Daily Pepper

RockStar: Fly, Cry, Pray… before you die

2011-10-04T03:49:00.000-07:00

If you have known LOVE. If you have known GOD. If you have known PAIN, you will cry with RockStar.

This CD is eerie, and powerfully eerie. It sucked me out of everything I was doing from the moment the Courier-wallah called out at the gate. I guess that’s why I had to wait so much and try so much to lay my hands on RockStar’s music.

With a phone call on one hand, and a hot kadhai on flame at the other end, there was no way I had time to open a package.

But I ripped the bubble wrap off with a ladle still in my hand. Uneasy, anxious, excited, with a strange chaos running in my fingers.

Everything went on. The kadhai got fire. The phone was carelessly left in the fridge. Dad kept shouting.

I ceased to operate for five minutes. Rumi’s timeless lines, Ranbir’s breathtaking eyes, Imtiaz’s words, the sketch of every song, the falcon, the lyrics…they just sucked me inside a musical vacuum cleaner.

I was already swaying. I still hadn’t popped the CD inside the music system.

So whatever happened after the magic started erupting out of the black box we call audio-speaker, was expected.

My room turned into something like a holy Dargah for the next few hours.

Every song planted wings. Every song drilled into the wells of heart.

The guitars, for the first time felt like hands folded into a prayer.

There’s everything inside this small round orbit of vinyl whatever.

There’s the bouncing step of Katiya Karun, there’s the ultimate dance of waltzing with your God in Kun Faya Kun, there’s the naughty hop of Sheher Mein, there’s the floating weightlessness and eternal depth of love in Tum Ho, the feeling of legs-and-arms turning into fins and feathers with Hawaa Hawaa, the angry-tearful rebellion in Sadda Haq, it’s all there.

Clouds, oceans, temples, Dargahs, far off places hugged inside mountains, words waiting to be released, dance of the strange person we all cage inside, Sufi trance, slide on the winds, the effortless closing of eyes, their turning moist, their mysterious smile, the involuntary banging of head, the freedom of brain, the angst of heart, the happiness of heart, the mess of hair and tresses as they dance out of their own volition…………..

Rockstar made me float.

It will make every heart do the same.

Float, dance, cry, shout, scream….am sure for every maverick who knows what these words mean:

Tum logon ki is duniyan mein jo bhi main karun tum kahte ho woh galat?

Marzi se jeene ki bhi mein, kya tum sabko marzi doon?

Sach ka path padaye Jab Sach sun hi na paaye.

Tera darr, Tera pyar, Teri maar.. Tu Hi Rakh.

Anyone who has struggled to keep their wings alive and to let their souls dance beyond all cages.

RockStar is an album beyond words. It’s into a different land, a free flight into a familiar universe every heart searches everywhere and aches to find.

Only pure music can make you sing, cry and dance like you are in a Prayer and above everything, everything.

RockStar. It’s Rumi on Guitar.

P.S: Don’t know what to say to Rehman, Ali, Ranbir, every lyricist, guitarist, drummer and the whole team that created this beautiful, majestic, bird called RockStar. You all have become immortal with this.

And sMiles to go before I snore

2011-06-28T13:15:00.000-07:00

By Pratima H

hEY Road, Where are you going?

Care to let me hop on?

I am clueless and dunno how to kill my time

I feel like a soap opera moron

The world is a blur and I feel like a lost ship

Not in a storm but no port to go either

Am staring at a blank page for hours now

Damn, I don’t feel like switching on the geyser

Have you ever been on a spiral that doesn’t go up or down

But runs in a loop like an idle rabbit

Life’s going the same way in some darn rut

Like a gravy train but I don’t wanna grab it

I just kicked a can on the grey tartar

And it made a noise I hate

Like the voices in my mind

Like the scratch of nails on a slate

Don’t you ever get bored of just going on and on

Even the stupid pit stops look the same

The fan rotating on the ceiling

Stray dogs without a name

A spoon of adventure would be a good idea

But I don’t mean floods, droughts or meteors

Can’t a Spiderman come flying

Or Superman doing some pizza chores

Bungee jumping is scary

And it would be another tick in the box

How do I stir this pot called life

It’s itching like chicken pox

They all serve the same Thai or Mexican, these chefs

The other ones make us believe their movie is a cut apart

But all stuff is recycled and dished out

And we keep dragging a lame shopping cart

I don’t even know what am I saying

I don’t even want to make sense

Coz it’s all fuzzy and ferrous now

I am groping for some future tense

Anticipation is half the drama

Do you dig it? Umm, like a prom dress

Should I ask someone to pinch me

Coz life can not be so friggin lifeless

People look like insipid robots

Living out of a virtual page’s pyre

Avatars and puppets of a beaten ramp

Strutting on like an anorexic tyre

Walking in a factory of spare parts

Watching ambitions rolling on assembly belts

Smelling the grease of inertia all around

The cookie no more crumbles, just melts

The X-Ray machines have conked out

No muscle, no real marrow left inside

Darwin must be turning in his grave

Evolution is now but a camel ride

The insane part is it’s hard to run away

Because every town stinks of concrete

Every countryside is impregnated

Even dreams are predictable and discreet

So if you are heading to another Black Hole

I would rather take a turn and stay muddy

But if you fancy wrestling a forest or something

Let’s get going, I have a full tank Buddy

P.S: No, I don't have a temperature. No crap of a movie either. Sometimes you know, letting the pen hold your fingers and just drifting, allowing the mind to be a vagabond....a flat tyre moment is not that bad after all.

Have you met this Rickshawallah?

2011-06-23T16:17:00.000-07:00

I have a theory. Rickshawallahs are like potatoes. You can find them everywhere, at every hour and each city has practically its own version. Hop in.

Pratima H

They all have whacky tyre-curtains. They all still continue being loyal customers for Bollywood illustrations. Whether it’s Jimmy aka Mithun’s peeping at you from the bumper thingamajig or Salman’s bully look freezing you in your tracks, it doesn’t matter.

If you are inside a rickshaw, you will see why this genre does not need any social network to follow someone and stamp one’s loyalty. If he espouses a celebrity, it’s there on the seat, behind the seat, around the seat, on the rear-view mirror, everywhere. In fact, the interiors of a rickshaw are the only place (except a serendipitious encounter at some barber shop of course) where you get to randomly bump into a Madhubala poster or a Sridevi smiling in a Urvashi attire.

They all feel at home inside their rickshaw.

They all have a funny hand-pole as a kickstarting contraption.

And they all have some God’s idol or picture at the very centre of their lives, their rickshaw.

But, pause before you paint them with the same brush. Because, every Rickshawallah is a crayon box to explore. In their world, there is no Xerox machine.

Some sing, some spit, some argue, some plead, some fleece your wallet, some pay back the 25 paisa change, some help you as a free GPS and some come back driving one hour 15 minutes to return a bag you thought you had lost forever.

Let’s start with the edgy ones first.

I met this one in Pune. I was new to the city and though I had a bike I always preferred to take a rickshaw when I had to reach a new venue for a conference. There’s no navigation software better than this species who knows his city like the back of his hand, I had learnt.

I shouted the usual ‘Rickshaw?’ in a tone of authority and ten steps ahead, he pulled over.

I got in, apprised him of my pursuit and handed him the co-ordinates, throwing my head back in relief and started digging for my headphones.

But I guess Enrique had to wait that day.

Sonu (as I will name him here for now) chirruped with a Horlicks-charged torrent of questions.

After satisfying himself with his interrogation about ‘what I do’, ‘where am I from’, ‘what’s the meeting about’ to which I concocted fake answers and was hoping to get back to some music, he poured out his drawing-board models.

“Madam ji, I don’t want to be a Rickshawallah all my life. Do you think I can try Mumbai for modeling?”

I gave him a proper look. Yellow shades, Baazigar-Shahrukh hair-cut, funky-silver collared, come-to-battle-Govinda type of shirt and a skull-hanging bracelet. Before I could finish hemming-and-hawing, he chimed in again and told about his well-chalked-out vision.

“I have told Aai that I will save some of this money for my salon. She’s a good woman, I know. Father will disapprove as always insulting my intelligence and will yell every morning as usual. But I will start this salon you see. Even if I need to run away, I will make sure it happens. It will be different. New styles, new freebies, new music systems inside. One day I will be known as personal hair-stylist of Akshay, no matter what.”

I got curious and asked him how much formal education he had covered. Turned out he had dropped out pretty early, but hadn’t bunked the school of life for sure.

The anecdotes he kept telling, the plans he had been hatching, the way he described the city, he was certainly making quick notes everyday.

He knew all the youth-hang-outs, all the malls, all the IT parks, all the Crossword points, all the multiplexes. He could only enjoy it from outside but still hadn’t missed any new movie any Friday since 14. He had some very strong opinions about some latest songs and cursed one or two RJs for playing crap everyday.

When the rickshaw screeched to an action-halt at the venue, I was full of energy that he had rubbed off unconsciously. I didn’t miss that twinkle in his eyes and lots of dreams in his head as he quickly whistled away for another sawari.

I am sure that even if he is still honking a naughty horn and working hard for that breakthrough salon, he is very much tuned in to Imran Khan’s new look.

But, Radheshyam (another alias of course) was his exact opposite.

I got to spend 15 minutes in the holy air of his intensive silence.

I literally jumped in this rickshaw after an exhausting walk out of the Airport. Some kind passengers directed me to get out of the taxi-zone to escape the vanity-show and find a transport with reasonable fare.

His was the first one that drew up, and I didn’t mind paying him double after lugging my suitcase this far.

But Radheshyam didn’t bother about the fare too much either.

We drove in silence all the way till Andheri. He had a Dilip Kumar frown on his face, and his condescending ‘don’t waste your energy on this petty stuff, you mortals’ look that he gave to the cockfighting fellowmen at traffic signals, really filled me with awe.

At one point, I mustered courage and asked, “How has the weather been? Has it started raining here?”

“Hmm.” Came the informative response.

“How far would BKC be at this hour from here?”

“Not much.” Came the very enlightening answer.

My bowl of knowledge brimming and content, I veered off to watching the city in its usual hustle, indifference and chaos.

Breaking my reverie on the quality-of-life and ‘where to is everyone always running here’ chain of thoughts, the phone rang. My cousin filled me in about passing her exams and we discussed her bright and sunny future-plans.

By the time I finished the conversation, we reached the apartment gate.

Exactly the doorway when voice flowed out from the front seat.

Radheshyam almost repeated the question twice before I could believe he had asked it.

“Madam, do you know what one can do after passing Secondary?”

I gave him the usual roster of options and he hesitantly continued.

“My brother is hopeless. He just doesn’t concentrate on education, and I don’t know what will he make out of his life? I don’t want him to end up doing what I do. Please tell me some direction I can push him towards. I will be as strict and as supportive as much as needed. But I will make him a better man.”

I offered all the information I could and he actually smiled when he said ‘Thanks’.

May be it was because he meant it from his heart.

I stood with my luggage, watching him roll ahead into the lanes of the city. My hands held a 25 paisa coin that Radheshyam had made sure to search out of his pocket and hand over.

Well, no body gives back exact change these days.

We are living in an era after all where Rs.6 is instantly rounded off to Rs.10.

As per Muthaiya’s arithmetic at least.

This one I bumped into, in Bangalore.

And I knew the very next second I got in this Rickshaw that I need an interpreter along in this city from now on.

Muthaiya (fictitious name again) did not understand Hindi, English or even sign language.

Or so he pretended.

But as flustered as I was left after ten minutes I knew he couldn’t be that good an actor.

For he was oscillating his head frantically and almost pulling his hair out in quite a convincing fashion.

His countenance was that of a man just out of some earthquake rubble.

I wanted to reach to Diamond district near old Airport Road and he stopped in utter confusion at Domlur. Believe me, he actually asked me to get out of the rickshaw.

My stern glance, angry words and all consumer-activism failed. Before he could push me out with devices like phalanges, I made a practically wise choice to surrender and step down the throne.

I mentally scribbled his ID and number when he mumbled some argument again and didn’t return a penny back for the note I handed over.

But when he whizzed by, I couldn’t help laughing. He was a sight to see - all perplexed, all insecure, all afraid and yet all greedy.

Well, greed is the way of the world now. It’s exactly the witch why the Hansels called trust and Gretels called fun can’t roam about without an-always-alert eye and a stony-rude face.

I was armored with the same don’t-mess-with-me face when I met George, after two days, in the same city.

He was happily cruising around in the nooks of Wheeler Road when I solicited his services.

Happy-as-a-sparrow but burly-as-a-Hippo, George had the same sitting-in-river-water-look of content. He talked like a man who just had a nice, sumptuous breakfast of hot idlis, bacon, eggs, cakes, tarts, and had gulped it down with a flask of Kodiakanal-kaapi.

It was tough not to drop the vain façade and break into a smile in five minutes.

George is a good raconteur if you want to know about the real Bangalore. He relayed his family history, stories of his forefathers, how they came, how they fell apart, how they reunited and how the city has been through tales of drama, change and times.

He asked about all the cities I could reciprocate with some entertainment on. His eyes had the curiosity of Columbus but his tummy and face had the contentment of a peasant’s wife. I have never met someone as happy in his world as this man.

But then it doesn’t take much to make people happy.

Even rude ones.

Like Kishan Uncle in Rajasthan.

I guess we both had a nerve-wracking day and it was easy to get into an argument even if it was a rather old man on the other side.

He was not really all-grey-haired but his face and eyes had that worn-out look of a man exhausted of life. Or cranky.

It was getting dark. The rain was catching force every minute and I was in a hurry to collect stuff from two shops before they started closing. I told him the directions but after a few minutes, he forked out on another route. I got disturbed, and told him strongly to stick by the earlier one.

He told me how he wanted to avoid water-logged spots and how he was doing it out of consideration for the time and comfort of both of us. We both were extremely waspish and stubborn, I chivvied him off with further stern words and soon we both were in a fierce argument.

There was a traffic cop nearby when he insisted on taking another rickshaw and that helped me win the duel.

But while I sat back relaxing on my own route, it dawned on me after five minutes that may be I had gone overboard.

Back here in this part of India, there’s no meter system and every spot has a fixed charge. May be he was worried about money?

I leaned forward and assured him that I would pay a reasonable amount for the waiting time and the detours if any.

He said. “No need Madam.” But his tone was different this time.

One small gentle word can calm a storm and that’s what happened when we both got polite again.

I felt the sincere touch of care when he explained me the safety issues about the routes I had insisted on at this hour.

He was mumbling how it was better if we reached our homes in time and everything when I started wondering about the cares and burdens he must be fraught with to be riding a rickshaw at this senile age.

I made sure I hurry with my chores and pay him reasonably well for his time and with gratitude.

He took only what he deserved and gave the rest back. But we both smiled and waved the white flag cheerfully before he left.

It’s hard to find such Uncles anymore.

No body cares as much. Not as much to come back from the other end of a big city to return a small bag. All the petty cash inside untouched. Suraj, Pune, 2009.

But that’s another story. Another Rickshaw. Some other day.

P.S: It's hard to believe, but some of these do exist in the mundane ones if one has some luck and time to spare. Have you met them somewhere?

Where am I going?

2011-05-20T02:40:00.000-07:00

Kids are tested with ‘Fill in the blanks’ in kindergarten exams. When they grow up, the computerized entrance tests take over, it's all about multiple-choice questions from there on. And then, sometimes, for some nuts, life turns a full circle.

Pratima H

THE bar was his first idea, but almost everyone knew him there.

To the mountain, would have required him to trek. The thought itself was exhausting.

To the pizza house may be, but the insurance agent would pounce on him again.

To the clinic would have really been peaceful, but what if there was no queue in the waiting room today! No way taking that chance at a dentist’s who loves her profession way too seriously.

Not even a theatre after surviving last week’s suicide attempt.

Then where?

Shopping malls are too creepy, sea beaches too crowded and temples too noisy.

He just wanted to run away somewhere.

Somewhere he could be at peace, calm with himself and his insomniac mind?

Just anywhere? Away from here.

Here.

A place that had driven him mad for the past few days. He found himself asphyxiated on his 25 storey building’s terrace and nothing helped. Nothing helped him and everyone he saw worsened his state. Even seeing a milkman ignited the fits and even watching a stripper was of no help, but ironically otherwise.

Right now, this guy who had chickened out of a ‘how many beers can you drink?’ challenge last Friday, would have skydived out of a plane in the blink of an eye. Just to be alone and to think. Or may be - just the opposite.

Tem minutes later, he found himself sitting on a bench. He wiped some beads of sweat and cupped his face with a sigh. The darkness that his handkerchief and two palms could spin now was way more relaxing than his wrestle-match with all his room’s curtains, light bulbs and at times even the celestial bodies

He has even started considering a nap in this posture when a shriek startled him.

A five year old boy gleamed with a loud cry when the see-saw sent him on top of the world.

His down-to-earth adversary, a chubby six-year old girl with pigtails was waiting impatiently for the heavenly experience.

Besides them, a merry-go-round was already grooming kids into the imperatives of standing-in-queues-and-waiting that their adult life would be all about. But yes, the happy screams of those whirling in joy, made the wait worthwhile.

Swings, toboggan rides, rabbit-chasing, knee-bruising, paper-scissor-rocks, healthy mud-slinging and aimless running around.

Oh, so he was in a children’s park!

Should he breathe out a cuss word at his folly? All this noise, all this disoriented laughter, all this chaos, cachinnation and all these greenhorns running amok! Is this where he ran away from the sea side?

Actually yes.

Ironically, he felt a little respite in this mayhem.

He wanted to be lost. What better than a crowd that is least bothered about you when they have a squirrel to catch!

Lost he became. Shutting out all the volume that had been screeching in his brain for the last few days. The voices in his head gave in. The remote control was back in his hands now. And he happily pressed - mute.

Fifteen minutes into gazing blankly at this parallel world he had parked his soul in, he was disturbed by a husky voice.

“Ain’t gonna go, I am telling you. The park will close soon. The mind will buzz as an obstinate bee again.”

He turned sideways and turned mute himself.

Wow! A face, as charming, as impish and as forever young as Gerard Butler! And the same lethal smile he had envied like since ever.

“Umm..eh..who..who are you?”

The face released a full-of-rains-and-winds laugh before he slapped the answer back – “What if I say I am from God’s Customer Care department? Would you believe me?”

“God’s what?”

“Forget it. You can call me Jeeves. But don’t expect me to hold a tray for you ok. So, now shoot. What’s the problem, dude?”

Silence replied with a stare.

Jeeves smirked, “Girl problem?”

“Oh come on! Why everything in this world has to be about women?”

“Because they are the ones who make the world worthwhile right?”

“Yeah, kind of. But they make it foggier also. Why do they have a million and a half moods? And why is it so complicated to really interpret what they are saying?”

“Or why just women! Everything in this world is so incomplete. Everything has been left in a black hole. The last pages mercilessly torn from a detective thriller.”

Jeeves gave a wise nod.

The outburst continued.

“Do people really mean what they say? If not, why do they say such things? Is it smart to be selfish or is it selfish to be smart? Do naïve people die happier than vile ones? Is there really a pot at the end of the rainbow of race, career and wealth? Is that the pot I am actually looking for? What if it has honey, but I don’t really have a sweet tooth? What if I want noodles inside it?”

“I agree. I would like it be full of peanut butter.” Jeeves piped in.

“Yes, that reminds me, Why are all things full of pleasure not good for health? I love staying up for parties or for work at night, but no, that’s not good for health! Beer, not good. French fries, not good. Driving at 100 kmph, not good. Why?

And why do we have to act all smart and sassy to get respect? Or have a snazzy car to get attention? Why can’t we be like these kids, stupid and genuine? And yet, we ourselves would mock or ignore people who might be silly but have a golden heart? Why can’t we have a golden heart? In fact, why can’t we afford to carry a heart everywhere we go? Why do we have to leave it at the janitor’s locker room when we step inside our offices or colleges or societies? What is so wrong about wearing your heart on your sleeve? What’s so heinous about letting your heart talk? Why can’t we trust our instincts instead of shepherds of this world who know nothing of the really green pastures? Why do we have to do things because some cowards have been doing that for ages? What’s wrong in stumbling? Why is there always someone else you would rather prove yourself to, instead of your own voice? Voice, now why can’t everyone sing? Why can’t everyone dance? We all are born the same right? Then why do some eyes are so beautiful and wise and some so shallow and sly?”

Eyes, the word, distracted him a bit, and he mustered his will not to gaze at Jeeves’ pupils; then he shifted awkwardly but then confessed.

“Why are there some eyes you can’t look into? What’s so scary about it? Why some eyes absorb you like a vacuum cleaner? Why do I feel that a baby’s eyes look right into you, even though a baby looks so harmless? What is so wise about them? Don’t you feel that all the babies have a secret code of their own and somewhere they are all laughing at us? Smart Alecks!”

“And yes, why don’t they let us sleep? Why doesn’t anyone let us sleep for that matter? Why do people make noise while a wedding is happening? Why do they go dumb when someone should really speak up? Why do we all fail to make the most of what we have? Why don’t we do something that will make our life worthwhile? When will we stop existing and start living?”

“When will I start living?” he gasped, “When will I do something that will make me celebrate ‘you live only once’? Anything? Saving a child from the fire or creating a recipe or writing a book or discovering America? Well, not America, that Columbus already did? But what went through his mind while he was at it? Or for that matter the minds of Einstein or Newton or Zuckerberg? They didn’t really know what were they after, and they still were after something?”

“Like what am I after? Love? Spiritual enlightenment? Food? Liquor? Cars? Deadlines? The guy who cut me in the traffic? The guy who broke my trust? The guy who is so disgusting, who wears Prada but smacks of arrogance? Oh yes, by the way, what is the right word for a situation or a remark which is so God-help-me nerve-wrecking that you won’t even react to it? When you really want to pity someone because they are beyond hatred or help? Why are there no words in dictionary for many people and situations? Like - What is the accurate word for ‘mmmmmmm’ when you taste that pav bhaji that Raju in Khau Galli makes? No, don’t say ‘delicious’ or ‘yummy’, it should be more accurate and more, more…like more wholesome….You get what I am saying?”

Jeeves smiled.

“I know you get what I am saying. Why is it that you know that some people would really get what you are saying even if it’s all gobbledygook or baby-blabber? And why is it that some people just won’t get what you are saying, no matter how many brochures you hand out or how many manuals you shove down their throat? Why do the best conversations happen in monosyllables? Why do Dads scold when you hate it and stop scolding when you want it?”

“What else,” Jeeves prodded.

“It just never ends. These questions. And it’s not that there are no answers that make me insane. It’s that why am I asking all these questions? Why can’t my mind rest? Curiosity kills the cat, but why do cats keep peeking all the time? Why does it give a kick when you gossip? And why do dogs bark or howl all the time? Why do they say ‘all men are dogs’? Is it insulting a man or a dog? Why do you call something a hotdog? Is it a compliment if a girl calls me that? Is it a compliment if someone calls you ‘interesting’? Does that not mean in a polite way that one is abnormal? Why can’t air hostesses be less polite? You know they hate you and they still greet you smugly! Ah, greetings! Why do we have to say ‘It is nice meeting you’ to stranger we just got introduced to? We hardly know that person to be called nice? Isn’t there a better salutation?”

“That and more. I am not a doctor for God’s sake. Why do we always ask a mechanical ‘How are you’ on every phone call when we both want to rush to the point? Would we really be concerned if she says ‘Oh not well today, my stomach is a bit upset since the pasta I had last evening’?”

“Why do we waste our time on things and people we know are a waste? Why do we take the more important people and stuff for granted? Why does the whole world look unpopulated when only one person is not around? Why does everything seem so alright when the same person is around, even on the ripped hulks of a sinking ship? Why does it take a ‘Titanic’ to say ‘You jump. I jump.’ Why can’t two people say the very words on a bungee jumping trip or a career-argument or a fight over a burnt omelette?

What’s wrong in admitting mistakes? Why do people use it against you when you admit one? Why can’t we make mistakes? Why can’t we have a tattoo at 54? Why can’t we try a DJ’s life when our friends are fighting for the cheese in B-schools? Why do we call big shots ‘big cheese’? Isn’t that derogatory, like rats after you and all? Why don’t rats live in jungles and make their own cheese? Why are they around us? If they are rats, why do we call some of them guinea pigs? Why are some people like rats and some like guinea pigs? Who are the real kahunas?

Am I a rat too? Why can’t I find a place to get lost to find myself? Why do we have to fill in silence? Why does technology make things more complicated sometimes than making them simpler? Why is there so little space that we need in this big world? What’s so selfish in asking for one’s space? Is it asking for the moon? Why do we need a sun to orbit all the time? Why do I need a car to do that? I can do that on a cycle? So why this fuss over petrol prices? We can be happy with so less and would still prefer to run after the so more and be unhappier. A shabby doll used to make us happy, now a full wardrobe fails to do that.

Why can’t my wardrobe have clothes made of bubble-wrap? It would be so less boring.

Why can’t coconut water be wrapped and stored in bottles or tetra-packs? Why can’t you use flowers in our lunch-boxes and beans in the vase?

Why can’t we make a chilli halwa? Or eat pills in salt-and pepper-shakes?

Why can’t we sing carols in office and nice songs for God? He wouldn’t mind a more creative, entertaining, remixed prayer, would he?

Does God exist? With the world so full of bad stuff and things and people? Are you for real? Who am I talking to?”

At this point, Jeeves put his hand over his and gave a warm, assuring smile, “You need to stop now, and let me say something.”

He breathed a thankful sigh and started to listen eagerly.

Jeeves pulled him along into a story.

Once upon a time there was a weird boy. He always observed things others never looked at. Always peeped out into the boundary of the beyond. Collected sea shells, pollen seeds, honeycombs and thrown-away cans. His friends laughed at him when he stopped mid way during a hide-and-seek game and started gleaning nuts, nails and screws from a new trail. “You are a nut case.” They ridiculed him.

One day, he left his village and joined some nomads.

Something he always wanted to do. To go for a treasure hunt. Even the nomads laughed at him this time. But he never cared.

Some years, miles and bivouacs later, they came to a quaint place, fossils of a forgotten kingdom as they discovered. But they soon grew bored of it when none of the bolted doors or rusted, iron chests opened. The locks were heavy, engineered in a very complicated way, such that their smartest tools, fires and axes failed to cajole them. Everyone left. Everyone but the boy.

He enjoyed the mystery and felt camaraderie with the aged trunks and boxes. They looked incomplete. They way he always used to feel with his curious eyes. Something crossed his mind and in a casual, enjoying maneuver he pulled out all the screws and nuts his own treasure was full of. And lo!

The screws fitted. The nuts jolted in. The nails embraced the holes in a tight grip. In the blink of an eye, everything snapped open.

The boxes now unbolted, welcomed the boy to a world shining with jewels, joy and extraordinary tales of a king’s life. All for the boy to marvel and indulge in.

I hope you got what I am pressing at?” Jeeves said. “The so-called nut, only, had the right nut.” He said slowly pausing on the word ‘nut’.

“So, I am a nut, and that’s not bad?” He asked back, all confused.

“No,” Jeeves interjected. “What I am saying is that the boy would have been the same as everyone, if he didn’t have the nuts, or the screws. Everyone found the treasure, but only the boy had the screws. And only he could open the boxes. Life will give you answers, will bring you to wrecked kingdoms and fairytale places, but before all that, you need to have the screws. The questions….do you get it…to have the questions, is more important! Because you would never be able to savour the answer when it comes, unless you have the questions with you. Forget all the comme il faut, forget what others are after, forget if they call you a nutcase, you collect your nuts.”

His face suddenly relaxed and all the frowns ironed out in the nod he gave back to Jeeves.

Jeeves winked and chuckled now, “Any more questions?”

“Yes, if we ever make the Indian version of F.r.i.e.n.ds, who will play the role of Phoebe?”

“You have figured out who will play Joey already? Don’t tell me!”

“Yes, but won’t tell you now. Let’s save something for the next time.”

Jeeves made a pout and stood up in reply, “Ok, that’s cue for me to go then?”

He knew he wanted Jeeves to stay, but he also knew there were other nuts for him to attend to. He smiled with a grateful handshake and said. “It was really nice meeting you.”

Jeeves gave a naughty grin, “Oh, that one. I am not falling for that. But till you find a better, more honest line, I will take that.”

Before he stood up and sauntered away like a Hollywood hunk, he added, “And by the way, you might want to try the chilli-halwa on your own.”

He smiled in affirmative and sat there watching him vanish into the crowd.

And then he muttered back to himself, “Why don’t Angels leave with visiting cards?”

“Why do grown-ups have to carry visiting cards?” someone standing at his back asked.

He turned to see a bespectacled Harry-Potterish kid looking at him for an answer.

“Well,” he replied, “Why don’t you allow grown-ups on your swings here?”

The kid stepped forth and joined him on the bench, “Umm…I don’t know. May be you have separate parks. Do you have separate schools too?”

“Yes, in a way. And different homework assignments too.”

The kid squirmed his nose and questioned again, “What homework? Are you made to stand outside the class if you don’t show it up? Are you allowed to use a ballpoint pen? Do you have a bigger zoo for your picnics?”

The questions kept coming. They filled him with a merry sigh, he chortled and the only answer he offered was – “I am so so jealous of you kid!”

P.S: Ships are safest in harbours, but is it where they are supposed to be?

I will find it!

2011-03-19T07:23:00.000-07:00

I have vowed to be happy, no matter what. Being stubborn helps. Being adventurous adds. And being arrogant abets. Well, why to let anyone else be my compass?

They tell me to fall in queues and go by the menu
To be jammed in an aisle, towing the world helpless

What if I jump around the kerb, to the wild bushes
Pluck those berries, or rent crayons for a mess
What if I let my feet find their own runway and catwalk into happiness

Why to wait for someone to pronounce the solemn ‘Bon Appetite’?
Isn’t the world a buffet, my plate huge, and my fork the best?

Books to nibble, poems to swig, movies to chew upon
Marinated with wardrobes, pages in the kitchen of a seamstress
Shaken, not stirred, is how one drinks Absolute happiness

Discover the Woman called Life, with an inch-tape and a Richter-scale
So much breadth, so much depth to it, why to sit on the shores and guess

People, their stories, their songs, their heroes, plots and villains
And the way life keeps peeling layers off you, yet the core, the farthest
It’s not a vacation all in all, but it’s a different land, it dares you- happiness

Money, Honey, trash to flash are like a bikini on a beach
What they reveal is good, but what they hide is priceless

To each his own, well right, pick the car, or the guitar
A job is still about finding true love, as wife or mistress
You can either sculpt long CVs or take your scoop of happiness

Running across daisies, opening the wings to fly
Falling out, breaking the herd, coz it’s ok to digress

Gallop on the winds, let some of it run through the hair
Blows, red-eyes, flowers, UFOs with whatever Life has to Bless

Board the storms, they will help you find new ports of happiness

If you can dodge the cookie-cutters, and refuse to be docile
Life is no fairy-tale but you can still be the princess

The crown has some heavy jewels but it can be fun,
Only if you do the right thing & have no one else to impress
The world is your kingdom, arrive, and find your happiness

Well, did a butterfly ever saunter in a harness ?

Life’s a game, but let it be football, not chess

If not in a trousseau, swishing a Flamenco dress

No need to be win Nobels, but live it large, no less

Let passion be your fuel, your heart the GPS

With some cajoling, some butter and a slice of duress
You watch it! I will find MY HAPPINESS

(Dig for it in your own way. It’s around. Oh, and yes, forgot to mention – Be honest. Because being truly happy inside is one thing we can never fake.

It's a wonderful world for sure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VNGgUHvkwQ)

Soulmate! Have you found yours?

2010-03-03T23:46:00.000-08:00

You are what I never knew I always wanted

WHAT’S the first rule of bargaining?

Don’t even think of dishing out acronyms like VFM, or Collaborative Window or Game Theory!

Go back to scratch (heyyy, stop itching. I didn’t mean that!).
Ok, I will help you. (scratching your brains i.e.:)

The first thing that your mother’s stern eye taught you at that bicycle store when the nine-year old version of yours was somersaulting in joy at ‘this is my bike!’ sight.

Before you could nosedive right onto its seat, the aphorism was planted with a strangulating grip and a sharp pinch – “Never show the seller that you have fallen for the product. Behave as if you are obliging him by buying the fare, rather than the other way round.”
Remember!

Yes, Momma dear, I still remember those ground rules of shopping (thanks to your pinch, that still hurts, ah). But am sorry, this time, I couldn’t restrain myself.

I had to shriek out of joy, get numb with ecstasy and dart right across to that masterpiece.
There was no time for abstinence when I saw it.

Just the same shade of purple. The exact fabric. Perfect print lineaments. And oh so absolutely symbion!
I don’t know whether I had really gone dizzy, or was it that rare moment of epiphany, but the whole enchilada suddenly transported my mind to few lines that some crackerjack had scribbled on an online profile.

Here’s what was quoted by the sibyl, from Richard Bach:

“Some one who has locks that fit our keys and keys to fit our locks.
When we feel safe enough to open the locks, our truest selves step out and we can be completely and honestly who we are, we can be loved for who we are and not for who we are pretending to be. Each unveils the best part of the other. No matter what else goes wrong around us, with that one ‘someone’ we are safe in our own paradise. Our soul mate is someone who shares our deepest longings, our sense of direction. Our soul mate is the one who makes LIFE COME TO LIFE.”

And that’s exactly what that top did to me.

It was the key to a lock that I had treasured in my wardrobe since my first Holiday to Goa. On a lark, (like most stuff women shop I know), I had got this weird printed skirt of a curious purple tinge. I just liked it. I knew I had nothing to go with it. Still I bought it (may be because the guy really had a cute smile and he said it will look good on me. Blush Blush).

But yes, I knew I probably would never take it out of my closet (like the proverbial skeletons…huahaaaaaaa. Scared you!). Ok, so there was this skirt, lying unattended, single, unattached, non-committed in neat pleats and forgotten long ago.

Until, that enchanted day when my eyes spotted its better-half - just the perfect top to top it, yeah.

As scatterbrained as I was at that bewitching moment, I squandered not a minute more. I summoned the shop-keeper, paid the first amount he breathed out, and took (snatched, to be precise) the parcel back home.

Moments like these stir up your sleepy spirits and make you utter Hallelujah!

When I placed the top next to the skirt, I started believing in God all over again.

It was the perfect fit. The top and the skirt were the epitome of MFEO (Made For Each Other). It was like they were cut out of the same cloth and sculpted by the same tailor, only to be stripped apart and made to wait for each other.

Opera music started wafting in my ears and the lines billowed down once again.
“Some one who has locks that fit our keys and keys to fit our locks…… Each unveils the best part of the other.”

Yes I had found SOULMATES.

Something half of Venus believes in and spends their life in looking for (may be a slice of Mars too, may be).

Soul mate.
A word that lifts us above our mortal existence. A hope that powers many matrimony sites and recharges some dating engines too. A musical mystery that keeps the cash registers ringing at most Coffee Cafes.

Weird as it may be, the law actually operates.

And you tend to believe in it all over again. Even after the fantasies you grew up with and nurtured as a teen (thanks to the chiffon world of Yash Chopra movies), get cruelly blue-penciled in the real world. Yes, even after that!

The law presents itself in other, strange forms and stamps QED to the lovely but hard-to-believe hypothesis around MFEO.

For instance, how do you explain goose bumps on your skin when you hear a song for the first time ever, and you just can’t stop playing it on and on in a loop. It’s like you have found something so-definitely-missing-so-far, or vice versa, and you feel complete in a strange way.

When you see a cloud, a sunset, a mountain, a tree, a scarf, a watch, a dress, a hat, a car; and you stand speechless, watching in slow motion, while the whole world around is whizzing by.

When you know, there’s some special, hard-to-explain pull in that thing.
A magnet that hooks you and makes you feel at home (even if you are standing in the far-off corners of some village near Beijing).

As rightly said, the purpose of Life is a life of purpose. And for a smart soul the purpose is to find the soul mate.

But life’s true joy and fulfillment is finding all the soul mates that are strewn across the world and around the years that make a lifetime.

The best beer-partner, the perfect listener, the immaculate shopping companion, the stranger in the lift, the perfect friend, the perfect mentor, the perfect coffee-mug, the perfect moment or the perfect arm chair.

For me, it’s also Tea, my perfect dress, my favourite serial, my adorable film star, my perfect restaurant, my perfect colour, my perfect flower and my perfect song. And yes, I still have to find many more. Like my perfect car (remember, Our soul mate is someone who shares our deepest longings, our sense of direction;)

In fact, to this list, I can also add ‘my perfect interview’ (As goes by the lines- “When we feel safe enough to open the locks, our truest selves step out and we can be completely and honestly who we are). Or for that matter, ‘My perfect shower gel’ (No matter what else goes wrong around us, with that one ‘someone’ we are safe in our own paradise. This would apply here for sure.)

For you, it can be the perfect hobby, the perfect job, the perfect book, the perfect bag, the perfect pajamas or the perfect paneer recipe.

The truth and the trick is, it can be anything.

Absolutely anything.

Anything that completes you.
Anything that makes you alive.
Anything that touches you at places you had no clue you had. (Ah, that reminds me, I have to discover the perfect perfume..read scent..yet)

It’s all about keeping your antennae open and alert.

Some people are lucky enough to find and unite wardrobe soul mates, like I did.
Some people are already lucky and successful in finding the perfect mug-song-sight-scarf all rolled into one, in their life partners.
That’s when a companion joins you forever.
Who’s more of a ‘sole mate’ than a ‘soul mate’. Some one who fits your shoes and will accompany you anywhere in the long lovely journey of life.
But till then, in fact, even after that, don’t miss out on the other hundred soul mates waiting to be found.

Or shall I say be also open to be found.
Didn’t get it? Hmm.

I didn’t know what to make of the sea-shell beads handed over as souvenirs by the staff of Goa Marriott during my stay a few days back.

It was nice (just like the beach-hemmed Hotel Uff), but there was no function to it, no purpose, no context.

Except of course, pulling all the shells out and challenging myself to sew them together again. (Which by the by, I was getting all the more inclined to).

But before the goofy urchin inside me took over, I wanted the neat, nice child to have a chance too. When I hit back home, I tried looking for another lazy corner to dump it in (after of course I failed matching it to anything in my wardrobe).

And Lo! Right through the vying sights of many other contenders, a small picture frame caught my eye. It was a moment captured in the water-world of Singapore, in some other forgotten trip.

But when I placed the sea-shell string around it, both of them came to life.

I couldn’t help but smile with them. The child joined and beamed with springs in her eyes (the urchin didn’t of course).

And it’s then when I wondered.
Sometimes, forgotten things have a destiny too.
Sometimes, all it takes is another incomplete part, to make life come to life.
Life is all about finding and being found.

I am sure Einstein meant it well when he said, “Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in Love.” Quod Erat Demonstrandum

Well, what else can I say?
Keep looking out.

P.S: And forget those shopping rules once in a while. It’s ok to jump and holler. Believe me. And don’t tell this to Mom (yours, mine, anyone’s). They can still spank.

What Men Want?

2009-04-07T02:45:00.000-07:00

Beer, Basketball, Porn, Babes, Cars, Gadgets, Bachelorhood?
That's all?

I KEPT MY PROMISE.
I told in my last piece that I will attempt to flip the question on the 'Men' side and here I am, struggling, yet trying my best.

Guys, all that I write here is the best distillation of all that my friends, cousins, classmates, colleagues, kith and kin have allowed me to see so far. I, and many more women, would love to hear, be corrected, be enlightened if you could build up on this litle piece of answers.

Hmm.

What do men want?

Let's try the catechism approach.

There is not much mystery, but something worse about the question on 'what a man wants?'.
Myths. There are a lot of assumed or overcooked conclusions from the sorority for the fraternity. When it comes to this question, guys don't puzzle girls, they irritate girls. At times, I wonder, how many of these myths actually hold true for the androgynous species. Let's try the most common questions any woman around is likely to have for the man in her life:

Arrgh! Why is he glued to that darn TV and that damn sport called Cricket all the time?

Ok, before I grope for the answer, a question for you girls (or to be precise, for us, girls). What's the problem here? Are you upset with the game, which in an Indian home, would be cricket and in somewhere west, would be Baseball or Basket ball. (But no matter what genre it is, that nettling game who hijacks your guy stays in the house, and in the blacklist of every woman).

So is it the choice of the game that bothers us?

Is it the oblivious number of minutes (sorry hours) he spends on it, blissfuly forgetting that 'you too exist' irrespective of proofs like your 'shouting', 'fighting' or 'sobbing'?

Dear Femme Fatale, let's learn to accept the rock-solid truth. Guys married sports and TV before they married you. The first love is impregnable. And does it really matter if your guy wants to slop into a couch after a hard day out? If he can relax with a 21 or 29 inch box without any word for hours, what's the deal?

Does he get so worked up or vocal about your time to relax at the beauty parlor or spa or shopping? Why worry then?

Cash the opportunity. While he is happily tied up with TV, make the most of the time, do that long-telephone goss with your friends, or enjoy yourself in the kitchen or take a nice 'do-not-disturb' nap. What more, you can call him anything, vent out anything, while he is hardly listening but still nodding.

Why does he not understand me?

Aha! Now we are very very clever at this one. Take a test yourself. Try to note down just one interpretation from a blank picture in a frame while she gazes at you with no help, no clue, but deep-mysterious eyes. And even if the audio -function is on, can you manage to translate anything when a confused, chaotic, multi-directional bulletfire is on?

Sweetie, if you really, really want him to understand you; first be sure at any one point that you want to be understood.

Be sure of at least one reason when you shed those precious tears?

What is causing these tears...a bad day at work, a bad bargain with the sabjiwallah, an argument with some monster-in-law, a date in your lovely calendar that he forgot today, a cue he did not pick up, a glance he could not read, a dress or recipe he forgot to compliment...what? Help him understand you. He may be dumb by your standards,.... so what, go out help him learn your syllabus.

Uf! His ever-wandering eyes

Yes, guys do have a roving eye.

Why? Boys, at least keep a check on it, when your lovely lady is along. And she would know it, no matter how dumb or careless she may look to be. So beware.

As to girls, well, even we can't help a sigh when a George Clooney or Vinod Khanna passes our eye. Well said.... your guy is not the Adonis. Same goes for us. It's ok if he ogles, as long as he does not googles;)

Bodyguard-cum-wardrobe manager

Don't wear that short skirt? Don't talk to strangers? I don't trust that colleague? Call me once you reach? Dress appropriately. I will come along............

For many girls, these lines are quite familiar. And for almost every man in their life.. They only travel from person to person..... From father, to brother to boy-friend to chubby-hubby.

Yeah, why do boys get so possesive and martinet-toned? I really hope to believe here that behind all that tough-stalin-hide lies a real concern for protecting their woman in this big-bad-world. May be, guys know it best how many rascals out there their breed has who can not be ignored. Am I right? Or is there more to the answer?

Being the Bachelor

As much as any girl would be tempted to, I would restrain myself from calling the commitment-phobia a universal syndrome. What may be irritating and funny to womanhood, could be a big big worry sack in a man's head. The question mark is visible right till the last step on the aisle, right till the prenultimate moment of 'I Do'. I wonder why didn't they make a 'Run-away Bridegroom' yet?

At times, this question mark costs more than some harmless joke or a little fight...at times it could cost a lovely worth-pursuing relationship and even THE woman of his life.

So why the question mark? As much convenient it feels to believe amidst all the frustration, despair and anger for a woman, there should be a better answer than a short - "He loves his bachelor life" or "He is scared of commitment".

And even if that's a plausible answer, there's more behind the curtains. May be for a guy, marriage is not a just lovey-dovey turning point in life. May be for him, it's an abbreviation of all the bigger responsibilities and changes that his life would have to embrace with the wife he weds.

May be he is not confident enough that he has it within him (and with the ever-supportive and contented woman beside him he can make it successful) to be a great husband and a great father. May be.

The obnoxious Beer Orgies

His glass-friends, his intoxicated appointments and the heavy hangovers. Hmm. Why can't guy say Bye-Bye to liquor? Why do they 'Keep Walking' there?

Time to flip back to the previous para and spend a minute on 'bachelorhood'. Girls bond differently. Girls relax differently. Guys have a different mechanism. Period.

It's not just the peg that lures him. It's the talk, the chat, the B2B blabber, the loosening up etc etc that he gulps along with that Guinness. Your 'stuff' is different from his 'stuff'. Why bother tweaking Nature's ways? Why forcing the wrong 'stuff'?

Let him have his holiday yaar. What's the harm in a beer-with-buddies every Friday?

Guys don't feel

Wrong. Objection over-ruled.

Guys feel, it's just that they don't show. Or they do so in different ways.

Just because he doesn't say a 'I Love u'every morning; Just because he does not respond to schmaltz songs or memories; Just because he is not all hearts and flowers, doesn't mean that...you don't matter to him.

He may not be soft, but sensitive he is.

His love has a different syntax, that's it.

He can not cuddle up and hold hands all the time. That's not how he feels love.

But yes, for him, his love is 'your being around'. You may (and all fault of his) very well feel that you are all in the background while his job, his friends, or car or TV go upstage. But lucky lady, do roots ever show above the surface? And try taking off the roots and see how he withers.

He loves. He just doesn't show. May be he just doesn't know.

Why is he so so sloppy?

It's next to impossible. You want to train him to death....Go ahead.

Some day, some wonder-day you will have your always-clean socks, a laundry in order, a clean kitchen after (and if) he cooks, a matching tie, a watch-at-the-right-place. Some day.

It's so interesting and intriguing. Leave the same male species on his own, beyond any form of female scrutiny, and I have seen guys actually doing their cooking, laundry and other such stuff perfectly. I dont know about others, but when I am home, with my Mom around, I can beat any guy in being all lazy and messed up. Why would a Guy exert so much if they have a Mom or a Mom-like-figure (a nagging wife for cleanliness) around them?

The questions, the myths, the frustrated queries don't end. There's a lot unanswered between guys and gals.

To cut it short....

It's just a personal opinion. But I guess guys too need to have their 'guy' space. Be it the time they spend with you, the time they do not spend with you, and the time they spend elsewhere.

They may look hopeless, but they are not. Underneath all the reckless, callous, tough-skinned apperance lies a responsible nerve, a caring muscle and a tender ligament. Let your 'man' be a 'man' and don't force a woman's DNA onto him.

Next time you buy him gifts, please look beyond that Rolex, the Cufflinks, the shirt and the perfume. This time try a sexy Playstation, a smart accessory for his bike/car, a whacky Beer mug, a ticket for a Rock concert, or a special pack of Cigars.

You love him? Love him the way he is.

(And guys, please don't prove my answers wrong. Share more insight, if you can.)

Keep Talking.

;)

By:

Pratima H

What Women want?

2009-04-06T02:21:00.000-07:00

Ahan! Now that is not just the title of a nice Mel Gibson movie, but a question that's haunting many men since Adam. Here's a small attempt for Guys, who actually are bothered enough for an answer.

FRIDAY NIGHT. A single stud musing over a Budweiser can as he gazes intently at a lovely hot chick sitting across, alone in the pub. THE question bubbles up.

Monday Afternoon. A flummoxed colleague staring blankly at the female boss in the corner office. Loosening his tie, he mumbles in disgust THE same question.

Sunday Morning. A bewildered fight-exhausted husband standing speechless at a door just slammed on his face. He gropes and prays for an answer.

Sunday Evening. After rummaging out all possible shades from his shelves, and sitting nonplussed in a sea of sarees, the salesman surrenders to the lady customer and to THE eternal question.

THE QUESTION. The same question that could be giving nightmares and day-long headaches to the market research and advertising team of any FMCG major....."What do WOMEN WANT?"

Yes, the question has echoed through centuries and across myriad varieties of situations and men. Estrogen has always been a puzzle territory for the other gender. And many might be familiar with the strange feeling in the pit of your stomach, when you scream out that question to your woman and all you get is... a very-very cryptic, silent gaze.

To confess, the answer is anything but simple. But whip up some sincere observation, with a dash of genuine curiosity seasoned with common-sense axioms filtered by all the women who have walked the earth before and now, and Lo...it's an answer worth finding out. If that sounds mammoth, read what follows and think over if it hits any chord.

You can either look for answers or ask some simple questions and question some myths.

Does a woman want ....a career or may be an identity?

Chivalry...or real respect?

Cosmetics...or feeling beautiful?

Tissue paper...or a hand that offers one when she needs to cry?

Roses...or a symbol that someone cares enough?

Cards...or the awesome feeling that you remembered her Birthday?

Eyes that check her out...or eyes that try to hear her once in a while?

Being judged all the time, person after another, one exam after another...or just being accepted for what she is, with all her flaws and her strengths?

Is she an awkward, sloppy, slow driver ...or an overcautious, scared driver who wants to avoid accidents and is more worried about not hurting someone, and that includes the car.

Power...or some way she can make a difference to the world the way only a woman cares to?

Women Reservation/ Equal opportunity Laws .....or real equality, dignity and rights?

A forever fuss over your Cigarettes and alcohol.....or a chronic concern for your health?

Clean socks...or a life in order?

And now some specifics:

If you are a brother, do you know what your sister wants? May be a little more than just a Rakhi gift or the usual dictums. She wants you to still teach the Bicycles at a new track of life, but like the first time, she wants you to believe in her enough to let go on her own, even if means a fall once in a while. And yes, no matter how grown up you are, your little sister may still want your strong shoulder sometimes.

If you are a father, just stop and ponder on what your daughter may want. She wants a life-partner, as much, may be more than you do, but she doesn't want to be pressed on finding a husband.

If you are a friend, a girl would give the best selfless friendship you can ever imagine, if she can have a male friend, who is 'just' a friend she can share everything with without any hang-ups or potential worries. A woman knows how hard (almost impossible) it is to have a platonic friend, who sticks by forever, without ever digressing on the other track, without ever 'seeing her in the other way'. It means a lot to a girl. Guys, if you are a good friend, please don't step over the territory and ruin everything. You can have the most beautiful relationship and friendship, if only you ensure to not let the other 'stuff' adulterate this great feeling.

If you are a husband, take my word, your wife doesn't care a fig for what you can do about her wants. She will love you much more, with an intensity and selflessness that will shock you some times, only if she knows that you care for what she wants
When your woman makes a new recipe, she doesn't necessarily want you to swallow and struggle for a false compliment....she just wants you to appreciate the effort. You don't really have to praise it as long as you can laugh along. ...She may apparently want a nice, clean house reflecting her fastidious obsession for 'shoes-at-the-right-place'. But may be behind all that, she wants a place, a home, a perfect nest her family comes back to when the sun sets.

If you are still on the way to be a husband, it's very easy to be fogged in some myths. But an honest gaze into her eyes will tell you without any doubt...she doesn't want diamonds, she just wants to feel special in any way you can tell her so. It looks great to see a man go down his knees when he pops the question, but that's not what a woman actually wants...what she may want is just to be looked up to, at least for that one special moment in her life, by her man..... And for all those boys wondering why girls scout for guys with a swanky car or a cushy job, well may be a girl wants a guy who's successful enough, whom she can really look up to. She doesn't want a car...she wants to feel proud that 'you' have earned it...... And yes, not to forget, as much as she sweats and frets over the trousseau or the guest list,... any woman, a true woman,.... would always something more special than 'wedding'. She wants a 'marriage'.

Talking of marriage for a moment here....She for decades, has been struggling to work that utopian marriage, where does not have to amputate one part of her life at the price of another when she gets married....where she instead gets to love and bond with two families that come together with marriage ......instead of tackling the heavy intricacies of compatibility, egos, prejudices etc.

You know what women (barring exceptions), women who still have managed to retain their core, what these women really want.....lovely rains...guiltless chocolates...carefree shopping.....happy pups....a small garden...kids....a peaceful warless, gunless world where she knows that her family is safe, happy, healthy and smiling.

What a woman really wants is a man she can really really respect and look up to.

A woman wants a feeling, an acknowledgement that she is much more than a uterus, or a Mrs. Someone.

A woman wants to come out of the shell of 'being taken for granted' all the time, everywhere.

Have you ever heard of a woman's retirement plans talking about Yachts and Island-vacations and fishing trips? At the end of her life, most women would rather be a fat, generous, grey-haired, happy Grandma playing with the grand-kids. She would sign off any cheque non chalantly for those blissful moments.

The answer actually, is simple.

For the guy in the pub....she does not want to be laid, but loved.

For the tie-wrestling colleague....she doesn't want to be obeyed, but respected.

For the man jousting in that argument with his wife, .....she wants to be listened...not just heard. For all her shouting and yelling, may me she wants to show that she exists around, with more tangibility than a forsaken, forgotten piece of furniture. She would always prefer a good talk over a good fight.

For the salesman..... your special customer does not want to be pandered to, but understood.

For the puzzled market researchers.......she does not want to sold to, but helped.

If you have this question boggling your life in any way, press the brakes, and stop for a while. No matter who the woman in question is; your wife, your boss, your mother, your customer, your sister, your daughter, or your special someone, she would not care for anything better...not even for the answer, if you can for once, for one small honest moment, manage to at least bother to ask that question sincerely...what does she want?

She would give her life in response to that question..believe me!

As to 'What Men Want'. Well that's another interesting question. Will attempt to answer that in my next piece. Till then, keep asking:)

By:

Pratima H.

Sand or Silica: Bob Massa, an interview to remember

2009-04-02T04:25:00.000-07:00

This section is where I normally write about discovering the ‘extraordinary’ in ‘ordinary’ people. But isn’t finding ‘ordinary’ in someone ‘extra-ordinary’ just as special? This is for Bob, who made me change my rule.

IT’S JUST ANOTHER AFTERNOON.
Just another day.
Just another elite hotel.
Just another of those ‘big’ interviews, I have arrived for.
About to meet a stellar business name, a rebel who dared to challenge a Goliath of the Internet bastions, a gladiator who ignited a war a few years back and a lot more.

As I swagger with my paraphernalia into the Coffee shop, my eyes scan across the room in a swift reconnoiter to pick out that Business Samurai. I had seen a few photos and thought it would be a quick hunt.
But as strange and inexplicable as it sounds, you never have to hunt for a friend, be it a train station, a high-decibel party or a forest wilderness….even when the friend has a visiting card that reads – ‘so far a stranger’.

In the same strange moment, my eyes dropped the 007 cornea, when they suddenly stopped at a table in the corner. Sitting in a casual black shirt, happily engrossed in his tiny notebook, taking an occasional break for a sip at the cappuccino lying beside, was this elderly face that I just had to walk towards.
As I approached nearer, I saw two bright shining eyes, framed in simple-smart black glasses flanked by a grey-but-shinier (am sorry if that’s a wrong word) duet of hair and a happy beard. The eyes looked up and shone brighter with friendliness when I stammered, “Bob?”
He smiled generously and answered back in affirmative as he stood up to greet me. An avuncular handshake and a warm ‘How are you’ later I found myself settled right across him without the routine clock ticking away in my head this time.
And that felt so comfortable, even though quite off-the-routine.

We had more than two hours to chat at leisure, unlike the normal clockwork appointments. And while I did wonder at the onset if this was ‘too-much-time’ and ‘what-if-I-ran-out-of-my-questions’, I had no idea how surprisingly and pleasantly the time was going to pass away.

Yes, as much as we journalists say about our profession, “Oh, I love it, I get to meet so many people”, we all know how soon and irretrievably the ‘people’ part evaporates.
You only meet names, pre-conditioned faces, PR puppets or masks.
And your interviews soon morph from an energetic conversation to an artificial Q&A, where all you are engrossed with is ‘your questions’ and all the person across the table is worried about (and PR punctuated with) is ‘the right answers’.
In the same rut-of-routine, I had arrived to meet Bob Massa, the guy who sued Google. I was like always armed with my questions, ready to steer ahead in the territory of my ‘scope-and-subject’ and the rough outline like always.
But this friends, was everything but ‘like always’.

By the time I was scribbling away for the second question, the interview changed to a conversation and I got more worried about listening to the person across the table instead of taking down ‘hot’ quotes and ‘Cold’ notes.
We were jumping chaotically from one topic to another, in a freewheeling skating trip of ideas, and soon I found a lovely order in all the randomness.
For a relieving change, I was not asking questions for ‘the’ interview, but for my curiosity. And here was Bob, a feast for my appetite, who got me more thrilled and attentive about ‘why’ he did what he did, instead of ‘what’ he did. His passion, his logic, his heartfelt reasoning, his ‘no-regrets’ tone can snare even the best of prejudiced minds.
Yes, it’s a treat to find all that candor when you are interviewing a businessman.
Candor that is fair and double-edged. Bob answers with the same incredible ‘no-words-minced’ frankness when you ask him about his flaws, mistakes and shortcomings.

When it was time to wind up, I really was surprised at how soon the time flew by.
As I started packing up my stuff, I was glad I had hit two-birds-with-one-stone or whatever they call it.
I was taking back a great interview and also this special piece for my blog.
I had come to meet another big-shot, another extraordinaire.
But what made him more extraordinary was the amazing endearing way, he had kept the ‘ordinary’ inside him alive.

An astute tech-and-business mind who still housed a soft heart inside;
A wise genius who can speak so easily on ‘how-stupid-he-has-been’;
An expat from Oklahoma, who is happy as a child to read a newspaper in his small garden in India, who is in love with a small city here and who beats me at greeting the ‘Kem Cho?;
A daredevil who challenged the big G, but a fun Grandpa who is happy to lose to a three-year old any time;
A 24/7 sleep-deprived workaholic who shuffles his sleep clock daily to answer client calls, but who still wistfully longs to be together with his wife for a simple holiday.
A body who struggles everyday with health challenges and still manages to be cheerful and bright-eyed round the clock.
A veteran boss who is all praise for a young COO hire and feels awkward when he has to fire someone;

And of course, someone, who after all the good-and-bad experiences of life still finds it tough to say ‘No’ to a friend; someone who makes me feel for a change that no matter how stupid or quixotic or gullible it sounds, there are still ‘ordinary’ hearts out there who would do some things just because THEY FEEL RIGHT, in the heart (even if wrong on a Balance-Sheet or in the world’s opinion).

Bob didn’t feel at all like a stranger.
It was really lovely meeting you Bob.
Stay the same.

By:
Pratima H

You wish life was Simple enough?

2009-04-01T00:26:00.000-07:00

I have always been a nitwit at Mathematics (My School Teacher can vouch for that). Why the heck then does God dish me out this algebra of life?

MY TEA had gotten cold again.
It’s a routine I have got used to now.
Everytime, when my mind gets battered bad enough with a fierce jab from life; and I skedaddle to this little corner by my window for some answers; the little spider on the top nook entangles me along.
As I watch him weave, thread after thread of a new intricate web, my thoughts accompany his blueprint design and leave me wondering at the similarities life has suddenly taken with this knotty architecture.
And like that night in class V, when I was fruitlessly sweating away at an algebra equation, I heave a helpless sigh and stare up with blank eyes. “Couldn’t this be a little simpler?”
The spider was busy with his web, toiling arduously, heedless to my sighs and grudges as ever.
I took my sight away from the web, shifted a glance to the mason-so-happy-at-work, and suddenly my point of view (literally and figuratively) changed. I took a flashback trip to myself as a happy child at age seven, who used to come by the same window, and watch the same construction site. That child never used to get entangled in the web. She never found it intricate or complex or lifelike etc etc. You know what she rather defined and loved it as? ‘Aesthetic!’ Yes, she indeed manage to find the web a piece of beauty and smart architecture.
Where the heck did I leave that simple child and accompany this stupid sulking grown-up instead?
Why didn’t my ophthalmologist detect this big skew of vision?
We wish life was not this hard equation we need to solve each day.
If we could only use some simple formulas and be unadulterated of all the pain that spoils a child’s way of life!
There’s actually a simple trick to attack every complication in life. Check some of my discoveries out…and am sure you would have many more to share ahead.

In life:

Nothing can be more esoteric than trying to understand the complex script of life, wondering and worrying everyday how the other characters would play out next. Here’s a much easier way out. Forget the script. Just play your role well. Get some claps once in a while for a good, graceful dialogue. And get rid of that make-up. You would enjoy it like never before buddy.

Expectations. Ah! The rigmarole of life. Shoo them away. At least keep them to the bare minimum. As a very good and wise friend told me yesterday, once you do so…everything that comes in your life then, looks like a bonus. Smarter Mathematics, Eh?

Lying. Now, What a waste of human’s knack at embellishment! What a snowball of cover-up lies and gruesome histrionics! Speak out the truth. Leave it there, whether they take it or throw it.

Understanding others is the Trigonometry of life’s Mathematics. The only clues to your advantage are ‘being your best’ and ‘being fair’.
Working up ways for revenge drains so much brainpower. FORGIVE. And then head off for a chilled beer.

Each one of us can sheepishly admit by now that hating is an all-time-headache. LOVE. There’s nothing more simple. Believe me.

Controlling others’ reactions? That’s a heavy one. How about making sure your actions are good and sincere? Once you have done that, you don’t know how great it feels to grab your worries by the collar and say with a sassy voice, “Go, take a walk.”

Pulling out a brawl over party-noise with the neighbour is not a good expense of YOUR time. How about some ear plugs?

Planning life like a stock portfolio. Why not live each day as if it were the last and rather invest on the more important stuff.

Keeping artificially up on social networks or P3Ps. Fragile. Being someone your friends can always count upon. Vouchsafe.

Writing for eyeballs. Why? Writing honestly, sharing thoughts. Why not?

Managing the junk of ill will is a rag-picker’s job. Flush away all hard feelings. Relax.

Fighting with parents. A little myopic. Try listening to their advice once in a while and switch places, even if just for fun over-the-fence. You may suddenly find your eyes with a changed number.

Fuming and fretting over a bad day. Load-Shedding. Switching on ‘Friends’ on the idiot box and being silly with ‘Joey’. Re-charges.

Boggled with questions. Out of your territory. At least knowing your answers, or asking the right questions. Your parking area Sir!

How to overtake someone in a race. Huh!. Being the marathon runner. More fun and more scores.

Struggling with sadness. Bad Debts. Pursuing happiness. Pays off.

Blaming the dark. Lazy. Lighting a candle. Bravo.

Tracking the barometer. Uff! Carrying a brolly daily. Ah!

Cribbing over the menu. Futile. Making a good choice. Smart & Simple.

Complaining to God. Complex. Praying. Simple.

At Work:

Slowdown! Oh don’t give me that. There are only two ways when you are shipwrecked amidst this storm. Either worry and lose blood pressure over when and whether you will see the shores. OR survive. Keep swimming till you can. Isn’t that simple?

Worrying about job loss can only up the anxiety. Do your job well and have a back-up skill (even carpentry if that be it). Now...Sleep well.

Convincing a customer. What a drudgery! Genuinely trying to solve something for him. Slam-Dunk!

Haggling. Complex and bad-odoured. Negotiating a win-win. Simple, fast and it-never-stinks.

Chasing and keeping power. Unwieldy. Earning respect. Much easier. More durable.

Being the boss. Aww! Being the Bud. Wow!

Offence. Complicated. Defence. Simpler.

And in Love…

It’s an Einstein’s work to find ‘the’ right man/woman of your life. Here’s something more simple. Be THE right woman/man.

Proposing. Getting rose-eyed over someone and then puff-eyed next while you wonder how and when to pop the question? Bare your heart. It’s much simple when the ball is not in your court. You have given your ‘serve’. You only have to wait for how it comes back. Even if it’s a zero, Dude, they still call it a ‘love’, don’t they?

Never worry about finding or affording that perfect gift. And if you do, remember that you are at least lucky enough to have someone you can give gifts to. Not many might be as blessed as you are.

Relationships. Maze. Love. A straight road.

Doing the love autopsy. Esoteric. Donating your heart selflessly to the one you love. Exoteric!

If you are struggling with missing pieces in a relationship, yes baby, ‘Love’ is still a patchwork, but you will be surprised to see how long and strong this simple adhesive holds everything together.

Staring wide-eyed at misunderstandings. Arcane. Keep doing your efforts gracefully. Satisfying.

Giving loud proofs. Courtroom. Doing a silent sacrifice. Justice.

And if you think falling in love has been too much of gravity, well think it this way - At least something was strong enough that floored you Sweetie.

If the struggle through love seems like a labyrinthine tread, feel lucky that you have at least found someone worth it all. A wise old man once said, “You have never actually lived till you have found someone worth dying for.” Aren’t you better off?

There are only two ways of living life - Complicated and Simple. One is that makes you worry over ‘tomorrow’ on a ‘yesterday’. And the other lets you sleep snug in the pillow everyday.
Choose your heart over every other organ.
That makes all the difference between living like a zombie and sleeping like a child. Dil hamesha left mein hota hai, par…hamesha RIGHT hota hai.

And mine has just told me that…The spider was just doing his job. I saw it as a web.
Good Morning!

By:
Pratima.H
(P.S: If you think likewise, share more such bullets on simplicity and let’s make life richer and simpler ahead)

Love Vs Romance

2009-02-09T03:16:00.000-08:00

Love...

It's not just about dancing in the rain

But mending the leaking roofs together

It's not just about candlelight dinners

But doing the greasy dishes together

It's not just about swinging in the hammock

But rocking the cradle together

It's not just about a long nice drive

But fixing the flat tyres together

It's not just about holding hands

But lifting the furniture together

It's not just about chocolates and Bourbons

But visiting the dentist together

It's not just about sharing a postal address

But sharing THE remote, if you can

It's not just about a cozy Friday movie

But standing in the ticket queue too

LOVE...

It's not just about picking silly eye-lashes

But about counting the wrinkles as sweetly

It's not just about Archies Cards

But handling the Ration-Card together

It's not just about gazing at the stars in space

But giving the space your special one needs

It's not just about giving scarlet roses

But scooping out the weeds in the garden together

It's not just about loving the charms

But about loving the flaws as

LOVE...

It's not just about giving gifts

But about giving sacrifices too

It's not just about great conversations

But about listening the unsaid

It's not just about pillow-talks or pillow-fights

But about making your shoulder a pillow forever

It's not just about how many anniversaries you celebrate

But about how many break-up moments you survive

It's not just about sitting beside

But about STANDING BY, no matter what!

It's not just about some Dates

But about years...and forever....

Love is not the Coke that will fizz out the next or next-to-next Valentine Day

But a wine, that will endure, grow and linger on against all odds.

Happy Valentines:)

To all those who have been blessed with this wine.

Cheers! And a toast to Love above Romance

pRATIMA . H

The Tch-Tch Killers...F.O! Get Lost!

2009-02-02T02:50:00.000-08:00

Someone's tragedy is not a pity-party. But it shocks to see how many people in your close circuit are drooling to be invited!

WHEN I hung up the phone, I was still hanging.
Somersaulting from incredulity to doubt and finally to blankness.
"What will I say?"

I had just got the news of a friend's engagement being called off.
"What will I say to her?"

I had to be beside her at this sad turn of events, just the way I was when we celebrated the anticipated Big-Day. Just the way I was along, when she was happily flooded beneath shopping sprees and trousseau trips.
"But what the heck can I say to make her feel better?"

She was so much looking forward to the big moment finally arriving in her life.
"And what can I possibly rummage out of my dictionary that will be sincere, heart-felt and at least some tiny bit of support?"

Heart-felt? My heart wanted to sob together, to hug her in a sad embrace, as it so well knew and understood how life-shattering such a volte-face can be for a girl! But tears, sobs and shock... she must be living enough of them. I needed to supply something different. Consolations are always my bete-noire territory. I always struggle with the maladroit inside me when consolation times knock.

How can you cheer-up or steady someone who has just been ripped apart with the blow of a tragedy?
In what words?
A dead-pet situation can accommodate sentences like "It's ok", "There's more to life" or "There's always something better". But can you even dare apply it to personal tragedies of irreversible significance like deaths? My friend's tragedy was almost a death, of the lovely future she was so ardently waiting for.

What can I say?
But as it turned out, that was the last question on anyone else's mind.
As I entered her place, I found her enveloped by voracious jackals, ravenous crows and ruthless vultures.
Interestingly, and sadly, all these species belonged to the so-called sensitive and soft gender called 'female'.
While I had been wondering with what to say, there was no dearth of words from this gathering.
Words were pouring in all shapes, in all flavours...as questions, as jibes, as potshots, as a generous lemon squeeze on the wound, as unsolicited cruelly-timed advices and what not.

There were aunts. There were family friends. There were 'oh-ever-so-concerned' relatives.
And no body was losing her chance to take a dig or to satiate the big gossip-cum-curiosity appetite or to flaunt her wisdom:

"What happened?"
"Oh. That's so sad! But how did things come to such a pass?"
"Good Lord! Just think of all the preparations already started."
"Whose fault was it?"
"What have you thought of now?"
"I know a suitable boy, you know my nephew, the one in UK I mentioned before?"
"Arre, leave it to the girl. Beta, I have some pictures. Have a look at them yourself. I am sure your online profile can still be activated."
"I know it's sad. But you have to move on."
"Gosh! She's already 27. This IS the time. You are already so late! It's now or never."

And if you thought that all this is a prerogative of the senior citizens, then Lo! How mistaken can one be!

Moments later I see our friends supplanting the bevy.
Her own close friends are now rewinding the same sequence of arrows and cannons.
And yes..the very friends who had their share of vulnerable spots too, but which my friends so considerately and strenously tried to avoid..always. She too had her chance of spitting out.."Why are you not planning a baby?" or "Why did you both break up?" or "How do you manage with your in-laws?"
But she never choose to even touch the delicate subjects, unless the other one initiated a catharsis.
May she should have, if she could have seen that these very friends would pounce on her today with casual cruelties.

"It's sad na. We are so much waiting for the big date."
"Come on. It's ok. You have to move on babes."
"You remember the guy we met at the Cafe the other day."
"Just flush all the pictures, cards and other stuff. You cannot weep over and put a pause to your life. Get up and move on."

MOVE ON!
Two simple easy words, which people use as recklessly and as detachedly as a tissue roll.
If ever fate makes these people walk the talk, I would really like to see how many inches can they even began to cover.
Even I, want my friend to move on but... like any sensible, empathy-oriented human being, I know that all that these two words, at the time of an unexpected bolt of crisis in her life, ...all that these two words can manage to mean is the simple existence of life and not the overnight transformation to a new relationship that only plastic hearts are capable of.

I want to see my friend move on too.
So that she can at least feel like applying some Dettol to her bruises.
So that she can at least swallow food items that used to be her drop-saliva favourites.
So that she can at least find Joey or Phoebe funny again when she stares blankly when the TV airs 'Friends'.
So that she can at least spare a look at the new stock or dresses or anything when we try to take her out shopping.
So that when we click a photo together, I can some tinge of smile in her eyes again.
So that she can cover the journey over the shattered pieces firmly as she treads on the broken glass of her life.Because that's a journey she alone has to cover, all alone, over every shard.
So that she can stop drenching her pillow with tears all night while the aunts and friends slumber to glory.
So that she can slap back a poignant glance or answer when people ask her the same questions and proffer the same advices every time,... every damn other time that they show up.

When I came, I was struggling for words.
And after witnessing this carnage of feelings, I felt grateful at my poverty of words.
As another scathing remark hammers the last nail in her heart's coffin, and she runs inside the kitchen, I follow her inside.
Her face is at the window and even with a side-angle I can see her silent tears and sleepless eyes.
I think of my options.
A. "Don't cry. It will be alright."
B. "Do you want to talk?"
C. "God's will buddy. Let's accept it."

Somehow, I strike off my options and turn back to brew some tea.
Some minutes later, I offer her a warm cup and a warm silence.
As I sit beside her, I hope and I know that she understands my silence which says.........
"It's bad and I know it. All I can say is that, I am around my friend!"

While we are sipping the grief and tea together, I can still hear the women outside exhaling their 'Tch.Tch's
Wish I could scream out. F.O!

pRATIMA .H

Auntz-the tiny species

2008-12-12T02:57:00.000-08:00

Being an Aunt is not at all the rehearsal for being a Mom. I discovered that.

How many times in life you get scared to the bone-marrow?
Age-7. Groping in the dark.
Age-16. Board Exams.
Age-18. First bunk for a movie.
Age-23. First Interview.
Age-25. First elopement (doesn't apply to all I know)
Age-28..............
A soft, puny, extremely delicate midget of the size of your palm and with no bigger body organ of significance except a pair of the most articulate and curious eyes....you stand in front of this strange species called a baby...and your best friend watches you intently...waiting for you to take the pink human mass in your hands!!
I check back in the dictionary and conclude...no 'scary' is just not the word.
It's so much more strange and serious than that.

Holding a few weeks old (Ok, may be I should use the word 'young' here) baby in your hands is a completely alien feeling. It's a feeling that travels from being petrified to blank to weird to anxious to seraphic.
You are not sure whether you can manage not to bruise that lovely Johnson & Johnson's face before you muster the courage to take her in your arms. And then you are not sure if her questioning eyes would condescend enough not to bawl to glory while doing the honours in your arms. Would she accept my brave efforts? Would she scream now? Would she be comforatble in my gauche hold?

But then something totally unexpected happens.

She manages to scrutinise my face silently and then rewards the valour with an angelic smile.
A smile that only babies can manage. A smile that shines on you right from the eyes. A smile that is the best synonym for contagion, for bliss, for being touched.
And before you even realise, you establish a lifelong camaraderie with a four week young (see I corrected) buddy.

Meanwhile, your best friend, in her newly-acquired designation of a Mom, is still waiting for some comment, the long-awaited compliment. But who cares? Who has the time? You are busy conversing in baby babble about the many nuances of life with the new found friend. Wish there was a Do-Not-Disturb placard on diapers too.

Good Morning!
The world has changed for you a little..or more.
Well.
You are an Aunt now. Yes, officially, the Mausi of this angel.

And even if the poor parents struggle to convince you about the vices of lollypops, Candy jars and lap-times, there's no argument cogent enough to reverse the zeitgeist.
"I am the naughty Aunt. I have all the right and I will spoil her all the time." You announce back.
"From cookies to huge Teddys to Playstations to Short-skirts to Boy-friends. I take up the Pamper-zone. You don't tresspass in my territory and I would reciprocate the same etiquette for your discipline-territory."
"Come On." you continue reasoning with the Mom. "Your role is different. Allow me the luxury of mine."
And moreover, our gang of girls can bestow the blue-eyed baby all varieties of Aunts.

Some would teach her culinary secrets.
Some would bequest her the craft of shopping.
Some would make her the heir of long-nurtured rhymes, songs and Lullabies.

And I can finally pick huge piles of tiny-tomes from the Kids section of Crossword, my favourite zone, (which bestows me many curious eyebrows when I spend three-fourth of my visit here instead of joining the grown-up sections of Pulp fiction, Self-help and abstract authors).
Wow, I can actually buy those Peter-Pans, Heidis, Enid Blytons, Pirates, Fairies, Pixies all over again. And I would have finally a nice company to read them with.
As I walk away from the book store, all elated, I feel like giving my new friend's Mom a big hug.

That's the best present she has given me for our lovely past together.

I can't however because she is busy swinging her sweet-eyed cherub when I meet her.
But my eyes hug her nevertheless as I find time to discover that my silly-old friend has turned so beautiful.
Her eyes have a different dignity, happiness and soul now, as she graces the experience of being a mother.
That's something we Aunts can never emphatise with.
And so, because the Aunts know that she would be a Super-Mom, we can have all the fun as the Super-Aunts.

It's not rehearsal. It's recherche.
Something you won't understand till you face a baby.
It's not scary.
It's different.

A Terrorist Vs A Citizen not scared anymore I

2008-11-29T10:28:00.001-08:00

If 20 people can hold 500 lives on the edge, imagine what a billion people can do in return

Anger can be sharper and more fatal than grenades.
All of us across India have seen and felt it alive in our hearts this weekend.
What has happened is sad but in some way, some way, it can be the watershed that might change India, for better.
And forget about anything else, if only, if only, we can keep this anger that's boiling in our veins right now, if only ....we can keep this anger breathing past the usual few weeks, India can be redefined historically.
How?
We get scared,
A country of about a billion people, a country with one of the finest Armed forces in the world, a country that is now leaving its footsteps around the Moon, a country with the most talented-dollar-paid-and sought-after IT brains, a country of martyrs, a country of heroic grandpas who still recount as bed-time stories the grace and valour with which they drove away a colonial power of 200 years...yes the same country....kneels down when 20 barbaric minds swim across our shores and attack our best insignia.
So what do we do?
Get angry for some time till our TV channels switch over to the quotidian, non-sensical 'breaking-stories' all over again?
Or choose to preserve and stock this anger and use it in positive and yet some conclusive ways that only a citizen has the power and dignity to apply.

Extreme situations call for extreme steps...I just heard this in one very nice and violent corporate debate on a News Channel.
It was wonderful to see how angry, disillusioned and disappointed CXOs are choosing to react in the aftermath.
And it turns out that there are many weapons a peace-loving citizen can fire to ensure that another Terror siege doesn't catches a city pants-down.

Imagine, what happens when ...
A citizen refuses to vote for incompetent power-vultures.
A citizen wakes up and demands answers.
A citizen refuses to pay taxes.
A citizen gets oneself trained enough to defend and give back when a life comes face-to-face with a terror situation.
A citizen won't lose a second to slap back (if not in action, in equally reverberating words) whenever any narrow-menial-mean tongue starts talking or instigating our society into division of any kind...be it religious, regional, professional, linguistic, ethinc, any kind.
A citizen has the guts and the time to say 'Shut-up' when people use serious issues as water-cooler or coffee-table gossip meat that only sidelines sections of our society based on pre-historic-era questions like where they hail from, what language they speak, which God they worship, which domicile they use, which profession they follow .....refuse to listen...or better still, tell them with a stern-eye and a firm-tongue...Shut-up.

When, a citizen stops wasting time and energy on waiting and demanding from Government..and takes the dire scenario today in his hands...do as much as he/she can..by not only fighting terrorism with vigilance, hawk-eyed alertness, the same do-or-die instinct that motivates a terrorist, and help to security forces whenever possible...but also by ensuring that the roots of terrorism are attacked everyday...by taking care of issues like rumour-mongering, by fighting panic as bravely as possible and by beheading the very causes that are able to motivate a 21 year-young lad to believe and act on the command of 'kill as many as you can till your last breath'.
We may hoodwink ourselves into believing that our enemy nations are breeding terrorists, but it's time we have the nerve to realise that we do it everyday, in our normal lives whenever we disrespect a human or participate in gossips that alienate fellow-humans.

And when a citizen has the spine to stand up for his/her neighbour, be it in a train, a colony, an airplane, an office or a five-star hotel.

20 People-Not-Afraid Vs 500!
Imagine.... One Billion People-Not-Afraid against the Same 20!
Just look back at the incredible human-and-soldier spirit that bravehearts from the NSG Commandos and the Indian media people have showed between Nov 26 and 29, 2008, and we know that the word 'Imagine' is hardly needed.
One billion people-not-afraid against 20!
Let's wake up....to our own power!

Or

'Kooda-kachda' nikalna padega

2008-11-28T09:13:00.000-08:00

Nov 26 -27, 2008 is the last nail in the coffin. Time now to shed our collars and put on the Sweeper's uniform.

48 hours gone now.
Taj is still under siege.
My friend in Mumbai tells me she is dead-afraid to get out as there could still be grenade-wielding terrorists randomly ambling on the roads.
TV Channels all over the world are watching as every Indian... be it the VIP hostage inside, the CEO, the police cop standing on vigil, the red-eyed journalist still reporting gunshots, the relative waiting outside, the widow of the martyr, the kid who came back from the-shut-down-school today and asked his mom bewildered 'What's happening', the waiter who saw the bullet shots, the angry filmstar speaking aloud on the TV, everybody, EXCEPT OUR HARD-SKINNED POLITICIANS, every Indian sits numb with terror.

It's not shameful anymore.
It's shameless.
And no, I don't want to waste any time now on saying these to our high-seated Neta Babus.
I am saying this to myself, to a normal Indian.
There's one thing called patience. There's another called paralysis.
There's one thing called being silent. There's another called being 'dumb'.
There's one thing called being calm. There's another called being deaf.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

I recall one very emotional and angry line from Naseeruddin in a movie...Mujhe apne desh se ye kachda bahar chahiye.
For how long would we accept and kow tow our daily lives, our loved ones, our mental peace to the grip of terror?

There is garbage in our house today.
It's time to pick up the broom and burn the garbage away.
And the garbage does not necessarily mean the terrorists or their attempts, they mean the roots where they come from. They also mean the hypocrisy, the compartmentalised mindsets, the discriminatory treatment, the professional-economic-religious divide that forces a 25 year old to pick up a grenade against a fellow human.
The garbage also means the impotent machinery we, ourselves, by our own volition, have chosen and seated at the top chairs of our country. The very chairs who just serve as wheelchairs or cushions where politicians sit, wait and watch the bloody drama, only to come out two days later to encash personal tragedies as political agendas.

If citizens can pick up pens and cameras and turn into exemplary citizen journalists...why not citizen sweepers or citizen commandos.
Our peace and unity is our own responsibility.
It's time to sweep it out.
I am going to do it.
And the first step, where I would show what my broom can do, is at the upcoming elections...with my NO VOTE.
Answer me, I am your new vote bank.
Unless you prove that you can take care of my India's streets, stations, hotels and homes, don't have the gall to come and ask me for a vote.
I am not voting for vegetables anymore.

I am busy sweeping.
If anybody wishes to join, most welcome.
Let's start, share and learn...what can a ordinary citizen do when caught in a precarious situation, be it a five-star suite or a station platform?
Let's step out and ask for answers and share tips from today.
From citzens to sweepers to commandos.
Flush 'em out! ........and the first step is here......

Section 49-O of the Constitution (Your Right to vote for Nobody; Or reject all the candidates in the fray)

Did you know that there is a system in our constitution, as per the 1969 act, in section "49-O" that a person can go to the polling booth, confirm his identity, get his finger marked and convey the presiding election officer that he doesn't want to vote anyone!

Yes such a feature is available, but obviously these seemingly notorious leaders have never disclosed it. This is called "49-O".

Why should you go and say "I VOTE NOBODY"... because, in a ward, if a candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has received "49-O" votes more than 123, then that polling will be cancelled and will have to be re-polled. Not only that, but the candidature of the contestants will be removed and they cannot contest the re-polling, since people had already expressed their decision on them.

This would bring fear into parties and hence look for genuine candidates for their parties for election. This would change the way, of our whole political system... it is seemingly surprising why the election commission has not revealed such a feature to the public.... A wonderful weapon against corrupt parties in India... show your power, expressing your desire not to vote for anybody, is even more powerful than voting... USE YOUR POWER!

__________________

Terrorism turns a commodity

2008-11-27T09:04:00.000-08:00

Once you make it an everyday occurence, terror and false assurances lose their effect. And what happens next is more fatal than we can imagine.

Last evening, as I was winding up work for the day, my colleague asked me "What story are you working on?".
I said, "Commoditisation of technology".
Didn't know then that 24 hours hence I would be substituting Terror for Tech, while the headline of the article remains unchanged.
But I am not half as excited or intellectually tickled as when I was working and researching on describing how Technology is becoming the new 'Denim'.
And it's the very lack of ebullience that makes me sure that my choice of the word 'commodity' is not indiscreet.
Because, yes, we are now back to the Television sets, to our mobiles and to our coffee tables, as India's business face, Mumbai, faces another terror attack, this time at our Tajs and our Oberois.

But as we go from one step to another, from hearing it in a SMS to switching on our TVs to blaming the impotent systems and reckless governments etc etc, I get a not so welcome Deja Vu feeling. I know that the routine is starting. And four days from now, the lava would slowly sink down a dormant crater till it erupts back from another volcano. It would go back to the crannies of oblivion, for you, for me, for the media, for the authorities, for the cops. Except of course, for those, who lose lives or their loved ones.
And the epiphany that strikes me now is that the 'routine' is settling in even now. Because the first question we ask after we get the first iota of news is 'Ab Kahan'? ''Is baar Kitne mare'?

The fact is that...we are getting used to it....and slowly but strongly drowning into the zone called 'INDIFFERENCE'.
And it won't be long before the common man travels from the stage of being indifferent for others to being indifferent about his life too.
The risk is a given today. We have accepted it. At the back of our minds we know the uncertainity of life when we embark that train, that plane or even buy that movie ticket.

And that's not the only reason why I call choose to call terror a commodity?
There are more.
Because....Terrorism can not be branded as Religious anymore. It's entering new shelves, like geo-political, financial, Have Vs Have Nots, Linguistic, ethnic and what not.
Because....it is snarling everywhere...Borders, Parliaments, IT facades, Stock market centres, Airports, Jewellery markets, Temples, Mosques, Shopping Malls, Schools, Train Stations.
Because...it has spread its claws to all kinds of hostages and diluted its presence...from war prisoners, Passengers on an airplane, pilgrims in a shrine, to kids in a school, guests in a five-star hotel, scientists in a academic institution, on-field journalists, and tourists on a holiday. From our buildings, our combat infrastructure, our defence, our intelligence, our patience to our minds and ability to endure.
Because....one of my friends who lives in Jammu invited me over for her marriage and all I replied then was, "Is your city safe to come to?" And today she can give it back to me by flipping the same question back.

And that's why terrorism is becoming a commodity. Even politicians are encashing and using it as recklessly as salt and soap whenever they want to play their favourite games like one-upmanship, blame-storming and vote-mongering. Even some sections in media find it a hot cake to bake their TRPs and readership on. Even normal people like you, like me, on our dinner tables with that TV remote in hand today would use it as the perfect gossip subject. We would talk, get angry, blame the government, and sleep over it.
Only to wake up the next day, for another uncertain day.

I wonder if this approaching indifference would be the final solution. Coz solution it would be.
Who would the terrorists terrorise when the common man would get indifferent to life itself. When he won't panic about a bomb anymore, because he would come to the terms with a stage where bombs are everywhere, ready to blow anytime, anyone.
When there would be no fear what would they terrorise with?
When there would be no lives left to kill, who would they terrorise?
When cities would surrender themselves as graveyards, who would the power-hungry rule upon?

As I was thinking all this, I wondered am I just zombied with all those TV shots and news bytes of Mumbai again.
But 15 minutes later, I had this words from an office peon, as we were whiling away our time gossiping about the blasts during a power-break.
I could see the anger turning into a more ferocious shade in his eyes as he said this. "Ye terrorist kaun hai pata nahin, magar ye jab pakar mein aayen to inke saath inke rishtedaaron ko bhi shoot kar dena chaiye. Just shoot them. Inke terrorist banane ki wajah ko, inke saath, khatam karo. Phir woh chahe koi bhi ho, kisi bhi jaat ka ho, bada ho ya gareeb ho. Ab hum tang aa gaye hain."
I could hear his actual message, "Don't rub off and test the common man too much."
It's time both sides of the terror realise the price of commoditisation.
Commoditisation if it is, it won't be that stale as it sounds for an FMCG brand.
It would in fact, be more dangerous and conclusive.

The movie Wednesday may turn real some day soon.

Impotency kills

2008-09-08T05:19:00.000-07:00

The difference between ‘important’ and ‘impotent’ is more than just a spelling mistake

NOBODY told me that ‘Mumbai Meri Jaan’ is a horror movie. Horror that leaves you stupefied. Horror that brings you face to face with the spectre of real-life. Horror that freezes you of the fluid of thought. When even fear flinches to flow, for what do you name it – the fear of plunging yourself in the ‘you-never-know-when-it’s you’ terror of everyday life; or the fear of helplessness, the feeling of being handicapped in a world of cell phones, heart-transplants, space-shuttles and Cyborgs. Being scared is not a familiar feeling after a cinema like this.

And then you discover that horror too, comes with a long menu card. The most horrifying part for me in this blood-splurged reel were not the scenes of the blasts, not the amputated bodies shown strewn all around the living fibre, not the daredevil attempts of the director to make the disaster look as alive as possible…No, the part that grips and numbs you is where you see the typical journalist Soha and the typical cop Paresh crying over their irony.
Everything is fine, practical, matter-of-course, the-way-of-the-system, non-mutable and all that…until it happens to you, until it touches you.
Writing about it, talking about it, gossiping about it, investigating it, doing the autopsy, everything dwarfs in comparison to the terror you feel when you see it all naked with your eyes, or worst when you imagine your most-feared sights when one of your close ones is incidentally in the city of the blasts that very day. I had only to go through a night full of that fatal terror, fear and anxiety during the Ahmedabad blasts to realize that.

The irony could only be the last nail in the coffin. The irony of impotence.
I am a journalist. My friend is a teacher. My neighbour is a doctor. In the course of my work I interact with top-notch technologists, CEOs, enviable geeks and acute business minds. Another one I know is a senior official. The list has barely started before I start citing Income tax officers, Black-Belts, mighty editors, cerebral scientists, stellar celebrities, media moguls, CAs, bank managers, bright students, spiritual gurus, high-flier executives, book-authors, advertising geniuses, PR power looms, NGO enthusiasts and so on. Professions vary and so do the powers they wield.
Everyone is powerful in their own way. Everyone has a strength that can make a lot of difference. Unique, inimitable, stark, heavy-duty and formidable. And we don’t need their visiting cards for the adjectives to be earned. At the end of the day, if not anything else, there is a citizen, a human being out there.
I don’t know and can not speak on anyone’s behalf, but the question at least to me is scary enough. How much of the power inherent in me, have I even cared to use till date? How much of the potency that my life has, do I bother to value, if not apply? Why does a movie like this leave me thinking and regretting for letting complacence, pragmatism, helplessness and fear sabotage my powers?
Don’t we all have the powers scary enough?
Power of speech, power of vigilance, power of reconciliation, power of peace, power of negotiation, power of precaution, power of teamwork, power of faith, power of initiative, power of contribution, power of denial, power of consciousness, power of sensitivity and the power of effort?
Is it impotence or worse than that – the illusion or acceptance of impotence? Don’t we know how terminal a stage that is?
Why don’t we bother or dare to stop our powers from rusting away?
Terrorism and impotence – it’s a new chicken and egg story all over again.
Meanwhile, Ram Gopal Verma and the Ramse Brothers have more competition than they think. Watch ‘Mumbai…’ only if you have intestines long enough.

Pratima H

When it's time to hang up

2008-08-08T03:55:00.000-07:00

Life keeps dialling. But once in a while it helps to hang up.

I LOVE MEG RYAN.
And before you think, I am turning a vagrant right in the first line, let me make it clear that this digression is not only deliberate but a much sought-after one.
Come on now, when and where do I get a chance to venerate the masterpiece that Hollywood is blessed with. She's awesome. Just superlative is the way she charms with a gauche gait, boorish ways and the way she stands miles apart from other screen belles. Give her any hair-style and she would look beatific. Give her Tom Hanks or Russel Crow and she would make the Love story as absolutely convincing and touching as one can imagine. 'You've got mail' or 'When Harry met Sally', she sweeps every one off with hers signature romantic panache. I tell you what. It's all in her eyes. One of the most beautiful pair of eyes God ever created. Specially, when she looks ponderingly down after uttering a crsip-deep line. I LOVE MEG.
Ok, back to the point now. So, it's because I adulate her head-over-heels I never lose a chance to get handcuffed with my remote whenever HBO or ZEE Studio plays one of her movies. So one idle Sunday when I was grumbling and surfing the TV channels, Voila! I catch Meg's face and I stop. It's some movie named 'Hanging up'. Habit-stricken, this die-hard-devotee just dumps every other chore aside and squats at ease.
It's been quite some time and I still don't get the drift. She appears to be a typical woman. Sandwiched between her garbs as a sister, wife, mother, boss and daughter. Trying to multi-task as she emotionally and singularly struggles to keep her bed-ridden Dad in high spirits while she juggles work, home and two ingrate sisters (one of them is my another all tiem favourite...Lisa Kudrow, I love you too!)
Ok no more wandering about.
So back to the movie.
So, Meg like a true-blue woman goes on, and on and on. Her life shuttles between calls from sisters, from the hospital, and from her dumb secretary. The fantastic bit is that no one, not even she, notices how her emotional strength and stamina is crumbling beneath each great mandate she takes up.
And one fine day, a stranger, a woman, elderly and experienced, lends her a shoulder out of the blue.Without realising, that is probably the one cradle she is long seeking, she crashes down and sobs. Sobs liek she never has done. Sobs like she should have done long back.
And then the sage lady pulls out her words of wisdom.
"You know what you should do?"
She takes out her phone, and presses the red button.
"Hang-up."
It's almost an epiphany.
Meg rushes back to her home and furnishes all her telephone sets to the dog to gnaw at. Her secretary calls right after and she tells her to shut up and manage everything alone. Her sister calls and she gives a cathartic response before cutting off the line that leaves the caller dumb and stupefied.
In short, she hangs up.
Now is that all I got out of the whole plot? And if so, why the heck I am writing a piece on it? Just to lionize Meg under a new pretext?
Well, the truth is that even if for just a moment, the line really penetrated me deep down.
Life is important.
Tasks beep on.
Duties are serious.
Relationships need attention.
Chores can not be just wished away.
People around us need us.
Problems need solutions.
The pillar-to-post lifestyle is of our own making.
And the network of life's constant telecom line never goes weak.

But once in a while, it helps, ..........it really really helps, to just HANG UP. And it's more emotional than physical.
After all, a break is better than a break-down.
Before the mind turns mechanical. Before the heart goes shallow. Before life tunes into an auto-pilot. Before the sap of life drains out in the mud of relentless headaches.
Shut out the noise for a while.
No matter where it is coming from - traffic horns, mobiles, friends, work, people important, people unimportant, your own strenous benchmarks, or the daily race of life.
Go inside. Shut back. And enjoy the silence before it goes silent.
Hang up.
You will know it's worth when you hang in again.
And that's why..
I LOVE MEG:)

Eka: The story of an Indian champion

2008-06-26T03:04:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it takes a trillion flops to make a Superhit. World’s fourth fastest supercomputer from India shocked everyone…pleasantly. But little do we know of the actual epicenter. Here’s some lowdown on what makes Eka a simple masterpiece!

Pratima Harigunani

OCTOBER was cruising towards its close. The clock was viciously steering towards the midnight stroke. Sweat-swathed eyebrows, nervous eyeballs, twitching palms, pounding heartbeats, crossed fingers, distraught glances and agitated minds. The air was bubbling with tension, anticipation, fears, prayers and tumultuous hope. An unknown campus in Pune's Hinjewadi outskirts was literally living a rocket launch NASA moment and just a hair distance from making history. It was nothing short in stature or excitement though. The 90 per cent run of India's supercomputer-in-making was successfully through, but the clincher was actually now. The last 10 per cent run-time. It might happen, it might not. Some kilometers away on his way and continuously on the phone, Dr. N Seetha Ram Krishna, project manager, CRL and one of the key architects, understandably still kept arming his team against the Murphy's ways, "It may fail, be prepared for everything." As the reverse countdown begin, every heart and hope in the jitter-packed room started racing high. Five, four, three, two, one and … YES! The supercomputer hit the 117.9 teraflop mark. At about 11 pm on October 31 at a TAT facility in Pune's Hinjewadi IT park outskirts at CRL, shrieks of joy, sighs of achievement, and euphoria was all that could be heard, seen and felt next. India's technological razor had made its sharpest cut again. The dream was finally alive. And one hour later when Dr Krishna looked around the same room he met another once-in-a-lifetime sight.

Exhausted with 22 hours of grinding toil for the past six months and worn out of a peak of excitement and tension just some minutes back, everyone in the same room dozed off into a blithe and well-accomplished sleep. "That's a lifetime experience." It surely was. India through CRL (Computational Research Labs), a Tata Sons' wholly owned subsidiary, had claimed its space in the world top 10 supercomputer league. Fourth in the global ranking and fastest in Asia. The 120 teraflop (sustained rating) supercomputer with a peak hit of 172 teraflop was actually a reality in October 2007, with the added pride of being the largest privately funded supercomputer in the world. And the story of this distinctive feat starts six months back? May be not. India's supercomputing lineage Supercomputing may have turned as spruce, breakneck, and swanky a game as F-1 today. But turn back the leaves of history and you find all the flavors of a long, patient, and sole marathon.

Performance was at the core then too but accompanied with stamina, persistence and time. Interestingly, the annals have their origins in the late 1980s when apparently India began developing supercomputers after being refused a Cray supercomputer by the US. For India, in particular, the epic of supercomputing scribbled its first page with the Param supercomputer programme. Param, the first Indian supercomputer, was developed by the Center for Developed and Advanced Computing (C-DAC). C- DAC pioneered the supercomputing movement in the 1990's giving India her first indigenous supercomputer in 1991 (PARAM 8000). The PARAM stock continued with PARAM 8000-600, PARAM 9000, PARAM open frame, PARAM 10000 (with 100 gigaflop (floating point operations per second) and finally PARAM-PADMA in 2003. Param Padma teraflop supercomputer with one teraflop of power (a tenfold increase over the country's previous supercomputer), heralded India's entry in the top-500 league. It was ranked 171 in a list of the world's most powerful supercomputers by Top 500, a respected rating agency for the high-end computing fraternity. Another member of India's elite circuit was Kabru, a cluster of smaller computers done at the Chennai-based Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMS) that crossed the teraflop barrier. Other stellar names of the crème-de-la-crème are the NAL's Flosolver (National Aerospace Laboratory), Anupam (Bhabha Atomic Research Center), PACE (Advanced Numerical Research Group) and CHIPPS (from the Center for Development of Telematics — CDOT, Bangalore) and the supercomputer at the Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, New Delhi, which finds a place among the top 500 supercomputers of the world. That was the pedigree that supercomputing had to take over from as it moved on to Eka. And interestingly, in a privately-funded environment this time. The epic entered a new epoch.

The rules, the tracks, the gear, the pitstop, everything was new, faster, and more competitive this time. And the chequered flag was only six months away. Eka incubates Tata's HPC (High Performance Computing) initiative dates back to June 2006 with the aim of becoming the one-stop-shop and achieving the iconic journey from atoms to applications. It armed CRL, its subsidiary, with the mandate of the Eka (Sanskrit for the number One) Dream. This 75-member team, which was divided into hardware, system software and applications, had beyond the obvious challenge of achieving the supercomputing power as set, also the nigh-impossible goalpost of doing all that in flat six months. It had Dr Sunil Sherlekar, the Head of R&D in CRL and also one of the founders Dr Narendra Karmarkar. This concept was presented to the Tata Sons Board to get the funding. Since then Dr Karmakar left and Dr Sherlekar stayed as the remaining founder. Incidentally, Eka also claims the distinction of being the only supercomputer funded by a corporate. CRL had the task of fully integrating and designing Eka with an in-house developed technology. The race flagged off. In June 2007 when the building infrastructure was set ready in Hinjewadi, a 4000 sq ft floor area set in record time, becomes the data center to house Eka.August saw the initial machines with 16 teraflop peaks and the first prototype going operational. September, the building blocks get ordered, set in place in due time and October sees the 172 teraflop peak system operation. In six weeks record time, the actual 120 teraflops (i.e. or trillions of calculations per second performance) happen, and Eka is born.

Nuts, bolts and paraphernalia

Eka's mandates and appetite on the technical depth were not simple by any account. Among the many objectives for CRL, was the ability to accommodate scalable parallel storage and scale at the lowest footprint space, HVAC for air distribution and cooling optimization, energy optimized operations, usage of indigenous building blocks, fully-automated monitoring and control, and accommodation of multi-system architecture and networks. Eka is built with 1794 blade servers using common off-the-shelf hardware using quad-core Intel clovertown processors. It has 400 ton cooling capacity and 2.5 MW power requirement. Its benchmark is 117.9 teraflop, and achieved final performance of 120 teraflop on a sustained basis with 172 teraflop as the peak score. There are 28 Terabytes of memory with a storage counterpart of 80 terabytes. Eka used DDR 920 gbit/sec)Infiband interconnect .technology for interconnecting the overall processors and storage, Linux OS, XC3 3.2.1 open MPI developer environment compilers and library. Cabling overall spread over 45 km falls between 10 km electrical, 15 km Infiniband and 10 km Ethernet areas. Other numbers of note include 28 TB RAM, 80 TB disk.

The revolutions in the evolution

There were quite many new approaches and dimensions during the making of Eka. The key was in the design of the architecture, then designing algorithms for application classes (a term that itself is nascent in the scientific domain and an ongoing research game), and the mapping of algorithms to the architecture. CRL also chose the not-tried-before circular layout, which serendipitously took the form of an octagon for stacking the servers and switches. Supercomputers don't come without their share of burdens. Scalability is a major issue. CRL addressed scalability by doing away with the need of connecting all nodes to all. Judicious balancing, compute and communication, and guaranteed load balancing were some of the ideas attempted here. Another concern was the cost per teraflop, which the Eka team managed to handle with reduction in interconnect switches, cables and connectors so that Interconnect scales up linearly. Similarly, usability, another issue with supercomputers was faced in the eye with innovations in library and Maths kernels thus hiding complexity of the underlying hardware, as shared by Seetha Ram Krishna. Additionally were solutions like novel interconnect architecture based on projective geometry that takes care of complexity as well as near linear speed-up of applications. There were also better algorithms for specific applications that helped Eka. In addition, the key points of uniqueness in terms of architecture are high density packing, projective geometry interconnect, hybrid parallel programming paradigm, optical interconnects and of course the circular layout as mentioned before. Props and poles As Dr. Sherlekar points out, fair share of credit of Eka goes to enabling technologies in networking, storage, power and cabling etc. While some of them had evolved to an adequate extent already, thanks to ongoing innovations, some of the path-breaking innovations that made Eka possible, in fact, happened during the making of Eka, with the concerted efforts of CRL and other partners in respective areas.

Cabling, for instance, is one major example. Eka became the testing ground of early fibercable technology since it was not feasible to use erstwhile copper cables beyond seven meters due to breakage concerns. The new technology that covered 20 meters, is already in production mode now. From processors, multi-core, programmable voltage, Interconnect Infiniband, sensors to cooling technology, every paraphernalia was as cutting-edge as Eka itself turned out to be.

120 Teraflops-milking the COW

The proof of the pudding lies in eating it. The actual work starts now when the supercomputer can start working on problems that have been waiting for the power of a superhero. Eka's usage is outlined wide and deep. Its applications - current and potential - cover a long spectrum. From system architecture research, system software research, mathematical library development, large scientific problems, application porting, optimization and development to future technology development and data center development, the possibilities have just started surfacing. Talking of simulations Eka's purview covers computational fluid dynamics and nanomaterial simulation. As Head of Applications Group Dr.Rajendra Lagu rightly says, "The young scientific minds are the ones to be looked onto now. There are for sure many applications that nobody has ever thought of yet." Eka is open for grand challenges. The exciting areas ahead range from aeroacoustics, weather modeling, carbon nanotube modeling, CFD or Computational Fluid Dynamics, Number Theory, Motif discovery, molecular docking, aircraft simulation, bio-medical simulation, to business applications like SCM (Supply Chain Management), BI (Business Intelligence), email scanning, pattern detection, video surveillance and so on.

May be the next Tata car would be completely simulated on Eka. Some 'grey' matter Eka is not without its share of criticisms and correction points. At a CSI seminar, an elderly and senior scientist in this domain pointed out areas like use of analog devices that was conspicuous by its absence in Eka; the complex use of FPGS; the perception that differential calculus is the ultimate in mathematics. CRL's explanation to them goes thus. The latter is still a topic of research and even CRL is doing work on inverse problems in this area. As to the use of analog devices, there are constraints on programmability and limits of a fixed function in an era where digital is in vogue. Even switched capacity filters, the hybrids are not in vogue, explained Dr Lagu in response.

The human in the superhuman

The real beauty behind the mystery of Eka, the supercomputer is the very absence of mystery. As Seetha Ram Krishna emphatically demystifies it, "Any company can achieve this. There's nothing complex behind it. Just some knowledge, expertise, logic, ideas and electronics put together in a system I can make it possible. "Today, with Internet as the ever-accessible ocean of knowledge and science, anyone can make their own supercomputer, albeit with levels of scale," he says. It was not a cakewalk. Every day was an ordeal, every runtime taxing and expensive. Problems were consistent, dead-ends kept coming, speed-bumpers were frequent guests, pressure levels always northwards, a new bottleneck knocked everyday and the Eka team was on an incessant 'on-the-toes' mode. But the dream, the passion, the resolve were the fuels that never ran out and made Eka a reality. The future of supercomputing is something that will unfold interestingly. "A supercomputer is a force multiplier and the third pillar of science. They are becoming all-pervasive to the games we play and the digital content we consume," says Dr Lagu. The Top500 supercomputer list would remain on Eka and CRL's dashboard. But the list, updated every six months, would be as fickle as the speed with which faster systems keep popping up. The top-ranker IBM's BlueGene/L System has achieved a benchmark of 478.2 TFLOPS. Pitted against computing superpowers like China, Japan and the US computing, India's sprint will be something to watch out for. Competition with the likes of China's Dawning, Japan's NEC's Earth Simulator and IBM's Blue Gene stirps would not be easy. The race is going to turn ruthless but will surely have India on the fast tracks.

Next on the cards for CRL, are plans of building a bigger machine that incorporates accelerators in addition to building domain-specific software libraries tuned for Eka architecture. Besides this, there are on the anvil, innovations on the software stack and productivity tools for the imminent many-core revolution. CRL also intends to explore hybrid architectural solutions for peta class machines with the use of FPGAs and accelerators. "What's a factor of concern however is the critical need of development of human resources in this space. It was tough to make about 75 to 80 member Eka team and we know how we did it. The future problems won't be the hardware or software, but the peopleware." Dr.Lagu stresses. Eka and its likes could buck the trend and drive more Indian cerebra to experience the inimitable thrill that CRL's team experienced that historical night. After all, it was indeed an eka moment. It's intriguing at this juncture then to think of some words that the father of supercomputing Seymour Cray said: "It's always easy to do the next step and it's always impossible to do two steps at a time."

(Acknowledgements to Dr Sunil Sherlakar, s the Head of R&D in CRL; Dr Rajendra Lagu, Head of Applications Group, CRL and and N Seetha Ram Krishna - project manager, CRL - all key members of Eka team and CSI –Computer Society of India's Gireendra Kasmalkar Pune for sharing the Eka story)

Vital Stats ·
1794 blade servers · 400 ton cooling capacity
· 2.5 MW power
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Sand or Silica: Extraordinary stories of ordinary people

2008-06-26T02:34:00.000-07:00

Extra-ordinary Stories of Ordinary People: 1.0

Salim ki kahani

June 25, 2008:

Pratima Harigunani

“ARE YOU NUTS?
Driving over 200 kmph and then spinning around the turn and halting right there at a feather’s distance to the girl! And this lanky yokel from Pune would do it?!!”, hollered the director.
“Sir, aap ek baar try to keejiye (give him a chance),” entreated the confidant spot boy. “If there’s anyone in India, who can do this stunt, it’s him,” he confidently bragged.
Ten minutes later, a car was screeching down the long road at breakneck speed, whizzing by a dazed film crew, and then taking a pronto turn, chalked two circles with the hot rubber and then suddenly took an almost impossible, suave, smooth, neat halt near the heroine.
A big applause followed and the director happily chewed back his words. After all, this was a scene long due for the past so many weeks and everyone, in the crew, from the director to the cast to the spot boys were losing their patience by now. It was one thing to steer a car at top speed but to make it saunter back in precision, and that too after some spine-chilling loops…was in one word, Phew!
So when this simple-looking hero, stepped out of the car, he was deservedly overwhelmed by hands congratulating him, thanking him - of the director, of the many assistants and of Bipasha Basu, who all, had almost given up the hope of the scene ever seeing the light of the camera.

For Salim, a common cab driver, who shuttles between Pune and Mumbai and nearby stretches ferrying passengers on normal days, this truly was not a normal day. “Maine Bipasha ke saath baith ke Thums Up piya. Unhone muje bola ki mein to ye scene ka aas hi chod chuki thi. Mera naam poocha. Accha laga. Wo din, mein bahut khush hua.” He says with a glint of the moment, he seems to line all over again as he recounts his adventures.
The sincere, sweat-earned, arcadian look on his face makes you squirm in your seat with an uneasiness. A Thums Up can be a trophy? And a small Gold Medal, can really be someone’s spring of joy forever? You have no choice but to believe as he shares his pride in an innocent, yokel but genuinely exulted voice.
“I got a gold medal for saving the life of me, the passengers on board and the bus, once when a Volvo I was driving met a brake-failure at top speed on one of the Ghats at the edgy Lonavala route. It was an absolute-death situation. And if the driver gets panicked, all is gone. Everything rests on the calmness, composure and the presence-of-mind of the man on the wheel at such a moment.” And so did he, by staying cool and smartly de-accelerating the bus by manouevring the gears. In return, he got wishes, blessings of the many passengers and a gold medal from the Travels’ proprietor.
The medal was the best and the second most emotional turn of Salim’s life.
“Mein aur meri biwi ne do din tak khana nai khaya, khusi ke mare. Uparwala bahut meherbaan hai.” Beams Salim.

Today too is one another special day in his life as he is driving me to Mumbai in an Innova. “Madam, aaj kismat se Seth ne ye ghadi chalena ko diya, kyunki doosre car nahi set ho paya. Sacchi bolta hoon, Innova drive kar ke life ne ek aur sapna poora kar diya. Majja aa gaya itna accha gaadi chalake.”

What amazes and humbles me is not the adventures this seemingly simple driver has been living off and on, but the sheer simplicity with which he embraces and celebrates life’s small but true bounties.
This was not what I expected as I opened a casual conversation on a boring three-hour drive from Pune to Mumbai one afternoon with the cab driver.
And when I ask, where he hails from, his sad but dignified and composed reply reveals the first most emotional turn of his life. Destiny brought him and his wife to Pune when an unfortunate earthquake hit his hometown in Latur. The Salim who saw his parents and other family members as mud-swathed corpses was certainly more brave than the daredevil driver he turned into. He saw, absorbed and accepted it all with a patience, faith and fortitude that probably only the common man is capable of. Amidst his tragedy, he extricated some more living bodies and contributed his bit to save some lives. “My wife incidentally, is another poor soul, who was hit in the calamity, and whom I happened to take out from the debris that day.”
Life left him bereft, of money, job and worst of all, his dear ones.
And so fate brought him to Pune to start everything from scratch.
The small child, who embraced his first toy- a car in all rapture, who used to be all in awe of his father’s taxi, and who shocked his Dad when he learnt driving by stealthily taking the taxi on a trial spin one evening while his father was having tea after a long day work, was now going to start an entire new life and his daily bread by driving taxis.
But he refrains from cribbing or making any complains at all. Uparwallah has been very kind in his estimation. “Wo niyat dekhta hai, aur barkat deta hai.” Staunchly believes Salim.
Clinging relentlessly to Niyat and himmat thus, Salim’s hopes and dreams now envelope his son Sulaimaan. “He too loves cars like me. I want him to rise high in life and do things much beyond I could dream of. I will give him the best I can.”
My stop has come as he finishes his sentence and all I can give him back for a hard-hitting inspirational ride is one heartfelt - Ameen!

Pratima Harigunani

The pot thanks

2008-04-29T06:24:00.000-07:00

As I enter into this new kitchen, ready to marinate my thoughts and whip up something palatable, I need to take a bow before two friends who literally dragged this sloth into this new world. Shashwat, who is a chef-d'oeu·vre himself, is not only my mentor and Guru in the big, spicy oven of journalism but also a dear friend whom I will always look up to. And Sanjay, my good old friend, you should actually get a gong for keeping up with your patience and hope on this.
Till I bake something new, thanks buddies!

Life is delicious

2008-04-29T01:37:00.000-07:00

Good food ends with good talk.
Geoffrey Neighor must have been quite a gourmet to say this.
Thanks buddy, for helping me, and many more gourmands like me, who love good food and a good conversation with equal appetite.
And life has hardly left me to starve on either of them. Every day is a new recipe. On my way to work, at work, off work, there's always a big buffet to dig in. So many stories each day, lying free, sauntering happily, pass me by and I wonder, why the heck was I fasting till now.
So here I am, ready to serve and have the cordon bleu.
Come, let's dine.