Keep on the sunny side of life :)

"There's a dark and troubled side of life,
There's a bright and a sunny side too.
Though you meet with the darkness and strife,
The sunny side you may also view"
-The Whites

I'm tucked cozily in my bed, listening to O Brother Where Art Thou's soundtrack and feeling really good. It's songs remind me of the Christmas carols we used to sing in school. Sniff :') It's late and it took a lot of restraint on my part to stop reading an extremely intriguing book which I'm going to talk about here once I finish reading it. I got a call from a good college for a course in Mass Communication and I'm extremely jittery but excited about the GD and PI. I feel like this is the first time I'm actually doing something which will facilitate the process of me getting out of this city. Am I, gulp, growing up? :O I should not be complacent about this. I need to prepare well. Fingers, toes and body crossed! Wish me luck!

I love it when I receive a comment or I get a new follower, because it makes me feel that what I write has somehow moved a person at least a teeny tiny bit. And that teeny tiny bit is enough to keep me motivated to write more. And I will. I've grown to love blogging over the years. I started my first blog when I was 14 and there were many spirited discussions and sharing of opinions there. It got deleted somehow (don't even ask how. It was so unbelievably stupid) and the writer in me died a little. But someone revived the zest in me to write again and I've realized how much I love it.
I love having my own little modest corner in this vast virtual Web :)
Thank you readers, I'm feeling an overwhelming sense of love for you all. Please shower me with more love? Smother me with incessant affection! :D

I was thinking, when you have these I'm-so-happy-nothing-can-bring-me-down moments, what exactly is happening in that tricky little brain of yours? Is it because of hormones? A feeling of achievement? (be it because of even small things like making someone feel special or doing an assignment on time) Is it because of music? Good memories? What exactly happifies you so strongly? Is it because of a meaningful, satisfying conversation? Same goes for when you're feeling utterly low and downtrodden and like the entire world is against you and you just want to die? I really don't get it.

Well, whatever the reason may be, I'm feeling blissfully happy to be alive right now. Even though there are a hundred things I want to correct about myself and there is a truckload of pending work, I feel like I'll survive. Something will work out in the end. I guess what you should focus on is holding on to these moments, climb your happy trees, share a laugh or two and spread it even further. Even a simple smile or a warm hug can completely change a person's mood or make someone's day. True story. Tried, tested and experienced. Spread the cheer because you never know who might be having a completely dull day. Sigh, life is funny. But it's worth living :)

P.S. I'd like to share a picture of me my brother clicked on his phone in the train when I was returning from Delhi to Agra on the first day of the year. I love train rides and train ride pictures. They have this whole eager, excited aura about them. It represents a journey, a change, eagerness to meet loved ones, excitement at the prospect of going to a different place. I love looking out the window, contemplating, thinking, listening to music, (reminds me of Porcupine Tree's 'Trains') soaking in the breeze and smells of different places and then slowly drifting off. Now, how many of you are reminded of Stevenson's From a Railway Carriage? :)

Chameli? Chikni? Seriously? :|

(SO classy. No?)

Oh.my.GOD.

Did you SEE the song ‘Chikni Chameli’ from Agneepath? :O

And sheesh! Can you believe the title? Chameli. Right. Very original. 

If you’re a boy, and if you’re a Bollywood-item-numbers-liking, shameless type of guy who looks a girl top to bottom, then scram! (Wait a minute, what are you even doing on my blog?)

I randomly saw the entire song today on TV. And man! Wh.. How.. Wh.. HOW is she DOING that man?!

Her body movements seem impossible! It’s like she’s made of rubber and has no bones at all! It’s beyond human comprehension how she is jiggling and jumping and flouncing about like that. It is bizarre. It seems like we’re having a battle of item songs for attracting people to the theatres. And boy, do they all flock over there or what! They’re like a herd of sheep, going wherever the grass seems juicier. And the grass on Agneepath’s pasture is juicy as hell.

I hate the entire concept of an item song. The sole purpose of having them is to make girls diet and exercise themselves to death to get that perfect, not-an-extra-ounce-of-flesh on them type of body and then expose and flaunt it unthinkably. And then they’re made to wiggle and shake like a jelly (and they’re paid heaps of moolah for doing so) which in turn gives all the pervs in our country an open excuse to get all the skin show and eye candy that they only fantasize about. My fate also made me watch another Veena Malick number, in front of which Chikni Chameli looks harmlessly laughable. (She’s wearing a blouse which has two luminous circles on it. Get the picture?)

The reason why people go to watch a movie should not be some sleazy boisterous dance song, but the storyline, or the acting or the direction or even the music. But the entire idea of inserting these vulgar songs smack in the middle of a story is so screwed up. I don’t even feel like watching music channels anymore. And on top of that, they make these songs so catchy! It is so infuriating! And WHY, may I ask, are the moves getting more and more embarrassing? How is she thrusting her entire body in all four directions all at once and then making those wicked expressions?  *cringe*

Yeah, I get it, you’re tall and perfect and beautiful, (and you make me feel pathetic about life) but need you shove your, ahem, bosom repeatedly into the camera to prove you’re sexy? I mean what were you thinking?! (Or maybe you weren’t, seeing as you were “pauuwa chadha ke aayi”) Go take some acting lessons, learn a bit of Hindi and do some good movies, no? Put that awesome face to some good use. You’d all do us a huge favour :)

Well anyway, the fact is that you cannot really ignore them. They are played on TV in shops and cafés, blared on speakers in the markets and radios, sung at inhuman volumes into the wee hours of the night in wedding baaraats, viewed endlessly on youtube and shared religiously on Facebook. Sigh, and now even my 16 month old niece lights up at the sound and sight of this song. It’s her new favourite and all you have to do to make her stop crying is play the song. And then see her hopping and giggling about. Chikni Chameli is the new Powerpuff Girl? :\

Oh well, at least the song is of some use. 

Incendies

I still haven’t recovered from the shock after watching Incendies. After watching it, I couldn’t sleep or talk. I just wept. We sit here, so comfortable in our daily lives, shrouded by our own trifle issues, that we do not realize our life could have been tremendously worse that what it is.

War, famine, poverty, epidemics, discrimination, abuse, murders, terrorism.. we never envisage these things could even touch us. They only happen to others, they cannot possibly happen to us. And yet, people have gone through things we cannot even imagine.

I wept not only for Nawal Marwan, but for the entire humanity. For the injustice, for the atrocity, for the circumstances that compel humans to become so hard-hearted that they do not even blink before ending somebody else’s life. What must go through them to make them like that? Their conscience has to be dead for them to become so heartless. I wept for the destroyed homes and souls of the people who cannot get the undemanding pleasure of living a simple life. I wept for people who pray, for people who have faith and for people who have none. I wept for the silent, greasy tears that stream down a weary soldier’s cheek and fall onto a land which is divided into fragments for pathetic, greedy reasons. I wept for the blood baths, for the ravaged, raped, abandoned bodies and the withered consciences. I wept for all the pain, for children who lose their mothers, for families that are torn apart, for dreams that are shattered beyond repair, for hearts that are broken into smithereens. I wept for the millions of souls that are burnt and bludgeoned and tortured and killed and scorched in a world where that almighty being in the sky still looks down upon us and for those who believe he loves us all.

Love in the Time of Cholera

I just finished reading Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and not surprisingly, my head is exploding with questions and thoughts. The story is set in the late 1800s, and yet, the feelings, the emotions, the madness, the confusions and problems that people have to face in their lifetime seem timeless.

It is about a young boy called Florentino who falls in love with a teenager Fermina and how they get to know each other through a passionate and fervent exchange of love letters. As she grows up, she realizes it’s not really love but immature, illusory stupidity and decides to stop being in touch. He cries and burns in anguish and helplessness and continues to write sonnets and poems in her memory.

A young, intelligent and reputed doctor, Dr. Urbino then proposes to Ferima and though she initially dislikes him, agrees to get married to him. They live a long and happy life, have children, and go through the usual downs and highs every married couple goes through. Florentino indulges into countless love affairs with many lonely women, while he still truly loves only Fermina and longs to be with her again.

When he is almost eighty years old and she is in her mid-seventies, with her husband dead and her alone and facing many unresolved issues, they find solace and comfort in each other. They crash into love and finally get the mental peace and stability they looked for all their lives. Fermina realizes that even though she kept feeling that she was happy with her married life, now when she retrospects, it seems so loveless, so complicated, so wrong.

That shook me. This is what we do. When we look back upon something, old incidents or relationships, we don’t really see it the way it was. Over time, every time we look back upon it, it gets changed, according to changes in our lives and in our personalities. At one point of time, when I thought I was so happy and content, now when I think about it, I wasn’t. I don’t even know what or how it actually was. I don’t even know what the reality is. What was it?

We change so much over time, that we lose parts of us somewhere along the years, and acquire so many new personalities. We’re over a million different people in a lifetime. How can we trust anything then? How can we trust anything or anyone to do what we think they would? Are we in a position to judge anybody’s actions? Are we to say anything at all? And can we trust ourselves? How do we define what is right and wrong? Is there any guarantee to anything in life? Is there any guarantee to love? Is there any guarantee to life itself? Is anything ever what it is? Or does it keep getting changed because we want it to? What is real?

Wish you were here

This is an open letter to you. Why is it open? I don’t know. It’s kind of thrilling I guess. It has to be more than just an e-mail when I know you’re completely inaccessible and vacationing in Goa. I hope you’re having exotic drinks and frolicking about in your Fedora hat and being the perfect eye candy to the skimpily clothed girls. Or should it be the other way round? :)

I stood in my balcony today, wearing only a single loose sweater with my hands inside the sleeves and allowed the biting winds to attack me with full force while I noticed the vapours coming out of my mouth wherein my teeth were clattering silently. I kind of liked it. I was thinking of you. And your abnormal gait and the newly developed hole in your cheek, which you purposefully try to pronounce so that I would compliment you. Right, like you need any more reasons to be cuter. And how you put your unimaginably twisted hand on your chest and say “that is correct” with so much of authority in your voice :P

I have realized that I should listen to you more often. I should have seen O Brother Where Art Thou long back, but I didn’t, even though you kept telling me to. And now that I’ve seen it, even I am hooked on to ‘I’ll fly away’. It is a wonderful, positive song and I feel instantly happy when I listen to it. I’m still chuckling to myself thinking of some of the scenes. George Clooney is hilarious. I’ve started liking old time country music so much now. Thank you! You’re awesome.

I’m addicted to OK Computer and In Rainbows. I don't understand why I’m so obsessed with Radiohead. It is so surreal and beautiful. I cannot stop once I start listening to it. Also, ‘Pigs’ is my new favourite song by Pink Floyd.  I talked to one of my friends about you today :) And another friend called us ‘disgustingly cute’! And cute guy with dimples has been texting me :)

I saw you in my dream where you were dancing to an old Helen song. Can you believe it? You! And dancing! We also had an entire conversation in it. You were plucking out your hair for me and asking me to keep it safely :)

I am almost done reading Love in the Time of Cholera and turns out, I like it. It has been written in a poetic, romantic way and yet it is funny in a lot of parts. I’m really hoping the ending to be good. It feels really nice when you follow the story of somebody else’s life and try to analyze why they do the things they do and then try to relate it to your own life. I don’t know, it’s a very good feeling, when you try to imagine yourself to be in their situation and then think of what you’d have done.

I know that I should seriously start preparing for my entrance exams and work diligently on my projects, but there is this huge inertia lurking about. I know I can get over it. My conscious mind says “I’m going to lock all my books away and deactivate my Facebook account and stop blogging and sleep less and switch off my phone and do some work seriously.” And then my subconscious mind guffaws with amusement and says “Yeah right” :|

It is so annoying. Okay, come what may, I have promised myself I’m going to make substantial progress in at least 2 out of the 5 projects at hand. I swear. And again, I need to start listening to you and STOP sleeping in the afternoon. The ‘naps’ get converted into 5 hours of dreams-infused, drunk, death-like sleep. And then I stay awake all night and yawn and nod off incessantly in the classes. Seriously, like you always say “something has to be done”.

I really like this line from the song ‘Tum Ho’ (Rockstar) because it reminds me of our long walks in Baroda :)

“Kahin se, kahin ko bhi, aao bewaja chalein,

Pooche bina, kisi se, hum milein.

Bandishein na rahin, koi baaki”

Okay I realize this is the most pointless blog post I have ever written but I had to do something. I’m missing you. Try to dream of me tonight?

Love,

Tweeky :D

Rahul is a cheater, he is a cheater! Cheater!!

Flicking through the infinite TV channels, and catching glimpses of movie promos which involves a lot of horrifying skin show and unspeakable and unbelievable body movements, and the vaaaast number of news channels spewing nothing but noisy nonsense, I was sitting with my typical half-an-upper-lip-raised-upwards exasperated expression. I was just about to switch the TV off when BAM!

There was a “Miss Braganza ahaaaan!” and a very young and suave Archana Singh in a mini skirt on the TV crooning “Romeo and Juliet.. ek amar prem kahaani!” I HAD to smile. I have seen Kuch Kuch Hota Hai about a million times and I know all the dialogues and scenes and songs by heart like a typical 20 something girl who grew up in the '90s in India. It was a movie that changed the lives of many young people. For one, playing basketball and wearing a ‘COOL’ chain around your neck and going on Summer camps became the new rage. The whole  ‘pyaar dosti hai’ theory made sense to everyone and every girl wanted a guy like Shahrukh Khan who would just stand in his iconic arms-wide-open pose and they would want to fly into them.

No matter the absurdity of some of the aspects about the film, including the obviously artificial falling stars and the fact that the London returned raspy-voiced Tina spoke in perfect Hindi and sang “Om Jai Jagdish” in the most melodious, magical voice you could imagine smack in the middle of their college to prove that she had her 'sanskaars' intact and that the eight year old girl had the sense and wisdom of an eighty year old, I have a strange affinity to this movie.

I love it because it is so flawed. I love it because it reminds me of myself when I was eight years old when I first saw it in the normal, non-multiplex cinema hall and had cried and made futile attempts at hiding my tears when Anjali left Rahul and went away forever. It reminds me of my childhood and the innocence and the eagerness and excitement to grow old. I still sing along to ‘Koi mil gaya’, which I once thought was the coolest song, like, ever and I couldn't wait to learn how to play the guitar like Tina (who by the way, just holds the instrument in the movie without so much as moving her fingers on it artificially. I guess she knew the audience would know she was faking it anyway. Oh wait, they didn't. Because they were all dumb like me) And I still weep when Anjali tries to hide her tears as they get mingled with the rain, because Rahul loves Tina and not her :(

I still laugh when Mr. Malhotra (Anupam Kher) climbs up his own house like a robber trying to locate the next rung of the ladder with his feet. I like the silent 'Jalebi' kid and his “tussi ja rahe ho? Tussi na jao” dialogue. I love the whole Dumb Cherades scene and the oh so romantic, wet, dreamy, silent dance under the shack. Sigh. SRK is so hot. I still like the scene where Anjali’s saree is blowing and blowing and blowing and blowing in the wind and Rahul is watching her with desire and sorrow and it’s STILL blowing. I still like the dialogue “hum ek baar jeete hain, ek baar marte hain, aur pyaar bhi ek hi baar hi karte hain” however lame it may sound now! I still smile with contentment when Anjali and Rahul finally reunite in the end and SRK flashes his gorgeous dimpled smile again!

After watching it today I’ve realized how much I’ve grown and how attached I still am to my childhood. I recalled so many different scenarios and people with whom I watched this movie. This one time I watched it with my friends where we were fighting over who SRK is best suited for and how cute he looks in shorts. I want to be that innocent, chirpy, happy, stupid girl again.. or not. I think I just want to stop growing old now. Ugh, I'm 21. I guess I’ll be okay. I guess these are the type of movies which we will still love when we're fifty and our kids will be like "What DO you like about these movies mom?" And then we'd realized what our parents meant. Or maybe even they'd like it. 


Well whatever happens, cheers to a time of innocence!

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai Rahul, tum nahin samjhoge :)


P.S. Please be Rahul again SRK. Or maybe you can be a dad to a new Rahul. Anything but Ra.One. Pretty please?

So how are you Holden up?

I have a new favourite fictitious character! Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye. The book, to put in Holden’s words ‘killed me’. I had always heard about it but never ended up reading it because someone told me your mind has to be ‘developed’ enough to actually appreciate it. And boy, did I appreciate it or what! (Okay, I think I’m under the influence of Holden’s manner of speaking :P)

It was such a pleasure reading the book, I almost read it in a day and felt that it got over too soon. It was written as a narrative by Holden, who is this crazy little kid. A seventeen year old who flunks out of school for probably the third time and who thinks the world is full of ‘phonies’ and ‘corny people’ and mostly everything about his school and his friends ‘depresses’ him. The language used in the book is probably one of the strongest reasons why it is so famous and why it started this cult of young rebellions. It is brutally honest, has a predominant usage of swear words, is extremely human and it feels like you actually live inside his head for a span of three to four odd days and see how feverishly it functions.

Poor little Holden. He is just confused and has his own set of problems and insecurities. Although he comes across as a cynical chap, in fact, he is soft hearted and curious about a lot of seemingly insignificant, but delicate things. And the way he describes his relationship with his sister and his childhood friend. Man! It’s as if you’re actually listening to an adolescent talk about his life, you know? He is this innocent, bemused student who doesn’t understand a lot of things and why some people behave the way they do and is probably going through a rough patch in his life and he gets all these crazy ideas in his head. He literally wanted to be a ‘catcher’ in the rye. I thought that was adorable.

I loved the ending, where he just watches his sister on the carousel going round and round. It was so open and honest. I will probably read the book again, after a few months. Definitely one of the best books I’ve read lately! Yips!

Just catching up on a few more things: This is my last semester! Last!! It’s delightfully cold and appropriately sunny enough every day. The kind when it your hands are too frozen to makes notes in class in the first lecture. We have really good teachers this time. And good subjects and interesting projects to work on.

I’ve had what can be described as the most amazing, surreal start of 2011. Oh, Happy New year! :D I don't really get why a new year is supposed to be a big deal though. I mean, sure, it feels nice to write a new date on the exam answer sheets for a change. But then, it does bring a lot of positivity with it, doesn't it? New promises, resolutions, dreams. A fresh start.

New year’s for me this time involved a road trip to Delhi, (with some of my closest peeps) stopping to have tempting parathas on the way, eating and dancing with family and friends, lighting night sky lanterns at 12, swinging on tiny swings like kids while singing “I’m with you” (by Avril Lavigne), standing in the balcony in the chilly breeze, clicking the cutest of pictures together, meeting En (I’m thrilled about that actually!), running around in the rain and reaching a pub all damp and trembling and looking like wet chickens, eating with chopsticks and sinking teeth into delicious doughnuts, cracking ‘that’s-what-she-saids’, more dancing and just plain ol’ horsing around. And believe me, this is not even HALF of it. I wish I could mention everything! I really do! Oh, this so does not justify what New year’s was like. Sigh, but I guess you’ll have to make do with this much, for now.

There is a lot of stuff going on. Nothing major, but just stuff that might lead up to something major. I’m excited! Yes I am! Too excited I guess, it’s 4 in the morning for Christ’s sake! What’s the matter with me?

I’ll hop for now. But I’ll be back. Very soon :)

Veronika Decides to Die

Yesterday I finished reading this book by Paulo Coelho which I'd bought at the Nizamuddin railway station, Delhi: Veronika Decides to Die. It is a story about a young, good looking, 24 year old girl with a steady job and plenty of boyfriends who attempts at killing herself by consuming an overdose of sleeping pills. Why did she want to kill herself at all?

Monotony. She felt that her life was too boring, too predictable and from then on it would only go downhill, with her becoming frail and weak and diseased and watching her loved ones die. She didn't see any point in living any further. She believed that every human being had a choice to take their own lives if they wanted to and 'God' shouldn't punish them for doing so, in fact, if anything, He is the one who should be apologetic for putting them on a place like the Earth in the first place.

Anyway, she survives somehow and wakes up in a mental hospital where she gets to know that her heart has been irreversibly damaged and she only had a week to live. While she waits for death to arrive, she suddenly realizes that she needn't care about what people think about what she says or does or how she behaves because she had nothing to lose. She needn't care about the walls she had constructed around her, trying to be correct, to be precise, to be proper. And so, for the first time in her life, she allows herself to be free. To do things she had never done, to experience beauty and love and hatred and perversion.

It is when she is so aware of death lingering around her that she finally understands what it is to live, to fall in love, to experience extreme emotions, to find joy in simple things. Isn't it ironical? Her decision to die teaches her how to live.

I read somewhere "The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost." It's only after we lose something that we realize what it meant to us. Veronika realized that she hated the way she had lived her life. She never let herself be a little mad, a little crazy; she always tried to be a cistern, containing all the water inside her; but never a fountain, overflowing with emotions and enthusiasm. She never took risks, she never liked adventure, she was never rude or spiteful, she never made moves on guys thinking they might dump her; she never lived life on the edge. There was no excitement, no meaning, no purpose in her life.

I guess this is what happens to most people somewhere through life. They lose the spark, they are too afraid to go out of their comfort zones, they don't live life on the edge, and they end up existing, instead of living. Reading the book has once again changed my perspective about life (earlier it had happened after I watched The Secret) I guess we should all live our lives like its going to end very soon. Like we only have a few days to experience everything we can and to do everything we wanted to do. Like there's very little time left. Like there's no tomorrow.

Be crazy. Be daring. Try things. Try things which are considered wrong. Make mistakes, make lots of them. Experience bitter resentment and extreme anger and maddening euphoria. Weep with happiness, jump with joy and laugh out loud. Live. Life is too short and there is a lot to be done. Like a wise man once said, "There is no time to act dead; for one day, we will be."