Theory of Relativity…

When Einstein gave us the theory of relativity, little did he know that all of us would experience it everyday, in every walk of life! It is amazing how the word ‘relative’ can change the ‘absolute’ meaning of everything. With the current pace with which the world is moving, it has all become relative. An actor is relatively better, an iPhone is relatively faster, a car is relatively cheaper, days are relatively shorter, winters are relatively warmer and the list goes on.

How I came to think about this great theory is because we recently completed a year of being happily married and it just seems like yesterday! The year was eventful and diverse.  The first six months, when I was in India seemed relatively longer, while the next half of the year went past in a blink. Though the absolute time was the same, there was a huge relative difference in both the halves

 

A relativity lesson from one of my favorite comic strips

Aaaaaannnnnnd, if you come to think of it, maybe even Einstein observed his theory of relativity in his daily life before he did in particles of matter Quite believable, isn’t it?

P.S. – This post looks relatively shorter due to a relatively lower level of patience to sit and type in this holiday season! It’s all relative!!

Forgetfulness…

No, No! I have not forgotten to update my blog (though the recent statistics might indicate otherwise ). I think I was going through what they call – “the writer’s block”. WordPress keeps mailing topics – prompts to remove your writer’s block! (feels nice to be called a writer though ). Never mind, I admit I am human enough and forget things. So far, I have always heard that humans are blessed with the ability to forget things. Here is another perspective of looking at it…humans are also lucky to be allowed to forget!! Imagine our plight if the (non-living) things around us were given this ability! :O Our day starts with the ringing of the alarm clock, is spent mostly in front of the laptop or on the cell phone and ends watching our favorite channel on the TV. We set reminders for our friend’s birthdays, store all numbers in the cell phone, prepare a TO-DO list on the ‘sticky notes’ in our laptop and keep posting all of this on Facebook to flood the News Feed! We are so dependent on these electronic gadgets for every chore we perform that their forgetfulness would create a havoc! Imagine,

• what if the alarm clock forgets to ring in the morning?

• what if the computer we log on to everyday forgets our credentials?

• what if our own cell phone forgets to show a birthday reminder of a dear friend?

• what if the television set forgets our favorite channel someday?

• what if the Facebook page we refresh every minute forgets to give us a notification?

• what if our debit card forgets its bar code?

We have become so accustomed to these electronic devices that our life would be a chaos if they start forgetting! Thank God I’m human and have these gadgets at my disposal

P.S. – Dont forget to key in your thoughts!

Love-all ! :)

Those who receive my Facebook updates would have no difficulty in guessing the content of this post. For all others, I just had my first shot at tennis last sunday. Hmmm..I know, 25 is pretty late to have your first shot at any game, but better late than never!

I was never an ardent follower of tennis. Being an Indian, I religiously followed cricket. Tennis, was just an interesting game the fair skin played and lately for me it was Roger Federer. I generally only watched the semi-finals and finals and could name the grand slams ;P. It was only in the last US Open, that I watched almost all the matches, more out of compulsion earlier (Aniket watched them at home everyday) and later out of interest.

After that, it had to be soon enough that I give it a shot. A lot of (free entry) courts by our University are an enticement coupled with motivation for everyone So finally, on Sunday I went to play with Aniket and his friends. No points to guess, I was a disaster on the court! I played badminton a lot and it took me time to comprehend that in tennis the ball is allowed to bounce once before you play. Like badminton, I tried to hit the ball full toss in the air After a few shots though I got a judgement of the things around and could at least return the ball on the other side. Aniket was out of techniques (and out of patience too) while teaching me to play

 

playing half court with Aniket

There were a couple of times when I hit and the ball landed in another court! :O I thoroughly enjoyed though. And I will go again with Aniket and his friends. It would test Aniket’s (and maybe his friends’) patience yet again. But that’s alright! I know they wont mind

oops! the ball landed in another court

 

Mistaken Identity ;)

My memory defies me in recalling the first time when I was first faced by the sentence “I almost confused you with XXX. You look so similar.” It is difficult to say how I react to these statements. Many times I find my face contort and give away an awkward expression which is a mixture of confusion, amazement and repetition. In the beginning there used to be curiosity as well, but as the frequency of these situations increased, the curiosity dwindled down.

I am still trying to figure out the reasons behind people finding me similar to someone. Maybe, I have a very common face (saying that, even I fail to understand what it means ) or maybe I give away a certain vibe which makes people talk to me and since they are out of topics, they start the cliched way.  Or simply, I am very approachable and make people comfortable enough to voice out their minds.

At one occasion, I was jogging on a ground and there was a lady sitting on a bench nearby. She suddenly asked me, “How is your mother?” I replied (thinking she must know my mother) “She is doing good”. The lady then asked me, “So how is your elder brother doing?” That made me realize that she has mistaken my banal face with someone else. Then I asked her (with the same contortion on my face), “Aunty, do we know each other?” She said “Don’t you remember me Sheetal?”

There was one other time when two maids almost scared me thinking I am someone else. It was on my journey to Bahrain and I was traveling alone when 2 maids came running to me shouting “Dipti! Dipti!” They were trying to tell me how Dipti’s boyfriend is crying out there to meet her!! They thought I was lying when I said I am not Dipti as I did not wish to meet Dipti’s boyfriend

The resemblance has chased me way along and caught me even after marriage. People confuse me with Aniket’s sister-in law, Sayli. And this time I am thankful for the resemblance as it gives me an edge when meeting new people. The ice breaks immediately with “She looks like Sayli!” and the flow into the conversation becomes easier

Genre: IIT

Everyday I wake up in the morning and there’s a new book in the market by an IITian. After the Chetan Bhagat success story, we have many aspiring Chetan Bhagats out there struggling with words on their (mostly romantic) novels.

Bit by the writing bug, 1 out of 5 IITians comes up with his own version of romance while he was in IIT. And most of them turn out to be the nowadays-found-everywhere love stories. I mean I found no difference in the way an IITian lives his/her love life and the way any non-IITian lives it.  The world seems beautiful, the stars start twinkling, the birds begin chirping and life becomes heaven in all love stories.

It was fun to read Chetan Bhagat’s Five Point Someone because it was first of its kind. It brought a whole new freshness with it. It unveiled the mystery behind the IIT life that everyone was curious to know. However, after that, the same mystery was unveiled again and again by different people which is not fun anymore.

The list that made me write this post:

Five Point Someone

Anything for you ma’am

Nothing for you my dear…still I love you

Heartbreaks & Dreams…the Girls at IIT

No offence to any IITian, its just that we expect a lot more from you guys! I am sure there is much more in you that everyone would want to know and would look up to than your (successful or unsuccessful) romantic encounters while in IIT!

In the heat of Texas ;)

I remember going to a skin specialist in India for a rash I had got on my hand. He diagnosed that I had a sun allergy. I was like ‘Yes, right! What do I do to escape from the sun? Establish life on Pluto and start living there? Well, that’s the only place where you wont possibly find sun rays.’ This was at the time when Pluto was still a planet. Now, I should change it to the next farthest – Neptune maybe Alright, coming back to where I was…so I supposedly have a sensitive skin that gets burns on being exposed to the sun!

To start with, I am currently in Texas which is supposed to have the hottest summers and the driest weather in the country. My starting semester here being Summer the first thing I had to face was – the Sun. A couple of days after we roamed about, I had sun burns (seeing them Aniket panicked completely and got me all the sunscreens, jackets and cap ). Thus, in a country where people believe in sun-tans and sun-baths and wear as less clothing as possible in summer, here I am trying to cover myself as completely as I can with a jacket, a cap and sunglasses; not to forget the sunscreen lotions I bathe in before I step outside. I am now accustomed to the oh-my-god-look-at-her-what-is-she-wearing glances I get from the passersby. Nevertheless, I know that the glances are easier to bear than the sun burns!

And as much Aniket enjoys pulling my leg, he tops all of this with a suggestion: ‘I think you should carry an umbrella. That would protect you completely.’ To which I have to react, ‘Thanks, I look funny enough without it!’

Master’s in United States

Just started my classes this week. A totally new frontier, new challenges – all together a different experience.

They call the Master’s a Graduate Course here and ‘Graduate College’ is called ‘Graduate School’. A couple of times I was taken aback when people asked me ‘When do you start school now?’ The maximum class strength is 20(!?!?!), so you don’t have people struggling to accommodate in the classroom.  My class hosts a heterogeneous crowd with a Chinese professor and American, Indian and Mexican students. With a strong accent of the professor it took me 10 minutes to comprehend that he was actually speaking English and not Chinese

The classrooms are fully equipped with audio-visual systems and huge LCDs. As the university spans across two geographically different locations, lectures are conducted on an ITV so that students can attend classes from both locations. Each student has a microphone on the desk on which he/she can speak so that everyone gets to hear the conversation.

There is no physical (paper) submission. The professor posts homework assignments on the class forum and students upload the completed assignments through FTP (something which is totally new to the Indian Graduates!) The library here is a 10 storied building with thousands of books of every subject.

All this and many more exciting experiences are keeping me really occupied these days. Its fun to be back at school and I am enjoying it!

The Journey (again)…

Huffff….yet again.. as is the case with my international travel (I had mentioned in one of my earlier posts) I was travelling alone, this time for a total of 28 hours with baggage more than was allowed (and more than my own weight ) Very typical to all Indian passengers, I had 4(!!!) cabin bags – 1 sack, 1 laptop bag, 1 document folder and 1 purse (I actually rehearsed taking out my tickets and passport with all bags in hand before leaving for the airport coz people at home wanted to be sure I could lift everything and walk a few steps at least )

My flight was at 5 a.m. (a punishment to my family who had come to see me off) Adhering to my way of describing journeys, here is what happened after I walked away from the waving hands and moist eyes at the Mumbai airport:

3.30 a.m. cleared immigration, security reached Gate 11.. Gate change announcement…. Run-run-run to Gate 3…reach Gate 3…Gate change announcement yet again… Run-walk-walk back to Gate 11 ….Everyone calls … 4.45 board flight to Doha.. 6.00 a.m. reached Doha… dad receives me there…had breakfast in the lounge.. chit chat with dad…8.30 a.m. dad boards his flight back to Bahrain.. 9.00 a.m. I board my flight to Washington…find the seat.. crew takes care of my cabin bags … take off to Washington DC… eat…watch a movie (The Princess and the frog)…sleep…eat…watch a movie (Devil wears Prada)… sleep…eat..watch a movie (Satte pe satta)…4 p.m. Washington DC… immigration…luggage check out.. check in to the connecting airline… take a coach…reach the Gate..board flight to San Antonio…9.30 p.m. arrive at San Antonio.. Aniket waiting with a bouquet at the arrival terminal …call everyone..11 p.m. Home Sweet Home

P.S. – All the timings in the description are local timings. The actual travel time was 28 hours, though here it seems to be 14 hours

P.P.S. – Many adventurous happenings are omitted from the description above due to the already long post, will create a separate post for those and believe me… you will have a laugh reading them

The Zoozoos :)

Apart from turnovers of zillions of rupees, IPL has brought with it refreshing changes in the highly monotonous (and often illogical) advertising world. Just when advertisements meant cricketers trying to act out their income, or zero figure models advertising for cement companies (I am still perplexed by that ad); Vodafone introduced “Zoozoos”, the egg headed, ghost white characters making strange sounds.

I agree to the fact that the ratio of number of fathomable zoozoo ads to the unfathomable ones is 1:1, nevertheless, it always amuses me to watch these creatures express emotions using mere hand gestures and static facial changes. Some of my favorite ads where zoozoos have shown extremely adorable gestures are:

Zoozoo News Alerts:

Watch the hand gestures of the scared zoozoo while leaving

ZooZoo SMS Jokes Alerts:

The Tribal dance..Unbelievably Adorable They actually lift one hand and wave it in the air

My Somniloquy :P

Or should I say “our” somniloquy!! Not until recently was  I amazed about my sleep talking. I was aware that I did talk at times (when ill or when extremely tired which is quite normal according to medical sources ). But just recently I (read Aniket, my husband) realized that I sleep talk almost every night. Aniket, being a light sleeper wakes up even by the ticking of a clock. Initially he was caught by surprise and thought I was actually talking to him. He kind of had an entire conversation with me (me talking trash while he tried hard to make sense out of it ) of which I remember nothing. We were rolling on the floor the next day when he enacted the entire conversation to everyone.

The paradoxical part is, even Aniket is a somniloquist!!! He too sleep talks! :D But the fact that I am a sound sleeper and no amount of noise can disturb my sleep has skewed the ballast on his side. It was as if we were taking turns with our sleep talking skills But the worst part of it is whoever talks while sleeping, its Aniket who wakes up

Its something we are working on. Hope we get over it (or used to it) soon

Till then..Happy Sleeping (I mean reading) !!

Re-connect!!

HELLO!!!! 

Its been a long long time after my last post. A plethora of activities on the personal front eluded my blogger self for nearly 2 months. Now, after having outshined the major impediments, having settled on all fronts I am back again with a fervor for writing.

Plenty of things to write about; experiences which I may not be able to put into words as they involve extreme emotions. Many more in the waiting…..

It gives me great pleasure to reinstate the my perspectives delineating my endeavours as posts in this blog. 

With a hope to keep up to the expectations of all my friends and readers I will try to make reading hence forth an enjoyable experience!  

P.S. – Some of the words used above are the repercussions of my most recent encounter with the Graduate Record Examination (GRE). I am brazen enough to use them even though I performed horribly in the verbal section

Ajab Prem ki Ghazab Kahani – Music Review

Ranbir and Katrina in Ajab Prem ki Ghazab Kahani

This is the first time I am writing a review on music of a film. Usually I am the last one to listen to new songs, let alone writing a review about them!

There’s always a first time though, and this time I would like to endeavor my skills to write about the music of the Rajkumar Santoshi’s latest most spoken about flick Ajab Prem ki Ghazab Kahani (from the title it seems like a Rajashree Production though )

Pritam has yet again proved his potential in reaching to the masses and making everyone sway at his tunes. Pritam’s fans have all the reasons to celebrate with this fresh and youthful music release.

The first song “Main Tera Dhadkan Teri” has already topped all charts. With the voices of Sunidhi Chauhan and Hard Kaur, it is one of the best numbers in the film.

Atif Aslam has sung two songs in the film – “Tera Hone Laga Hoon” and “Tu Jaane Na”, both romantic numbers. Alisha Chenoy’s and Atif’s care free voice makes “Tera Hone Laga Hoon” a beautiful song to listen to. “Tu Jaane Na” is also a pleasant melody. However, Kailash Kher’s unplugged version of it beats the original hands down.

“Prem Ki Naiyya” is a peppy number, though not one of the recommended ones. Hard Kaur’s “Follow Me” is a creation appreciated by her fans (I am not really interested in this genre of music).

Music Release of Ajab Prem ki Ghazab Kahani

The originals, in general are much better than the reprises (barring an exception to Tu Jaane Na). All in all the music raises the hopes of audience. The lyrics are penned by Irshad Kamil & Ashish Pandit. Pritam would surely have his eyes on this year’s music nominations for Ajab Prem Ki…

My Favorites: Tera Hone Laga Hoon… Tu Jaane Na (original as well as unplugged)

My Word: Surely an album to have in your music collection!

A new look…

Owing to my continuity in blogging and the considerable response I received from all of you, it was just a matter of time before I moved on to a new (and supposedly better) blogger. I hope this new look will make reading articles more interesting and the new features would make writing more enjoyable.

I promise to keep the blog updated with interesting stuff and continue this effort as have done in the past! Please update your blog roll’s and bookmarks

Happy Reading!

P.S. :- I am learning to keep my posts small! Its tweeting, and not blogging that is on the cards these days

P.P.S. :- Do not forget to vote in the poll on the right. Your feedback will surely be taken notice of

Some imminent interests – I : Calligraphy

A lot of free time (at work) from a few days made me explore some of my interests apart from the odd jobs.One of my long desired interests is learning Calligraphy.

Calligraphy means the art of beautiful writing. The word Calligraphy is derived from the Greek words kallos “beauty” +  graphẽ “writing”. This was the way books were written before the invention of the printing press 500 years ago. Each copy was handwritten out by the scribe. The handwriting was done with a quill and ink on materials like parchment or vellum.

Today there are 3 main types of calligraphy:

• Western or Roman
• Arabic
• Chinese

As far as India’s contribution to the art of  Calligraphy, the roots can be traced to the times of King Asoka, where there were stone inscriptions. Copper was the most popular for such inscriptions. Many Indic manuscripts were written on palm leaves, even after the Indian languages were put on paper in the 13th century. The palm leaf was an excellent surface for penwriting.

Some samples of calligraphy for reference:

Sweetest Day!!!

Just browsing through the net, I came across this really interesting celebration – Sweetest Day!!

The third Saturday of October is supposedly observed as the Sweetest Day. 2009 sees the Sweetest Day on 17th October, coinciding with one of the most auspicious days of Hindu religion – Diwali (Lakshmi Poojan).

The sweetest day celebration was first started by candy manufacturers to promote health benefits of eating candy and chocolates everyday! Though not as popular as Valentine’s day, Sweetest day celebration began to honor close friends, relatives, employees with special gifts and chocolates.

The way to celebrate:

1. Gift your near and dear ones a box of chocolates or sweets.
2. To give a personal touch, make a scrapbook with your memories and gift it to your loved ones.
3. Flowers are always a way to make the person in front smile, a bouquet and sweets will surely cheer up their day!

So, alongwith Happy Diwali, dont forget to wish Happy Sweetest Day this year!