had to fly back to San Francisco barely a month later and again, for anyone who knows Indian govt. offices, a month is not necessarily as long a time period as it sounds. So we went into the passport office scoffing at the long line that extended all the way into the parking lot even before 9 AM(The office opens at 10:30 AM) which we assumed was the line for passport applications under the ordinary scheme(i.e not tatkal)
We went upstairs assuming that the P.R.O, whoever he was, had an office where he would meet with us and help satisfy our deficiency. Oh! How wrong we were. After much asking around and wasting precious time we ended up, that's right! in the long-ass queue that we had scoffed at earlier, which by the time we decided to join it, had doubled!
So we stood, and stood and stood. Finally after about a couple of hours we reached the counter where this guy with an old DOS computer asked me for my receipt number, he kindly informed me there is a discrepancy in my parents name - i have entered something different from what had been printed in my old passport. Right away, i felt like kicking myself. I remembered changing my dad's name on the application at the last minute because I figured that the travel agent who filled the application got my dad's name backwards. See, my dad's first name is Palaniappan and his last name is Ranganathan, which is his fathers name. The travel agent had filled Rangathanan Palaniappan, which I changed to Palaniappan Ranganathan before handing in the application. Now my old passport lists my dad simply as R. Palaniappan, which according to every government official in the state of TamilNadu, means my dads first name is indeed Ranganathan, so what if that is his father's name?
Anyway, so about 6 hours and many queue's later I reached the tatkal officer, one harried Mr. Bhoopathy, who nevertheless had the time and patience to explain to me Tamilnadu's system of nomenclature. "Paapa(child)", he said, "Until you get married your father's name will be your first name. Therefore, your name is Palaniappan Meenakshi. After you get married no, your husband's name will be your last name and Meenakshi will become your first name. This also you don't know va? What college level and all you are studying?"
I was too exhausted and afraid to argue, so all I apologized for my ignorance and moved on. He assured me that I would get my passport within 7 days. Once again, feeling triumphant, I walked out of and bid farewell to the passport office that I happily did not see myself coming back to until 2020, by which time I figured I could finally have Mr. Bhoopathy accept Meenakshi as my first name.
Call me superstitious, but I firmly believe that anyone who leaves the passport office without a trace of apprehension about not getting their passport will be made to return to that hell-hole again and again until they fear it. Yes, I did have to go back there today, July 30th, because 2 weeks after my last visit my status had not changed. As i approached the man with the MS-DOS computer, i felt like I was checking my board exam results and I held my breath. I held my breath until he told me that my passport was granted yesterday and will reach me in the next 3-4 days.
Yet, I live in fear.

Leo and Virgo

2009-06-29T15:22:00.001-07:00

Do you believe in sun signs? I don't think I ever did, but I loved checking out my horoscope nonetheless! I remember checking out my(Virgo) love compatibility with Chandru(Leo) almost a year ago and all the results I got said it was a terrible relationship.

I wonder then how all of a sudden, the results say this is a great long term relationship... they seem so true and real, as though they are written just for the two of us. If you know me or/and Chandru well, read some of these lines and tell me if I am just imagining the veracity!

When Leo and Virgo come together, they may at first think they have no common interests and nothing to learn from each other. This is a relationship that evolves slowly, each partner learning gradually how to understand and appreciate the other. Leo is outgoing, dominant, and charismatic, and often has a short fuse ;). Virgo is studious (???) and quiet, possessed of more versatility than Leo. Although these two are completely different, they make a wonderful team once each partner learns to accept the other's unfamiliar style.
Early in the relationship, Leo and Virgo may see nothing in each other but their faults. Leo may seem autocratic, and Virgo may seem too critical (so true!). But once they stop focusing on each other's faults and begin learning about each other's strengths, they'll discover a great deal. Leo may feel Virgo is overcritical, but will teach their partner to take things less seriously. Virgo may accuse Leo of being egocentric and overbearing, but can teach them to be attentive to the needs of others.

If Leo is a spend-a-holic, Virgo leans toward pinching pennies. (Tooo much of a co-incidence!?) This can be a source of conflict, especially if numbers-oriented Virgo is minding the household finances. Virgo may not always jump up and down with enthusiasm, but their steady presence has a value beyond just ego stroking. Leo's dream of enduring love can be realized with Virgo, whose integrity means promises are kept. This combo thrives when grounded in the details of daily life, spiced up with moments of exuberance.

Whether I am just imagining the truth in these statements or not, this makes me really happy. It is a sign, maybe even one from the heavens?! ;)

Same difference

2009-06-16T11:44:00.000-07:00

I was warned, everything will seem different when you go back home, they said. Your parents will not understand that you have changed and will still treat you as they did before you left, they said. Your friends at home who have gone through extremely different experiences will not understand you the way they did before you left, they said. I did not want to believe what they said, but it only seemed logical.

Now, I don't know if I am simply one of the lucky ones but I feel completely normal at home. I feel like my parents understand me, give me credit for the amount I have grown and I feel like we both appreciate each other a lot more than I did before I left, which is a definite positive. My boyfriend, who I had not seen for the last ten months, and I seem to be more connected that we ever were before.

When I say I feel normal at home, I don't mean to say that I feel like everything has gone back to how it was last summer, because that would be abnormal. No, I feel like I walked into a home and felt comfortable in it at once. My actions are rarely questioned, I feel like I am treated as an adult in my own home. I love it and I love all the people who are making me feel this way.

From San Francisco to Chennai

2009-05-30T07:18:00.000-07:00

Separated by 13,900 Km of land, water, concrete and sewage, these two cities are literally as different as night and day. On one end of the 12:30 hour difference in the streaming sunlight, the stainless steel vessels in Rathna Stores radiate heat and on the other end the heavy fog sits atop the lit up golden gate bridge at night. Sweaters, jackets, tank tops, shorts, mini-skirts and boots that proudly hung on pink and white hangars in my closet at school are neatly ironed, folded and pushed out of sight in my Godrej cupboard at home. My stomach that yearned for the less than mediocre, exorbitantly priced naan and curry at school is rejoicing at the sight, smell and taste of hot, fresh chappati, murungakai sambar and mutton fry. My mac that never failed to find me a free wireless connection no matter where my travels took me in the United States, finally decided to give up on me in the land of 'sab-chaltha-hai'.

My accented and cultured 'sorrys' and 'thank-yous' are met with bewildered stares that make me feel foolish. My tendency to convert rupees into dollars and thus declare everything cheap is an advantage to my friends who benefit from this startling generosity.

Life as I know it is a term that is rendered invalid, in this partly nomadic lifestyle. Life, love and experience take on different meanings depending on which point in the 3 dimensional globe I am pinned to.

Moving back and forth

2009-05-19T18:47:00.000-07:00

July 14th 2008 was an important day, it was the day when Chandru began his first day of college at VIT and I flew to The United States to embark on my own journey in college. I still remember that morning- when Chandru left to VIT, that day- when my friends packed for me, that night- when I bid farewell to everyone I had ever loved (Except my mom, who was with me)...it was painful, yes and it seemed as though I could never be as happy as I was before I left.

In short, I guess that feeling was true.

Until July 14th 2008, everyone I had known and loved lived within a few minutes of me, so leaving them for an unknown world full of new experiences and surprises was frightening. Then I came to the U.S. and spent a month with the family before I had to leave my mom on my birthday. Thats right, isn't that just the worst birthday present ever? Saying goodbye to the one person you love more than anyone else? It was hard for me and I know it was hard for mom, but in the 9 months since I have grown so much, its hard to describe it in words.

I have had some life-altering experiences and some consciousness-altering ones too ;), I have realized how to live in the real(but a little protected) world, I have made some lifelong friends and essentially, learnt more about myself.

Tomorrow, May 21st 2009 will be the day I go back home. Its funny how one year away can make you uncertain about what to expect from a place and the people you spent 17 years with. I can never be as happy as I was before I left on July 14th 2009, and the reason is because I will miss my friends, family and life in San Francisco. Whether I like it or not, San Francisco is pretty much home - The freedom of taking the MUNI, the ease of making my own money, the freedom to do whatever I please, make my decisions based on my own criteria - are just some of the things I am going to miss, greatly.

Yesterday, May 18th 2009 was the day I officially finished my freshman year of college. I moved out of Hayes Healy 408 at 7:00 PM. It was emotional...and I certainly remember every detail of the day. My final - that morning, My friends helping me pack - during the day, saying goodbye to them - my family at school, driving to San Jose with my brother after some difficulty fitting the stuff in his car....

Who knows what the next 3 months will bring...whatever it does bring, I know I can handle it.

Almost home

2009-05-11T16:43:00.000-07:00

Exactly 8 days before the flight takes off ...

A few hours of sleep, a little discomfort caused by the cramped seats and I'll be home.

I'll be home before I know it ...

Able to see the people I love, in the city I love.

I love Chennai - the unique culture, the annoying heat, the mokkai jokes...

I can't wait to go home.

I imagine walking out into the airport - looking for my parents, Chandru and my friends. Hugging them, talking to them face-to-face for the first time in 10 months.

Going out into the parking lot, joking about the amount of luggage I have, getting into the car and driving home on the familiar roads, commenting on what has changed.

Going home, petting Zebu, going into my room and falling asleep on my own bed, for the first time in 10 months.

I have changed, my friends have changed, Chennai has changed, but the idea of home never will. I yearn for that stability, that comfort, that happiness that nothing but home can provide. I yearn for it and to think that I will feel it in less than 10 days...

Who am I? Who am I becoming?

2009-03-16T17:06:00.000-07:00

I certainly have changed in the last eight months that I have been away from home. But why?

Why do people change when situations change?

Does the environment really play that much of a role in our thought process and the way we lead our lives?

I just realized that it does. It plays a much larger role than I expected.

I always assumed that I wouldn't change unless I consciously made an effort to change, now I realize I was wrong. I changed, unconsciously. I can only speculate, and I propose that the only way to remain unchanged is to consciously and continuously try to. Then again, this is not that easy a task and I certainly don't want to trouble myself trying to keep that up.

Anyway, when I say I have changed, I don't mean my accent, the way I dress or how responsible I am. As always, I am talking about relationships->love->long distance->analysis of my thoughts.

I have been feeling, and I am sure Chandru will agree, that I have become very critical, cynical,and have been expecting way too much out of him. I never really thought it was me, as I am human, I automatically blamed him for the change. But now I think it might be my fault, to an extent :)

I think I know how Alexander Fleming felt when he discovered penicillin, the feeling of finding a $10 bill on the street, the feeling of learning something unexpected. I happened to watch Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge while eating lunch today as I hadn't watched a hindi movie in months..When I found Shah Rukh's act cheesy and unbelievable, I felt something shatter in me, my belief in romance, cheesy as it may be, was something I was proud of.

Thankfully, as the movie progressed and by the time my favorite song Zara Se Jhoom Lo started playing, I found myself realizing that I had been watching too much American TV and too many hollywood movies where the underlying theme was pretty much - girl and guy feel an attraction, they are together for a bit, they have sex, they want space, they split up, they find some one else, have sex, that doesn't work out either, they move on again, and again, and again until the end: they find someone 'perfect' 100 relationships later (OR) they realize that life is best when lived alone.

In DDLJ when Shah Rukh teases her the morning after she gets drunk and his little speech on 'Hindustani ladki ki izzat' and his 'sharif but bad boy' act is so cute, it made me realize the crudity and the predominance of sex in the western concept of love. I am not saying that romance as I imagine it in Indian terms, places no emphasis on sex, but I truly believe and would like to continue believing that sex is special...

Anyway, my point is - love had begun to seem a lot different from what it meant to me, I had begun to seek the 'perfect', ' smooth' and 'seamless' feeling in my relationship with Chandru and obviously I didn't find it, because that feeling does not truly exist. And when I did not find it, I found myself thinking in terms of Sex and the City - i.e:Whenever there is trouble in the relationship, you up and leave - that is what I would call the stereotypical western concept of relationships.

However, to my credit, I got through the difficult times, a wee bit grudgingly, but it is all worth it. So worth it. I love Chandru, and every time I realize that it seems unbelievable that I could have ever thought otherwise.

Is this why they say moving to a different country is difficult? As easy as it may sound to say you must always stick to your roots, remember your culture, and as much as you want to do those things...the environment around you does bring about certain inevitable changes, some good and some bad - I must learn to have the courage to influence these influences and be the person I want to be, not just be the person I become by default.

Yay Me!

2009-03-16T02:06:00.000-07:00

You know how they say that love is not all laughter and smiles, true love is being able to endure difficult situations...I feel like I know what that means now. Granted, I have been through moderately challenging situations in my love life...the last one month was pretty much the peak of all kinds of personal challenges. And I survived it.

There were several FML situations in the last few weeks. I even considered posting on www.fmylife.com, thats the state I was in. Oh to sidetrack a little, I am obsessed with that insanely addictive website :) Anyway, my relationship with Chandru was bumpy, my school work was sliding, other relationship/friendship drama, my aunt passed away, my mom broke her leg, I was having an identity crisis or sorts...I can think of a 100 more, but I don't want to overwhelm myself - so I am going to stop.

Basically, I was in hell. But I survived it, by MYSELF. True, I came out a little less innocent and a little more cynical, but what the hell - that is what growing up is, right?

Timepass friends

2009-03-02T01:35:00.000-08:00

Timepass friends can be defined as those friends who you hang out with not because they are great friends or because you click with them, they are the people who you would not be friends with if you had the other group of friends who you really think of as 'friends'. You can never have a singular timepass friend, they always come in a group.

Why is 'timepass friends' an offensive term? I think I am a timepass friend to many people in many groups. I don't mind that at all. Its not that I don't want to make new good friends, its just that making new good friends takes a while and maybe eventually someone from your group of timepass friends will make it as your good friend.

Maybe it is my fault, maybe I am being to reserved and I am not letting my guard down, but I have never been away from my good friends. I have always had a best friend and a group of good friends. I have never had, nor been a timepass friend before I moved to college, but I like being and having timepass friends. It gives me a new sense of privacy and personal space. It enables me to identify with a group and yet not. Its interesting and confusing...I certainly am confused right now.

America : The land of freedom, to all but one?

2009-01-21T23:31:00.000-08:00

1940 - Japanese

Almost 110,000 Japanese, including several American citizens were sent to war relocation camps after the pearl harbor incident. They were uprooted from their homes and jobs - all because of the country their descendants were from.

5 years later the internees were freed and given $25 and a train ticket home. $25 to rebuild their entire lives. They had lost everything they owned, they had no means of livelihood, they had to start from scratch.

1950 - African Americans.

After years and years of slavery and ill-treatment they continued to be segregated, tortured, prosecuted by the police and government on fake grounds, insulted, humiliated, called unnatural - all because of the color of their skin. Hundreds on people laid down their lives in the hope of a better tomorrow for their fellow people.

But some people like Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream and realized it.

1960/1970 - Gay

As homosexuality began to come out into the open, people all over the country tried to beat it down. They used some of the most illogical arguments. They used religion and god, they said that gay people are evil forces who are trying to recruit their children and eventually will cause an end to the world as they will put an end to the family lifestyle. The openly gay people were shunned from society, lost their jobs, had their homes taken away, were prosecuted and ill-treated by the police.

But some people like Harvey Milk recruited them and he took a bullet through his head that opened the closed doors of closets all over the country.

2000 - Islam

More than 50 years ago, the thing that happened with the Japanese, happened with the Muslims. September 11th brought bombs, all the muslim-americans were tortured, taken in for questioning, held without evidence - their lives were destroyed.

Today Muslims certainly do not have equal rights that non-muslims are provided. A muslim faces open prejudice, hatred, judgement, inequality and they can't do anything but wait their time out.

I see a pattern, I see that at every point different minorities are targeted, the country graduates from being against a certain sector of people to finally being for them. And almost inevitably, they all have one great spokesperson or leader who represented them and then got assassinated.

Is it just that people feel the need to have an issue going on? Can the world never be at peace and can everyone just not be equal? Does there have to be segregations based on religion or ethnicity?

That said, I wonder who will be the spokesperson for the Muslims. Who will pull them out of their bottom of the heap status? Could it be Barack Hussein Obama?

Come to think of it, it has to be someone with enough power to convince America that their prejudice against Muslims is unjust, and I truly can't think of anyone who can do that other than Mr. President, who is all for change and equality.

Kupam-Nai(Kutha) Crorepathi

2009-01-11T01:13:00.000-08:00

Slumdog Millionare, the movie that has made such a huge impact in American Cinema, a movie about Bombay - the slums, the corruption, the mafia, the poverty, the prostitutes - and all its unfairness, failed to impress me.

Yes, it was an enjoyable two hours, but when I found myself looking forward to the next question on the Who Wants to be a 'Milllllare' (as Anil Kapoor chooses to pronounce it) just so I could try to answer it myself, I realized something wasn't perfect. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying it was a bad movie, it wasn't - especially for a director who is not a mumbaiite, it is quite commendable. The little flashbacks in the police station where Jamal grows from a young boy into a man even before you realize it was a brilliant strategy. However, some of them like the 'Benjamin Franklin' one failed to seem plausible. Why would a young, blind, illiterate boy (Arvind) care to ask who the man on the dollar bill was and further yet how would he know his name? I did not know that Benjamin Frankin was on the dollar bill and I am sure most of my peers wouldn't either and I did my entire schooling in India.

The female lead character who played Latika, was very pretty and looked very Indian despite being Hispanic. I did think that her character as the third musketeer should have been developed better. All that I saw of the relationship between Jamal and Latika, before they left for Agra, was at best two children playing together. Yes, Jamal invited her to share their shelter when it was raining, but they were little children and love at first sight does not exist at that age and more so when they had just lost their parents. That action was clearly that of pity and even if they had grown closer over the relatively brief part of their childhood that they spent together, I didn't feel like Jamal -had- to go back and find Latika.

Salim, Jamal's brother, on the other hand was an excellently played character. The actors who played him at different ages, all fit the character and one another perfectly. Jamal himself was a very subdued character, unsurprising for someone who went through all of that in less than a decade. Yet, I liked Jamal. He seemed like a good guy, a guy a girl could fall in love with, a guy who would not trample over others for anything.

Another issue I had with the film is the way the Police unrealistically let Jamal off, no false cases? No attempts to make some money? Come on, with a guy as recently famous and as rich as Jamal, surely they would expect something for holding him in questioning for a night. Irrfan Khan, as the cop, didn't really have much to do. I love him as an actor, but this wasn't his best performance. The other fat, short cop on the other hand, always plays such a good bombay cop! I loved him!

All in all, a must-see movie for every Indian, because it will make you feel good and proud that you are Indian(Even though it doesn't show the best of India, you know what I mean - you will love that an (essentially) Indian movie has made it huge in Hollywood!). As for people of other ethnicities, despite everything I said - it still is a great movie and I would recommend you watch it, just once though!

P.S - Sorry, I translated the title into Tindi(Tamil+Hindi) because I don't really know the word for slum in Hindi! Educate me?!

Compromise is to relationships as a sail is to a boat

2009-01-04T14:37:00.000-08:00

All of us in relationships have heard and believed some variation of that phrase. But then is sacrifice a compromise? If one person sacrifices something for the other, something they want for themselves - is that okay? Is the relationship still a healthy relationship? Can both the people move on and live happily? Will the sacrifice-r never be able to stop thinking 'what if' and will the sacrifice-e be able to live with the fact that the other person is truly the 'better half' in the relationship?

Is it okay to accept something that the other person gives up for you even though you know that they really want it? Isn't that selfish? But what if there is no other solution to the problem? What if one of us must give up something big in our lives to make the relationship work, how do we pick the lucky one?

And the clock strikes 3!

2008-12-25T17:15:00.000-08:00

27th December 2005, seems like ages ago doesn't it?

Well that was the day Chandru and I became a 'thing'. Today, 27th December 2008(that is the date in India right now) marks the 3rd year of our relationship. Not a continuous one mind you, we have had breaks that lasted a minimum of 10 minutes and a maximum of aprox. 2 months. The reason I consider these breaks a part of our relationship as well is because - 1) We didn't really date anyone else during that period. 2) We never marked the dates we got back together each time :)

Moving on, we have been in a long distance relationship for the last 5 months and it surprises me that after the initial hiccups(more like choking) I am very happy in this relationship. In fact the only thing that I would change if I could is - the fact that I have to spend my own money to call him. Yes, I am frugal.

No, but seriously, I am not going to say that I wish we were together all the time now because I feel like the last two years in high school, we were together all the time and while that is not a bad thing, I like the fact that we both lead our own lives and are still able to manage a relationship.

I feel like I know his friends pretty well, I feel like I understand the problems he is going through and I feel like I can talk to him about my life and expect him to be interested.

Every aspect of our life is not connected, and while I liked it while it was that way - this variation was necessary for me to believe that we could be together in any situation.

They say distance makes the heart fonder and I think that is true in a sense, there is some frustration that I cannot be with him physically when ever I want, but I know I will be with him relatively soon and that is all that matters.

I love him, I do. And I am sure that this 3rd anniversary is only the beginning of many more to come.

I do NOT listen to music

2008-12-06T12:34:00.000-08:00

You read that right.

No, I'm not kidding, I mean it!

Why is music such a big deal? Why is the first question I'm asked always have to have the words 'favorite' and 'bands' in it? Why do people think its weird that I don't really care about music?

Sure, If something is playing I will not object because music just sort of fades away into the background for me. Unless it is a heavy metal scene, in which case I will get out of there as fast as I can so that I can avoid dealing with my splitting headache later on.

Songs don't seem 'brilliant' or 'genius' to me. Really, it is a bunch of words(that more often than not, do not make sense) sung to a tune composed by pounding drums, twanging guitars and an electrical piano.

I do not understand why people make such a big deal out of music. Maybe I am an odd extremity at the negative pole of the spectrum, but I don't really understand the people at the other end, who define their lives with music. How can someone define their lives based on lyrics they hear, i.e - other people's emotions/feelings/thoughts/etc. ?

I have never been into music, even when I was much younger and didn't contemplate so deeply. I remember back in 7th standard, when Kavya and I were watching the Tamil movie, Minale at the theater, she vowed that she would make me learn at least one song. And so she 'taught' me how to learn the lyrics of a song. All I remember of that song today is 'Sunday monday tuesday, elu naaluke something-ya' .

People always give me pitiful looks when I tell them how I'm oblivious to music, but really I don't think I am missing out on anything. Sure, it would help me identify with a specific group of people with a particular music interest, but other than that - what exactly am I losing?

Mumbai, again.

2008-12-05T17:58:00.000-08:00

July 11, 2006 is a date that every Indian living in India will remember, fondly called 7/11 borrowing its format from the better known 9/11. There was one 9/11 and none after, the United States of America got the message the first time around. They made sure their security was so fucking tight that any brown person was a suspect. I am not saying what they did was right or wrong, I am saying it worked. So maybe India is a little slow, maybe they needed terrorists to blow up major cities more than once. The 1993 blasts in Mumbai was so long ago, they forgot about it. The 2006 blast came as a MAJOR surprise. There had been a little terrorist activity all through, but nothing as major as that. The city eventually got back on its feet and people resumed their lives. But I, as I assume may other people did, figured that after such a major attackt terrorists would have some serious problems getting through security, etc. The Indian forces obviously must have known that it wasnt going to stop with Mumbai and that terrorists would try and attack other big cities.

Forget other cities, one would imagine Mumbai would have increased their vigilance multifold. But no, barely a couple of months later, September 8th 2006 - At least 32 people are killed in a series of explosions, including one near a mosque, in Malegaon town, 260 km northeast of Mumbai.

Shocking? Read the rest of the chronological terrorist timeline over the last 3 years.

Feb. 19, 2007 - Two bombs explode aboard a train heading from India to Pakistan; at least 66 passengers, most of them Pakistanis, burn to death.

May 18, 2007 - A bomb explodes during Friday prayers at a historic mosque in the southern city of Hyderabad, killing 11 worshippers. Police later shoot dead five people in clashes with hundreds of enraged Muslims who protest against the attack.

Aug. 25, 2007 - Three coordinated explosions at an amusement park and a street stall in Hyderabad kill at least 40 people.

May 13, 2008 - Seven bombs rip through the crowded streets of the western city of Jaipur, killing at least 63 people in markets and outside Hindu temples.

July 25 - Eight small bombs hit the IT city of Bangalore, killing at least one woman and wounding at least 15.

July 26 - At least 16 small bombs explode in Ahmedabad in the state of Gujarat, killing 45 people and wounding 161. A little-known group called the "Indian Mujahideen" claims responsibility for the attack and the May 13 attack in Jaipur.

Sept 13 - At least five bombs explode in crowded markets and streets in the heart of New Delhi, killing at least 18 people and injuring scores more. The Indian Mujahideen again claim responsibility.

Oct 30 - Eleven bomb blasts rip through Guwahati, the main city of northeastern Assam state. Detonated in quick succession, they kill at least 68 people and wound 335.

Nov 26 - At least 101 people are killed in Mumbai as an unidentified number of armed attackers shoot at and toss grenades into crowds at landmark hotels and buildings.

Nov 29 - Police finally end the siege at the iconic Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai. At least 155 people, including foreigners, were killed in militant attacks on two luxury hotels and landmarks across the city.

(Source: Reuters)

If one listed the major cities in India, one would realize that many of those cities are represented in the timeline.

Don't you think its time India did something about this?

Is your life the 'default' ?

2008-11-19T00:02:00.000-08:00

Do you believe in living the 'default' life? - to quote my brother. The default life is defined as the the life led by one who does not aim to do unique things that interest him, but instead follow what the society requires one to do to to be considered a successful individual - study, work, marry, reproduce, die.

I for one, don't agree with the 'default life' theory. I believe that every person derives happiness from the way they live. It may seem to people on the outside that their life is boring and monotonous, but it may not be so. If one is not happy with the way he is living, he cannot sustain that way forever. He will seek to change the situation and make sure he is content with the way he is living. I know that I probably would be happy not leading an 'exciting life' traveling every week, because while that may seem exciting to someone on the outside it probably is more stressful than anything else. I know I would be happy living in 2 maybe 3 cities my whole life. I know I would be happy getting married to the person I love as soon as possible. I know that I would be happy having two children and a suburban house. I know that I would be happy working a 9-5 job.

Why does everyone have to have an exciting dream? I have a dream and I think it is exciting! My dream is to have a steady job and a happy family. Yes, it may be what everyone wants from life but it is different. It is different because the way I will relate to my husband/kids will be different from the way someone else will. I think it would be really satisfying to be able to go back after work to a family that loves me.

I love spontaneity, so maybe a unplanned vacation with my husband will satisfy that! The point I am trying to make is that people can have exciting lives even if they don't have souvenirs from 15 different countries to prove it.

Koooo Chuk-Chuk-Chuk

2008-11-15T23:49:00.000-08:00

Have you ever missed a train? Arrived there literally a second late to see the doors shut in front of you? Watched it chugging away from you ever so slowly that if it were an Indian train you could have easily jumped in? Calculating all the things that took you a second too long to do that might have contributed towards the few seconds late that you were? Had to endure the hour long misery of sitting on the platform waiting for the next train occupied with nothing but your thoughts that seem to focus on this recent event?
As I stood on the platform and watched my San Francisco train slowly start crawling away from me, I realized how Shah Rukh Khan felt when he stood in the railway station watching Preity Zinta go back to Pakistan, in the movie Veer Zara. Now as I sit here on the blue bench in the presently train-less San Jose Diridon station, having watched all the trains depart one by one, I can do nothing but wait for the 5 pm Caltrain to San Francisco.
Missing this train is going to inconvenience me, especially since I have to be at the Castro Theater at 7:30 pm, which seems a little out of reach right now. But more importantly it provided me with yet another new experience.
Those of you have never missed a train, will never be able to comprehend the emotion. It is a compound mixture including a feeling of failure, helplessness, frustration, exasperation, anxiety and boredom, which will manifest itself later as you wait for your next train.
What do you do when you miss a train? You must occupy yourself somehow, like I am using this opportunity to update my blog. If you don’t have a laptop/ipod/phone/book/psp or anything that can entertain you, you are going to have to resort to using your imagination. Trust me, it can be quite fun! Day dreaming - if there is something that you miss or desire, nothing beats the power of daydreaming but while fantasizing – mind you, keep them clean unless you can conceal the evidence, if you know what I mean ;) . Making a mental plan for the future – for the day, week, year, 4 years of college, or what the heck – your entire life! Making up a life story about the people around you, imagining what they are saying in Spanish – are they talking to their significant other? Are they having a fight? What could it be about?!
Alright, its 4:45 and the train’s here now. Relieved, that you are done waiting, you get in and sit at your favorite seat, which in my case is the end of the row two-seater in the upper part of the train. But you don’t have to stop using other people as entertainment. Look at people on the seat opposite you. This has never failed to provide some amount of amusement for me. This time it is a father and daughter, who seem to be too intimate to be considered normal. The girl is probably around 12ish and she is holding her dad’s hand and sleeping in his lap…hmm…there could be something messed up there! On the last train that I took to San Jose, there was this Indian guy, who did not stop yelling at his girlfriend in Telugu ALL trip. That was not as entertaining, since I was trying to do homework. The last time I took the train back to San Francisco, a couple of weeks ago, there was this old man who was trying to get to a concert in Golden Gate Park. Since USF is right by the park, I offered to show him which busses to take, and we ended up traveling together on half the trip. He was annoying, not in a very bad way, in the sense that he never stopped talking and praising himself. This was just before the presidential elections, so he went on and on and on about how he heads the city council of his town and therefore is very politically informed, etc. etc. etc. At the end of the trip he gave me a little paper with his phone number and asked me to call him sometime!
Alrightly, I have successfully managed to convert my one-hour of waiting into something, i.e this post! The train just started moving and I’m glad I’m in it this time as opposed to out there on the platform! I’m sure there are a few people who got in a couple of minutes late this time and watched this train roll away from them, and as an experienced train-misser I wish them all the best while they are waiting for the 6 pm train!

Long distance relationships

2008-11-11T15:24:00.000-08:00

I did not think myself qualified enough to write about long distance relationships(or LDRs as they will be referred to in the future) until now. I have maybe 3 months of experience under my belt and trust me, it seemed like 3 years.

When I committed to being in an LDR i truly did not imagine it would be so hard. I did not for see the technical difficulties that I would endure. Thats right, technical difficulties such as bad internet connectivity in Vellore. This may not seem like a big deal, but it is. I have never had a two way webcam chat with Chandru because his damn reliance data card sucks.

Long distance relationships are like virtual relationships. Its a different life, you are a different person because you only talk for a few hours a week. You talk about stuff in the past, because that is what is common to you. The present on the other side seems foreign.

Your boyfriend cannot pacify you when you are frustrated - that the bank is closed for Veteran's day after taking the BART all the way there and spending the last $10 of cash that you had on you - because it is 3 am for him in India. Besides it would take too much effort to explain to him what the BART is, why you had to go all the way to Dublin, CA to go to your credit union, what a credit union is, why I do not have more cash on me, what Veteran's day is, and a million other questions that may arise. Even if he is a smart guy and realizes that he shouldn't ask questions when you are distraught, his unawareness about local terms and customs will disable him from making you feel better. This inability of his will only frustrate you more and cause a rift between the two of you.

I survive my LDR by giving it a huge amount of priority and giving up my hard earned money, because I think it is worth it. I think I have something special. I think its love.

I have no idea where this came from..

2008-11-08T19:27:00.000-08:00

A photo is the most misleading piece of information. It leads your mind to form impressions of a person based on physical appearance alone. I think people are NOTHING like what they look. You cannot look at a person and say, "wow, he looks luck such a smart, funny guy." You know why you cannot say that? Because you will never look at a silly looking guy in orange jeans and say that. He may be smart and funny and charming and just have an extremely bad set of genes(pun intended!)

Almost every person I know is very different from their photographic self. Posing for a picture in front of the camera is something you learn as a child. As a one year old, you are encouraged to smile or wave at the camera. As a five year old you are taught to make funny faces. As a 13 year old you try to imitate the look your onscreen hero sports. Cameras as we see them are extremely dangerous objects. They have the capacity to record an image forever and ever that can never be erased. This scares us subconsciously and we try to look, what we think is, our best - which inevitably winds up being fake.

Productivity tips for myself

2008-11-02T22:22:00.001-08:00

1. Clear up the space around me and organize my thoughts

2. Make a practical and doable to-do list

3. Think of a reward plan

4. Multi tasking helps me work better because I prefer variety.

5. Go to the atrium and don't take my laptop, unless i have to work on a paper/essay/research

6. Drink some tea and rejuvenate myself

7. Think about what I want from life and all that I have promised myself and others.

8. Think about how I don't want a repeat of high school.

9. Push all thoughts out of my mind and get to work.

10. Stop writing in my blog and start reading Jane Eyre.

Sinful deeds...

2008-10-11T14:00:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I got drunk for the first time last friday.

The reason I delayed writing about it was I didn't want my initial high to cloud my actual perspective, and it might have. I just found the draft that I saved on saturday and it said that getting wasted was GREAT! I still think it was, it was a lot of fun to just be able to not care about what you're doing but I kind of feel like I prefer being in control you know. I don't think I was totally not in control of myself, I just wasn't totally in control of my self either.

That said, if I was with people I've known for a long time and trust unconditionally, I wouldnt care.

This doesn't mean that I am never going to get drunk over here again, I probably will but I know that it will be more fun if I am with people I know better!

I am never going to get over this and stop writing abt SF vs. Chennai

2008-09-29T12:14:00.000-07:00

Do I fit in? I am sure some people out here think I am boring, shy, immature, or simply have nothing to say. The last one just may be right. Sometimes I just have nothing to say. Because when people are randomly talking about stuff(arratai-adichifying), I don't know what to say.

Maybe what I am doing is wrong, maybe I should make more of an effort to act like how people act here, but that will take some time and it will seem like I am changing myself because everyone is different.

When I walk back from class with a big group of people, I usually don't say anything because I don't know what to say, I know I am repeating that phrase too much. I feel awkward to walk back in silence.

I am not sure what is right and what is wrong. I have made a couple of mistakes. Like once, I was telling this guy that one of his jackets looked awesome, and that he had a good taste in clothes! Then for fun, kalaikara mathiri, i added that his taste is not always good, and pointed at what he was wearing right then. That would elicit a few laughs and a witty response from a guy back home, but this guy was a bit offended and everyone around him was kind of shocked. I was like oh fuck. That is totally my fault, because I should have realized that he might not take it in the same way that my friends back home would.

I feel like I have to have fun and go out on the weekends because everyone is. Don't get me wrong, I love new experiences and I love that I've had a whole lot of them in the last month, but sometimes I want to just be by myself because I feel out of place when I go out with big groups.

One thing is for sure, I have a hectic schedule. With school, homework and my jobs. It keeps me pretty busy. On top of that, I have a pretty amazing floor with girls who accept me for who I am. I do have some 'normal' fun like gossiping, telling funny stories, watching movies, etc. And the transition into college has been a lot easier than I expected. I atleast dont have apparent problems like a roommate who hates me, or a floor full of people who don't acknowledge me.

Life is good, but I am just beginning to realize how much of a Chennaiite I am :)

From Chennai to San Francisco

2008-09-14T12:49:00.000-07:00

Hi,

I am Peed to friends and Meenakshi to a few people. I am considered to be petre and not know Tamil. When I told people that I was going to college in the United States, they were convinced that I would be much happier here than back home, because I spoke english and I did scene!

I am not going to say that I am not happy here, because I am. I love San Francisco and its liberality. I love the accepting nature of people and the diversity of my college. I love the weather and my dorm room. I love my classes and the fact that I enjoy what I am studying.

But I miss Chennai, I miss driving by tea kadais, political rallies and kalyana mandapams and hearing loud music from the latest rajini movie blasting on the roads.

I miss being able to walk down the road to Maharaja stores, Cake Walk or my favorite shoe store right outside univercell!

I miss being able to walk in the other direction and get to the beach and meet at least 10 people who I know!

I miss getting calls or messages on my cell phone every 2 minutes about the plan for the day at anytime, with no concern if I might be asleep or awake.

I miss trying to coordinate those plans and make everyone come on time so that Chandru, mugsy and I don't have to wait for too long in the car!

I miss using da every time i address a guy.

I miss punching Chandru and Mugsy.

I miss going to CCD and eating my brownie.

I miss going to funk n jazz for my rainbow sprinkles doughnut.

I miss the water gun fights and the pillow fights that we had.

I miss having everyone in my room at any odd time of day or night.

I miss listening to Vyshu sing.

I miss sitting on the sand and worrying about sand getting into my pants.

I miss coming back home trailing beach sand into the house and flopping on the sofa, while my mom yells at me for getting sand everywhere.

I miss appa knocking on the door and calling me for dinner.

I miss going into mama's room and sitting and chatting with her while she sorts out her closet. I miss being able to call anyone at anytime of the day.

I miss gossiping about people from school.

I miss double meaning jokes and mokkai's.

I miss being able to eat sambar, rice and dosai everyday.

I miss talking in Hindi to Chandru, so that nobody else can understand.

I miss teasing everyone with someone else.

I miss Tamil.

I miss the conservativeness, humidity, and the familiarity of Chennai.

Chennai is my hometown and always will be. I never realized how much I loved Chennai until now, despite not being able to wear spaghetti strap tops outside, not being able to hold Chandru's hand on the streets, or being able to walk alone after 6pm.

I swear to god I can't think of anything else that I didn't like about Chennai. I love Chennai, and I will always be a Chennaiite/Madrasi!

Initial days at USF, a long overdue draft.

2008-09-02T23:35:00.000-07:00

Moving in was a scary experience. When we were almost at USF, i felt a feeling that I have never felt before. I was really really scared, nervous and anxious. I was after all moving away from home. I felt grown up, I felt like I didn't have a home to go back to, not because my parents would throw me out if I did but because it just feels like I shouldn't. It was nerve wrecking.

When my mom said goodbye at the door, we were both crying. She has already gone to the East Coast and I cannot believe that I will not see her for a long long time. I've never been away from home for this long.

The first two days were weird, I didn't really know anyone and only international students had moved in, so the dorms were pretty much empty.

International orientation was okay, I met a few people but it was mostly boring.

Then the regular students and my roommate Caitlin moved in, that was another thing I was worried about. But thankfully everyone on my side of the floor seem to be REALLY nice people. Especially Caitlin. She is such a nice person. My birthday came 3 days after everyone moved in, and she didnt even know me very well. She threw me a surprise birthday party with chocolate cake and that was just so sweet. Everyone was so nice.

The next few days were filled with orientation activites. Recess was my favourite, after the Hypnotist. At recess we all just mingled and I feel a lot better about just randomly introducing myself to people now.

Then came the classes, they seem a lot simpler compared to 11th and 12th standard! I have four classes this semester. Bio 105, Psych 101, Rhetoric and Interdisciplinary studies. My science classes seem simple and the rhet one has a LOT of writing, but I like that about it!

New Life?

2008-09-01T19:07:00.000-07:00

Firstly, my apologies to those few readers of this blog. I have not written in the past couple of months out of pure laziness and a little bit of busy-ness.

I have moved out of the country. I now live in San Francisco, the best city in the world(some claim), and I would agree with them because it is extremely liberal, beautiful, efficient, helpful, diverse and yet one of the most successful cities. I love this city, but not as much as I love good 'ol Chennai.

You may say that is impossible. Chennai cannot stake a claim at any of those afore-mentioned tags, but so what? Chennai is where I grew up, where my memories lay, where my friends and family live, where my principles were founded and this city seems foreign to me. And I don't say that with any anger or disappointment. It is what I expected of course.

I suppose moving to the United States for college was a good thing, in all practical sense. I do know that I will be more successful academically. But my desire to be the same person that I was in Chennai is so great that I think it would be very hard for me to change as a person and frankly I will be glad if that theory proves to be true because I love who I was.

I am Indian, and for someone who grew up in India it is incredibly hard to understand just HOW different life is here. Its not the food or the names of the people. It is just a whole bunch of things. The culture shock, is a commonly used term but I don't think anyone who hasn't experienced it knows what it means.

For us from India, we are just so used to multi-linguallism for example. That may seem like an extremely trivial issue for someone like me especially, who predominantly speaks English. We incorporate so many words from different languages, like Tamil or Hindi while we speak and I know for a fact that I used a lot of Tamil words in my daily speech. The inability to do that here just makes you feel like you are speaking a different language.

Accent is another thing that hit me, and i don't mean difficulty in understanding other people's accents. We've all watched so many Hollywood movies it would be silly if we still had trouble with American accents. No, the problem is when other people don't understand me. It feels weird .. I have always been complimented on my English and I had begun to become vain about my English speaking ability. I was always told I had a neutral accent. It feels like an insult when people don't understand me now. [To my friends from the US, please don't take offence. I really don't expect you guys to understand everything I say.]

Then there are common topics, for someone like me, who watches mainly bollywood and kollywood movies, a few Hollywood movies, but I'm not really good with actor's names and such. So when people talk about a particular actor, I'm like what? oh no, what do i say?

Music, oh my god. Every one's first question - what kind of music do you listen to? I understand what a big deal music is over here, and I do listen to a little Hindi and Tamil music but I just don't really care about music, its not such a big deal!

Then there is my name. I do accept that it is an ice breaker when people cannot pronounce your name but it gets exasperating after a while [ again, no offence :)]

Everything isn't too bad though. People are really nice, and I do have a lot of fun. I just really want to be able to go back home often, meet my friends, be who I was but just a little more petre :)

I'm just really homesick right now, and writing always helps me feel better when I'm down.

So thanks for listening to my crap guys :)

I promise I will post a more positive and accurate account of my move to the United States of America!

Love is in the air!

2008-06-13T14:12:00.000-07:00

Or maybe just raging hormones!
Or maybe it is because of the sudden freedom and boredom!
Or maybe Cupid is working overtime!
Or maybe the sea breeze acts as an aphrodisiac

That was *meant* to be a cryptic message, by the way :P

Not yet and adult and yet not a kid. . .

2008-06-13T13:00:00.000-07:00

It seems like it was just the day before yesterday when we took a class trip to Mt.Abu, suddenly I realize that it has been 4 years since that trip.
It seems like just yesterday when we all were sad and crying because half of our 10th standard class was leaving school that year, suddenly I realize that it has been 6 months since the last day of 12th standard. How are things moving so fast?

To quote Kavya 'I feel stupidly grown up' . I didn't think about that statement when she first said it, but now I think it is an extremely accurate description of what I am feeling.

I say, 'I want to go to college and be independent' but do I even know what that means? I'm not scared of responsibility or peer-pressure or any of those other issues that parents give lectures on. Its more a feeling of being thrown into the deep end of the pool on the 2nd day of swimming class.

I will soon turn 17, but I feel like I'm too old and yet too young.
Its a weird feeling, 'Adults' who never used to take me seriously a couple of years ago have started making real conversation with me. My dad who was sure that I couldn't make the right decision between science and commerce group in the 11th standard, doesn't even try to influence any of my decisions now. My mother and I have deep conversations about relationships and other 'grown up' topics. And here's the best one - My boyfriend and I actually discuss news and politics. Even today when I am watching TV and my parents discuss the news, i automatically switch off, its just what kids do! We don't care what is going on in the world, do we?!

I find myself thinking of my long term plans. What happened to taking each day as it comes? I find myself thinking of one day having a family, a career, a dog!

The only time I can compare what I am feeling now with is my first Hindi class in 9th standard. I opened the text book and saw these really complicated philosophical poems by Harivansh Rai Bachchan, just two months before that I was reading 'chidiya rani'. I realized that the syllabus had just taken a huge leap and that is how I am feeling now, like I am taking a huge leap right into the center of the real world.

Determination

2008-04-30T08:47:00.000-07:00

Life will be full of challenges, hard situations, decisions and the one thing that can get me through all that is determination. But sadly, I don't think I have much.
My parents keep telling me that I procrastinate, but what is the point of telling me that? It doesn't help in ANY way, as I am already aware of that. In fact it demotivates me. I have told my parents from the time I was a kid that pushing me or saying that I cannot achieve something, does not make me want to achieve it. But unfortunately, parents are people who think they know everything about their kid. They think everything that worked for them will work for their children as well. And who can make them understand that they are so wrong?
I understand that I have to have the resolve and that when I decide to do something, I shouldn't give up. I don't need people telling me that, advice doesn't help when you are aware of what to do. I wonder why my parents cannot understand that.
I admire my best friend Kavya, I think she is the more determined person I know. I don't wish to be like her, that is too hard a goal right now. But I am going to try to push myself more, it will be incredibly hard. All you motivated people out there can never imagine how hard it can be. But I am still going to give it my best shot.

Gym Buddies

2008-04-21T10:30:00.000-07:00

I laughed when I first heard that term, in a queue at the snack bar in Satyam Cinemas. That was a time when I did not even know what a gym looked like, apart from having the treadmill ofcourse.
21st April 2008, 6:00 AM, marks my foray into the gymming world, the world of fitness. Sadly, I don't feel like I have become any fitter. At best, I feel physically broken!
Kavya, Upasana and Varsha are my 'Gym Buddies' at Power Gym. Now this place is located on the third storey, reachable by really steep steps. Ofcourse, what problem would a 16 year old have climbing 3 flights of stairs?! None at all! But climbing down the 3 flights of stairs after an hour of gymming? Major problems!
I feel ashamed that I am complaing so much about 10 minuites on the treadmill and this other sadistic machine, but what to do? I felt so drained after that, I was speechless ( ofcourse I was panting to hard to talk, but thats different! ) with shock at my lack of stamina.
I guess, I will become fitter as time goes on, or so the gym instucter said. Who looks really stylish by the way!
So no more late nights, no more nocturnal behaviour, no more ice cream - Welcome to the world of fitness!

The last month, chronicled.

2008-04-15T10:47:00.000-07:00

Its almost been a month since the board exams ended and while I can say that I have no idea how the days flew by, I do recall some extremely boring days.
The first week was great, the excitement of just having graduated(hopefully ;]) and no more 12th science syllabus was enough to convince even my 'padips' friends to take a couple of hours off from their entrance exam studying-schedule!
In the second week I was in Agra, because I just HAD to see the Taj before I left India. The trip was great actually, if you didn't mind the totally dry heat, because of which I found myself able to finish 2 liters of water in less than an hour! Amazing, you say?! Not so much when you are at Taj Mahal at 12 noon.
The third week was the eating-and-watching-tv-all-day week, which got kind of monotonous after 2-3 days, not to mention my constant fear of putting on weight from all the ice-cream and chocolate! By the end of the third week, I decided that I needed to do something with my life and so I joined this journalism course and decided to go and get some experience in HR, from my mom's friends company.
Today(the fourth week) marks the second day of this new schedule and I am already beat. The city is just too hot and humid to travel around. The journalism class is interesting, but the assignments are a little bit not my type. I prefer feature writing or opinionated writing, reporting is kind of bland, besides going out to search for a story in this weather is unimaginable.
But from the next(fifth) week I am going to make my days even more hectic by adding an hour of gym in the mornings! About 99% of the people who know me will respond with a - 'Why do you need to go to the gym peed?! You will disappear', or some other similar remark that revolves around this totally outdated perception that I am all skin and bones! But I am not! I was, I admit, but that was a whole year ago and putting on almost 8 kilograms in a year is not exactly healthy is it?!

A book that sparked an analysis of my relationship with Chandru.

2008-03-08T17:11:00.001-08:00

ORU NADIGAI NADAGAM PARKIRAAL (Once An Actress)
By Jayakanthan (Translated by K S Subramaniam)

An extremely philosophical book, dealing with two main characters and the emotions and thoughts between them, touched me like no other book has. Maybe that had something to do with the fact that I paralleled the characters of Kalyani and Ranga with Chandru and I.

I identify with many aspects of Kalyani’s character, but she is distinctly different from me in many ways as well. The character was portrayed as a selfless woman, who kept her feelings to herself and completely derived happiness from her husband’s happiness, which is not me. Further, I find it hard to believe that such a character can even exist in real life.

Ranga’s continuous self-declaration of being an intellectual, struck me as somewhat erroneous because his thought process did not seem like one of an intellectual, but maybe that is because I believe that an intellectual should be rational and logical, which he clearly was not. He was in many situations acting as any typical Indian male will, and was also a self proclaimed MCP! His greatest flaw, I believe lay in his concept of love. Though it seemed like his thoughts about love were very complex, to me it was very clear, he wanted his wife to ‘prove’ his love to him by at least proposing to give up her career to make a home for him. He did not realize, even until the end, that she had made sacrifices, similar to his, while marrying him. She accepted him as he was and loved him unconditionally. She realized that his staying in her house would affect his self respect and without even batting an eyelid, agreed to move even though it was extremely pointless.

The two characters thought about each others thoughts more than they discussed them. They did have a large number of debates, but it seemed to me like they always kept the crucial thoughts to themselves. They both seemed apprehensive to come out and tell each other what they truly felt. They were not willing to give their relationship a second chance, and this is what I feel is their biggest mistake.

The only reason I felt I felt a similarity between the characters in this book and my own love life, is because of the large number of heated discussions Chandru and I share and because of the umpteen thoughts I have about love and if what I feel right now is true love.

I feel like this book has made me more mature, each dialogue or thought in this book was of extreme interest to me. Normally I find philosophical books boring, and I tend to skip the philosophical parts in the books I read. I still don’t understand the complete meaning of ‘philosophy’, but because of the vastness of opinions about love and relationships, this book seemed like a philosophical book to me.

As recently as one year back, I truly believed in ‘Mills and Boon’ love. The voice in the head saying ‘he is the right one’, the continuous passion, the endless happiness and other such fantasies. Now, while I am still unsure of what love really is, I know consider it to be a mixture of decision making by practicality and a desire to want to love and be loved by that particular person. I would like to further clarify the latter, I do believe in love and I do so because I -as inexperienced as I may seem- think I am in love.

Why do I think so? Most people assume that it is impossible to be in love at 16, and all teenagers with raging hormones experience is lust. I will not deny that, the relationship I have with Chandru today did start of as pure lust. He was the ‘popular’ guy and I could talk to him like I couldn’t to anybody else, maybe it was because I felt the constant need to impress him, as I still do with most people I meet up until a point when I know them very well. I did fantasize about him being my boyfriend and on a whim I made it clear that I liked him. We started going out and initially it was just the excitement of having my first ever ‘secret’ boyfriend that made it all worth it. I don’t really remember what exactly happened, but after about four months we started drifting apart. I would look for reasons to avoid talking to him at night, when just months earlier I would forgo dinner not wanting to break the conversation. I remember talking to Upasana and Kavya about how I felt it was just lust, but I was afraid to initiate a break-up and waited about a couple of weeks before he did. It ended painlessly, and both of us were happy, I think. But then as the result of being a part of the same group of friends, we were constantly thrust into each others presence. This caused needless discomfort between us and for our friends who didn’t know what to do or say. I remember the long SMS fights we used to have over the next month, both of us searching for the best way to emotionally hurt the other person. We were both cruel and ruthless and I am sure he was as hurt as I was, I cried many nights because of those messages that I incessantly reread for some reason.

The school term started and Kavya insisted on sitting in front of SR and Chandru, as they were a part of our ‘gang’. The first few weeks were awkward and strained, but for some reason he called me and asked me if we could try to be friends again. I agreed to that and a month later he suggested that we give our relationship a second chance. My friends had asked me what I would do, if he asked me out again and I had told them that I would say no because I realized that it was pure lust. And I kept my word, I told him that it wouldn’t work out and it wasn’t worth to put ourselves through that whole episode all over again. He was incessant and on a gut feeling I agreed. My mind told me not to, but I still went ahead and said yes, this is why I say that I do believe that there is something paranormal about love. It isn’t totally rational.

It has not been all milk and roses since then, there have been many ups and downs, especially during the initial stages of our second attempt. We were faced with jealousy, ego and judgemental problems, but we dealt with all of them and recently, just after our second anniversary (since we started our relationship for the first time), we both reached a stage where I think we both have matured as a couple. We still don’t miss our minimum quota of at least one fight (or ‘disagreement’ as he prefers to call it) per week, we have accepted that fights will happen, and we will reach a compromise (though I should be fair and say I think he compromises a lot more than I do).It may seem awkward, but I don’t hate fighting with him, because normally it is because of a silly reason and I know that we will make up, which I totally look forward to. Of course, with me, the whole fighting expereince is an emotional rollercoaster, and hats off to him for learning how to ride it without falling off ;)

Done with physics! Or am I?

2008-03-08T13:22:00.000-08:00

7th March 2008, a little less than two days ago, I wrote my Physics AISSCE paper. I never liked physics right from the 11th std, it was a subject I always barely scraped through. I didn't want that to happen in my Board exams. I wasn't even aiming for 80's or anything, because I knew I had to have studied physics right from the 11th for that. I wanted at least a 65, and I believe I prepared perfectly for that. I was considering the past TEN years Board exam papers. They all had a set of standard five mark questions that got repeated throughout the last 10 years. But we had to be the unlucky batch. My physics paper was unbelievably hard, it had NONE of the standard questions, some 5 marks of theory and the REST was conceptual, which was insane and unfair.
I really doubt if I will get 23/70. If i have to write compartmental, that will suck MAJORLY. I really hope they make me pass, because I did study enough to get a 35/70 on a normal paper.
Ashok Ganguly said the HOTS(Higher Order Thinking Skills) was to "Separate the best from the rest". That is exactly what is going to happen. The best will pass and the rest will fail. Seriously, how can CBSE even do something like this? With absolutley no indication that the paper was going to be insanely tough? What is the point of constantly raising the bar?
If I pass I will be satisfied, because I am not going to study engineering and I'm not even going to study in India. But what happens to all those people out there who are already are at a disadvantage because of state board students? Physics will bring down their average considerably. That simple isn't fair. I really think CBSE should give people grace marks. I really hope they do, otherwise my future is -pretty much- screwed.

One month of torture...

2008-02-19T10:21:00.000-08:00

I have not been studying this ENTIRE year, which pretty much translates into I'm failing my boards and this is my totally last chance to do something about it, because today is Feb 20th and I have EXACTLY a month before my last board exam.
Since Cheenu and I are in the same boat right now and he also happens to be my good friend, we decided that we can work it out together. Since neither of us are motivated enough to do anything ourselves, we came up with a plan involving joint study for Biology(his week point and my strong point), Math(My weak point and his strong point) and Organic chemistry(Our weak point, we hope we might be able to figure it out together!) . Apart from the joint study, we are going to finish the rest of the chemistry portion individually, but using the same study plan.
Here is the plan so far :

20th feb - P block
21st feb - Solutions and Solid state
22nd feb - Ecosystems + Bio technology Unit + Co-ordination compounds
23rd Feb - D and F block and Metallurgy
24th feb - Surface Chemistry + Electrochemistry + Biomolecules(From Enzymes)
25th feb - Chemical Kinetics + Polymers + Chemistry in everyday life
26th feb - Haloalkanes and Haloarenes +Alcohols, Phenols and Ethers + Biomolecules (Till polysaccharides)
27th feb - Aldehydes, Ketones and Carboxylic Acids + Amines + Biomolecules( From polysaccharides)
28th feb - Question papers from year 2004-2007
29th feb - Question papers from years 2000-2003 + Revise

1st March - Chemistry Board Exam
1st to 6th - We decided that we will manage physics somehow, though how we both didn't know!

7th - Physics Board Exam +Matrices and Determinants + Linear Proggraming Problems + Inverse Trignometry
8th - Differenciation + Applications of differenciation
9th - We will probably study English together

10th - English Board Exam + Genetics 1 + Genetics 2 + Reproduction 4(Myself)
11th - Sexual reproduction in flowering plans + Human reproduction + Ecology 3
12th - Human Welfare Unit + Evolution(Myself)
13th - Ecology 1 + Environmental Issues + Revise Biotech + Reproduction 1(Myself)
14th - Previous year board and sample papers

15th - Biology Board Exam + Relations and Functions + Differenciation backlogs
16th - Integration Unit and Areas
17th - Probability + Integration backlogs + Differencial equations(Maybe)
18th - Previosu year papers (2004-2007)
19th - Previous year papers (2000-2003)

20th - Math Board Exam + Freedom!!!!

This is a pretty hard plan, especially for a self-confessed procrasinator like myself. However I realize that unless I pass these exams I won't got to college and unless I do reasonably well, I probably won't be alive to go!
I do think the whole joint-study thing might make a difference though, because Cheenu, I believe, pretty much does something when he decides to. But then people say that about me as well. It is true in a way, when I promise a friend I will do something for them, I never let them down. Now I have told cheenu that we will do this, and I can't let him down.
Maybe that could be my motivation...

Right, I have to go and sleep now because I have to wake up at 6:45 AM tommorow!
Bye bye and wish me luck !

A blogger, on blogging

2008-01-13T12:21:00.000-08:00

I just saw 'We The People' on NDTV this evening and well, I must say it was one of the more interesting talk shows that I've seen. The topic for the day was 'should blogs be regulated?' which featured some people with blogs that didn't affirm to the stereotyped Indian mindset. Like there was this girl, Meenakshi Madhavan who blogged about sex and similar so called 'bad' stuff, I am just so happy that the media is finally showing a different side of India, not one with sari clad women and macho dominating men. The show also had a guy who was homosexual and very comfortable about it, which I'm sure is not something that can be said for the maamis and aachis who caught the show!
What interested me more than the original topic was the people they had chosen. All the speakers seemed to portray an urban India that most people don't seem to want to accept. Living in Chennai, the conservative metro, I know that feeling too well. Heck, when I walk down the street with my boyfriend people stare at me like I'm naked or something.
Coming to another important discussion on the show, about how blogs give people the cover of anonymity. I didn't really agree with that part, because all the bloggers I know have their blog's URL on their facebook or orkut profile, where all their friends can view it and judge them the same as they would if they spoke about an issue.
Why the great affinity to blogging? I'm not really sure, for me its because I love to write and introspect, A blog provides me the perfect opportunity to do both!

Congratulations from the University of San Francisco

2007-12-22T22:25:00.000-08:00

That is the *best* e-mail i have ever received!
Getting accepted into USF has taken off SO much tension that I had, the constant doubt of whether i would go to university, a one i wanted to go to, i mean.

USF seems like such a perfect fit, even though I've never really been at the campus with the intention of being there, my brother tells me that we did drive past the campus once in 2002, so technically- I've been there!
Apart from the scenic campus, with lawns and Frisbees satisfying my image of the university of my dreams, it is perfect in every other way!
Rankings - It was ranked 112 by the US news in 2007, yeah it isn't a top 100 university, but it is still pretty high according to me! I'm not looking to go to an ivy-league so this is perfect :)
Academics - I don't care *much* about academics, I just don't want the university I go to,to be highly competitive and impossible to secure an 'A' kind of place, Its not that i just want an easy 'A' on every course, I would work as hard as i could on something that i am interested in, and I would love an easy grade on a general-ed class that I'm not really interested in!
So the base line is, despite the decent ranking this isn't one of those study till you drop kinda universities. Which suits me just fine!
The Location - San Francisco is a city I've been to, and loved! While I am still not sure whether i want to go to a 'urban' school or a 'rural' school, I think that if i go to a school in a tiny town, I will be confined to the University and my friends on campus. The advantage however is that I probably wont be very distracted, which is kind of a problem for me :)
In San Francisco, which I know is a cosmopolitan city, I probably will learn a lot more, as in non-academic stuff. There will just be so much more to do, so many different things to experience, and I might find it easier to adjust. And oh, a pretty important attraction that USF offers is the proximity to my brother! :) It is important to me, we have never really had the 'brother-sister' relationship, but I've always wanted one! And here is my chance to get it :)
And another thing my brother pointed out was that I could also get the snow that I wanted, just a two hour drive away!

It seems pretty amazing, I never really thought there would be a school with all that I wanted, actually I knew there probably would be that school, but i never really thought that i would get accepted into it!

Oh and for those of you who go by brand names, Its not that I never cared about brand names, in fact a part of me still wishes I could go to Rice(which seems impossible!) but, It is also true that where you do your undergrad from doesn't really matter if you are going to do your post graduation. And if one can go to a school that they think is perfect, because they know they will have fun there and maybe have a real shot at discovering who they are, I think they should go for it!

But me? I still need a little time to decide, depending on where else i get accepted. But something tells me that USF is the right place for me, and I hope i end up there! :)

I think I will too!

Bala Vidya Mandir - Now a part of my past

2007-12-08T07:03:00.000-08:00

I am in 12th standard, and yesterday was officially the 'last' day of school for me. Ever. For the past 8 years I have been in Bala Vidya Mandir senior secondary school and in Vidya Mandir (Adyar) for 6 years before that. They both are the essentially the same school-same campus, same benches, same teachers, same friends- the name changed in my 4th standard.
I cannot even attempt to organize my memories or feelings about this school, they are just too many.
Yesterday, the 7th of December 2007 was a day i will never ever forget. I had been anticipating the feelings i would have, but when they hit me they were much worse than i had imagined.
Let me try to account for everything i did and felt yesterday -
The day started with me going to school at a record time of 8:35 AM , the earliest I've been in years! I walked to class with Vinayak Eashwar(Vinu) who is one of my good friends from school. I was feeling normal till then.
We got into class and started taking pictures and talking randomly. I was also trying to co-ordinate the cake reaching school. The first couple of hours passed pretty uneventfully, we took loads of pictures - here is one of my favourite ones of Arvind Swaminathan(SR), Kavya Suresh(Keevs/kav) , Meenakshi Palaniappan(peed) and C. Chandrashekar(Chandru) - These three people are my BEST friends, and they are one of the main causes for my missing school already.
Kavya is my best friend of 12 years - i have a whole post dedicated to her titled 'my 11.5 year old relationship', anyway I have never spent more than a couple of weeks without seeing her, and I really don't know what I'm going to do when I move away.
Chandru is My boyfriend of 2 years and my best friend of a year before he became my boyfriend! I have a post dedicated to him as well titled 'I'm in love'. he and I have grown so close to each other in this relatively short period of time. I really don't know how life will be without him, i have grown so accustomed to so many things that are almost a daily routine and I know I'll be lost in their absence.
SR, he is a relatively new friend. We have spoken for about 2 years now but i feel really close to him only for the past year. These past few weeks I feel even more close to him than I have felt before. He is a really hilarious guy, 'mokkai pottufies' and jokes about everything I really cant think about school without him. This year I've sat behind him in class, drawn stuff on his shirt, bugged him loads, teased him about so many things, scribbled on his textbooks, given company when he was failing, laughed with him when he cracked one of those amazing jokes of his....I only realized how good a friend I take his as yesterday, i mean he was always my best friend, but yesterday, when he hugged me and was so emotional, so unlike the SR i thought i knew, that is when i realized that he is one guy who I really really want to keep in touch with forever. That is because he is a guy who is totally worth knowing, you can never be bored with SR around.
Anyway going back to my initial purpose of recording the days events, after the first period the guys went down to play 'hand cricket' in the cycle stand. Kavya and I were pretty content taking pictures for a while, but when the guys kept playing for half the day we both got pretty irritated. We couldn't go down and call them either, since they were playing outside the boys toilet! :)
So we just stayed in class, writing some random people's memory books and wondering if they ever going to come up. I for one, was pretty pissed. Eventually SR came back up, for a drink of water, he said something to Kavya, she just looked at him and didn't respond, he looked at me and asked me what happened, i didn't respond either. He realized something was wrong, he sat down and tried to talk to us, initially we didn't talk, then we said stuff like 'just go and play' and i started crying, he realized we were seriously hurt and said he wouldn't go back down but he would stay with us for sure. We didn't talk to him initially, but he being SR made us feel better! Later Chandru came back up and SR told him what was wrong, he tried apologizing and showed that he really meant he was sorry by getting most of the class to confess truth about the people they've had a crush on from our class. That actually worked out pretty well, people actually told the truth! Including me :)
That lasted for a while, but the commerce students put a dampener on that, so then we were back to doing nothing much. I had a fight with Chandru, and cried more and stuff! Emotions were pretty much flying everywhere!
Anyway, we made up in a while but missed the water balloon fight :(
So then we all decided to form a 'train' and run around school, we were interrupted by Vijay Ramaswamy, our 24 year old English teacher who doesn't even have a degree in English and makes like a gazillion grammatical errors! He refused to let us go, as he was scared that we might get into trouble. I still don't get why he cared, but he succeeded in ruining our last 15 minutes of school, I didn't let that happen without a fight though, I yelled at him, and I hope he doesn't take that out on my English paper! :)
He went on to prove that he is a bastard by making Keevs cry and by yelling at Chandru for patting me on my shoulder, with some bullshit about how he should behave decently in class, all he did was pat me for gods sake! Anyway, we all went down when it was like 3:58 and as soon as the bell rang we had a 'group hug' and then we formed a train and ran around the entire ground with the whole school watching on!! That was fun!
After that everyone started crying of course, and we all started hugging each other, I hugged almost everyone and I am so happy that I did! :)
But yeah, after some initial attempts by the teachers to make us go home, we were left alone, we stood in the basketball court and spoke for a while, and did some of our class's signature stuff - like the 'ESSAR' thing, 'chur mura' , the Chandru song...
Chandru and I had a pretty in depth talk about whats going to happen after school, but yeah that's personal :)
Anyway, other than that SR was really sentimental, those of you who know SR will know why it is worth mentioning! He was so so sweet and all!
Cheenu was surprisingly sweet too! He promised to keep in touch, he said it like he really really meant it!
After all that stuff we had to go home because the teachers came back at around 6:30 PM and realized that we were still there and started yelling at us!

I don't even know how my life is going to be without school, I have always been the one for taking life as it comes, but now i realize i am apprehensive about my future. When i was in school, I knew what i would be doing the next day or the next year. But I don't have a clue about what I am going to be doing anymore, and that frightens me. I wont have my comfort blanket around me anymore. I have been in this school for 14 years, and I don't know how to live life without Bala Vidya Mandir.

Busy Busy Busy!

2007-11-04T10:43:00.000-08:00

Am i? Well, i do have LOADS of things to do, but its not like I'm doing any of them! Like right now, I should be studying for my math test tomorrow, but instead I am blogging at 12 midnight!
Procrastination
God, how i used to hate the word when my parents used to accuse me of it. But now, i figured out it is true! I am a procrastinator, and i HATE being one.
For all you highly motivated individuals out there who think it is the procrastinators fault for procrastinating, just be happy that you are lucky to be so motivated! Its really hard not to procrastinate you know, how much ever you want to stop. I do have goals i want to achieve, but i worry that I'm going to waste my life procrastinating.

And now, to prove that I have will power, I hereby give in writing that I will study for my math test before i sleep, If i fail to complete this task, i will abandon this blog forever.

P.S - If this is the last post on this blog, you know why! ;)

I'm In Love!

2007-10-16T11:30:00.000-07:00

I'm 16 years old, and have been in an on and off relationship for almost 2 years now Out of which the first 9 months could be classified as a 'time pass' relationship, but i consider the last 1.3 years to be pretty serious.
I know I'm kind of young for anyone to take me seriously if i say i am 'serious' about a guy. But i really think i am! Earlier, when we used to talk about a long term commitment i always used to think "what will life be like with another guy"or "do i really love him to be with him forever", But now i don't think i want to have another serious relationship! I am pretty content with this one!
I mean he is definitely not the 'perfect' guy, but then does the perfect guy even exist?! I don't think any guy/person can be perfect, as it is impossible for them to know what you want/like. But a guy who is willing to do anything for you, to make you happy is better than the hypothetical perfect guy! And that defines my boyfriend!
He used to seem like the perfect guy to me when i was in the 10th during the initial stages of our relationship, but when i became serious about him, in the 11th, is when i started becoming critical about him! I guess that will happen with anybody i care about. To quote someone 'you are most critical of the one you love' or something like that. Anyway, I think that is totally true, once you really love a person, you want that person to be perfect, you start noticing small things that would never have bothered you otherwise, and you become most critical of that person.
So Chandru, in the future when I'm critical about minor details concerning you, just remember - its because i love you! :)

But this was not meant to be a justification! This is to tell you about one of the most important people in my life - my boyfriend and my best friend! - Chandrashekar (a.k.a) Chandru!
He is a guy i have known since i was in the 7th, as a 'bench mate' (well i don't wish to embarrass him again by writing down how he used to act back then, but if you are interested you can just skim through the 'memories' post!)
When i really started noticing him was in the 9th 2nd term, he had just come back after spending a term in Bombay, and had started talking to girls! He was good friends with Kavya(my best friend) and suddenly became one of the popular guys! I wanted to be his friend too, and this wish of mine was fulfilled after our excursion in the 9th when i spoke to him on the phone after he broke his hand! Then he got my number and we spoke once in a while after that about random stuff. We used to speak mostly during the nights when we both were jobless, this was supplemented by the 'meeting ups' in the 9th to 10th summer holidays with Kavya, Upi, Varsha, Ganpa, Chandru and I. We started talking -loads- after that, we used to talk until 2 in the night and all. I distinctly remember talking to him once till 2 am and then waking up the next morning when he called me at 11 or something and talking to him till 4 pm or something, man those were the days! How did we have so much time! Anyway, so basically we became -really- close after the summer holidays and i think i was 2nd on his list of close girl friends( after kavya), I was pretty happy about that! Anyway, i didn't have an inkling of 'liking-ness' for him then, no matter what my friends and parents think! I really only thought of him as a close friend, and i don't even remember when i started liking him, it must have been sometime in the 2nd term of 10th standard.
So right, after that everyone pretty much know what happened, we became a couple officially on the 27th December 2005! That was when i was 14 years old. Since then we have broken up twice, during the initial stages of our relationship. Once was after the board exams, and once sometime in may 2006. The first time we made up in a day or so, but the second time we broke up it took a couple of months and even then i truly didn't expect to really fall in -love- with him. Love is a very complex thing, and i know i am still very young and there are loads of circumstances ahead of me that will test my love for him. I do think i will pass all of them, and i hope i get centum in this at least!!

My 11.5 year old relationship!

2007-10-09T11:10:00.000-07:00

No! I am not talking about a romantic relationship.
This post is dedicated to my best friend of 11.5 years, Kavya Suresh!
We met 11.5 years ago, and we have been best friends ever since!

Here is the story -

April 1996, Thirvanmyur - chennai, I met my best friend for the first time. It was at her house, and we were 4 years old just having graduated from kindergarden. I was apprehensive, all my parents had told me was that we were going to meet some random family friends of their's who had a daughter my age. I vivdly remember, as my dad was searching for a parking space on the road perpendicular to their house, i stood up in the backseat trying to catch a glimpse of the house i was visiting.
When we were done parking, Kavya's parents came and greeted us and reluctantly dragged an uninterested Kavya back into the house. She was playing with her friends outside her house, and obviously did not want to leave her game unfinished to meet some random girl she didnt even know! So we sat down in their living room, and the grown ups began to talk. At first i didnt even look at her, how i was so shy is just beyond me!, but anyway, we both didnt even look at each other and then kavya's mom told her to show me her room and to play with me.
I followed her into her room, still not daring to look at each other! God knows what was running through our minds, i wonder why we were so scared to talk to each other, kids that age generally tend to talk to just anyone about anything, but we were different! Anyway, we went into her room and she took out this jigsaw puzzle of a train engine or an elephant, i cant seem to remember which. So as we slowly assembled the 25 piece puzzle(that seemed difficult for us then, it consisted of such a large number of pieces when compared to our age 25=5*5!) and then kavya put the nose of the engine or elephant at its tail end i gave an involuntary giggle! This made kavya giggle too, and we looked at each other and laughed!
If you are thinking, this might have broken the ice between us, you are wrong! We still didnt start talking, we didnt know what to say but we wanted to tell each other that we were friends, so we kept giggling for everything for the rest of the evening!
We did say goodbye when i had to go though! Anyway, i think it was one of the most productive evenings i have spent and i do hope that now Kavya doesnt still regret leaving her game unfinished!

So well, this may seem like a weird way to make friends with a person! But i do believe it worked, for she is one friend i dont EVER remember fighting with even once. Our friends circles have changed several times between 1st standard and till the present but we have always been together in every one of those different groups!
We both have changed so much over the years, our interests and attitudes vary so greatly, yet we complement each other perfectly! Though we are so different, we agree on the same things. We truly understand each other, she is one of the few people who can figure out what i'm thinking with unbelievable ease!
Friendship truly is incredible, and i only realize this at the end of this amature attempt at displaying the history behind the relationship with one of the most important people in my life!

Memories...

2007-10-05T04:53:00.000-07:00

When I walk into the primary school building during lunchtime or break time or even during class and look at the tiny kids playing 'lock and key' or 'land-water-lake-sea-fire' or the 'holding-hands-and-twirling-game' that i don't think had a name, all my childhood memories in those classrooms come back to me.

Some of the memories that i still vividly remember -

*Waiting for break time or lunch time to continue the never ending boys vs. girls lock and key game, or run down to the canteen to try and get an akka or anna to buy me candy that was sold at 25 paisa! I don't think i even have a 25 paisa coin anymore!

*I remember my friend sunayana used to play 'tickle monster', she would tickle me till i was on the floor gasping for breath...

*When i was in 3rd or 4Th std, my friends Rishab and Rohit had a fight and i took it upon myself to sort it out! Upon interrogation, Rishab told me rohit had called him a bastard and rohit told me that was only because Rishab had called him 'bloody' or maybe it was the other way round, but thinking about that brings a smile to my face now! I don't know why i vividly remember that inconsequential incident..

*In 1st std, there was this girl in 1 'a' , annapoorni, a real trouble maker from what i heard, she climbed up a 10 foot slide and just jumped of the top instead of sliding down, and then her class teacher and the ayahs put sugar and ghee on her split lip and sent her home! I don't actually remember this, but all my friends remember it, and repeat it every time we reminiscence, so in a way it has become a memory!

*Sanskrit class in 5Th std, i remember sayeekumar sir's tiny voice which i could barely hear right at the back of the class, where i would sit '4 in a bench'.

I remember crying later in 5Th std when my name didn't make it to the top 30 who got into the Sanskrit class, i didn't really cry because i felt bad but because everyone was giving my such pitying looks that i felt like i had to feel bad!

*I remember getting slapped my Madhu miss in the 6Th std because of Bhavana who was talking to me when we were supposed to be reading 'Rusty', this also resulted in my house(kailash) getting a black mark because of me!

*I remember fighting with Krithika in 5Th std, and being forced to make up by arundati and sunayana during our excursion to some random bread factory!

*I remember the 'footsie' madness that was prevalent when i was in 7Th std. We were all entering our teens and kept daring each other to play footsie with some one! It was usually done as a trade-off or a deal, like someone would say if u play footsie with 'someone' then ill play footsie with whoever u tell me to!

*I remember sitting next to my current boyfriend in the 7Th std. He was not my boyfriend then, he was real shy or still hadn't gotten out of that phase when boys hate girls! He never used to talk to me, and i still remember the only words he said to me all year 'I hope I've done well in my exams', these first precious words were spoken moments before we got our first term exam results! I also remember he was the first person i was dared to play footsie with! I think the deal was that if i played footsie with him, Amitash would play footsie with Poornima..

* In 6Th std i got 73.5/75 in a math paper, and i for the -only- time in my life was the class topper! I beat Sree Ranjini! Yay!

* In 8Th std, we had a game of 'hangman' during one of Yamini misses famous substitution classes, and our 'row' was behaving badly! We were yelling, cheering, booing and the other two rows weren't! Now out of the three rows only my row had both boys and girls. 8 boys and 4 girls. If u read my previous posts, you'l notice i have mentioned the hating relationship that Yamini and i shared! So after one such cheering session Yamini decided she couldn't take in anymore, and decided to minus 10 points from our group. This made us ALL yell in protest and then Yamini had the audacity to single me out and say that i had no decency, i was yelling along with the boys, unlike the other girls. Now the last part was what got me angry! For 2 of my friends(girls) also yelled, when i pointed this out, she told me that i had no manners and haven't changed from 3rd standard and that she had a good mind to take me to the principal. Now that really got me pissed, i was like yeah that's a good idea, lets take this to the principal and see who is right! I don't think she expected me to agree to go with her to the principal, she expected me to get all scared i think! Anyway, that was the end of the fun as the bell rang and she stormed out in fury!
- that was my fun-est memory i think!

Okay, i have to go! So that's it for now!

Campus visits - US universities

2007-10-02T11:34:00.000-07:00

May 2007, I visited a few university campuses in the US, with the purpose of trying to find the perfect one for me! Well, The only university i do want to go to is not on the list and i still don't know what my second option would be, but here's what i learnt from my half a dozen university visits!

First university i visited - Kutztown University of PA

They have a really -beautiful- campus, the 2nd most beautiful amongst the 6 universities i visited(Bryn mawr being in the lead!)
They have recently built some new hi-tech classrooms, that looked pretty good! Their library was pretty cool, with a coffee-shop inside!

Now, i didn't get to see the dorms, which I've heard are pretty bad!

KU is in 'kutz-town' which is traditionally an Amish town, so it still has some quaint Amish horse carts which look really cute but I'm sure the dung isn't that great!

Okay, now coming to the education, well, they aren't a top university, but they aren't a terrible one either! So I'm definitely applying to them, as they are my 'safe' university and also my Mom works with them, so i will hopefully get some benefits!

The 2nd university i visited - Temple university , PA

I loved their website, and was pretty sure i would go to TU if i got in, before i went for the campus visit! I mean, i still am going to apply, but i don't know if I'll end up there. I mean, I've always wanted to go to a beautiful university with lawns, and people playing Frisbee in a small university town, the traditional American university! Well, TU wasn't any of that! It is located in he center of Philly and is on either side of the main road, which is full of traffic! And i hear Philly is a city with high crime rates and that its really easy to get mugged. Well, but i also learnt on my campus visit that they have great security as long as your on the temple campus!

On campus- they have amazing 'food trucks' that feature just every type of food at really cheap prices! Their computer center is sexy, I'm not a computer freak but when i saw that floor, i totally wanted to stay there and just stare at all the various gizmos! There have to be like a million computers in there! Their tech center is all hi-tech(pun intended!)

I ate at their cafeteria..well, their food was regular college food i guess!
I never got to see their dorms either, but i guess they are just regular dorms. Well another thing that got me interested in TU is, their high Indian student population! They have some 500+ Indian students, which is pretty high for any university!

I met with their international students officer/counselor and he told me that with my SAT scores i have a good chance of getting in, so i sort of count TU as a 'safe' school as well!

The next school - Bryn Mawr College, PA

Well, i was taken into this 'single-sex college' against my wishes! Or rather, my cousin tricked me into entering this place that i never intended to set foot in, It is a girls college, but a breathtaking one at that! The campus is so beautiful, i fell in love with it. The fee structure is a major problem though, my dad just wont agree to shell out $60,000 a year for my undergraduate!

I don't think I'll apply, considering i most probably wont get in anyway, it being one of the most competitive universities!

But i did get to see the dorms at this university, the dorms were amazing!!
But this is way over my league! financially, socially and academically!

Drexel University - PA

I didn't really do, much of a campus visit, just sort of drove around the campus and pretty much formed my opinion based my cousin's(who went there) running commentary as we drove!
Well, i didn't think much of it, at the same time i don't think it is a bad university. Its just that, nothing about the university jumped out and grabbed my attention.
The education, is decent i guess, but for the cost i don't think its worth it! But that's just my opinion. I truly don't know much about this university!
I didn't want to go the drexel before, i don't want to go there now, and i don't think i will want to go there!

I then flew to the west coast and visited a couple of UC's

University of California - Berkeley

One of the nations -best, largest and most active- universities. The campus totally fit my 'dream university' but its way to hard to get in, and i think I'm applying to too many hard colleges already!

But anyway, the campus is green, with Frisbee playing students and stunning architecture, the food is pretty good actually!(or maybe this is just my love for hot dogs speaking) and the town is great too!

The education, well, dare i even attempt to question education at Cal!?
I spoke to a psychology professor, who gave me some course schedules to read but refused to talk as she was too busy with the upcoming graduation.

I did see a sort of political thingy going on, some random guy standing on a barrel in the middle of the entrance and yelling something about Bush. I then came to know of the universities history of such political speeches/rallies.

Anyway, Cal is a great university that I'm not going to apply to, considering their standards and tuition rates!

University of California - Santa Cruz

Another UC, totally different though. With a sprawling campus covering the entire hill, with great ocean views from all around, wooded areas, laid-back attitude, vast spans of nothingness, and yet not even 10 minutes away from the hustle n bustle of the tourist-y beach, UC Santa Cruz did seem more like a holiday resort than a place to study!
They have a residential college system, like Rice University which I really like, i think it makes life so much more fun! They have 10 colleges, and they each have a theme restaurant! And you get to choose your college!
Well, the education at UCSC, I've heard is pretty good, and most of the people who went there consider it the most underrated UC. Though, i cant really see myself studying there in a million years!
I loved it though, I'm still not going to apply though, I'm not exactly a highly motivated individual and i don't think i could study in a resort! But i so would love to go there, if only for a holiday! :)

So that's my comprehensive guide to 6 universities!
By the way, the university i really want to go to is Rice University, TX.
But that's another really competitive university! Well, lets see how it all works out!
*Wish me luck*

Satisfying parental ambitions = Inviting insanity

2007-09-09T09:52:00.000-07:00

Admission to the top school in Chennai, keyboard classes, tennis coaching, chess classes defines the Perfect child of today, the child every -parent- dreams to have, the child who excels in everything -they- want, a perfect all rounder, the pride of -their- lives. Do you see, everything is about -them-, the parents! Do they even think, what does my child want? Do they ever think can my child be a self confident individual unless we let him make his own decisions? No. They have his whole life planned the day he is conceived.

First the pre-planning- If its a girl her name will be Aaarthi and if its a boy his name will be Aaadarsh, god forbid 18 years from now alphabetical order becomes a factor for college admission .

Then when the poor kid is born - His name will be put down on the waiting list of all the top schools ( ever wondered how these waiting lists started? its because of all these crazy parents who want their kid to be the best! )

When the kid is 3 years old and has to go for an interview for admission to kindergarden - The parents stuff him full of rhymes, alphabets, numbers, 'good morning sirs and thank you sirs' , buy him his very first suit, book a Mercedes and give him countless lectures about behaving in front of the principal.

In the event that he gets into one of the top schools - they make him do his homework everyday, take out his text books and teach him stuff themselves so he can be ahead of his class, make sure his colouring book is the best without a single dot outside the lines of the picture.

His first quarterly exam - Stop his playtime for a month before the exam so that he has extra time to study his ABC's and 123's . Get previous years question papers and make him practice them thoroughly. Make sure he has at least 4 revisions before the exams and advice him about how to handle exam tension.

The day he gets his report card - Wonder why the teacher has said he needs to practice 'Mary had a little lamb' , and make him repeat the rhyme 5 times every morning and night for a month. Wonder why he has got only a 99 in arithmetic and look at his answer paper, they realize he had written the number 6 as 9 and fear that he has dyslexia. Take his to a specialist and run him through a series of the most expensive tests which say he is absolutely normal! Then they reach the conclusion that the reason he lost 10 marks is because he made a silly mistake probably due to lack of concentration! So they enroll him in a 'how to improve your concentration' course. The poor kid is now weighed down with at least 2 hours of studying and 2 hours of extra activities on weekdays and 4 hours of studying and 3 hours of activities on weekends.

This kid grows up to become the school topper, state level chess player, keyboard and tennis player for the school and a social recluse. Do you blame him? with all his activities where would he have the time to socialize or even realize what socializing means!? Anyway, his parents don't notice that, and when he enters his 9th std they put him in IIT coaching classes, 8 hours a week he learns IIT syllabus. Then comes his board exams which he undoubtedly does well in and then he has to take his IIT exam. He takes it, later when the results come out - He Fails.
Yes, for the first time in his life he Fails. (This is not surprising when you take into consideration the millions of kids who are all trying for the 300 seats in IIT. ) But this failure at such a high level, destroys him. He is over 18 years now, used to success, used to being the best, he cannot believe he is not the best all of a sudden. He had never had any time to learn survival skills, ways to cope when you run into a bad patch, and therefore he breaks down like a toddler who hurts his knee for the first time. Except this has much more serious repercussions. He goes crazy, he wants to be in IIT, he has never been denied anything that was academically achievable before, he has always been able to fulfill his academic goals. And the knowledge that he failed to achieve this practically kills him.

Is it worth it? seriously, i know parents want only the best for their children, but is it worth putting them through so much torture and not letting them grow naturally? Is it worth having a genius for 18 years of your life and then acclimatising yourself to your totally destroyed kid, having to struggle to help them lead a human life....Is It Worth It???

P.S- some points are highly exaggerated!!

PSBB culturals - REVERBZ

2007-09-07T20:22:00.000-07:00

They said, PSBB have the best culturals after C.V, they said all amazing judges would be there. So we went with our -best- students, fearing that it would be impossible to win the culturals against the 30-40 schools that would turn up.
But what did we find?! A commerce dept. HOD who cannot speak english as a shipwreck judge! Ex-PSBB students as judges for almost every event! And get this- only NINE schools! Out of which only P.S and B.V.M are main schools!
But anyway, i love reverbs because we placed in the most unlikely event i would have imagined - makover(face painting, hairstyling and tattoing!). we were only 3rd but yeah, thats a big deal for me!! :)
I do hope we win the overall! If we dont, i swear we suck...with just P.S to compete with we have to win the overall!!

Innocence...

2007-08-30T10:27:00.001-07:00

God, i cant believe im at the end of my school career, i still remember my LKG classroom, with saraswathi miss, finger painting among the various crying kids, sitting in a circle for story time, making a mess of the class during break time..
My UKG class, with rama miss, in the class nest to the staff room, using 'halwa' gum and reciting the alphabet! On the last day of UKG i remember giving Rama miss a bunch of flowers, she was truly an amazing teacher!
Karthiyani miss is 1st std, she adored me, i remember getting the spelling of knife wrong, and wondering at length why knife wasnt spelt nife! Aah...those days...that innocence...carefree nature...without a worry in the world!
Vasundara Miss in 2nd std, playing B.I.N.G.O, hating 'borrowing' sums..
Yamini miss in 3rd std, the mutual hate that existed between us, being in the same class as my best frnd Kavya for the 1st time, plotting against Yamini, becoming frnds with arundati and sunayana...
Indhumati miss in 4th std, a really sweet teacher, Tim spending a week at school much to the joy of the other boys, bringing a cake for Indhu miss's birthday...
Manjula miss's class in 5th std, another teacher i hate, freaking out before the short exams or long tests! God, i wish thats what i had to face now!

I wonder sometimes, how simple life was then! I never cared much about my reputation, had no worrys about tests, didnt care what i wore! And yet, im sure i was having an amazing time!! God, primary school truly is the best time of life!!

School friends-Friends for life?

2007-08-30T10:12:00.000-07:00

Most of the people i talk to say college friends are the people who will be ur frnds for life, Is that true? I wish it isnt..
Im in my final year of high school, i barely have a few months left at my school 'Bala Vidya Mandir' where i've spent 14 years of the better part of my day! My frnds are an integral part of my life. I cannot imagine life without thinking stuff like, What will kavya do about that pestering vyshakan? or Will chandru call me tonight? or Why did cheenu bunk school today? or Who is S.R going to call for his birthday? or How did upi do her exam today?
Yeah...they will seem like inane questions that mean nothing to you, but to me, these are some of the people whom i cannot imagine life without..Okay, i can imagine, but then imagination has no bounds! So it'd be better if i said, i dont want to imagine life without them! Sure im looking forward to college life, making new frnds, living in dorms, living in a whole new country, studying only what i want....But i just wish my old frnds could be there with me till i got settled in. Sure i know thats impractical...but nobody never lost anything wishing for something, did they?!
We all promise each other, 'we'll keep in touch yaar', but will we? I wonder..Maybe we will! Afterall most of the people who said they have lost touch with their school frnds are from a generation where internet was non existant! But on the other hand, once we get acquainted with our new frnds and new life will we bother to keep in touch with old frnds who would have become totally different from us!?

A typical day in my life!

2007-08-24T04:07:00.000-07:00

Monday-Friday
Wake up - 5:30 AM (Excluding Thursday where i wake up at 8:00 AM)
Tution- 6:00 AM - 8:00 AM( Excluding thursday when i'll be sleeping!)
Getting ready for school- 8:05 AM- 8:40 AM (by now the 1st bell at school would have rung!)
Breakfast - 8:41 AM- 8:50 AM ( by now the second bell would have rung)
Drive to school - 8:53 AM - 9:05 AM ( by now im Late as usual!)
Argue with the person stopping me at the gate(as im late)-9:06AM-9:10AM Go into class late during the 1st period- 9:15AM- 9:20AM
Sit in school and do everything but study - 9:20 AM- 4:05 PM
Talk to my boyfriend :) - 4:05 PM- 4 :15 PM (i hate to leave when i do, but have to otherwise i wouldnt be able to get home! )
Bus ride back home - 4:15 PM -4:45 PM
Come home, do random stuff - 4:45PM - 5:30 PM( call frnds,check mail..!)
Watch TV- 5:30 PM- 7:30 PM (suite life of zach and cody, full house, my wife and kids, friends)
try to study -7:30 PM - 'varying time depending on my mood'
Dinner- 9:30 PM - 10:00 PM
Study some more/go online - 10:00 PM - 12:30/1:00 AM
Sleep - 12:30/1:00 AM

free-writing!

2007-08-22T05:14:00.000-07:00

Okay, i have to get this out of my system before i start! I SAW SURIYA LIVE TODAY! Yayyyyy! And from less than 10 meters away!!
Yeah, now i can start! To begin with, for those of you who don't know who suriya is, he is a Tamil film star. One of the most popular, and best and most handsome! He looked SO hot today, he was wearing these really sexy jeans and a fitting black shirt that totally showed his amazing body! And he said hi to me! Um...actually, I don't really know to which of the 45 girls he said hi to, but id like to think it was me!
Okay, now I'm getting a teeny bit carried away! and this is exactly what i don't understand. What is it that about a celebrity, especially sports stars or film stars that make us go crazy!? Why do we act like fanatics?!
Is it because we want to see if their character on screen matches their real character? I think that is unlikely, because (1) we aren't going to understand their real character by looking at them live and (2) that wont apply to sports stars as they don't really portray a different character on screen.
Why do we fall in love with actors though we know they are just acting? If we love an actor in one movie,it should mean we've fallen in love with the character that he portrays in that movie, but people aren't normally fans of a movie, they are fans of the actor, and no matter what role he plays in a movie they love him. That i think is not true fanatical behaviour!
And why do we fall in love with sports stars? they are just doing their job, the same as every other person in this world. But because they are on world TV and probably representing a country, citizens think being fans of their representatives is showing loyalty. Well, i guess it does bring a feeling of togetherness among citizens of the same country. But it also brings hatred to innocent citizens of another competing country. Take for example India-Pakistan cricket matches, however cordial the players are towards each other, the Indian citizens are hoping for another Karil war on the cricket pitch. Because its Pakistan, they don't just want India to win, they want them to crush Pakistan, to make sure they are all out for 10.
Well i guess I'm deviating from the topic i started out writing about, but well this is -my- space and i thank god i don't have to worry about whether I'm sticking to my teachers specifications while writing this! It feels so good to write about nothing at all, i.e - 'free-writing' as Barron's college prep books call it!

mood swings? feeling down/depressed? feeling pissed off?

2007-08-22T04:57:00.000-07:00

When i was a kid, there used to be times when i would feel irritated for absolutely no reason at all. I didnt understand it one bit, but i hated it. I used to call it 'feeling like that', I used to tell my mom "Mama, im 'feeling like that' again"...and she'd be like, hmm...i actually forget what she used to say. I guess she used to be considerate at times and get irritated sometimes.
But now, i've grown up considerbly, and for the most part, i can classify most of the emotions i feel pretty accuratly...But i still dont know what emotion 'feeling like that' is.
I could call it having mood swings, but it doesnt really happen that often. Most of the time im a pretty hyper, cheerful person and my mood, swings very rarely...so i dont think i could say i have 'mood swings' because that would seem inappropriate.
I could say i was feeling down or depressed. But calling it depression would make it seem way to serious and you generally feel depressed only when something is wrong. But i feel this way all of a sudden, it hits me from nowhere, and i get all irritable, with the way im feeling, with people around me who suddenly seem irritating to me, and everything seems to be going wrong for those coupla hours.
I could call it feeling pissed off. But again, u need a reason to be pissed off. You cant be pissed off for no reason at all! You are either pissed of with somebody or something. And when im 'feeling like that' usually nothing has made me feel that way, atleast nothing im aware of.
Weird? yeah it is, and after -contemplating- at length about the topic i still dont know what to call it! Well, atleast this post served one purpose, Its made me feel better, im not 'feeling like that' anymore! Maybe thats they way to get rid of it, well, ill contemplate that the next time i 'feel like that' !

Love

2007-08-21T11:28:00.000-07:00

Lately i've been thinking a lot about what love really means...Is it that warm gushy feeling that comes with a whole lot of tingling feelings as decribed in the mills and boon books? I would like it to be that, but is true love anything like that? I dont think it is...i dont think love can be described in a general way, I think its different for each individual.
So how would i know when im in love? How would i know that I really love the person i think i love? Is love an instinctive feeling or is it a decision?
Does it mean you love a person when you feel happy in their company and think you can never get bored of their company? When you feel trust, security, a feeling of commitment?
If you care about yourself more than the other person, does it mean you dont love them? Do u have to convince yourself to love a person? Do you have to look at the overall package? Will u care about the persons appearance, behaviour, reputation when you love a person?
True love is often said to be blind. Is that just another random statement that simply sounds good, or is it really true? Do you really overlook superficial factors when your in love with someone?
If you are really critical of your partner and try to change him to suit your definition of perfect, does that mean you are not in love with that person? Does it mean you are just manupalating a character to suit your needs? Are you in love then with the character you've created and not the man you say u've fallen in love with?
These are some of the zillion thoughts i have about love...I have a lot of questions, why arent there any people who specialize in love?! But according to me, that shouldnt be possible. As i just said love is different for everyone! Well, then why doesnt god give each person the capability of realizing when they love a person? why cant there be clear cut signs when u fall in love? But I guess that would make life too easy!
Well, as u can see, this is my space to put down all my random questions that get lost in my thoughts, if u came here looking for answers, Im sorry, i dont have any, Im searching for answers myself!