Mundane Musings

Last week I got caught in the mother of all jams. In all my life of riding my bike I am yet to have come across one that physically sapped me like the one I endured that day, on my way to office. I can safely say that the speedometer refused to climb above 10km/hr for a stretch of 6 kms. As I sat on my bike, fuming and mentally cursing no body in particular, I thought about ways to keep myself occupied. If it was another lucky day I’d have had my mp3 plugged to my ears rendering soulful songs. But alas! When this super infuriating jam was to take place how in the world could fate have rewarded me with a comfortable portal that’d transport me to another blissful world? So I sat on my bike, studiously avoiding glances of curious fellow travelers who seem to think the best way to beat the jam is to look at what people were doing while waiting out the clearance of congestion. So I decided to watch the vehicles instead. Lo and behold I saw an impressive dark blue Nissan Xtrail parked next...

Oh boy, the joy of reading a good book! Felt that a couple of weeks back and still feel the glorious warmth filling me up like a good movie could or even good sex! The book in question is Khaled Hosseini’s – The Kite Runner. I don’t read tomes which are too serious or which ponder over the philosophy of life and such. And I stay away especially from books which proclaim self improvement tips or the how-to –types. My kind of reading veers alarmingly from pithy strong romance to some good serious fiction. I am quite partial to reviews written by my favorite critics, leaving the job of keeping abreast with the myriad books being published per month and deciding which ones are a good read, to them. So it was, that I sat down with the Kite Runner one lazy afternoon and was tugged and pulled to great heights like a kite, by the skilful writer. That it was his first book and that he could write it with such simplicity and understanding amazed me. The characters in the novel are so real that...

1. Read info about a certain hill station written by a travel enthusiast. Take particular note of a eatery that you would like to visit. 2. During the stay at the hill station keep hopping about and going on and on about the restaurant to unsuspecting friends. 3. Make a plan to finish site seeing and lunch at the said restaurant. 4. Spend the morning taking in the scenary on foot and decide to take cycles to commute to the restaurant (thank god for that) 5. Clumsily handle the bicycle which shows no signs of breaks along the first road going down hill. 6. Huff and puff, literally, and give up attempts at self mortification by simply walking uphill towing bicycle along. 7. Hurriedly sit on the seat and try not to grin as speed picks up due to sheer gravitational force of the road sliding down. 8. After initial excitement, think of real purpose of the journey. The restaurant and its whereabouts. 9. Meet with blank stares from people on the road when asked directions. 10. Try ...

Sometimes certain habits become pleasurable activities because of certain happy interludes. Like for example, brushing ones teeth is a routine activity that has taken the status of a habit now. But on days when the toothpaste is changed one automatically charged up (atleast for the first few days). I don’t know when this came about but the newspaper which I have been reading all my life purely out of habit has suddenly taken a preference above other papers. Dad had subscribed to this paper, The New Indian Express, from when I could read a newspaper (even if it were habitually). I had felt then that the paper presented the news in a crisp form and helped easy reading…as against its popular counterpart – The Hindu, which almost three fourth of the population reads in Tamil Nadu. But increasingly I feel like the newspaper is growing younger or perhaps I am catching up with it. It’s a pleasure to take the paper and read reviews and columns written by like minded individuals. I pick up the ...

Working in an MNC having free lancers as a major workforce, one comes across a lot of interesting observations...oh no not enough to blog regularly about but definitely worth a blog or two. In order to motivate these freelancers or consultants, the company organises a lot of meetings and training sessions on regular basis. These meetings unfortunately are not limited to the managers talking (as if that were not enough) but it also involves successful consultants coming forward and sharing their "success stories" to the bored crowd. Now it must be noted that these consultants are largely homemakers who have stepped out for extra money and in some cases a chance to recapture a dream - of perhaps being a career woman. One cannot expect them to be good public speakers nor can one expect them to wax eloquence in English. But it doesnt apply to the ladies in question who insist on using a smatter of English when they speak. A word that is so subtle yet used a lot is the very ordin...

I have made this my home page. Looking at this page everyday will remind me to blog. Atleast that way I hope to reduce my shame of wasting precious internet space by merely having a page on the www (ok I dont want any smart alecs reminding me that writing blogs wastes internet pages like nobody's business). My favorite guilt factor is not giving importance to something I start with so much enthusiasm, (read, choosing blog templates and ids and whiling away time picking correct color schemes). This year I have the strange feeling that perhaps I apply this kinda attitude to my life too. So this year I am going to put in more blog postings... Would that be a blessing or a curse remains to be seen...

Since music is my passion the thought entered my mind that I wanted to make a neat collection of my favorite songs in english, hindi and tamil; separately. I haven’t come any where near to recording at least quarter of my favorites in one language. Sigh. What a difficult job this is. However this blog is not about music and the lengths I go to ensure I have a steady supply of music to last me a lifetime. This blog is on a song I came upon after a very long time. To say that Abba's Winner takes it all, is a poignant reminder of the harsh game of love, is an understatement. I have been hearing that song time and again over the past couple of weeks and each time I thank my lucky stars that I have not lost a man to another woman...mabbe coz I chickened out of relationships even before they got a chance to prosper. I don’t seem to remember coming across any friend too who has suffered the pain of losing a loved one to someone else. What was one supposed to think through all that pain an...

Last year's Friendship Day fell conveniently on a Sunday... convenient because I had the opportunity to think about the role my friends have played in my life to date. I should be an authority on the subject - "You are what your friends are" and I am proud that I turned out alright. Being a very friendly extrovert I think I had the prerequisites for being the kind of person people hang out with. Right from kindergarten, (oh yes I do remember my head being repeatedly banged against a wall by one very healthy 'friend'. I was terrified of her!) to this date, I have had at least one friend to whom I could tell everything. I am glad I do. Parents do have a hand in infusing good qualities in us and I thank my parents too for giving me the guidance in choosing good friends. In preparatory school I hardly remember having a close friend (I think I could be excused for having greater things to think like; when mum would come and pick me up after a grueling day of learning m...

I had the opportunity to eat at Bella Ciao the roof top Italian restaurant on Nungambakkam road. I have been meaning to visit the place for long but never got around to it, predominantly because of the harsh summer Chennai has been experiencing. Short of getting baked like one of their lovely pizzas there seemed no other option than to visit the place in a more pleasant weather. Two weeks ago my friend S and I were off shopping in Nungambakkam and suddenly hit upon the idea of having dinner at Bella Ciao. We had not booked earlier and were worried that we’d probably encounter a Sunday-Italian-loving-crowd there. But we needn’t have had to bother for; the place was pleasantly filled with an odd couple here and a subdued group of people there. The ambience of the place filled my eyes as soon as I stepped on to the terrace. It had a non fussy décor with non fussy arrangements. The décor was in blue and whites with gauzy maroon curtains. What I really liked about the place was the priva...

The plight of the single girls in our city is sometimes pathetic I think. There are so many out there that the competition in getting attention of any unattached male who neednt necessarily be worthy of all that attention is pathetic to say the least. I wonder if the same is the case for the opposite sex too. Anyways I have had the mis…er…fortune to over hear a conversation between two people in the gym. It is a given with these people around that one doesn’t come to the gym to merely exercise. Gyms have now become one of the coolest places to catch guys having similar interests and vice versa. So what if the only thing one found them doing was strutting from a treadmill to a cycle in designer wear and not really bother about serious exercising? At the cost of sounding like a frumpy 28 something, I must say Orkut has done its work of getting lots of clueless youngsters to mingle and wait for a tingle (er…thanks Karan). So here is a reproduction of the conversation between A (a loud...

For the past few months I have been having lots of discussions with my friends on THE ONE. It started with me having borrowed a book from the local lending library called “Bet Me” written by one Ms Jennifer Crusie. It was a beautifully written book as far as romantic books go. Mixing humour and subtle romance and sometimes the-oh not so subtle intimacy, she weaved a story around a handsome guy and a well endowed un-anorexic gal with an attitude (haven’t we read those a zillion times!), and made a winner out of it too. My friend and I were left wondering how such stories could exist in the world these days where in beauty and money was everything to most people. I was of the opinion that if the girl was not wealthy she should be extremely good looking to catch the prime guy in a match. If she didn’t have looks well she’d at least have money to fall back on. Now it was the in-betweens like me and her who had problems, we decided. The ones who I could call “the averagers”, who had average...

The Hectic Tech City - 2 Golconda fort was beautiful to say the least. The ruins stood majestically over the mountain and the sound of the parrots and other birds lent a peaceful atmosphere which helped in building up a picture of the times bygone. Our suspicious nature due to the morning’s episode did not desert us when we cautiously entered the magnificent doorways. So when some enthusiastic ‘guides’ advertised their knowledge of the place we refused to be tempted. We strolled casually inside and took our time admiring the different archways and passages. Our itinerary was rather straight forward. We wanted to see the sound and light show which was to be held at 6.30pm. Since we were at the fort by three thirty and since it was not a long climb and since there was not much to see, we took our time strolling in the gardens and watching people. Even then time seemed to crawl, so we slowly walked up the path leading to the fort. By the time we had climbed 20 huge boulders roughly cu...

I am back from a trip to Hyderabad and I didn’t have time to dissipate my enthusiasm by bugging my friends about the trip. Since the enthusiasm hadn’t found an outlet I simply had to write this on my online journal. My friend P and I decided to attend my friend’s wedding early this month. We used the wedding as a good excuse to see Hyderabad. My memory of Hyderabad was that of ten years back when I visited that city as college student. The distractions of going on an excursion are many…least of all being the total lack of perspective. So I looked forward to this visit as I was now a mature adult having a good idea of people and places. Ahem We worked out the trip from Sunday through Monday so that we could get back by Tuesday. My friend’s wedding was on Sunday night. We planned the places of visit and realized that Salar Jung Museum and Golconda fort had to fit in. But we had learnt that the museum needed good amount time to look around. So we squeezed Golconda fort on Sunday and t...

Reading Sys’s comment on the previous blog I realised that a mere 3 days break from monotonous work life can accumulate memories that last a life time. My friend’s blog on this trip is more helpful to people who are planning to trek places rarely seen. You can read her version of this trek on http://www.pkblogs.com/royalvilla . For those romantics who like me need to first know the details/experiences from somebody before meaning to ask them the technical details; can continue reading this blog as this is a diary of my most favorite memories in the trek. The trip to the top of the waterfalls was accomplished in about an hour and half as we had lots of important duties to do in between – like taking snaps of every unusual twig and leaf that we encountered, taking snaps of ourselves standing beside all these unusual twigs and leaves, taking snaps of others standing or posing beside er…all these unusual twigs and leaves, stopping to eat foods that performed the noble deed of putting...

The other day I had the pleasure of starting on a trek with a group of friends, most known, a couple unknown. The word trek was virtually unknown to me until this latest expedition. So in order to expiate the doubts of clueless souls (like me) I hereby give you a gist of my favorite parts of the trek… nah contrary to popular belief, they don’t include time spent gorging on calorie-loaded foods. Atleast I shall spare you those details, again as a gesture of solidarity, which only food lovers like me would know. So being the ignoramus I was I started gathering information from my more experienced partners on what one does on treks. My friend who was in charge of the travel and stay did a good job of keeping us posted on what to bring, what to wear and what not to wear (though I got terribly confused at one time and thought I’d have to wear a bright coloured tee to keep off the bison! Oh yeah, I am capable of that). But still mental pictures of people who wore trendy tracksuits and je...

I was reading an edition of Outlook magazine and I found a very lovely article on Hindi film songs. Top singers, musicians and music directors named their top 20 songs and those songs were listed in the book. Having grown up on a staple diet of hindi movies and songs, I can say safely that I loved all the songs featured there. But there were many that were left out which I felt, could have made the list. Still it was theirs and so I cannot have a say in it right? So I decided to make my list of top hindi songs. I started with my top 20 but fickle minded that I am I decided to relax that to top 25 songs and I am still not satisfied. If I could I would probably have top 100 but I am sure I would feel as if I had left out a song or two. Before I start my list I would love to put on record that I had a great time reaching the top songs in this list. A big hug and a huge thanks to my sweet friend P for helping out with the titles, song lyrics… not to say the song itself (don’t even ask… w...

I haven’t updated my blog in like ages (read one week). Yeah I can hear the over active minds saying that there should be something to write right? But then there is loads of stuff to write… at least about my city. One of the advantages of living far from my workplace is that by the time I reach either destination, there is so much seen and heard that the distance seems to dissolve. I see so many interesting things on road that perhaps a proper thesis can be written on it. But no no no I am not going to be doing all that so please read on. The other day I started off from work well after the office hours (you know, after the five to eight slot). The advantage of travelling at this time is that one can sight see, hum a song, drive/ride lazily or fast and do a million (er.. hmm ok so I exaggerate) things that a lot of people going in the office slot simply can't enjoy. At a leisurely pace I rode down to a junction, which is crowded at all times of the day and gazed dreamily at the nu...

"A 300 Rs ticket".. Oh yeah you would think it would be for any one of those myriad programmes we seem to be having in chennai.. like posters pasted on the roads tell us about the P Suseela and S Janaki concert, of course the Swingers or some other dance school advertising their dance performances or; the very recently held dance by a Bulgarian troupe which got some rave reviews.. but no, I didnt mean any of those... this I should say was a ticket to a dining experience in a prestigious hotel in Chennai. My dad being a share holder got some coupons which could be used in this particular hotel. As is the case with any coupon, we read thoroughly what is written in it for fear of missing some hidden clause which could lead to a nasty eating experience... you dont need me to tell you that right? So I very methodically went through the coupon and then told my friends S and P about it. They shared my enthusiasm.. no doubt due to the coupons belonging to the hotel in question. On ...

Recently I read on my friend's blog, her views on the rains in chennai. Not finding much scope to write on, thanks to Chennai's virtually nil rainfall, she moved her topic to mumbai which obviously boasted of considerable rain. But her blog got me thinking... In chennai we complain so much about the rain gods not blessing us and then complain more, when they do, about our city not being equipped to manage the bounty.. But what happens in between? Like the days we are having now.. the stifling heat in the mornings followed by a wisp of cool breeze by afternoon and then the oh-so-beautiful dark clouds gathering in the sky by evening and.. and just when one thought gale and rain would pound the rain starved city.. the skies open up and a mild shower descends on us. Beautiful... Ha! Didnt think I would use that adjective right? But it is beautiful.. as I happened to experience yesterday. Not really taking our recent sporadic showers seriusly, I had left my arsenal against the rains...