Ready for a check list

A brawny hero CHECK
An item song CHECK
A runaway bride CHECK
A secret CHECK
AN impersonation CHECK
A happy joint family falling into the swimming pool CHECK
Villainous uncles and cousins CHECK
A damsel in distress CHECK
A knight in the shining armour CHECK
A love song CHECK
Songs at the most unexpected situations CHECK
Some close friends in guest appearances CHECK
A shirtless scene CHECK
Reformed uncles and cousins CHECK
Lessons in manners CHECK
Cheesy one liners CHECK
Crude situational humour CHECK
A happy ending CHECK
READY!!!!!!!!!!
That’s Salman Khans’ READY for you.........

Fathers and daughters

ME: I need an appointment with the eye doctor. I cannot see well at night.
MY FATHER: What nonsense? At such an early age?
ME: Dad! Am touching 40.
MY FATHER: Oh! Yes, you are!


A FRIEND WE MET AFTER MANY YEARS: How old are your kids?
MY HUSBAND: My daughter is nine
ME (nudge…..nudge): She is thirteen.
MY HUSBAND: Oh! Yes, she is!


Daughters never grow up,do they?

The unsung song of an unwanted unborn………..

I am cocooned comfortably
Eagerly quietly waiting
Preparing to meet the challenges of life
I know I will be cared for and am wanted
What is that I hear? A voice says
“We don’t want that …..”
No, surely they are not talking about me
Or are they
I am not sure
I snuggle again letting my little
Heart learn to grow so that one day
It will beat for the one who carries me
But again I hear a shout…….
No !I never wanted this.
I am getting rid of this
Some wants to get rid of me!!!
Yes they are talking about me
"I cannot afford one now"
I hear a strong voice say
"I need to buy that car I saved up for
So this has to go"
So I have to go
This is it
Me replaced by a chunk
Of junk
No!don’t do this to me
I will grow one day to love you
Iron will rot
I will grow one day to cherish you
Iron will not
I will grow one day to be the pride of your life
I promise, Let me live
Let me see the beautiful world,
Let me be a part of your life
Do not set me apart!!!!

MEE SINDHUTAI SAPKAL..

Two days after I watched EAT PRAY LOVE I came across this DVD.This is a Marathi movie about a gusty lady Sindhutai Sapkal who lives life at her own terms.
She too eats,prays,and loves and in an amazingly different way.


Elizabeth of EPL has imaginary issues with her life and tries to recover from them.
Sindhutai has a difficult childhood and a tormented youth.
Elizabeth walks out on her husband.
Sindhu is thrown out of her house.
She is accused of bearing another man's child in her womb.
None of her problems are self created.They are presented to her by society but she never loses her will to survive.
Elizabeth prays to find solace for herself.
Sindhu prays for the world.
Sindhu goes to the temple and changes her name from Chindi (meaning a tattered rag) to Sindhu;the name of the mighty river.This is highly symbolic as now she magnifies her existence from a mere rag to a mighty life giving force.
Her prayers are for inner strength that will reach out not just to her but to a multitude of people.

Elizabeth loves selfishly for herself
Sindhu loves selflessly and loves everyone.
Sindhu becomes MAI to all including her husband who turns to her when he has nowhere to go.

Elizabeth has all the money backing her.
Sindhu has nothing with her .............
but the clothes she is wearing and a day old child when she leaves home.Thrown out by her own family, she is helped by people who don't know her.They take no money to assist her.She rebuilds her world helping and aiding poor hungry kids.

Elizabeth struggles to discover what she wants.
She is stingy and keeps to herself.She can't think beyond herself.
Sindhu helps others discover what they want.
Sindhu opens her heart out to the universe and it reciprocates multifold.Sindhu stops thinking about herself.She thinks about the children she is rearing.
Elizabeth is left all alone.
Sindhu has the world with her.


This link gives an interview with the lady herself.
http://cms.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=6497

The Tangent in my Circle of Life

What chance do I stand of not being engulfed by the madness around me?
Nothing at all.In a nation of cricketing fans and fanatics, singular voices of dissent like mine are silenced and thrown out in disgust.One gets treated like a pariah.....so if you can't beat 'em join 'em... thought I.
My family was berserk that India had entered the finals of the World Cup.India was bleeding blue.The euphoria was enthusisatic and for the first time in my life I agreed to witness a full cricket match.
My association with cricket has been minimal.Content with hearing the final scores or just about knowing who defeated whom this game had not entered the circle of my life.But now it was threatening my existence.If I needed to survive in my own house I better know the game.If I needed to sustain office gossip , then I needed to know the game more than what Kalpana or Radhika were doing in their lives. No one discussed anything but cricket.I could not have any conversation with anyone if I didnt know what happened in the ground the previous evening.
So all armed to meet up to this latest challenge in my life and keep myself in sync with this crazy cricket world I decided to go and witness an entire cricket match.
Of course I would have loved an outing with the entire family,roaming the seasides,building sand castles,the bhelpuri on the beach and some leisurely dinner after all this.But then I would have been the only one doing that ...
I found myself on the 2nd of April 2011 in a theatre( Wankhede tickets were out of the question..so the next best was a huge screen)all set to watch the match.I too dressed in blue and even wore sports shoes to feel like a sportperson!!!!!

Well the match began . Three maidens and the audience was going wild..... as long as the Lankans were not scoring it was good for me.The pace was steady.The afternoon was heavy .It was siesta time.My eyelids drooped and I had a nice snooze in the cozy ac theatre all fragrant with popcorn and samosas.
'how can you sleep....Why did I miss something?' Maleha was still playing and the other guy( can't remember the name) he too was there before I had drifted into dreamland.
All seemed quite and still.So I quite didn't think I missed anything...
And for the rest of the day I lost my husband to the guy sitting next to him.They conversed animatedly..laughed over the fact that Maleha would be Sreesanth's captain in the next IPL and passionately discussed every ball thrown.
Finally it was half time.
God above would I survive the next half?????
India started batting.Sachin and Sehwag on the field.What more did India want?I dont know But I would have loved a nice blanket and some hot tea.

The audience was in a frenzy when the first ball left the bowler's hand.Six,six,six........and....................oh ok..no run...
Loud cries of "Its ok Sehwag...take it easy...." Of course Sehwag heard them.He just needed advice from these guys,right ...I thought .Once again there was a frenzied rush and people began to scream six,six siiiiiiixxxxxx and then ........OUT.The hall fell silent .Sehwag went back on a ZERO.The hall was quiet.I could hear a two hundred and ninety nine hearts beat in tandem and then I felt mine too go the same way...the audience was mourning.Was my heart too? I wondered? Then again Sachin went out for an 18.They all cried.With God out would the mortals be able to do anything?
Every time there was a ,four people began dancing
Every time Gambhir gimmicked people nearly had heart attacks.Why Why does he do this?Young blood that he is...Gambhir play slow...they screamed....
I was hungry, stiff and tired..
I looked around and found no supporters.No one cared for food ,water or anything else...The enthusiasm was of course infectious .When the young guns turned the match around I too had started rooting for them.I clapped loudly when Dhoni rocked.. and then when the final six exploded on screen the hall was a volcano.
What was simmering till then erupted now....
People were all over the streets.The Indian flag flew high.
The skies exploded in a multitude of colours.Impromptu rallies were the order of the night.With a long weekend in Mumbai,the party had just begun

And as for me,the madness is still beyond comprehesnion.Cricket still is a tangent in my circle of life.I am content with knowing that India has won.

Eat pray love

Eat Pray Love (previously "The Virtues of Life") is a 2010 comedy-drama film starring Julia Roberts as Elizabeth Gilbert, based on Gilbert's memoir Eat, Pray, Love. The film was co-written and directed by Ryan Murphy. It opened in the U.S. on August 13, 2010
Plot
Elizabeth Gilbert (Julia Roberts) had everything a modern woman is supposed to dream of having - a husband (Billy Crudup), a house, a successful career - yet like so many others, she found herself lost, confused, and searching for what she really wanted in life. Newly divorced and at a crossroads, Gilbert steps out of her comfort zone, risking everything to change her life, embarking on a journey around the world that becomes a quest for self-discovery. In her travels, she discovers the true pleasure of nourishment by eating in Italy; the power of prayer in India, and, finally and unexpectedly, the inner peace and balance of true love in Bali.

Does she really find it?What she do ?
She eats
She prays
She loves
She never does them together.And for me that is where the search fails.Spirituality is a way of life.Happiness is a way of life .These cannot be willed into your life.Positive affirmations do have far reaching impacts on human psyche and self confidence but it needs to be a part of your life and not fitted into it.
In India we are taught that food is God.Taking no religious stances,I strongly believe that we are born and reared in a culture of spirituality.Nothing is material.Everything is spiritual.The food you eat....a baby is ushered into the process of eating for a lifetime with a prayer .The clothes you wear,the house you live in,the education you get,the money that comes from your job, the car you own everything has its own associated spirituality.You learn to respect the position that all this occupies in your life.
Elizabeth leaves behind a confused husband and gorges on food in Italy.When you look at food only for physical satisfaction you do not deal with it spiritually.Food has to satiate not just your body but your soul.You do not gorge on your food.You savour it.You enjoy the process of its preparation as much as its consumption.In south India little kolams are drawn on the cooking gas stove so that the one prays before one cooks.Food is freshly prepared daily so that it retains all its vital nutrients and passes it on to one's body and through that to one's soul.
Ready and fast foods satisfy your body not your soul.these cannot replace good home cooked food spruced up with prayer and love.
Elizabeth reaches India to pray.Does a place inspire you to pray?Prayer comes from within and not without.Those have seen the song itni shakti hamein dena daata will notice that the two characters who sing the song keep doing their work while praying.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w_P5Pr6eEQ



You don't segregate prayer from yourself. You don't only pray to figure out what your life is all about.You pray along with your life to figure it out.The munis and saints who renounced the world did so when they reached a higher plain of spirituality .They were beyond the demands of the physical world.And that is not something we all aim at in our lives.We aim to lead a happy life where the mind body and soul are all happy.
She reaches Bali and falls in love and once again enters the domain of marriage.Was life proving to be a full circle and marriage her final destiny?Or was this marriage again to a prelude to her next session of unhappiness ? Marriage again for me is not an experiment.It is not meant to be just a physical union .It is the union of the minds and the souls.You need to learn to live with all the pluses and minuses of your partner remembering that you too are a store house of pluses and minuses.One is not perfect .
Marriage is when you eat pray and love together.Marriage is when you eat pray and love for each other

You do not will happiness into life.You do not lay down conditions which say 'I will be happy only if.......'.

Elizabeth embarks on her travel no doubt supported by all the money she has earned.She travels around the world knowing fully well that she is financially secure.She doesn't need to worry how her next ticket is coming.She doesn't need to worry where she will stay.She doesn't need to worry how and where her next meal is.
Financially secure,she undertakes a travel which in her mind is a search for happiness and spirituality .
She feels she has reached her destination.For me she will never reach her destination as she will never stop searching.Why?
Simply becuse : she doesn't know what she is searching for....so she finds nothing.

caw caw at my window

"What are you doing?" asked my mother-in law- as she saw me leaning over the kitchen window."Oh just two slices of bread...the kids don't eat these..they are the first and last slice of the loaf.I was keeping them for the crows.They eat it." I informed her.She was slightly taken aback."You put bread slices for the crows?" "Yes,"I said,"Why is there anything wrong with that...with bread selling costlier than cakes,it would be shame to dunk into the dustbin......."Ok," she elaborated,"traditionally crows represent our ancestors and our ancestors never fed on bread.Don't do that.You could anger them!!!!" Ah I said.......of course we had a proud lineage.Just consider the people in question...my husband's paternal grandfather...the village priest:the most respected man around.Next my husband's maternal grandfather...a prosperous hotelier of his times.Chariots adorned his compounds.Then my paternal grandfather, the founder principal of the SIES group and my maternal grandfather, a business baron in Pune.Oh did I suddenly feel small and humble suddenly being surrounded by such luminaries..but why the grandmothers never came down as crows continues to puzzle me......anyway coming back to my story.....,"so," she declared "you need to feed them rice or at least something South Indian...an idli , a dosa etc but not bread...."
Ok so lets not anger the ancestors campaign had begun.The next morning after steaming the idlis, I religiously placed one on the window sill.
The first crow flew down...ah possibly one grandfather has come...he looked hard and long at the idli and went away.He came back with another one..goodie...one more grandpa has come.They both now stared at it.Was the shape wrong? Was it overcooked? Was it undercooked?I was as nervous as a new bride!!!!!
The third one came along.They almost seemed to be having a meeting.They kept looking at the idli and then flew away to their perch. None of them touched it.I thought they are probably waiting for grandfather 4 to come along too.A good ten minutes were spent in just checking the idli.I was almost a nervous wreck.
"My colleagues at the office would have devoured this by now.Whats taking these guys so much time......then they began CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW...all three of them.
I decided to be naughty and slowly slunk in the regular slices of bread and VOILA there was a flurry and the slices just vanished
Even as I type this out,the poor idli waits to be savoured by any willing forefather!!!!!!!