Today…

Raindrops on the window sill,

hot tea on the stove,

luke warm memories,

knees gathered at the chest,

an effervescent smile,

the phone rings…

Life is good today,

Hasn’t it always been?

The only thing…

The only tears worth shedding are ones when you are laughing hard.

The only song worth singing is the one that puts a smile on your face.

The only thing worth your disaapointment is the absence of hope.

The only thing worth dying for is your country.

The only thing worth killing is an innocence hunting predator.

The only thing worth stealing, is a kiss from a sleeping child.

The only life worth living is one where you leave the world more beautiful than you found it.

We get one shot, one time to live it right… to love as much as you breathe, to laugh like it sustains your life, to say “I love you” as much as pleases or thank you s…

We get one lifetime to walk in the rain, to hear the crickets at nights, to fall asleep in someones arms listening to the pitter patter of rain on the window sill, to wake up to freshly pressed coffee and sleepy lips in search of yours.

We earn one set of close friends to travel the world with, to stand by you when the world thinks you are wrong, to drag you out of your shell kicking and screaming, to share the last bowl of soup you can afford, to take the buses with you when your mercedes breaks down, to share your silence as much as your tears…

The only thing worth your indomitable spirit is to live like you deserve it all

Men – 101 (Lesson 1)

Raj walks into the lobby of the famous interior decorator’s office.

“This is a nice place Archie. Let’s just pick a color and get out. There’s a match on ESPN I have to catch”

Sigh!

“Allo! Bonjour… How are you? It eez nice tho meeeth you Cherie!” A very french and a very gay designer welcomes us into his beautifully furnished office space.

“It ees vonderful no?” His cheerfulness is catchy. A definite positive and joyous vibe surrounds him…

My friend Raj looks over at me. Raj is not homophobic. Thank God for that!

Homophobia has become a fashion statement for testosterone deprived, fickle minded men and women on a gossip diet these days. It’s a relief to be around someone who doesn’t need to pick on someone’s sexual preference to make himself look macho.

“Hey I have to get back home to watch the match. Can we rush through this?” Raj fiddles.

“Oh Oui, but ufcourse, let me ge ze color palette and ve can v0rk on eet”

“Actually I just wanna make it cream colored or something”

Our designer flinches like someone sand papered his behind.

He walks over and hands us one of those circular color pallets each.

“this ees a color veel. Diametrically opposite colors are complimentary colors. They give bold…err… contrasting…ze brilliant” Raj ducks, the flailing arms barely missing him.

“like…er… Amber and India Green, you kno, dark lava and perzian blue”

His fingers are a blur as he points to diff fuzzy patches of color on a giant multi colored barcode kind of art work behind his desk.

“Colors that are ze voisin…er.. ze neighbor no? Next to next. Zey are pleasant…relaxing. Like ze salmon,orchid and eggplant make ze nice scheme. You take your time and come to me no? You speak in ze next room sil vous plait?”

Mr.Fancy colors ushered us into another room where Raj sat in shocked silence.

“Well I’ll be fucked!”

“Hey!”

“Sorry boogs… but what the hell was that? India green? Persian something? That racist bastard. I don’t get it”

“Dude, you’ve been watching Russel Peters”

“Screw that… He is talking about A FISH-A VEGETABLE-AND-WHAT I THINK IS A FLOWER. Do YOU know what he is talking about? What’s with this wheel?”

“Relax! There are instructions behind it… “

“Instructions?” waving the sheet at my face, “Men don’t read instructions…Our colors are programmed like windows default.” Counting out with his fingers “Red, blue, green, yellow. Fruits and animals have their own damn names. I got a game to watch. You and Monet here finish up”

Lesson 1 – He may have all the colors of emotion, but a little over 14 basic colors might actually piss him off

Chuck Norris – Top 10!

1. Crop circles are Chuck Norris’ way of telling the world that sometimes corn needs to lie the fuck down.

2. Chuck Norris sold his soul to the devil for his rugged good looks and unparalleled martial arts ability. Shortly after the transaction was finalized, Chuck roundhouse kicked the devil in the face and took his soul back.
3. Multiple people have died from Chuck Norris giving them the finger.
4. Chuck Norris drinks napalm to quell his heartburn.
5. If you want a list of Chuck Norris’ enemies, just check the extinct species list.
6. Chuck Norris once threated to sue Burger King because they refused to make it his way. When asked what “his way” detailed, he replied: “with barbed wire and nails, of course”. He then roundhouse kicked the reporter for even asking.
7. Chuck Norris always has sex on the first date. Always.

8. Chuck Norris’ evil twin brother, Richard Simmons, once approached Chuck with the hope of reconciliation, but at the sight of Richard’s curly, well kept hair, Chuck Norris became so enraged that he turned green with hate and ripped Richard Simmons arms and legs off. This action was the origin of the Marvel Comic badass, The Incredible Hulk.

9. Chuck Norris used live ammunition during all shoot-outs. When a director once said he couldn’t, he replied, “Of course I can, I’m Chuck Norris,” and roundhouse kicked him in the face.

10. Chuck Norris never “gets laid”, rather: “laid gets Chuck”.

Content borrowed from different websites!

Kollywood Kisukisu!

Vijayakanth doesn’t carry a gun . He bounces bullets off his chest. He is currently training to bounce off surface to air missiles while free falling from a military chopper.

Rajkiran was fired from a construction job because he  bent a 10 inch thick steel cylinder by accidentally grazing it across his thigh.

Vijay ’s house does not have doors. He just welds a ‘Vijay Shaped hole” wherever with his blowtorch. His house and his head are being checked for leaks.

Major Sundarajan has posthumously been awarded a national award for best Tamil actor in a film. He won the best English actor for the same film. Ajith Kumar announced this during the inaugural ceremony of his next movie ‘Konjam Dullah’. Speaking in the ceremony, he said ‘The idea for this movie came to me when I was shooting for ‘Billa‘. Wearing shades indoors and outdoors in the movie gave me this brilliant idea.”

TR has declined the offer to teach English Voice and Accent in a reputed MNC in Chennai. Sources say that he is busy shooting with a song with Lil-Wayne called TR Pain.

Here is his audition tape: (Watch from 00.17  to 01.02 , sorry I couldn’t get a better quality)

Stay tuned for the next post “Chuck Norris – Top10!”

P.S: This is a post dedicated exclusively for tamil readers, if you haven’t figured it out by now!

Height of Recycling!

I came across a picture in an e-mail forward and it got me nostalgic!

Back in high school we were discussing about a project, that we were supposed to present on Nov 15th: World Recycling Day.

Disclaimer:

The following conversation is a true. All similarities to people, expressions , stupid ideas and rude gestures are by law of nature. It is designed to offend people whom it is targeted at and if you can’t handle it, go play with your Cinderella glow in the dark pumpkin carriage. The names are changed to protect them from total social ostacrization and widespread pointing and laughing in the street.

Here goes:

Hari  : So back to the topic guys.. what do we do?

Seth  :Recycling day? What do we recycle?

Jigu  :My mom recycles food everyday macha…

Evie : So… tell us already!

Jigu : The chutney I had for breakfast turns into a gravy for dinner! he he

Me    : Evie don’t throw chalk at him, here take my math book. It’s heavier.

Seth :C’mon man, we have to beat the other sections

Hari : Macha I have an idea! recycled condoms!

Can't think of an appropriate caption!

All :huh? what?he he he! Condom na yenna? (What’s a condom?) I’ve never seen one before, I think my brother has them, Waaaaccck! Chiiiii!.. etc, etc. Some walk out.

Seth :Wait wait, let’s see what he has to say.

Hari: Ille macha, we can use plastic wrap instead of condom na? My auntie came from America, she brought this saran wrap which she wraps food with.

Seth : Fucken retard!

Jigu : So you’ll collect used ones?

Me   : Retching sound

Hari: What like y’all had better ideas!

Seth: It’ll break you idiot.

Evie : I still don’t know what it is!

Jigu : So you’ll collect used ones and wash them? (bewildered expression)

Hari : ok ok… how about gloves? 5 in one !

All     : (@$%^ #%&^>R@&M&^*^^****$#@#!!?)!!!!

Hari : A genius is never respected in his generation

Evie  : But we don’t know what a condom is!

Lucy: It’s like a sweater for the penis…

All : ROFL!

Footnote:

Evie now an expecting mother. She is 7 months along and has been married for 8 and a half months (arranged marriage ofcourse). Guess she didn’t have sweaters on her shopping list!

Hari works for a medical supply chain (Irony of life! Who knows he might be stealing a couple of latex gloves now and then)

Lucy teaches middle school… Sweaters indeed!

Grandma’s tales – The legends of Deepavali

The festival season is upon us! I wished to share the Deepavali aka Diwali stories on my blog for my non-indian readers.

Just like Haloween, there are many legends that surround this truly unique festival – The festival of lights…

Slaying of the Demon King Narakasura:

Effigy of Narakasura

According to the Hindu religion, there was this demon prince called Narakaasura (Nar-uh-kaa-sur-ah –> Yeah keep trying. It’s not that hard!).

Legend has it that he became so powerful that he conquered both heaven and earth. Having done so, he couldn’t resist abducting 16,100 women and holding them in his palace (Whoa! I know!) for many many years.

Lord Vishnu was born as Krishna and when he grew up, he battled the evil king. The epic battle was fought along side his wife and Lord Krishna rode on Garuda (A large Eagle-like mythical bird).

On this day, many years back, he defeated Narakaasura and rescued all those women. Boy did they celebrate! They had fireworks and singing and dancing in both the heaven and earth!

Coronation of Lord Rama:

Lord Rama was a great prince. Kind, just, loving. The strength of the bond with his brother Lakshman is legendary. Lakshman was loyal to a fault and his accompanied Rama and his wife Sita to the forest when they were banished by their father.
Now Ravana, was a great Pundit and ruler of today’s Sri Lanka. He kidnapped Sita. Rama rescued his wife, slaying Ravana in the process. Mind you, this was no easy feat, because legend has it that Ravana had 10 heads!

The return of Lord Rama to Ayodhya (his kingdom) and his subsequent coronation as King is celebrated as Diwali.

There are several other coronations to mark this day, but I don’t remember them all.

Here is how we celebrate:

• We celebrate the festival by traditional lights all around the house.
• An Indian equivalent of an oil massage and bath is customary at an ungodly hour in the morning.
• People wear new clothes and dress all fancy before offering their prayers. Special ceremonies are conducted in temples and homes.
• 

  Golden Temple (Amritsar) on Diwali

  Fire crackers in every conceivable form and size are bought and people are happy watching their money go up in smoke!

• Sweets are made and shared with neighbors. Presents are exchanged.
• In northern parts of India, effigies of the defeated demons are burnt after processions.
• The best part of all this is that it doesn’t matter if you are not a Hindu. It’s a festival for everybody.
• Although I never EVER (not even for christmas) wake up at an ungodly hour or enjoy fire crackers (except the colorful rockets in the sky). I still feel very much a part of this festival.

That’s my India for you. We eat awesome biriyani for Ramzan, make cakes and cribs for Christmas, sweets for Diwali, sundal and doll shows for golu, pori and poojas on ayudha pooja and so much more that I cannot even begin to describe…

Being an Indian is an overwhelming sense of belonging regardless of race /religion / language (over 250 registered languages you know!). Yeah we fight here and there. But in the end we stick together. Just turn back in time… Kargil, Gujarat Earthquakes, Floods, Tsunami…

India is like coming home to a warm hug. I’ll always feel a part of her open arms and inexplicably ornate culture… Jai Hind!

White-Knuckled Freefall…

Ok, here’s the thing. Everyone goes through a hard phase in life. It goes by many names: depression,time out, burn out, breakdown etc.

The past month has found me in one of those hard phases in life. Many changes have to be made, realities to be faced, truths to be accepted. Having been a listener and a soldier all this time, it’s no surprise that life has left me with no one to turn to.

How do you turn to people for help when you’ve been their shoulder in similar situations? How do you cry and not listen? How do you cut in and say “I’ve heard enough of your whining, I have some of  my own”? How do you make people understand that you aren’t avoiding them, just trying to make sense out of your life? How much can you hope for people to realize that you are human too?

Looking back at the past month: “Been busy”, “I’m meeting someone else”, “At work”, “In a meeting”, “On the toilet”, “I was sleeping”, “Taking my dog to the vet” were some of the reasons I spewed on friends who wanted to catch up. I’ve been absolutely free, met no one, not had a meeting in a long while, don’t have a dog and I don’t use my phone in the bathroom.

There were people who decided I was haughty and just plain stopped speaking to me. “You are too busy for us huh?”, ” She must be busy with her ‘other’ friends”, “She’s not here when I need her, what color shirt should I pick now?”, “Whatever, I’m not bothered”

There were also the ones who saw the walls and shamelessly barged in dragging me out kicking and screaming. I owe my sanity and smile to them.

Here are  10 unforgettable moments:

10. The bottled eyed fish says “What’s the point in just being there for the heehee s, I have to be a shoulder too. Come on, what’s going on?”

9. My sister and I go out on a girls’ night out. Too disturbed to enjoy, I drag her to unrelated places that just pop into my head. That night in bed, I get her SMS “I enjoy spending time with you! We should do this more often you know? I love you”

8. Marcus calls from far far away:  “My friend will pick you up, you are getting a full day at the spa. Now tell me, is something wrong Boogs?”

“You can’t BUY information from me like that”

“Plan B is coercion – choose wisely”

7. Long ride to my favorite restaurant in the world with my best friend.

6. Mom treads carefully and makes sure she doesn’t leave me alone a lot. We find our way to a play through pouring rain. Quite an adventure.

5. BPC (Haven’t obtained permission to publish his name yet) makes sure that I get a huge hug and we tell each other that we’ll be ok. The plays and movies make us feel a little better. His dandanakka dance made sure we laughed our asses off for sometime, like nothing bad had ever happened…

4. Ashwin notes that I haven’t been eating. I get a call at 1.30 am at work. “Hopey, I’m at your office and I brought food.”

3. Thomas takes me to watch ‘The ugly truth’. It actually helped a little. “You are my best friend and my sister. I can’t see you like this. I need you”, he says. For once, my eyes well up when am not sad.

2. My little brother IMs me in the middle of the night : Arun: wat happened???am so worried about you…
1. The need to get away from people and places and faces drives me to church. The silence irrigates my parched soul and tears finally feel free to run their course… Feeing a tug, I open my eyes… Between my bowed head and my lap is a tiny little fist peppered with my tears, it opens to reveal a small candy bit in half.

As I walk out, the candy tucked in my cheek and the tears back in the vault, there seems to be something different about the night air… Atleast I’m walking now…

Pink, Red and Black!

We were supposed to meet up to pick up a new bike (Yamaha Fazer).

The order was placed a month back and he had to wait for a long time to get the color that he wanted – Black!

So finally the day arrived and I was waiting for Thomas to come, wearing my Oh so pink shoes and drinking sugarcane juice!

There was a red ambulance parked in front of my scooter. As time went by, I noticed smoke coming out of the side windows. It had me wondering… so I tried to take a picture of it with my phone… Just as I hopped off my scooter, the doors opened and two scrawny ‘hospital attender’ guys jumped out and locked the door behind them. Am telling you they were smoking in the back of the ambulance! lol! Now, that’s a first for me. Never have I even imagined!

Anyways, we went and got the bike, took it to church, had it blessed. Then, I rode home to spend the some quality time with some other friends as well.
The highlight of the weekend was furniture shopping with Ma. It’s nice to see her giggling like a school kid, running around, looking at shoe racks, antique bedside furnishings and ‘authentic teakwood cupboards at 50% discount’.

It’s like she the prodigal son has finally come home… She sits on couches, measures kitchen fittings, tries computer tables, knocks on wood, shakes tea tables violently (probably an ancient fool-proof- earth quake-test) and brain drains the sales guy; all with an ethereal glow on her face (and no it’s not the aloe vera juice!)

When we leave the sales guy looks about to drown himself in a pool of acid. I loved it.

We then had dinner, just the two of us, talking, planning, dreaming, laughing… I realise that we both have missed this over the years. Just us girls, learning to respect each other for what we have been through and what we want to make out of it.

She looking back and I looking ahead.

If I turn out to be like my mother – I’d have only lived a righteous life, never giving up, doing things the right way, having no regrets and touching more people’s lives that I’d care to count.

Weekends… who knows what’s next

I’m ashamed of myself

Screeeeeeeeeeeeechhhhhh… A car cut me off.

My scooter was doing around 50 kms/hr and it scared the hell out of me.

Taking off my helmet and mustering all my strength “Holy mother of crap! What the hell are you doing?”

Meaaaaaaooooww!

Window rolling down “ I saw you and wanted to say hi… Did I scare you?”

Muttering to myself “Puny Todd you bastard” I searched for a dignified rebuke.

He made gestures asking me to pull over to the curb.

Shaking with anger, I pulled over and parked, still searching…

Puny Todd shuffled towards me, hitching up his pants which were half way off his ass.

“You DICK” I raged out loud. Decent and dignified, that’s me.

“Calm down Jo gurl! Want some gum?”

“Jump up your own ass and die freak!”

“You watch too much TV, want some pongal?

“What the fuck man! Wierd ass psycho FREAK. I could’ve been hurt fool… HURT!” The bats could hear me now

Traffic Cop (Parking his bike)                : “What seems to be the problem?”

Me (Trying to keep my voice steady): “Nothing sir. Just going to work”

Traffic Cop (Assessing the vehicles)   :  “Night shifts?”

Me (Producing my ID)                              : “Here is my ID card sir. I work 5 minutes from here”

Traffic Cop(Turning away from me)    : “Who is this? Your lover?”

Me(Disgusting retching sound)             : “No”

Puny Todd (Taking out his wallet)        : “he he he…Ok, don’t make a scene sir. Tell me how much you want?”

Traffic Cop (thundering)                           : “Making a scene? I’ll show you. Go and stand near the bike. (Turning to me and lowering his voice) If I ever see you with this son-of-a-bitch (he used a rather disturbing tamil word) again, it won’t be good.

Me (to his back)                                            : You won’t.

Traffic  Cop (adding an afterthought) :  “Paathu po kannu” (Ride safe dear)

Puny Todd (yelling)                                   : “Message me when you reach Jo gurl”

Traffic Cop (As I was staring the bike): “Modhala pant ah olunga poduda” (Pull up your pants first)

SO much language in a matter of a few minutes…I use f*** and different variations of the word (Which is my next post), but not the other cuss words. (I swear TK, I don’t)

Some people do bring out the gutter in me!

I’m ashamed of myself

Psst: This is where you say –> “You ought to be ashamed Archu,but,we still love you Archu…