"Yes yes.. mamma will give you sweety", my friend crooned to her 3 year old. It was her son's birthday and she had put together a party and as all kids - he was totaly cranky at his own party. I watched as Vidya rushed to the kitchen trying to find her son's favourite glass to give him water. Her place was jam packed with people.

She was working with a leading IT company and she had really struggled to make it home on time for this party. The whole day too had gone by for her trying to juggle work and making invitation calls to her various relatives for the big party. It was already 7:30 and everyone had come and the cake still hadn't arrived. Vivek was supposed to pick it up on the way back home and he hadnt even started yet. She wondered just when it would finally come and they would cut it and the party would get over and everyone would go home and she would ... whew!! finally rest her feet. Just thinking about it made her head spin. She had round about 9 permanent members in her posh 3 bedroom apartment. Having married her first cousin, she had her parents , her brother in law, her grandma (also Vivek's of course) and her 2 uncles staying with them. Every day was one big party for her as she tried to satisfy so many people's whims and still tried to take out some time for them as a family.

I watched her, running from place to place and trying to get things just right and I thought of the Vidya I knew years back.

I and Vidya had been classmates 9 years back when we had both come to Trichy to do our post graduate. I still remember my first impression of her - whirlwind ! Thats what came to mind. Small structured, bob cut hair, a fitting salwar, perky eyes and a mouth that never stopped smiling. That was Vidya. There wasn't a single person in the college who didn't know her. She was smart, funny and fun to be with.

Flowing water - you can admire it and even think you got a taste but when you try to hold it in your hands it slips through your fingers. That was how she was - like flowing water. No one knew what made her tick - what made her cry or laugh for that matter. She was your best friend without you being hers. Enigma at the same time so simple it took your breath away.

And she had a vision for a life. Where she would be allowed to fly. Where she would have her own independence. For being an only child - she had been cossetted in the bossom of her huge family and not let out much. But any fun thing and Vidya was game to try it. Such a "filled with life" personality that anyone would perk up in her company.

And there was one who had the privilege of being that close to her. Of knowing her inside out. Knowing what lay deep in her heart. And he loved her- heart and soul. Love they say is just a feeling - you have to feel it- with these two it was tangible. You could reach out and touch it. And her life with him would have been.. Well who is to say what it would have been.
For, when push came to shove, and it was time to tie the knot- Vidya tied the biggest knot - tied her whole family in one box and put a bow on it. Her parents couldn't have been happier when she quietly went and married Vivek - her own cousin. Vivek loved her - no doubt - to know her was to love her. And she was flexible enough to shove all of her past aside and put all her energy into making the future of her choosing - bloom.

And Vivek - probably he never realised what he got. Taking Vidya and her love for granted he is a completely happy man till date. What you never know you never worry about - and so Vivek never worries or even thinks about how his life would have been had Vidya not been a part of it. How close he came to losing her and just how much of a sense of duty she must have had to pull her off all she desired and into something which is today sapping all of her energy - he could never even hazard a guess.

I watched Vidya as her mother came and stood near me. "I thought I made the right choice for my girl with Vivek - thought she would be more happy than ever and will go settle abroad and have her own life. I spent my entire life looking after everyone and being taken for granted. Now I am old and cannot do it anymore. Still I am pushing myself as much as I can for the sake of my girl. But it hurts to see that she is going down the same path I trod upon - following in my foot steps. Devoting all she has to care for the same people I have cared for all these years. My baby - and I cannot do anything for her. I just tell myself she is happy and leave it at that. But it is an empty consolation" , she wiped off a tear and hurried off to help Vidya. And I thought yet again - how parents always think they know best. How they manipulate us into doing what they KNOW is the right thing and how we always come under their emotional pressure  ( I really dont want to use the word blackmail here ) and do it. And then comes a day when they look sadly and think to themselves how it would have been better to actually let go of their children to make their own lives, take their own decisions, and just be there as a support for them and not force them into the narrow roads which they felt were the best.
Mmmmm.... Must read this again and again as Somesh grows up !

This is a story - fictional yes.. but the skeleton I borrowed from someone. So my apologies to that someone who might want to write his own story :)) Some imaginations.. Some additions... Just to make it a bit more interesting... Here's to you :)))



"Move ! standing in the middle. your father's road is it" , the fat lady pushed by him. Koyambedu in chennai was at its peak on this sultry humid saturday night. Fot the nth time he thought of his reasons for booking in the bus and not going for the comforts of the train. He had been in chennai for 3 days- on official duty- roaming from place to place, having meetings for his current job and maybe even the next one he may take up. After all the flitting from place to place he was finally going back home- catching the late night bus. Tall and lazy looking, he shifted from foot to foot watching people all around him. He was a born observer- it was a second nature to him. His eyes took in the fat lady pushing her way through groups, the wailing baby on the mother's hip, the incessant honking of the buses in and out of the stand, the loud speaker announcing the arrivals and departures (as if it were a bloody airport!) , the slushy mud beneath his feet, the wind which teased with the promise of december coolness yet held itself back. Mind on things, his eyes went on absorbing sights around him without really registering it, when suddenly the earth stopped its rotation. the wind silenced its howling. The fat lady stood still, the baby on the mother's hip was frozen into immobility. For him the moment simply stood still - for there SHE was. He couldnt believe his eyes, his mind went into an overdrive and pulled him 12 years back.

No tensions as only a 18 year old could be, he was enjoying the whiff of adulthood - college gave a boy the feeling of being a man like nothing else did. Not to mention the coveted glances of beautiful girls looking shyly beneath their eyes when they thought no one observed them. But there was one and only one he watched for. Fair, slim and beautiful eyes (though in this HE could give her a run for her money), she was an year his senior. But love bloomed in his young heart as it has never bloomed before and probably would never after too. She was perfect. So sweet. So pretty. Even saying her name made his heart trip a beat and hammer in a rhythmn only he could hear. But she was a secret he hugged to himself. He was big on anticipation. The more you look forward to something the more interest it adds to your life. So he was busy being a friend to her. They will proceed to the next level sometime- of that he had no doubts. After all she seemed to like him, spent time with him, laughed at everything he said and was generally comfortable with him. The next step could wait. There was time yet. He did not have a doubt in his tender heart that she would be his - why! just last week when he fell ill, didn't she come to his house and put a smear of holy ashes with her own sweet hands on his forehead? His parents were so puzzled and asked him a hundred questions, but though his body burned with fever, his heart sang. When you are down, thats the time you find out who really cares. And she most certainly did.

Then came the day when she told him she wanted to talk to him about something. How with a heart full of hope he went to meet her in the groud- their favourite meeting place and how with his big puppy dog eyes he gazed at her waiting for golden words to fall from her lips. His goddess was about to give him the fruit of his waiting. "This is the guy I am going to get married to", she giggled as she showed him the photo of a young man. While she had eyes for none but the man in the picture, she missed the glaze of tears in his.

And so he went and watched the love of his life marry another. He was dead inside as he saw her exchange vows with another. His heart will never know happiness again. Everything was over. His life as he knew it was over. Unshed tears glimmerred as he left her laughing.

And now 13 years later- there she stood, in the busy busstand. Waiting for her bus to come. He recognised her immediately. He had been to chennai countless number of times in the past years. It was not obsessive that he thought maybe somewhere sometime he would catch a glimpse of the long lost love in this mad crowd. He did not actually look for her but he looked for her everywhere. In every face, every hand, every pair of eyes, he thought he caught a glimpse of her. When he crossed her street, he looked for her in every girl who stood by, who shopped, who bought vegetables. So many many times he had been to Chennai- stayed for so many many years, yet never met her even once. Never caught a glimpse of her anywhere. In one corner of his mind he always knew he would meet her.
A hundred imaginations he had of the scenario when he finally did. He would be a big star and she would come ask for his autograph. He would be doing a show and dedicate a touching song for her - hearing which she would cry and contact him. He would be eating in a restaurant in her area and she would walk into the same one. And some really imaginative ones too for who has a control on imaginations !
But never once did he think that he would meet her like this. Suddenly, in the middle of a crowded bus stand, when he wasn't even prepared for it. Only last week he had been going through his old albums where there she was all pretty and smiling and a fleeing thought crossed his mind how it would be to meet her yet again. And here she was ! Right in front of him. He went to her slowly and said "excuse me" . She turned and the universe came to a standstill. The honking of the buses seemed zillions of years away, the crowd seemed planets apart. This moment had only him and her. "I am S.." he started to say and she completed his name. The silly love songs, the sweet nothings described in them all seemed to make sense. Adrenaline pumped like a broken water geyser, making his brain go all fuzzy. They spoke - "my god !", "So many years", "How are you" , "How many kids" - but it was as if he stood steps apart and saw someone else go and take part in this inane conversation. He was just standing and gazing at her. Just drinking in the sight of her after 12 long years. She hadnt changed much. The same eyes. The same expression in them. The same voice. Maybe put on a bit of weight?  One part of his brain managed the talking part, the other had turned into mush.

They exchanged numbers and she got into her bus, promising to keep in touch. He walked as if in a daze and got into his. To go back to his family. His real life. Where his kids awaited him. His mind was reeling. What would you call this - fate? That he chose this particular day to return home when he could have very well taken the bus the day before. Or this timing. Or that he decided to take the bus and not a train. Or she was booked into the last bus - on this day. Or that in such a crowded bus where even with mobiles on hold you could take time to locate a known one- they came across each other? FATE was too small a word to explain this occuring. Miracle? Amazing? Awesome?

She never knew years before what she meant to him. How he had cherished her. His 18 year old heart was still in love with her. The grown up part had matured and learned to love others. His wife, his kids. His family. His job. His friends.
But the 18 year old heart was locked in a small box - untouched and fresh and it was that part of his heart now which was still hers that was ruling him. Now, after all these years- should he tell her about how he felt once upon a time. Will she realise on her own the next time they meet? Is there a purpose to their meeting. In a heartbeat he had gone back to being 18 again. Oh the thrill of simply looking her. The rush of seeing her call on your mobile. He could remember so many things about her - so many frozen memories which were etched forever in his mind. Small even inconsequential things which even she may have forgotten. He forgot what he had for breakfast yesterday but he remembered her first phone number. The mind was a funny thing. Some things it preserved so crystal clear and some it chose to shove out.

Life - so many uncertainities, so many decisions to make, so many problems, so many dilemmas - amidst all this fate thought of letting him become a "younger him" once again. Smile foolishly at his own thoughts. Have a skip and a hop in his steps. Hug a secret to himself and see it when he felt good- or even when he felt low. Show him that life after all can still be beautiful. All it takes is a memory to come alive ....

"He will become an engineer" - Yesterday I was talking to my friend and telling her how Somesh - my 5 year old - was taking apart his cars and examining it minutely. This is what she told me. And it set me thinking just how many times I have heard this same thing from various people. But whats strange is that whereas we like to think when our kids pick up the screwdriver they will become engineers , and when it is a steth then doctors, we dont like to entertain the thought that maybe their interests could be somewhat different as well. For instance, Somesh has a flair for drama. Even at his age he likes to mimic people and gets even adult expressions beautifully. But if I ever exclaim that he will do bright in media - my husband frowns at me and tells me not to put rubbish ideas into an young mind. Then again as a very small child he was very interested and curious about the workings in the kitchen- he liked to see how I make certain things and even though I do say so myself - if you ask him he will tell you exactly how to prepare a mean cheese sandwich. But a chance joking remark that he may become a big chef earns me a "dont utter inaspicious things. What if it becomes true?" It is a bit scary to think that he has to live upto so many people's expectations and probably won't even get a chance to explore what pulls at him the best. I am not supposed to even tell him about areas and fields into which "normal middle class families who want to make a decent living" dont usually foray. For him the roads are limited - engineering, medicine, and God knows what other traditional stuff has been already charted out for him. I love it when he comes and tells me his imaginations - how he imagines about a flying dragon and how he would love to have a wand like harry potter's ! But Senthil, my husband, gets worried and states "Do you this is normal, healthy that he is imagining things?" Now what is a kid who lives in a world of cartoon network, Laptop games supposed to do if not give free reign to his imagination?
Steering children in the right direction so that their future is bright tomorrow and most importantly risk free is every parents responsibility and duty and I must say we do our duty very admirably. So much so, that most of us, today in our cosy lives, with cosy jobs, wont even remember what WE were actually interested in, when we were young. We look at people who are doing what they always liked - singing, writing, acting and discuss that "this is fame which doesnt last long" - cannot be compared to a stable job which fetches a steady income end of month. But deep in - I am sure everyone has a burning desire to be what they had dreamed of, of doing what they truly had a passion in. Yet we will do our duty and tell our kids not to think of mere interests and hobbies as a career and go for it. Mmmm.... I can just remember one thing right now which i had either read somewhere or someone great must have told me  - when you take up a career of what you most love - the work is not work to be done everyday. Commente !! :))

So, what is it that seperates the Indian children in India and Indian children brought up out of India. Lets take specific cases. Personally I feel (and I did say personally, so ...) , that its not the children who get confused in such cases and its often the parents who cannot for the life of them decide whether to bring up their children Indian way or the ways of where they are and probably are going to be residing. The problem starts , boy or girl, when they reach the adolescense. Till then, its kind of OK. You can afford to be lenient, let them do what their friends are doing, for- childhood I feel is not bound by cultural differences. I mean, who cares if you child is wearing a slip and playing in the mud or sporting a swim suit and going for swimming classes. But you would care if the child in question grows up and starts demanding to be let go on dates, sleep overs, etc etc. Now now ! Thats not how we were brought up right? Why do you have to stay over at someone's when your father can easily pick you up in the night and bring you home? Whats this silly concept of sleep over that children are so hung up on? And how can I allow you to get a driving license when you have just turned 17 !! And why should you go for a summer job while studying? Hasnt it been drummed into our heads that once you get interested in earning money studies take a back seat? Then why this need to be independent? Amidst all these questions, its the kids who get grinded. Not allowed to be like those whom they have grown up with, and not knowing how to be like those "belonging to their culture", they often teether from one side to the other - and finally - oh no ! Don't even for a minute think they do what you bid them to. You brought them up, taught them so many thing. As much as you know them, they know you back. They know what you need to hear and what will keep you happy, so ultimately they give you that and do what they have to (peer pressure is not something to be laughed about please !) "under cover". Motto -"what you dont know is not going to hurt you". But there is one very funny thing I have begum to notice. Parents abroad are more and more forcing their children to conform to our indian culture whereas parents here are proudly announcing how they are become broad minded and dont mind certain things which were not even thought about in their days. Funny thing this "culture" is - so flexible that you can change is as you go along. Great !!

No please :))

I was wondering today how is it that some people are able to say a firm NO to something they dont want. I for one have never been able to do it and so I will be the first to admit that it is indeed an art to say NO. And I dont think I am the only one. People instictively recognize my kind and ask /demand /plead in such a way that they know it will most definately work. The resultant being that I end up doing something which I never wanted to in the first place AND do it as if it was my idea all along. In my defense I try to avoid people whom I know would like to manipulate me. To be very honest, I am thankful to the handful of friends / relatives who KNOW that even though my lips are saying yes sure why not, my mind is probably screaming NO WAYS !! and they let me escape. But how long to go on like this. I have often tried to learn the art of saying NO, even tried it sucessfully, but again anded up feeling awfully guilty that I did so. Refusals- polite or not- hurt - or they hurt me , so I automatically assume that they hurt others to, although people who do say NO assure me that it doesn't. No one is indispensable. If I say no chances are they will find someone who says yes in a matter of minutes if not seconds. So what is it that stops me from stating my mind ? Is it a need to always please everyone? But I do know thats a sure sign of failure for no one can please everyone at any time right? Am i gaining more friends and less respect by being like this? Or is that too a myth that you are respected more if you know how to say NO? Reading this, I am sure you will categorically fall under one group- mine or the elusive, talented, extraordinary of those who can manage a firm NO. If you belong to my group then come lets sit and lament over our weakness (you can't say no to this too- I know !) and if the other then,  please dont smirk at us. You "know" you never "know" when you may need a person who can"no"t say a "no" ! Kudos to us !! :))

The Harry Potter mania continues. With the first part of the last movie of the magical legend hitting the screens, the buzz is thick as a smog !
Many muggles wonder how the unbelievable story of a eleven year old wizard attending a magic school and sporting a wand can captivate so many people's imaginations across ages. J.K.Rowling has touched a pulse here. Amidst so many tangible truths in the world , giving one's imagination a bit of a stretch and really letting yourself in the world of magic has its own therapeutic effects. The story captivates the child in you and gets you hooked to the age old concept of good triumphing over evil albeit in a different way. The different terminology used and the spells and charms described are really refreshing and though we have already come across "The tales of wishing chair" decades ago by Enid Blyton, Harry Potter is more of a real time hero. Friendship, love, rage, desperation, depressions, loneliness - all are addressed throughout the seven books in a different angle and doesnt fail to impress upon the readers that it could very well actually be happening in the very world we inhabit. As each book is made into a movie- it prompts the Potter fans to read and re read the books yet again to keep the story living in one's mind. The amazing number of discussion blogs and posts over the feud between He-who-must-not-be-named and Harry shows just how much of a reality has been accorded to something which no longer can be called a mere piece of fiction. Harry Potter is set to create history. I read it and am saving it up for my son to do the same. For those still not caught up in the whirlwind - open your minds a teensy weensy bit and try to put yourself pat in the middle of Ron Hermione and Harry and see where their adventures take you. If there is no proof of magic but then there is none against it too. After all who wouldn't want a big bottle of felix felicity to smooth out paths. Happy reading :)

Short Messaging Services :))

Harry Potter , Facebook, Video Games, Chatting - though not in the same league as these biggies Short Messaging Service or SMS is an addiction nevertheless. Watch any school /college goer and you will see their fingers flying over the mobile composing messages which although dont conform to any language standards are still immediately and easily understood by everyone. More frightening is when they stand, smile, talk to you with their eyes on your face and yet manage to send a perfectly legible message to whomsoever it may concern.
HRU, WRU, WTF, BTW are some of the short forms which if you dont understand right away means that you are sadly behind. And it is not constrticted to the school/college. The more the number of meetings in an office the more the number of messages flying out of the room unknown to even the person next seat.
So much so , SMS is a medium which allows one to say things which probably cannot be said face to face or even on the phone. Written words cannot be taken back and the waiting for reaction is no less strainful. Send a really important soul baring/naughty message and then keep looking at the mobile which remains pitifully silent. The obsession doesnt end here - waiting for a reply stretches to the extent of carrying the mobile across to the bathroom and hearing for the sound of incoming message alert over your shower.
SMS addicts are becoming more and more common and amidst all age groups. It is a personal affront when one does not reply to a sms immediately and it leads to fights/misunderstandings. The "tone" of a message is also understood and widely contemplated upon by youngsters. Hours go into deciphering as to what "see you sometime" means.
So next time you see someone texting someone, dont frown upon the technology. Try it and you will be able to say somethings which you may have stuttered upon for years and even get a positive response to it. :)