Oh my! It's December? How?

Wow, the last post was in May, and I am very very far from the most consistent blogger on the planet. :P But i never said i would be, so i'm off the hook.

Now i'm going to stick to the slightly more realistic goals of blogging once every two weeks or so, and perhaps the new year resolution bug will bite, and 2010 will be a better year for my poor attention deprived blog.

This post is dedicated to the spirit of Christmas. Growing up in an exceptionally liberal family does wonders for your sense of secularism, and so, even though I'm Hinda, Christmas is one of my favourite festivals. The rose cookies, decking the tree up, the crib, the plays, and above all- The Carols!

I love singing Christmas carols, and there are fewer songs more hum worthy as you pull out your woolens and ask for cups of hot chocolate.

They teach you to wait for Winter Wonderland to show up, tell you about the Three Kings of Orient, let you Jingle the Bells as you walk around in the cold. If you felt like a fun story, there was Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, and a instant pick me up for the winter months is Jingle Bell Rock. The Twelve Days of Christmas is special to the love struck, and for all those like me who may have turned seventeen but are actually three and a half at heart, Santa Claus will always come to town! :)

But my favourite part of Christmas, my favourite carol, of all time- Silent Night. Nothing prettier compares, and all you really need to do to feel as yuletide-y as ever is light yourself a candle, walk up to your Christmas tree and sing Silent Night.

I love love love the Spirit of Christmas. :) Be it the Ghost of Christmas Past, Present or Future, they are all welcome to one girl, who waits eagerly on Christmas Eve to hear the pitterpatter of the reindeer's hooves!

oops... and a long story

I'm a horrible horrible person.

Not only have i not posted in years, but i'm also going to commit the most heinous crime in the whole world. i'm going to use my blog to help do my history homework. gasp! shudderr! :)

but since i love history and my homework is pretty cool, thats not as scandalous as it could've been. 

Okay, so my history homework is a book report, and i picked a book with a heavy sounding title, and content fractionally heavier than the title. So, the book is called "In Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India" and it's by this guy, Edward Luce, who used to be a journalist from The Financial Times and it's written brilliantly, but it's virtually impossible to summarize.  It's pretty much a 350 page essay, complete with witty anecdotes, random interviews, extremely perceptive opinions, and many many millions of facts some of which were pretty hard to comprehend. It took me a lot of energy, and many many attempts at self-motivation to finish the book, because there's enough info on one page to fill a newspaper.

And I'm now wondering, how do make life easier for myself? do i pick up random facts that really appeal to me? or do i work on a generic essay? do i send a link to the blog to my history teacher, to show him how dedicated i am to the cause?

In any case, back to my book. It begins with one of the most classic topics of discussion with regard to modern India, the traditional land of paradoxes debate. He talks about India's schizophrenic economy, where over two thirds of the people are employed in the primary sector, while three fourths of the income is from the service sector. He talks of stunted urbanisation, and of poorly executed reforms, in addition to the largest BPO business, and many successful garment makers who supply for the likes of Marks and Spencer and Gap. (and much to the author's amusement, Victoria's Secret. lol) 

He then goes on to talk about India's bureaucracy- about how a government job is the difference between a pukka house and a cow shed. Of the active and keen officials who join theIAS, and are then severely disillusioned by many transfers for any transparent work. He talks about a system which is an ancient relic from the times of the British, and has undergone barely any change, as well as the judicial backlog that plagues our country.

His next topic is where he slowly begins to wade into the controversial from. He talks about the rise of the lower castes, and of Ambedkar and the story of the Mahars. He talks about caste politics and the idea of the caste vote bank. He touches on the story of the All Indian Yadav Mahasabha and talks particularly of Lalu Prasad and Mulayam Singh. 

Next he talks of the threats posed by Hindu Nationalism, and talks particularly about the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), and their off spring party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Luce goes on to visit the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the militant side of the RSS, and hears of their Hindu extremist ideologies.  He begins the story of L.K Advani and the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.

And this is like four chapters... there are spprox five left. So you see why i'll never finish? :( 

I think i'll do another part in another blog post. it's really sad that i have so much to say about school work but there you go.

Oh and one more thing. guys, feel totally free to comment on anything in these posts, cos i really need your inputs to make my project beyond awesome.

okay, in true tamil serial style, to be continued.... :)

Something happens to me when it rains...

and its this inexplicable feeling of being happy and content. it's almost like the rain can wash away any problem, and everything that got me feeling down in the morning is gone because it rained in the night. 

and its the perfect time to cuddle up with a steaming cup of soup and your guitar, or a copy of pride and prejudice, or maybe watch my fair lady for the thirty millionth time. :)

i love the rain. and the way it feels. all wet and wonderful and cleansing.

i love the way it smells of new earth, and makes me think of happy farmers. 

i love the way it looks, like sheets of molten glass (does that exist?). and i think im getting poetic beyond necessity here. but most importantly, i LOVE the way it sounds. makes me want to write an epic, or compose a song for it. but here i am, in my own dysfunctional way, blogging about it instead.

I love you, rain. and you always make me happy. here i was thinking people said that about the sun. :) 

If animals could talk, they'd have a lot to say

This blog post was inspired by watching brother bear for the ten millionth time. 

For everyone who's read the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, talking animals arent that big a deal. we all know that we're far from the smartest animals on the face of the earth. dolphins and lab rats beat us. But just imagine if you were a bunny, or a snail, or a crocodile.

I've always loved the idea of animals talking. i've always been pretty sure in my head, that the moment we walk out of a room, all the lizards and grasshoppers, and cockroaches and mosquitoes gossip furiously about everything we did or said or anything. Why do you think devices to spy on people are called bugs, hunh?

and especially if youre Indian, the whole talking animals thing is self evident. many of our gods (hanuman, ganesha) were wise, benevolent talking animals. Egypt, for examples with its crocodile headed god, Sobek, cow headed goddess Hathor, and the main god, who happens to be a falcon, Horus. In Mexico too, they worship Quetza'lcoetl, who is a feathered serpent.

If animals could talk, they'd probably tell you how sucky the world is i guess. Do animals understand beauty i wonder? or magic? do they feel happy?

Why is Walt Disney the only person to give this thought? 

I love animals. Which is why this post is about them. because the next time you see a dog looking lonely, maybe you should give it a biscuit. the next time you see a puppy near the side of the road, you should call SPCA. 

oh and if you want to do something when youre on the computer, how bout this?

join this community, http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2220336885&ref=mf

or go to this site http://www.theanimalrescuesite.com/clickToGive/home.faces?siteId=3

five minutes is all it takes, you guys.

for all you know, they think like you and talk like you and probably have friends and family like yours.

for all you know, theyre blogging away on their little comp screens as well. :)

do your bit, everyone, cos animals are people too! 

(P.S the SPCA number for bangalore is 25540205)

What a wonderful world!

What is it with me and naming blog posts after songs? 

but seriously, this post is dedicated to being grateful for everything that's worth the effort.

I've wanted to go to egypt for as long as i can remember. And i know people say that, the whole as long as i can remember thing, for pretty much anything that goes, but honestly. I have wanted to go there since i knew a place called egypt existed. And it didnt really strike me that i was there till i saw the pyramids. And i did what every truly overwhelmed, filmy girl does. I cried. I cried because there was so much, and it was so old and had lasted so many million times my age. I cried because thousands of people had seen this before me, so many people who changed the course of history. Alexander, Napoleon, Caeser. The sun had set on those massive stone structures for four thousand years. and rises each morning, and it will go on for another couple of thousand. I have never felt so small, so insignificant, so much in awe of human accomplishment, and for that one second it felt like i was somewhere i really truly belonged. i had this moment that defined me. my whole life was waiting for that one second. and i dont think i will ever understand how much that one moment changed me. but it did. i felt like a speck on the sands of eternity, like one star, but for the moment that i was near the pyramids, that i was the star that shined on them, it didnt matter.

I cried because i'd lost a dream that i took with me to bed every night, and woke up in the morning with every day. Even if i didnt think about it, it was there. hidden inside. Like a best friend you take for granted. Or the air that you breathe. I cried because i hadnt given it enough thought or love or energy to truly deserve the splendour of the pyramids or of the country.

I cried because i had never felt so much gratitude in my whole life. like this surge of being thankful, just for being alive. for being myself. for everything in my life that i love more than i can ever tell them/it. for the music, for the love that the world has given me. for the people who have mattered. more than they'll ever know.

And so what if i'm the size of a blimp, or failing history. i know that someday, none of this will matter. because i need to do everything i can to ensure that i was worthy of them. that i am worthy of this life that i have, because there's so much in it that's beautiful.

There are so many things to be happy about. It really truly honestly is a wonderful world.

Discipline

What does it mean to be disciplined?

I always thought that being disciplined meant knowing where you had to be, when you had to be there, and what you had to do on getting there. I thought it meant getting up every morning and having a day full of things lined up for you to do. It meant having lists and timetables and plans that won't fail you if they/you tried.

Discipline meant being able to do something, and see it to the finish. It meant trying and not giving up. Even when you're tired and uninspired and sad and just plain lazy.

Disciplined meant doing just what you set out to, accomplishing it, and sitting down at the end of the day, with a tall, cool glass of diet coke, and feeling like you mattered.

Discipline still means all of that, and some.

It may not always need a plan or a schedule. It needn't mean i give something hours of time and energy. 

It means i do it. One day at a time. One hour, if i need to.

It means i listen to kabir (the doha person familiar to those who took second language hindi in cbse schools), and do what i have to. Now.

25 minutes

Okay, just so you know this is not my i-worship-MLTR post(yet). This is my race against time, i have 25 minutes till my computer runs out of power... thus giving me, pretty much accurately 25 minutes to live. I've seen so many of those twenty five things you didnt know about me posts on facebook. this is my warped twisted version

25 things i want you to know about me, before my computer decides to shut down.
25) I really do actually like random bands like MLTR. it's not just me trying to be uncool and failing. i actually am cool enough to admit that i think mika epitomizes cool.
24) I will cry over every movie i watch. this includes really bad, really random movies which arent sad at all. read: i cried over om shanti om. believe you me, that is the pits
23) I will also cry over books. this can even be hysterical. the worst was when i read gone with the wind for the first time. also half of a yellow sun. omg, chinua acheve is amazing.
22) Although it may seem like i cry a lot, i actually am a bloody optimistic and much too chirpy for her own good kinda person to be around. people tell me if i continue to be this happy, i might explode one day
21) I love chocolate. no this isnt random. if i had to tell people something before i died, it would probably be, "i love you, but i may love chocolate, and mr. darcy more..."
20) I love mr. darcy. if you havent noticed already that is. I LOVE HIM.
19) I laugh a lot. I am possibly the easiest person in the whole world to get a laugh out of. I laugh for really bad jokes. like this one. What do you call a fly with no wings? A walk. Har har. me actually laughing here.
18) I'm possibly the world's loudest shower singer. I swear, people next door applaud when i finish singing a song in the shower.
17) I love talking. It's probably my favourite thing to do. After reading. And singing. and playing my guitar.
16) I have twelve minutes to live. So clearly I've screwed up somewhere. I'm just gonna skip ahead to number 11. Call me for nos. 15-12
11) From above, i hope you've figured out, i love my cellphone. really, i'm nomophobic. i love talking on the phone.
10) When i get angry or upset or anything, i cry. and then go to sleep.
9) I have this thing for bad guys. Like this really really big thing for them. I'm into jerks in a huge way.
8) I have this tendency to jump to conclusions and get hysterical. I worry over practically nothing. And i worry. All. The. Time.
7) I actually think harry potter is over rated. It's good yes, but there've been better.
6) My dream date is a romantic walk in the rain after a four hour conversation in a coffee shop near a bookstore. So, if there are any big, muscly guys who are reading this, you know what to do to win my attentions. ;)
5) I have about 83 billion best friends, and a couple of million more really good friends. I love bumping into people i know. this habit of mine annoys a couple of people, mostly best best friends.
4)Ooh, i'm almost near the end. And i really don't have much to say. Yay liverpool for beating real madrid. I like liverpool.
3) I would make a really bad contestant on the 'Moment of Truth'. As you can see, very very clearly. It does not seem like i have a lot of deep dark secrets, does it?
2)I am possibly the most gullible person in the whole wide world. i will fall for *any* sob story.
1) things just happen to me. My life is like a bollywood film, without the matching outfits and random item numbers. It's just REALLY dramatic.

There you go, i'm done. And my power is going to die.
I did have 25 minutes to live!