Butterflies!

Whenever I listen  the word butterfly, I always recall a dialogue from the movie 'The ultimate Gift'. Where the little girl, the cancer patient is asked "What do you think how it will be with God?!" and she replies, "Butterflies, lots of butter flies", the reason she gave was, "God paints wings of butterflies with his fingers." There is something in this dialogue. Definitely butterflies are close to God.

As my birthday 25th birthday is approaching, I am getting nervous. There are some news flowing in the air which actually helps me to revive my little positive mindset. My best buddies and me, flowing with the river  little stream of joys and this year can be important for each of us, professionally and personally. The little thought of missing each one of them gets sharpened but then upcoming news make me tearfully happy.

The reason of my nervousness also lies in calls of relatives pointing at me, who is entering the danger zone of 'Unmarried single girl'! I keep calm obviously. Some where I know everything will be fine, of course being the rebellious yet scared soul inside, it wont be too natural.

With my birthday, my exams are approaching, the never ending job hunting has started without any responses from the employers for all us. Life is not going to be easy. I am nervous.

Butterflies in my stomach.

May be God is taking care of their wings some where. He is still painting their wings.

Shooo April, Go!

When I was 5:

The month of April used to be of sheer joy. With examinations coming to an end by mid April and of course the very big Birthday of my parent's princess were some of the reasons. Ah, did I mention the month of April brings summer vacations back in life?! Precious days!

Buying new clothes, mom's baking a cake session (Yeah generally they never bought cakes, I was a premature baby and so no Bahar-ka-khana till the age of seven!), Dad buying me cool stuff and Dadima's and mom's long sewing sessions which used to end before my birthday- Do I need any other excitement?! Well, my mom now says, they called kids on my birthday against my wishes to be alone so that I see them eating and I eat,I play and start developing good nature, otherwise I used to 'Hate' meeting people. It is a shock for me, as some of my friends says , I am too extrovert and fast when it comes to making friends. Phew!

When I was 15:

The same old joy, with a little bit of tension for exams. The harsh sun of Ahmedabad still failed to make me nervous, though the young girl was shocked with no-friends-enjoying-April-Syndrome. Batch mates were busy discussing about effects of sunlight on skin and Bubblegum was busy celebrating her birthday plans (Yeah it was a celebration itself!) with the fantastic frock Buddy N.

When I am 25:

April is no more a special celebration! My best buddies are in India, mom dad and brother -Well I have failed to meet them on my birthday after 2009 due to my job. Exams are approaching and projects are killing. Even though I have some really good friends here,I know it wont be an easy day. Tears will flow, smileys will bloom due to irritating friends calling me from India at odd hours! One thing I know, even when I like to age, entering the Quarter Life crisis is a danger zone for me!

So please APRIL fly high and don't come back soon again. Please Go!

Dying vernacular characters of kid's world!

One thing I am really proud of is, my schooling. I studied in Gujarati Medium from KG to 12th Standard. Not that I had put lots of efforts in College to suddenly start with English! I never felt weird,even for a day. My parents and school actually had taken enough care!

As my mom says, she and my dad had a big fight over this when I was to be admitted in a school. My father adamantly said and still stays, a kid should be taught in the kitchen language! Yeah not even the mother tongue, the language which a toddler is used to when he/she is fed by her parents. This ideology was given to him by my grand father who himself was a doctor, who studied in Mumbai state at that time. My mom whose brought up was of Kolkata, felt I might feel inferior when other kids talk to their parents and friends in English. The fight I guess was won by my father who actually admitted me in the Gujarati medium school , 'The Shantiniketan of Gujarat'! Just like my grand father who made my father learn 'Pathamala' which is an oxford level seriese to learn English, I was made to study all parts of the series in vacations. It was fun I tell you. Of course my grand mom made my lessons so interesting with stories- how my grand dad made her speak English! One thing my parents and grand parents never missed, the avid little reader of the family-Bubblegum should never feel bad/inferior/odd while reading vernacular books!In fact I was encouraged a lot. I picked my first English book (other than text books and news papers) in 7th standard. By the time I had started with history Novels in Gujarati- K.M.Munshi and Zaverchand Meghani! I guess, my morals were shaped by characters of Gujarati Kids literature.

When I see today's kids, reading lots of books in English which is good, I feel nervous about those Gujarati kids literature books! There are hundreds of characters which were portrayed by those stories, who inspired many directors to direct theaters for kids and who taught me the difference between right things and wrong things!

As now I have reached almost 1/4th of my age (yeah I might live hundred years!), I can safely comment on authors who wrote amazing stories and created amazing characters!

Miya fusaki and Tabha Bhatt: Stories of Hindu Muslim friendships, never a single story promoted communal differences! The sharm Miya and a hogger Bhattji!

Bakor Patel: This character  based in Mumbai was created almost in 1930s! I can still connect to all of them. The best kid's character ever portrayed in Gujarati Bal sahitya! My grand father got 24 books of the same seriese for my father, with hard covers, same is passed on to me. I still have in the very same safe condition. I will keep them with me all my life.Amen for that!

Gappidas: The simple comic character which falls in some trouble every time he lied. The morals of each of the stories which made them unique.

Inspector Kumar and Jamadar Husainkha: These two gentlemen cops were our heroes, just like Sherlock holmes! Those amazing little story books made me go under the table and read, so that my dadi or my mom don't disturb me! :D

These are some of the characters and even when I write this, I feel nostalgic and sad. May be they are dying with the English crazy parents and kids. It is not the story of only Gujarat, I think all states are fighting to save vernacular kids literature.

English is important but killing vernacular characters is almost a crime for me, specially of kids literature!

PS: I tried to Google images for some other characters, I almost find nothing. May be the post is a pure rant.

Bubbling Bulletins!

So a friend called me yesterday,asked me in a quite a scary threatening way,

"Where is your new blog post?"

"Well I don't know...Umm.. I have nothing to write may be!"

"Or you will have many ideas accumulated in your mind to write about!"

"Na ...na..."

Pause. Well I do have many updates but one more post with bullets did not trigger me to write. Frankly even I was scared when I saw ever decreasing count of posts per month. Not that I am a writer or something, but blogging gives me another world to pour my feelings out. There have been things I want to blog and I cant as I run out of intentions or guts but, I have seen many blogs dying or living in coma due to this. Certainly I don't want this to happen to my blog! So even with the risk of  bore you with my bulletins here I go!

• Thanks to my evening night lectures which keeps my mind running at the super sonic speed even at twelve in the night, I have turned into a night person. I tried and even started getting up in the morning but my anti allergic (anti sneezing - nose leaking cum coughing) medicines made me sleep ten plus hours a day. When I stopped it, I continued sleeping for same numbers of hours but at odd times. Like from 3 am to 11 am?! So, after days, today when I got up at 7.30 am, I decided to blog! Isn't it a beautiful day with a cup of adarak wali chai?!  *Coughing!* *Sneezing* 
• Some days ago, I felt amazingly at home!While eating canteen food in the university! Can you believe it? Yeah, so it was one of those lonely days before the lecture. No one was to give me a company to eat.I could not make anything at home. I wanted to eat something Indian and so I tried Komala's in the canteen! I was trying to locate an empty table.A Singaporean lady near by smiled (?!) at me and asked me to sit on the same table. She was quite casual,yeah she was working there. I smiled back and sat to wait for my Paneer Paratha to cool down. She started, " Is it some kind of a Dosai?!", I said no and explained how it is made. "India has amazing food range no?!", I smiled back. I was irritated with the taste of Paratha, which was horribly hot as well. I thought I should take Iced Milo. I got up and went to the stall which was empty. She got up and said, "You want iced Milo lah?", I nodded. She suddenly came forward and said," You go and eat lah, I will come and give you the glass"! Yeah, with that I got tissue papers as well. She sat down with me, talked to me while I finished the horrible Paratha. Period. Something like mom does at home, just sitting at the table while I eat!
• The other day, when me and my Kiddo friend 1 (I will post about us some time!) wanted to eat hot waffles! I had an idea that it might contain eggs! So, we asked as my Kiddo friend 2 doesn't even tough eggs! I being, 'eggs only in cakes and not at home in raw form' girl I asked the lady making it, "Does this contain eggs?", She replied, "No!". I had a doubt. I pointed at the vessel where she had kept the batter and asked again. She laughed and said, "Yes yes Many Many egg!" Yeah English was being murdered.
• Time flies. I came to Singapore a few months back, I realize now, very soon I am going to finish my studies. Many students feel at home in Singapore. I realized, I cant settle outside India.Period.
• Next few months are not going to be easy. I have to cross check my ambitions and dreams every now and then. As I read it some where, "Dont give up what you want the most, for what you want now!"
• April, is going to really challenging as well. With all sneezing coughing and sleeping problems, I have exams at the end.I have to fight with my destiny for my work, my life. Or may be convincing destiny works?

How about you all? Any bulletins?

Tried!

Reference: The awesome TED talk: 
http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kay_if_i_should_have_a_daughter.html


I remember I believed as a kid,
Independence and education will bring happiness,need not bid;
Those books fascinated me, I was assured;
Dad is saying the truth, my dream of machines are so good.

Joys and sorrows which look small now;
Of course they are close to me, no idea how,
My degree, my job and one more try to study hard
I have doubts over my believes,if machines are still on my card.

Money is not the problem, my heart is;
No body told me how I am going to express by machines and means,
I studied, I served, I blogged and I danced
Even the bath room songs did not give me any chance.

Those are hidden expressions trying to bloom inside my soul
Joy, happiness, tears, curiosity everything ready to be poured in the bowl,
Emotions are not good if they are caged inside,
Do you know how I can throw  away creatively, yet imbibe.

No degree no money, no work can teach you to express,
Here I am telling you as it is for me the best,
Keep on singing, dancing, crafting and cry!
That was the kind of 'Spoken Poetry' I tried;
I suddenly smiled!

Love, again!

Any person on this earth can not be perfect. Yes, that is the rule of thumb to love. Each of us has some amazing qualities, along with them, we have a bunch of negative or I would put them as not-so-positive traits. Does that mean, we are not meant to be loved? No, we all deserve love and care from each other. That is how the world moves on every moment.

Loving some one, even after knowing him or her (totally!) is not easy. One needs guts, power of forgiveness and adjustment, the power to resolve fights and many more other qualities. These qualities to fight flaws make us Human. That is why human beings have partners for life!

I know one person with some really irritating qualities. Qualities?! Yes, as these qualities make her unique.

• She is an absolute emotional fool. She gets attached, she gets ditched too. She cries for herself and for others too. No that is not the problem. The problem is she throws her frustration on people whom she loves. Yeah she fights too,horribly. 
• She is otherwise a happy-go-lucky person. She can divert her mind from things which irritate her, most of the times. Wait, she is, when negative or depressed creates a whole big cloud of negativity around her. She can pull people in it! Pathetic I know.
• She calls her best friends and cry-scream. Yeah some times they scold,some times they listen to her. Some times they just ignore her. She cries again and then never stand on her attitude and gets back to her original mood in a day. In process she sometimes hurt her own people.
• She is moody. She thinks a lot. With age she is becoming choosy and cautious about the whole  game of friendship.

Do you think, you will like her? I like her. In fact I love her. Absolutely, with all her flaws. Her flaws make her warm! *

May be that is the unconditional love I possess for her. 

Yeah,she is Bubblegum and 'Love Thyself' is what I believe! ;)

PS: I think I owe this post to 'Shana' who, makes me realize each time we fight out of a fanatic discussion! 

*Copy rights reserved by my best buddy!

For me please?

If some one asks me, do you believe in God? I say, yes. I believe in all those thousands of Gods and Goddesses in Hindu religion,I believe in Mahavir , I believe in Allah, Jesus , Buddha too. As I believe in the Super power.  A few days ago I wanted to ask for something to this super power but I did not dare. I have started asking what I deserve. There is a reason.

I have a different relation with the super power. I fight, I snatch whatever I want and some times the super power does that to me. So when I tried asking for something a few years ago, he gave but made me suffer after giving or say, gave me after a long fight. I believe it was his way of making me stronger. I am twenty four, I can still fight.

What a two year old baby can do?? She has done it though.

She calls me Masi. She is the one toddler who when calls me 'Masi', triggers my heart. I see myself in her. There are some similarities. She had a tough fight when she was born. A real tough one, I had one too but not this tough. She was brave, she was awesome.

She just turned two. She is sick again. I don't know how is she. I have not seen her in the hospital. She is one of those very few reasons for me to enjoy in Singapore. I don't want even the simple cold to cling on to her.

I wont make things more complex. If you share better relations with God than me, the super power,

PRAY for her. 

For me please?