"Sweets & Namkeen/ Chocolates at my desk"

I have no idea how it is in other professional set-ups, but my colleagues have this concept of "team building, group participation and strengthening communication skills" by sending out such invites to not less than twenty people at any particular instance, in order to mark celebrations. The reasons for the same may vary, the customary ones being

- I/bro/sis got/getting married/engaged/met-a-girl-might-get-married-here-is-her-snap-how-do-you-find-it
-Sis/Bro/Son/Daughter, good marks, HSC, SSC, Graduation
-Sweets from home or vacation spots, which could be anywhere from Jammu (loooaddded with dry fruits) to Kanyakumari, Calcutta to Rajkot
-New house, bike, car
-Chocolates from trips abroad

Now, not being the sweet kind myself..err..the "sweets" kind (save for rasagollas, G. Pulla Reddy's mysore pak and pedhas from Dharwaad), or not even the chocolates kind, I always reach out for the Namkeen, the fare brought by an Indore-ian colleague, being the most favourite. The venue or "the desk" generally makes for updating oneself with the latest on the addresser's front, with an extra ten minutes thrown in for admiring the snaps, if any. (The venue may also make for a racket, with sense creeping in only on being gently chided)

All in all, apart from ensuring cameraderie and bulging waistlines, such occasions also attest to the average Indian's first love, food, food and more food, especially stuff with dollops of sugar and ghee thrown in for good measure.

(Inspired by a cubicle-mate who got chocolates today to celebrate Arjun Rampal's birthday. I am serious!)

Current Music - Abraham's Theme - The Chariots of Fire
I haven't seen this movie yet, unfortunately so, for the reviews tell me I am missing something. Lovely tunes by Vangelis, but this particular theme mesmerised me the most. A violin and the piano, I presume. It gives a feeling of sitting on a window ledge, with a broken pearl necklace in your hand, watching the pearls fall on the floor, almost hesitatingly; while you watch them roll, away from you, never to return)

Comatose

The shrivelled skin
Of a hand
Cold, unfeeling
In search for warmth, a fire perhaps, another hand clasping it perhaps

Dried up
A sponge
Thirsting for a drop

A mind famished
A hunter, (a scavenger if the need be)
The morsels, they, do not suffice

A kite
Wanting to soar, unbridled, unfettered..

Where, oh where, pray tell me
  Does the wind blow
The water flow
  The prey dwell
Or the wood burn nowadays?

For it has not
  Rustled the leaves on my path
Or seeped into my pores
  Satiated my hunger
Or softened my palms

For long..

Current Music - Matchbox Twenty - If You're Gone
(Funny name for a group, but good vocals, I would recommend Bed of Lies by MB20 too)

Ini-Mini-Mani-Mo

No amount of stabbing around is helping of late. Additionally, jabbing away to glory is time-consuming.

Ogling at the alphabets, expecting one of the letters to sidle up close, execute a Hula routine, and whisper with a suggestive wink "is it me you are looking for" is all in vain. Unfortunately A, B, C and D have a penchant for group dance and refrain from performing solo.

There is a limit to how many chits of paper you can stuff in the sleeve of your shirt/salwar kameez and under your wristwatch, unless I get a trendy sports timepiece with a huge dial and wide straps, (*tubelight on* which also justifies my always having wanted one. Two-birds-with-a-stone philosophy)

I am short-sighted and distance is unfortunately considered to be of prime importance during such gruelling mock sessions. A pair of binoculars in a classroom would seem mighty suspicious don't ya think? (unless of course, I profess to all and sundry, my undying love for watching wildlife, the only issue being that the "sundry and all" in question might not take too kindly to the same and would express their displeasure by coughing politely at such an announcement. To make matters worse, one of them has access to this blog too).

As a last resort, I jog my memory, huff-puffing my way 'round the track, which in cerebral terms would roughly translate to travelling back in time, *switch to black-and-white-flashback mode*, 3-5 months ago, monsoon mornings, Japanese lectures (JLPT Level 3) when I could have been either
a)dozing off    b)chewing the rubber off the pencil    c)traipsing in dreamland (or penning verse on rain pattering down the windowpanes)    d)all of the above

Did I ever tell you how I despise exams, especially those that offer multiple choice? The probability of getting the question right is 0.25. To make matters worse, I have this fetish of siding with the majority. Hence, inadvertently, I am always scraping my cranium clean over which one of the other three options that make up the 0.75 sounds like it could be correct.

I also happen to follow a policy on mantaining safe distances from that which is bound to be disagreable. Thus on that ill-fated day of the exam, should I

a)Conjure up a headache    b)Stick myself in a traffic jam    c)Pour half a bottle of Benadryl down me throat    d)Get myself kidnapped ?

Current Music : Lifehouse - Hanging by a moment

Veni, Vedi...

Ve-shot, Ve-uploaded a few, Ve-shall be adding to the lot over the next few days

(And Ve-also wishing ye all a very Happy Diwali)

Current Music: Dil Tarasta Hai - Stop
Jagjit Singh features in my playlist after long..*stray thoughts*..how must it be to possess such talent, so as not have to look elsewhere in order to regale oneself..I wonder..I really do

(Forced) temporary amnesia?

"What part of Pune is this?", She.
"Aundh", Me.
"And this?", He.
"Model Colony..Senapati Bapat Road", Me. Etc, so on and so forth.
"India is so dirty na, so hot, so much dust, no planning, narrow lanes...", He.

"Are you visiting Pune?", Me. Clearly bugged.
"Err..no, we live in Pune, we've just returned from a visit to the children in the US". Stereotypes.

Why don't you just stay there and do this country a whole lot of good, I felt like screaming.

The couple in the bus back from the airport. Fakes. The kicks people get, pretending to be aliens in their own country or city, right after short trips abroad.... Grrrrrrr!

I am home. Back in a place where I understand and am understood.

Current Music: Winds Of Change - Scorpions
(One of the best memories of my visit to Germany was watching a man strumming his guitar to this song, the whistle et al, leaning against a wall, on the cobbled streets of old Düsseldorf, whilst I loitered around, apparently window-shopping)