“As I make my slow pilgrimage through the world, a certain sense of beautiful mystery seems to gather and grow.” --- Arthur Christopher Benson

Hmmm it is quite some time since I wrote (spelt as s-c-r-i-b-b-l-e-d) something. In a way to end the year 2008 in a very pleasing way, I went to two religious places with family. Yeah… I know its not like me to go out with family… but I did. Wanted to pen a few things about the trips… a long one.. beware :)

Trip 1: An “on an impulse” visit to Puttaparthi with mom.

It was around 8am on 20th Dec… a sunny Saturday and I had all the possible excuses and reasons to stay home and laze around. But mom had this feeling of visiting Puttaparthi after watching the Sathya Narayana Pooja telecast from Prashanthi Nilaya. And as a good daughter (that I am not), I decided to take her to Puttaparthi for the evening darshan of Sathya Sai. I told her clearly… we are to return back the same day since we did not know anyone there nor did we know the place. But as always, I was the first person to pack an overnight kit minus the essentials (soap, tooth brush & paste). I enquired around and made sure that Sai was in Puttaparthi and started our trip. Reached Majestic Bus Terminal at around 12:30pm which meant we won’t be able to return the same night. Again, we were enlightened with the information that the 1pm bus was not available that day and had to take the 3pm bus.

I really want to share a small episode that happened in the bus station. The bus to Parthi came at around 2.30pm. After boarding the bus, I asked mom to stay put and went to rest room. Just as I came out, I noticed a young girl (Rathna) crying a lot. The keepers of the rest room were talking to her. Being a person who does not trust anyone, I assumed they were abusing her and spoke to her. She told me shes from another town which was 3hrs away from Blore and she had ran away from home since her parents scolded her often and that she didn’t know what to do next. She was crying so much that a small crowd encircled us to watch the drama but not many to help. A guy in the crowd was a little too generous. After much coaxing and advising, Rathna agreed to go back home and got her relative’s phone number. The generous guy waited until I spoke to the relative in my broken Kannada and Ratha finished her story to the relative. Finally the relative assured to come and take the girl back home. In fact the guy (in the crowd) took out 200-300rs and asked her to go back. May be his intentions were good… but the way he kept touching the gal’s hand to offer money didn’t look very appeasing. Finally, I had to leave the girl with the care takers there and had to go on the way to Puttaparthi.

While all this was happening, another thing happened in the bus in which mom was waiting. A very humble looking lady seems to have spoken to mom in Tamil about the seats. They picked a conversation and both looked pleased when I came to the bus. It seems that aunty (Lakshmi) is a resident of Puttaparthi and is a staff at Prashanthi Nilaya. She offered to take us to her home to refresh and on reaching there, she also arranged for our stay there with her a boarding house just next to hers. Since it was very cold, she even woke up early to get us hot water for our baths the next day. Though she did not come along, she helped us with all the needed details to have a very pleasant and memorable 2 days visit to Puttaparthi. In fact, we were even happier since our trip was complete after the morning darshan of Sai.
These two incidents made me realize “What goes around, comes around”. I felt the need to help the girl Rathna and it came back to us in the form of Lakshmi aunty. Don’t you all think so?

Trip 2: A not-so-well planned visit to Manthralayam with relatives.


(I started writing this blog during the first week of Jan 2009 and am trying to finish it today. Many thoughts, memories and opinions that were flooding my mind then have trickled down a lot. I still continue to write about this trip to remind myself details about it.)

Dec 28th, 2008 – The last trip for the year - to Manthralayam with 11 relatives, inclusive of my parents. My uncle (dad’s cousin) told me that we will reach Manthralayam the same night at 11pm. That’s 13hrs from Coimbatore, my home town. If I had travelled that long in a flight, I might as well have reached US of A, taking the shortest route. But I was all ready to visit Ragavendra Swami in his abode. Yes… visit him, because as history & news quotes, he is still alive in his Jeeva Samadhi. (Samadhi means higher levels of concentrated meditation…. And not death). I just found the exact meaning. I assumed Samadhi meant “dead”. How ignorant!!

We had the usual family train travelling experience, with food packed from different families, shared, complimenting – sharing recipes if it tastes good, giving hints for better tastes, gossiping about relatives, about movies, etc. We crossed Puttaparthi en route to Manthralayam and it actually felt good to revisit the rail station.

We reached Manthralayam by 11pm, lodged at APTD guest house. The next morning, we went for the 8am Dharshan. Since it was a Monday, there didn’t seem to be much crowd. As usual, I became very pious when in the temple and could feel the vibration of… don’t know what that is.. but I get a feeling of presence of something… someone…who you can trust. I feel this more when I talk to Lord Krishna.


After that we hired a cab and left to a place called Nava Brindhavan, which is in the banks of the Thungabadra River in the state of Karnataka. We had to cross the then slow flowing river in a small motor boat to reach the temple. This place is revered for the Samadhi of 8 saints. The place was quite but for few tourists/ devotees like us. I wanted to take a dip in the cool river, but time set a constraint on my small wish :)

From there, we travelled another 15km to reach Hampi. Here again we had to cross the river to reach the Virupaksha temple, which is said to be the oldest temple in that region. Monuments and architecture never seize to astonish me. The temple was just so AWESOME. The sculptures, the layout was all so beautiful… and so was the mood of the people there, most being tourists. The enthusiasm there was so infectious that it seems to catch the entire crowd there. Unlike Bellur/ Halebid, was able to find a lot of westerners here. I heard from localities there that these people stayed there for quite some time to study about Hampi and its rich culture. I indeed felt proud to be an Indian and part of the heritage.

The best thing I liked in this age old temple is the the image of the main Gopuram that passes through a small vent in the wall and its reversed reflection is seen in a small room well inside the temple. The scientific knowledge of our ancestors does not fail to keep our modern thoughts humble. Again, cause of time constraint, we had to return without feasting our eyes on the other monuments in Hampi. We returned back to Manthralayam.

The third day of our trip, we had time until 12.30pm, the time we would board our return train. So it was decided that we will take our bath in the supposed-to-be holy Thungabadra river and all of us headed to the bank at 6.30am. To my dismay, a small dirty pool of water was all that said a river actually flowed there during the monsoons. Though my relatives did take a bath there, I though against it and came back to the lodge and had a decent bath. Now I sincerely prayed that the source of the tap water wasn’t the ‘river’ or at least it was processed well. High hopes… ha!

Once again we went for Dharshan and had a good one too.
We were told that there is Anna Dhanam (food distribution) in the temple and it’s would be a blessing to have food there. I even got coupons for the meal. But now is the saddening part. I saw a placard directing us to a dining hall inside the temple campus itself. On enquiry, they told me that the food will be served at 10am. I took my parents and relatives to the place only to be humiliated. They said this place is ONLY for Brahmins and that food will be served in another hall outside the temple campus, for non-brahmins. Not just the Brahmins working in the temple… just any tourist who claims to be from a Brahmin family. In fact, the guy there did not even give us the holy water (theertham) and shooed us off. All of us were really upset. We were grumbling among ourselves about this untouchability that is followed here, a temple which was built on the land donated by a Muslim. Another tourist, should be a Brahmin by birth, said that’s because they will have to tell their pious Gothra and some sloga there. What the heck. Does that mean all non-Brahmins come from bad Gothra’s and are not children of God. He also suggested that we can just tell our gothra and have food from the Brahmin dining hall. But we didn’t want to do that.

Later I asked a friend (of Brahmin birth) about this and in fact, he had reasons to justify it. I too agree that if the dining hall is exclusively for the Brahmins who work in the temple, then all is fine. Every place… be it a temple or a corporate office, it had its own dining area for the employees. But how can any sundry tourist with the sacred thread on this chest and a different slang be allowed this honor. I wish someone would remind the temple management the principles of the great saint Ragavendra Swami.

With a little bitter feelings and lot of cherished experience we returned from Manthralayam. I do not know if I would go back to Manthralayam again (unless I get a divine instruction to come there), I would most definitely go back to Hampi someday, stay there for 2-3 days, at the least, and explore more about the place or just to sit in the high rocks to watch the sun rise and set. I forgot to mention the most important thing that kept me surprised. The whole area, be it Manthralayam or Nava Brindhavan or Hampi… all had huge rocky hills on either side of the road and the banks of the river. Each mould made me wonder how nature holds these rocks together. Hail Nature!

She can change your life…

“The key to change... is to let go of fear.”

In a sense, yes! She did to mine! May be… just may be… she can change your life too, like she did to mine, though not to the greatest extent. I can tell you how.

In your busy schedules, at times you have the heart to not feel guilty and indulge yourself to a nice hot dinner, a comfy couch (bed in my case) and a TV-DVD all to yourself and no one to judge you about the dress your wear, the angle you are inclined to and the movie you have settled down to watch. Sounds like fun. Isn’t it? In the recent days, I’m seeing more such lucky nights J

And the movie I saw yesterday was Amelie from Montmartre (the English title for the French movie Amélie). I want to write so much about the movie but don’t want to write a review of it and spoil the fun of watching the movie. On any given day, I would recommend this light heart-touching comedy flick.

A one liner about the movie… it is about a girl, obviously named as Amelie (played by Audrey Tautou), who has a cute little mischievous smile throughout the movie. She happens to help a 50yr old man get a glimpse of his childhood through the toys she recovers and how the happy-tear filled face of the man prompts her to help people around her. She goes out of her way to help others but she realizes through another person that ‘self help is the best help’ and finds her love. She understands that letting go of fear can do wonders.

Needless to mention are her wild imagination of things happening around her. The unspoken moments that Amelie shares with Nino (her love) are short and sweet. The extra second that she lingers while kissing on his eyes… is just so cute. And the ‘am happy and contended’ expression on her face when she goes around in the streets of Paris in Nino’s moped seems to make her entire life seem fulfilled.

Coming back to how she influenced me… she made me to realize that helping others is not always the best option… helping ourselves to get what we want is more important, even if the attempts are small and the need trivial.

Definitely a ‘do not miss’ movie… she is out there to change your life forever.

Hero Worship……..

Hero-worship exists, has existed, and will forever exist, universally among Mankind.

Always wanted to write about few people who are in my list of heroes and who I hero-worship shamelessly. In fact my list of heroes is never fixed… it keeps moving up and down like the equalizer in WinAmp with different colors as well. Red for most favorite, amber for steady favorite, green for recent favorites, yellow for those I like but don’t dare to disclose to anyone and those who drop off from my list get merged with the black background.

Anything uttered by Rajini kanth (always red in my equalizer) off-screen can make me ponder over that for many days to follow, even if it sometimes is controversial to his earlier quote or is outright illogical. He inspires me to set a style of my own (no luck yet), to travel around the world, and also to leave everyone I know & abscond to the Himalayas, Rishikesh or Haridwar. Then there is this guy named Kamal Hassan… who haunts my dreams only as the numerous characters he has portrayed or rather lived on-screen. No words to describe that. Any nonsensical so-called-romantic dialog articulated by Ajith and Brad Pitt on-screen can bring butterflies in my stomach. Then I do like Ganja Karuppu (listed under yellow)… with his horribly shabby appearance and funny accent. And I used to be in so much awe for Sidney Sheldon, until I realized the person is a HE and not a SHE. Still I do esteem his books and wouldn’t mind reading all his novels for another umpteen times. I have heard enough to hate Hitler, but somehow, his crude courage in his 5 feet body inspires and shocks me simultaneously. I love Calvin and would do anything to have a kid like that (Of course, if I get the boon of immense patience) and make my life more interesting. Ok…… I know am being silly. But they are few of my heroes and I do worship them. Who is to say not to?

Now is the reality bites part. The sad part is these people in flesh or fiction don’t even know that I exist. Does that make a difference to the way I feel towards them? No, it does not. Neither do I want to meet these folks and spoil the glamour I feel towards them.I was searching for a quote to be used for my GTalk and happened to see this one “Each man is a hero and an oracle to somebody, and to that person whatever he says has an enhanced value”. How true!!

I sit back and think about some people who crossed by path and made a difference. All my friends and relatives are my unsung heroes and I don’t have it in mind to talk about them here. An example of people who inspired me… my teachers Bama(math) & Nagalakshmi (English) in school. Is it because I adored them that I liked the subjects or is it vice versa? No idea. Whichever way it is… both have been a very pleasant feeling. There are many more people who I have come across… who are heroes in their own little and big way.

Hmmm… I thought of not writing about my relatives as heroes. But I do want to write about by brother (anna) who has always been my hero. Is it because he was my first play mate, or was it because he was my first friend, or was it because he was my first study mate, or is it because I realized he was my sibling and not just a play mate, or was it because he is guardian, or was it because he is my role model or is just his presence in my life… I cannot think of which makes him my real-time, all-time hero in flesh and blood.

Whatever it is… he means the world to me yesterday, today and many more tomorrows to come. There have been times when I trusted his every motive to be beneficial to me and the days when he boasted that I am the best sister anyone could get. We crossed days when I thought he was the most selfish person on earth and me the most ridiculous being. There have been days when I did not want to hear his voice at all and then days when he made sure to avoid talking to me. There has been too many not-so-happy events in the recent days where I am put to test about the hero-worship I have towards anna.

I wish people realize that we can create lifelong connection only with some and cannot be forced to stay put with someone just coz someone else wants you to. I wish life was much easier and people can keep aside any hard feelings. I wish, I wish, I wish…. Too many wishes and very little time to wait to for the wishes to become true. I am trusting only on the hope I have, to set me free, coz I have realized that that fear can only hold you prisoner (The Shawshank Redemption)

Gosh… the blog was intended to mean and sound something nice but it has ended in a sad way. I do not have any intention to change it. As I always say… this page is a vent to my feelings and am glad to let out some pressure through this.

So much has been said and sung of beautiful young girls, why don't somebody wake up to the beauty of old women?

“It is now time for another write-up”. This thought came up last night when I happened to read one of the short stories of author Sujatha, titled “V.G.R”… a leaf from his collection called “Sri Rangathu Kadhaigal (devadhiagal)”.

I need not elaborate on the story for Sujatha’s fans. But to others like me… it is about a mathematics teacher who lived long, had a very grand death ceremony, is still remembered and has a scholarship program running in his honor in the school where he used to teach. But the sad part was, he had a slow and lonely death with no one near to care for him.

Neither I am a rightful person to throw light on Sujatha’s work nor am I going to do that. As I was reading the story, my thoughts went around my grandparents for a small fraction of time and wanted to write couple of lines to keep myself a little satisfied.

Saraswathi: My dad’s mom. Never knew anything about her. I heard that she passed away even before her 6 children finished school education. Not a pleasant death though. I wonder at times what it would have been like to have a paternal grand-mom around. Dad has one very grainy photo of her. The few features that can be seen remind everyone of my dad’s second younger sister – Bharathi. This meant we were only able to visualize a shadow of how grandma would have looked like. Mom said that on the day of their wedding, dad asked mom to take care of his siblings the way a mother would. I think she did her part well. In fact, mom named me after grandma… ShreeVani (Vani meaning Saraswathi).

Sundararajan: Saraswathi’s husband. My dad’s father. I and my brother were not much connected to him as the other grand children of his. So was my dad. Sometimes it haunts to think how disconnected a family could be. Grandpa passed away this April (may be on 7/04/08). Dad normally sends him money every month. But since he was abroad during grandpa’s last few months, it was my responsibility to send him money every month. And I am happy that I could see to his needs at least in a small way. Even now when I think about him, in spite of all hard feelings, I still tend to have a soft corner for him, the only reason being… he gave me MY dad.

Krishnaswamy: My mom’s dad. I like him for few things and hate him for one thing. Until he got bed ridden two years before he passed away, he was always active as a bee. He would tirelessly stitch nice skirts, blouses, etc for us granddaughters. I don’t remember if the boys got anything stitched by him. And for his age, he would traverse a might distance during his evening walks. And when he visits us, he would at times (very rarely) give us 50np or so for candies. Any given day I would be grateful to him for having altered my school uniforms from the previous year to be used for the following academic year. I will never be ashamed of that because he used to do such a good job with my clothes. These are few things that I liked best in him. Now comes the reason I hate him. He had a darker skin tone… following which each of his alternate born kids (1st, 3rd – my mom, 5th) were not on the fairer side and that resulted in me having a not-so-fair skin tone.

Visalakshi: My cutie pie grand ma. Mom’s mother. Avva (means grandma. I also read on the net that ‘avo’ – pronounced as ava, in Latin means grandma too) from here on, can be described as nothing short of Mother Teresa or Rani Lakshmi Bai or both or simply comprise everyone into Visalakshi. The way she cared for each of us will make any one see Mother Teresa in her. My mom and her siblings will never forget the days (years???) when avva used to put up a fight to meet the needs of the family and how she taught her kids that self help is the best help and made each of them grow up strong and independent. Know what, in those by gone days, avva has been the Counselor of Pollachi. They say she had actively participated in politics until forced by husband and in-laws to see to the welfare of the family alone. Mom has told us stories about how avva had kept the family stable during financial crisis and helped every one moved on. I sincerely believe that she inherited all the good genes from her father – Nataraj. And by the way, avva is very fair toned and her 2nd and 4th kids (both daughters) are fair skinned too.

Being all this and more does not show a trace now in her life at ripe age of 84. All my aunts, uncle and mom say it is really very difficult to take care of her now. No… neither is she bed ridden nor is disabled. The problem is she has taken refuge in watching TV soaps and reading any kind of Tamil novels. She keeps asking for the time with a phantom fear that she might miss a show on TV or if she has not yet finished reading a book within her planned (???) time schedule. Avva is a person who used to be very strict about the way she wears her saree and how she ties her hair bun. But now, she has moved on and has accepted to wear nighties and has a very short hair cut. Tears crept into my eyes when she looked up from her book and said, “See… how short they have cut my hair ” and went back to reading her no-name novel. The last time I visited her on (16/08/09), she said to me,” Ha… after so many days you’ve come to see me. I like Bholi (a sweet) a lot… nice that you bought me some. It has been ages since I tasted once of these”. This time, my knees went weak listening to an old lady remembering that I did not visit her. Does that mean she would have thought about me once in a while in between her TV shows and reading spree? If she could remember me in her not so steady memory line, why don’t I remember her more often and visit her as well. All said and done… I wish I could life a full life like hers and have a family that would care for me if I happen to live that long.

Etiquette please ......

Ha.. Etiquette for everything and most importantly, of the rest room in common places.

During end of last week and the beginning of this week, there were few emails sent from some RESPONSIBLE female colleagues in our floor at my work place.

The first one spoke about the basic etiquette to be followed and pleading the so called, high paid PROFESSIONALS to help maintain hygiene in the toilets. The event that triggered this event was that some unlucky soul had to finish an urgent nature’s call and finally found that the flush not working. I was one of the lucky few who were not destined to face it. SOS :)

After the house keeping guy came to the rescue, we could breathe again. And on Monday again, there were few reminders of healthy habits and requests, a mail on indirect finger pointing and another mail on standing up for self-esteem to say ‘Do not point finger at me. I am as shocked as you are when I witnessed the scene in the rest room’.
All this made me write about the rest rooms we come across in common places like the malls, movie houses, bus & rail stations, etc.

When I used to work in Chennai, me & my roomies happened to go to a very small theater (near Thiruvanmayur bus stop) to catch a much talked about movie "Engal Anna". I could really kill the person who recommended this movie to us, but wasn’t able toL. That being a small talkie, the crowd that normally throngs the place is of the lower middle class or lower class economic crowd. We were very skeptical about going to the loo during the intermission. But we went anyways and were really taken aback. Yeah, you guessed it right. It had one of the most clean and well maintained public conveniences I’ve ever been to. This made me change my perception of judging a place by it size and crowd.

I can go on describing about the numerous public wash rooms we encounter. But I wanted to write about the unpleasant experience I had in hi-fi shopping malls in Bengaluru.
As everyone know, Bengaluru malls give u snap shot view of how a westernized world looks like, of course until you take a peep into the women’s wash room there. The girls waiting to relieve themselves look so pretty with their cute clothes and make-up that it makes people like me to feel totally out of place in a beauty pageant dressing room.

Then you get your turn to use one of the rooms and all the fairy tale images of the models outside and who just left that room crashes with a loud thud as I drop the toilet seat (of course after draping my hands with almost a whole roll of toilet paper). I was reminded of the funny quote about marriage that goes as "Those who are out want to get in and those inside want to get out". The quote was so apt at that moment. These washrooms are the most disgusting places you could find in a so-called modern hang outs. I really pity the housekeeping ladies there and pray that they do not get infected with some horrible disease. And I do not want to imagine anything about the male convenience room at all. It no wonder that many shops keep their washrooms under lock & key and don’t let customers use them :)

I sincerely wished that day that I had a digicam handy to click the mess they have left, to run around all those gals who created it and yell out in front of their friends/relatives about how stupid they are behind closed doors and stick the photo on their face. These people need to be trained at gun point.

I spoke about the small theater in Chennai before to show you the contrast between the people of the supposedly higher class and the normal people for whom going for a movie once a month itself is a luxury. I am a person who usually has a soft corner for the working class and this episode makes me move more comfortably with them rather than with the "models" beautifying the malls’ corridors.

Blue is my favorite color.... but not today.

I am in one of my colorful moods -blue, red and green. Yeah… I am sad, angry and jealous.
I wish someone would spare some time to ask me what is causing me these mixed emotions. I know it is a very busy world out there and no one have the time to ponder over their own feelings and emotions.
Am sad since I don’t have anyone to trust and belong to.
Am angry because I don’t get to be me but to remain a puppet.
Am jealous as everyone around me seems to be happy in spite of their problems.

Being composed is one thing…. Composing oneself is a different plane altogether
Smiling from soul is one thing… Smiling just with lips is another dimension
Taking the beaten road is one thing, taking the road less travelled is another… Journeying through a non-existent road is where I’m treading on.

Even now I’m wondering why I write this on the blog… but can’t help crying out for peace for my heart that’s in pieces.

Shree's Day Out... Alone

“The soul that sees beauty may sometimes walk alone.”
I was unemployed for the first time after a long gap of 4 yrs and 2 months. Unemployed for one day on 15th July, 2008.

My last working day with SRIT was the previous day which ended with a lots of tears (only from my end), gift of a beautiful saree, a grand lunch with team @ Bageecha and of course, the relieving letter at EOD.

I had to join my new organisation today (16th July, 2008). So that meant I had one unemployed day all for myself yesterday. Am writing the following as it happened on 15th July, 2008.

8:00 am
I ask a friend… how much are the tickets @ Lido on a weekday and she says… 100bucks. I wonder… 100rs on a damn busy weekday?? She immediately says… may be its Rs.80. I think… and think and then decided to do the thing I always wanted to do. Go for a movie all alone.Speculated for another 45min, rushed to take bath, packed an apple for snack ;) and was out ASAP.

9:20 am
Am already in bus stop still speculating about whether to go or not. But I have to and get over this mental block I had of goin alone for a movie… I know it sounds crazy for lot of people and I can hear them asking…Wats the big deal here?

Point 1… even now my parents freak out if I go for a movie… with friends… in Blore or Coimbatore
Point 2… am not a person to spend 100rs for a senti Hindi movie in a multiplex.. DVD costs cheaper
Point3… am the club leader of the people who think movies are to be watched with friends
Point4… am not smart enough to face the people who stare at me in the queue when I say “1 ticket to Jaane Tu ya Jaane Na – 10am show”. Yeah.. that’s the movie I went to.

9:40 am
Was in the theater. I thought it will not be crowded. But the ticket counter was crowded, will LOTS of gals’ gangs, which reminded me of my own college days when we used to bunk college (pssst… my parents dnt know abt that yet). While in queue, the guy in front of me got 1 ticket to the same movie. I was happy I was not the only member in the loner club today.

9:55 am
Around 50ppl decorated the hall… almost 80% of the seats were empty. I was lucky (as if) to get a nice seat in an all empty row… imagine that… empty rows to the front & back and me in the middle. Felt eeir but good.

10:00 am
Jana Gana Mana music composed my ARR. Beautiful. Then the movie started… for the first time in my DTS expierence, I could sense the real surround system. The title had a saxaphone playing as the BG score… It seemed to eminate from different corners of the movie hall. It was such a beautiful experience. Now I would say, it was all my mistake that I never cherished the DTS effect in the innumerable films I’ve watched. I did find the difference when I watched Jodha Akbar… but now, it was very much mesmerising since the theater was almost empty. Beautiful is the word for that.

Upto 12:50 pm
Mmmm thats it… the movie went on.. Good entertainer. Reminded me of a tamil movie in which Prasanth & Shalini starred. Had my apple… finished the movie and came back a winner… like in Who Dares Win :)