A lot of times, I take too long to make a decision and often, beat myself over it thus get stressed. Over time, I have learnt that one can look at one of these parameters while making decisions :
1) Importance Look at how important making this decision is to you. Is it life altering? Will it significantly change things? If yes, does doing it move you towards your end goal/values? If yes, do it. If no, don't. If it is not life altering, look at the 2nd parameter. 2) The Happiness Advantage
Does this make you happy? If yes, does this also contribute to the happiness of others who may be important to you? If yes, do it. If no, you may still do it but if it is instead causing them harm in a way that it is hindering their spiritual growth or obstructing their personal goals, don't do it. If it does not make you happy i.e. sucks the energy out of you, don't do it. If it does not significantly affect your happiness, don't waste much time on thinking over it because it does not matter what you choose to do. Take a random decision and shift focus to yourself or if you can, decide not to take a decision at all.
"Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run There’s still time to change the road you’re on."
- “Stairway to Heaven”, Led Zeppelin (Source: Nissim's blog)
sometimes you have to brush thoughts or memories aside, put them away in a corner of your mind because you aren't sure what emotions they might stir up.
lately, I have just been brushing a lot aside.. as i can't figure out what a lot of things might bring up. some things are hard to brush aside but i think it is slowly getting easier. I stay on it for some seconds and then allow the thought to pass away. it's also with other thoughts. it's like- nothing is really important "right now".
sometimes i may find something interesting that grasps my attention - a good blog, bits of the tv shows my parents watch, the ads that come in between, something in a music video, a few lines of lyrics of a song i always listen to but never paid attention to before.. i carry these as i go along. maybe it's all part of something that's still getting created.
as for thoughts- they are just that. thoughts. they come, they pass away. none that important as to grasp my attention and very few as strong as to take over me. i feel spurts of peace. so maybe it's a good thing.
i wish to have less of these thoughts and more of the stillness or perhaps, the "fullness". the things that catch my attention. my heart.
Just last week, I received a confirmation for the vipassana meditation course that starts day after tomorrow. It is 10 days of meditation and the testing part about this course is that you aren't allowed to speak to anybody during this period. No phones or emails either. And in case you are wondering, this has nothing to do with religion, caste or belief in God. It is just a technique that helps you live & transform your life and it's open for all.
I have been struggling with a lot of things over the past few months so thought this will really do me good to cleanse my system. After doing some research on the course on various blogs and websites, I learnt that it helps you to focus on the present moment and to see things "as they are" which is what "vipassana" literally means. I need to learn to focus on the present moment so much!
Seeing things "as they are" is so important because a lot of times, we perceive things as per the stories we have built around them in our head, completely ignoring their true form. This is something I must learn to do all the time.
There are some rules of vipassana that I already follow though.. one of them is to always speak the truth. Now, I do almost always speak the truth when it comes to others but this involves being true to yourself too and a lot of times, we don't realise it but we aren't true to ourselves or to the present moment. The other rule is to lose the importance of 'self' or 'ego'. This is something I have been practising since quite sometime now as it helps to accept/transform dark thoughts such as anger, resentment, revenge, jealousy etc. Everyone has a dark side and it is important to embrace it all the same. Just the other day, Reeti & I were discussing how we almost naturally think of what is good "universally" and not just about what is good for ourselves. Sometimes, though, the ego can get the better of us and we need to work on ourselves again.
So a lot of spiritual healing & cleansing awaits us. I am doing this with another friend of mine (Alisha) so that's some comfort. Though I won't really get to speak with her, it's nice to have someone you know around. Worried about the nights as I am not used to spending nights alone especially in an unfamiliar place. Hope they put me in with someone. A partition is okay too. I should just be able to reach out to someone!
Excited and nervous both. Wish me luck. Might blog about the experience once I get back! :)
Don't remember when I reviewed a movie last.. but this particular movie deserved a review -- not because it is worth a watch. In fact, I wouldn't really recommend it unless you're a film critic. But just because it left us feeling doomed. Like we didn't know what happened in those two & a half hours! (Thank God movies aren't 3 hours long anymore..) This review will not tell you how the movie is or how I rate it. This should not be taken as a base for whether you should watch the movie. Perhaps you'd like reading it better after you come back from watching it. So here's my take on Raanjhanaa.
The first half of the movie is mostly about Kundan Shankar (Dhanush) pining for the unattainable Zoya (Sonam Kapoor). I found this to be a sort of a power play where Kundan gives Zoya power over him by loving her even though she does not feel the same. Zoya uses this power without fully realising it. Love, when obsessive, can be destructive. The audience naturally sympathises with Kundan because "all is fair in love & war". Well, it's not. There are a lot of questionable/objectionable scenes in the movie such as Kundan threatening Zoya that he'd slash his veins if she does not claim her love for him. And the one where he almost harms her, driving her into a river and leaving her in the waters alone when he finds out that she loves someone else (Abhay Deol). After which he slashes his veins again, by the way. The scene also made for a movie poster :
The first half also includes scenes where Bindiya, Kundan's best friend is handled roughly. Kundan is Bindiya's childhood love and yet he makes her do things she doesn't entirely approve of but later feels happy about.. because it makes Kundan happy. I think all the women in the movie are handled roughly by the lead men in the movie at some point or the other in an acceptable manner. So it feels like an irony when we learn that Zoya's lover (Abhay Deol) is an activist who fights for social causes. The second half of the movie is mostly about revenge & violence. It's about Kundan taking revenge on Zoya, then paying for it by being involved with her activities & work and oh yes, Zoya slashing her veins, she feeling jealous of Kundan's growth, her taking revenge over Kundan. The problem with the movie is .. all of this is shown to be legit. The obsessive love, the rough handling of women, the slashing of veins, revenge, violence.. all of this is shown to be okay. Like it's acceptable. Like this is how love is. There is enough proof of this on social networking websites with status messages like "Finally a true love story!". People who strongly feel this way should introspect.. Because such movies make you work less on yourself and treat your behaviour to be acceptable (just because it is out of "love"). But, this isn't love. Love is wanting to see the other person happy even if it means sometimes curbing your emotions because you don't want the person to see they hurt you.. because that'd make them sad and you don't want that. The good thing here is, Kundan realises that he wants to help Zoya, he wants to let her be happy. He wants to do the right thing so he helps her out by talking to her dad regarding getting Zoya married to her lover (Abhay Deol). But he fails when he reacts impulsively almost always (before doing the right thing) e.g. when he first hears about Zoya being in love with someone else, when he first learns that her lover is not a Muslim. It does happen so in life that you want to be strong & want to do the right thing but you push yourself so much to do it that you end up doing the wrong. In the movie though, he does the wrong every time. Rest of the time, it feels like he is paying up for what he did wrong. It's like a cycle. Consequently, a lot of innocent lives get hurt / taken away in the end. I feel they should have shown a small 'alternate reality' segment at the end of the movie.. something along the lines of the Butterfly effect.. just one segment at the end. Something like- "What would have happened if Kundan had just decided to be a friend & helped Zoya unite with her lover or decided to go his own way". With regards to acting, I wouldn't say much about Sonam. It's cliche now to say that she doesn't act well. Sadly, it's true. She will make a great model perhaps but she isn't a very good actress. She may try working on it some more if she wants to make it. Abhay Deol has acted fairly well but not as good as he was in DevD or Oye Lucky Lucky Oye or Ek Chaalis ki Last Local. I feel his part didn't do justice to his acting potential. He is a good actor, otherwise. A lot is said about Dhanush's acting in the movie but I felt like he played the part well because it came naturally to him. He has a mediocre personality and he played the part of a mediocre Benarasi guy. Plus, he was shown to be the son of a Tamil priest. That covered up for his South Indian accent as well, in certain parts of the movie. So I don't see reason to glorify his acting in the movie. I found it average.
I like Kundan's friend Muraari's character in the movie. He's shown to be straightforward plus he always stands by him. Just as a good friend would.
Bindiya is both innocent and strong. It is actually Zoya's character that is most confusing. They have shown it with respect to Kundan (how his love makes her manipulative) but not as an individual. They could have worked on that more. The good tidbits : I like the Benaras backdrop of the movie. There is so much colour and tradition. A couple of the tracks are really good too. I was hooked to "Tum Tak" for a long time because of the variations in the song. The track takes me to Banganga waters in Walkeshwar (Mumbai) for some reason.. "Benarasiya" is also a pleasant track. Some of the dialogues are really funny/catchy like the one they show in the trailer: "Vitamin humse khaao aur aashiqui inse ladaao". I like the warm colours of the movie (in the first half i.e. Benaras).
Sometimes, when you wake up from a confusing dream, it leaves you with a clouded feeling in your heart all day. You cannot remember details of the dream. Some flashes, however, are vivid and you don't know what to make of them. As you get through the day doing your thing, slowly, life brings you back in its flow and the dream is now a distant one. Forgotten or laughed over or just kept aside.
It's just a dream, after all.
Except that this wasn't.
It felt like a dream and yet it was too real to be one.
It could not have been a dream because it felt so real..
And yet so dreamlike.. like if there was a thin line between reality and illusion, i was on that line, in that void..
It was something I tried escaping from and yet longed for. I cannot make sense of it. And it has left me with a clouded feeling.. Should I dig deeper or just let it go like I would, a dream? Will I make peace with it, ever? Will life bring me back in its flow, filling me up with love so that I forget it? Will I forget it? Do I "want" to forget it? No. Because I just can't let myself. Because it happened. Because I *know* it did. Some flashes are so vivid I feel them still. Especially when I go really quiet and can't feel anything else.
The flashes.. I want them to be real. They are real, but not quite. They are much like dreams but I know they aren't.
I put off writing this for a week now because frankly, it's been so long that I've been dealing with them that I am actually over it!!! But I am determined.. so here I go.
Early October (2012), I ordered a pair of earrings and a pendant from this shopping website called www.yepme.com. They were shipped to me in a week and while the pendant was okay, the earrings were slightly damaged. Since they don't let you open the package at the door, I couldn't send it back right away.
So, I gave them a call within a week's time after which I was directed to write to them instead.
Below are the thread of emails..
"Mr. Bhat" was amusing :D Anyway, so, I waited for like really long for their product to come back in stock..
After getting no response to my emails at all, I tried contacting them on Twitter.
And my last resort was sending a message to their Facebook page..
And they gave me the silent treatment again.
Needless to say, I am still waiting for them to do something about it. But it seems to me that they just couldn't care less.
I had even posted a status update about it on Facebook and learnt that I could approach the consumer forum about this and I plan to. The reason I am all the more determined to fight them is because their lack of response is hugely disappointing. I would have appreciated it if they had atleast replied to my emails. An apology would have done no harm either.
Bad customer service lowers your faith in a brand. Even if they do send me a replacement now, the faith won't get restored. Not so soon, not so easily. I doubt I'll ever order from them again, however promising their policies might seem. And it goes without saying, I would never recommend buying from them.
Friday, April 12, 2013
Sometimes, we complicate things by thinking with our heads.. And other times, we associate our thoughts with who we are from the inside. Came across this wonderful line while reading an answer on Quora. "If you identify with your mind as your self, you will be a very unhappy self" I wish I had found this when I needed it the most.. It would have saved me and someone I was associated with from a lot of pain. You are not your brain. And over analysis is useless. After all, life is for living.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
day by day, as i sleep,
i close my eyes but i am wide awake,
the heavy heart doesn't let me dream..
a prisoner for no faults of my own,
i carry nothing but love..
and yet i feel burdened..
Every once in a while, it's so important to switch off from life, from all the chatter in your mind..
I got reminded of it when, the other day, mom mentioned how relaxed she feels once she enters Parel.. It also reminded me of Reeti mentioning a lot of times how all her worries fly away when she steps on the Matunga station platform.. (possibly because that's where some of her best memories were created.)
For me, it's the little loft in my house that shuts down my mind completely of all thought & worry.. I just have to go up there and I feel like I've escaped.. and it's not even like I have many memories there. It's just a small and cosy place which makes me feel so safe that I don't need anything else.
All that noise in my head silences when I go to the chai waala near my college as well.. it is one place we regularly went to everyday in the last few years of college.
Some people can switch off on their own, they don't need a place to go to.. I am still learning! :)
Want to switch off for good? Or atleast for thirty seconds right now? Go to http://www.make-everything-ok.com/ and push the magic button! That's my gift for you :)
Today, I'll write about Mulki, where I stayed all throughout. Let me warn you- this is going to be a long one!!!
Mulki is a small town about an hour from Mangalore.. Lots of temples, fresh air, clean beaches, narrow lanes, bad roads and warm people.
On the first day, my uncle took me out for playing badminton in a proper court.. I also remember having 'chaat'. It's far different from the 'chaat' you get here but still better than what I used to put up with in Hyderabad!!
We used to go to Hejmadi beach in the evenings sometimes..
I loved coming here.. this reminds me of a really nice conversation I had with my uncle here.. we bonded really well.
And here's my click.. nice, eh? :)
This is my cousin Anagha (on the right) playing with her friend Vandita. I also like the couple sitting in the far end.. Just noticed them!
Kids love posing for pictures.. :)
The bungalow there is huge and completed 100 years this year. I shot a lot of videos of the house and took many pictures too.
And like I mentioned before... spent loads & loads of time with Anagha.. I love her!
And that's her mom i.e. my aunt
Anagha & Aniruddh on their scouts day:
Food in Mangalore is mostly cooked in coconut oil but surprisingly, tastes better than it does here. Maybe the quality of oil there is better. There is something called "Charmura Upkeri" which I took a liking to. "Charmura" is basically "Kurmura" or "Mamra" :
So, this dish is like "bhel" but made very differently. You won't get the exact recipe or image if you google it. You *have* to go to Mulki/Mangalore to eat it.. or just follow this recipe (I asked how it is prepared): You mix a lot of "Mamra" with pure coconut oil, chilly powder and saambhaar powder. Then add chopped onion, fine pieces of "kairi"/raw mango, chopped tomatoes (but not a lot of them else it'll become soggy) and salt to taste. If any of you do happen to prepare it, let me know how it tasted :) And if you don't know where to get pure coconut oil, go to one of those Ram Dev Baba/Patanjali stores and you'll find it there!
I miss my aunt's cooking there.. she used to come up with new dishes everyday..
One strange thing I found out was that cheese is very difficult to find there. Someone I know loves cheese chilly toast and I had learnt how to make it a long time ago. Each time I make it, it just gets better and better (atleast that's what I think!!) and I wanted to make it for them. But I couldn't find cheese in the whole of Mulki. I didn't think cheese to be so rare.. Finally, when we went to Udipi, I happened to find it in one of the supermarkets. My cousin Aniruddh loved what I made but I don't know about the others :/
There is also one more thing that I love getting from Mangalore -- and those are sweet potato chips. I am really very fond of those and you don't get it anywhere except for Mangalore. If you ask for sweet potato chips anywhere else, they'll give you tapioca and tell you that sweet potato & tapioca are one and the same. But tapioca and sweet potato are far far different in taste and also in the way they look (sweet potato chips are deeper in colour & have more oil than tapioca). I loooooveee sweet potato chips and each time someone goes to Mangalore, I order packets of those. So if you happen to go there, be sure to look for sweet potato chips or "Kananga Kachri" (Konkani).
There is also a small hotel there that resembles the Malgudi Days hotel.. My uncle and I went for breakfast there once..
This is how it looks from the outside..
Shabby exterior but real good food inside :D
People wondered why I was taking snaps of the place.. :D
There is also a famous dhaba there where you get Punjabi / North Indian cuisine. It's called Bittoo Da Dhaba. We went there on the last day of my trip.
This is my uncle and me:
Coming to the main purpose of this trip..
My mother had asked me to go see her uncle (her only uncle alive) who lives there. Her mother (my 'granny' or 'nani') passed away before she could get married and hence, none of us got to see her. My nani's brothers had all passed away except for this one.
It was real nice meeting him..
Okay I know I looked really tired.. this was my first day there.
I asked my aunt (his daughter-in-law) whether he would remember me. The last time I had been there was when I was only five. To that, she said- he remembers everything. He remembers all the birthdays, all the phone numbers - of all the relatives and friends. 24 hours of a day aren't enough for him, she added. He makes his own tea early in the morning around 5 a.m., goes back to sleep for a couple of hours, wakes up for breakfast, calls people to wish them on their birthdays, passionately follows cricket on TV, naps after lunch, goes out for a walk, talks to everyone in the village.. he is a very busy person, she said.
I took a lot of videos around the house..
Won't put up all of them but this one is a bit special :
(In the video, he is actually singing a Kannada song that tells the story of Krishna & Kanakadas (the one I had narrated in the previous part of this travelogue). And I am telling him in Konkani that I don't follow Kannada.)
Loved my stay in Mulki .. and my grandpa was all the more happy..
Soon after I returned home though, in a couple of weeks, my only grandfather alive collapsed of brain haemorrhage and was in coma for two weeks till he finally breathed his last. :(When he was in a coma, I had asked my mother to call uncle up and tell him to play light music (grandpa's favourite songs) around him. I had read somewhere that music heals people when nothing else does.. but somehow it skipped our minds. Whenever uncle called, we discussed grandpa's health but we forgot to tell him this. I regret not remembering to tell him.. :( I am glad though that I went there. I had written in the first part of my travelogue how I was almost going to change my plans of going there but now I am glad.. May his soul rest in peace.
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