Merry Christmas!!

So..it was Christmas and we kinda celebrated it...Yeah dhriti was maha excited about christmas tree and so...we took her "mall-hopping" and showed her the christmas decorations :)


Getting ready to go to MegaMall. Destination-I


Christmas decorations there...it was awesome! And we had a really tough time getting Dhriti to pose for the photos


One "proper" snap we could get her to strike a pose for!

Next day we went to TimesSquare, yet another mall. The decorations were not "ooh-la-lah" but quite okay.

Our latest "family photo"

We then went to the indoor theme park and Dhriti took a few rides...On one of those rides...

Waiting for her "train" to come and pick her up!

And finally on Christmas, we got her a "dress" and dressed her up...


Ofcourse, a Christmas tree too!


So...that's it...our 3 day long holiday :)

A movie on a week-day

Okay...our maid was sick so I couldn't come in for work yesterday. So, after having some incredibly good time with Dhriti and getting her to sleep, I started watching Umrao Jaan. Yeah, we bought that DVD some weekends back hoping to see it someday (the seeing part is ME only, not WE!)

And it was actually quite okay, slow-ish kind of movie but really...Ash was not bad....she actually was good in some way...Abhishek was the one who was bad...not really suitable for the role and Suniel Shetty ...blahhh..

this actually set me thinking...we normally follow the trend don't we? If lots of people say Ash is very plastic, doesn't know how to act...we expect the same thing. I am really not sure if Abhishek is the greatest amongst the current actors, is he really that good? Or is it again the people's voice and not mine? Don't really know!

But who cares..as long as I get to watch a movie un-interrupted on a weekday, that's good enough for me!

A quick snapshot of what i watched over the last few weekends:
Don-Good and all but too many twists in the tale. And couldn't compare with the older version coz I almost forgot that :(
Dor - Interesting movie and every one was good except for Nagesh Kukunoor. Gul Panag is actually very cute :)
Janeman- Yet to finish this fare, maybe wrong timing (Dhriti was trying to eat food off my plate) or whatever but I somehow didn't like the part that I saw.

Going the family way

One of my colleagues is getting married today...and I wish I were there right now...
there are just too many marriages that I missed out...marriages of my best friends...relatives..

I was never really all that excited when i was a kid to attend marriages..maybe thats got to do with the fact that there were too many relatives all keen on asking how you have been studying!!

How I wanted to grow-up...not care about the studies and enjoy the marriages...Aps and Suneetha's marriages were one that I'll never forget (Never mind the fact that i cant seem to recollect the exact date...thats another story all together)
Both these decided to get married on the same day...one in the day @ Hyd and one in the night @ Vja...and this was when we were just out of college...so we were all still closely knit, in-contact and all that stuff...
so we had this special bus to take us from Hyd to Vja just after the marriage got over
Since I stay @ Vja...all of us landed at our house and somehow it looked as if we were having a marriage @ our place...

These were the only friends marriages that I attended...and then Sunnu's marriage in Nellore...
I wish I could have attended the rest...

And a new friend again

Dhriti has a new friend at home, Pavani...yeah one of our colleague from India is here to work from the KL office. And dhriti has taken instant liking to her..she treats her more like a friend

And courtesy Pavani...we have some amazing snaps of Dhriti taken over the last weekend...



A thinking Dhriti...????


That's her new bag!


The teddy is bigger than her, but she still manages to lift it up...carry all over the house and actually even sit on it..


This is her "house". We had just too many of her toys lying all around the house...so I decided to buy this "house tent" and dump all the toys there..


Her fav chair...now she stands up on this chair and does all sorts of stupid things...maybe joining circus could be one of her career options..

I wish...

....I were at home right now, not bothered with the timelines and deadlines at office
....It was my birthday today, I got so so influenced by Vidhya's blog
....I could go back to India and spend some time with my parents...
....I could go back and relive those college days..ofcourse minus the exams..
....I could afford to buy that Sony vaio yesterday...or maybe not think twice abt buying something that's so dreadfully costly..
....there were no traffic jams in the world..
....dhriti had never fallen ill...

I hope...
..Dhriti is never sick again..
...Shiva has a good time at work..and doesnt get stressed out..
...i'd be able to share a good rapport with my relatives once I'm back in India
...my father stays fit for a long time to come...he still needs to see dhriti and play with her
...my brother settles down well...he deserves it and he's been working hard on being a good doctor all these years..
...we'd have enough money to donate and lend to people in need

And there are loads of other things like this...but yes essentially looks like I've gone mad and not fit to work anymore!!!

Thankgod

she is back to normal now! Yeah Dhriti was down with fever all of last week which meant I couldn't go to the office at all. She has recovered now and is back to her usual self and this means I can't be with her coz I have a lot of pending stuff at office (literally late night everyday). I hardly get to spend an hour with her all through the day...
Anyways she is fine...doing good. And I need to take her to a zoo and a temple. Let's see how it goes. I promised to do that

The idiot box

A lots been happening with Dhriti lately...she is a grown-up kid now ...:) She talks non-stop, runs around, jumps, plays with crayons for hours together, watches TV !!!!!!
Yeah...she is "into" watching TV these days...she can recognise ALL the TV serials...Tamil (yeah we get only Tamil here in KL) and Hindi..(thanks to Zee) and also some Malayalam serial that even I am not aware of...
she sings to glory all those title songs..."Selvi", "Kalki","Gubbare", "Sa-Re-Ga-Ma-Pa" (ofcourse including the HeroHonda...which she pronounces as HeroGonda)

and I just cant wait for her to grow up and start watching movies...oh what fun we'll have then...!!!
I am just hoping she likes MY kind of movies and not the ones that her dad prefers...
so get us some purrrfect Hindi movies,telugu movies...and we are happy...when Dhriti..when? :)

OK the picture has nothing to do with this post...this is the one we've taken when we went to visit Sammy...more pictures from India trip are due and will post them soon...

Miss You....

yeah...somehow my heart's very heavy today. I've been thinking of what my parents might be doing...what my friends might be doing at this moment..
And I miss them all....Its really been ages since I've talked to some of my close friends...ages since I've actually chatted with them...even when I met Sammy in India...it was not the same...not the good old gossip...we really didn't have time for that...
I don't know how, when...etc etc...but I know for sure that I need to do that sometime..sit back, enjoy...have chai...read a novel and gossip over the phone...and yeah ofcourse play with Dhriti...:)

Miss You All...and Love You All....

And I am back:)

and back with lots of work pending...and piled-up at office :((
But then that had to happen...

Anyways...how was my trip? Good...but not really great...

Couldn't meet Vatsan and I am so very much ashamed of myself
And then met Sammy after a long long time, and no she didnt change (except for the fact that I got to know that they .. she and her husband jogged early in the morning on their vacation!!!!!!
Good to know that she found an ideal match !!)

Had some really house-wife stuff to do, thanks to the maid who was on a festival vacation in Hyd..
And literally did not even boil Dhriti's bottles at Vijayawada, thanks to so many people ready to do the stuff for me

All and all, Dhriti had a great time, some times getting cranky...and all "Mammmmmmyyyyy" but she was great nevertheless.

Now waiting for the time to get back to India FINALLY

A much needed break

is finally on the cards!!. Yes, we are flying back to India tonight for a 3 weeks holiday....
so...after some hectic weeks of handing over the work (which BTW is still not over), with lots of apprehension on how things are going to work out....and ofcourse asusual lots of things left unattended....we are FINALLY off....

And then..

the unthinkable happened...I found my phone again (after almost 24 hrs!!!)

Yes today morning I tried calling my phone again and it still rang...Now if someone stole the phone, wouldn't they just throw away my SIM by now...so that kind of propelled me (and one of my colleague's push) to go back to the showroom I visited yesterday...
I went there and asked the person-in-charge...
Me: Did U happen to see any Samsung phone here. I might have lost it yesterday.
She: No, nothing that I know of.
Me: I don't think I'll find it, but still...it seems to be ringing...so can U check with anyone from yesterday's staff please
She: Ok..
Goes, checks with the cashier and comes back and gives me the phone...

What do I do in return...?Give a million dollar smile and walk away with my phone!! :)

Will they be friends aswell?

Maybe yes...maybe No...but I atleast want them to meet, want them to understand when they grow up, that their mothers were best friends!!

This is Akanksha, Aps cutie-cutie daughter...

Why...why me?

I've been using a mobile phone since the last 4-5 years. I've never had a habit of carrying a purse or a hand bag. That means I effectively manage my hand-phone + wallet in MY hands. And I've never lost anything...
So by now you know where this is going right? Yeah...I lost my mobile today. And add to it the problem that it was a company phone not even my personal phone. And that means even if I buy a phone now, I'll have to replace the lost phone first :(
Boo hooo....

(N)Mandu

Whole of last week, Dhriti had some wonderful time in company of a cute little one called Nandu. Or if Dhriti had her way, it will be Mandu.
She was ready right from the moment Nandu arrived, she was waiting for him to come from the airport.
She was always at his back,giving him this and that to play with and ofcourse taking away anything that is even remotely interesting to her :)
She HAS to be there when he is taking bath.
She was imitating him all thru', crawling like him, laughing like him and "sounding" like him
She didnt even cry when this "chinna babu" pulled her hair :) and she doesn't even let me touch her hair!!
She even tried "teaching" him the animals/words from her books!

Now, she promtly says "India" whenever we ask her where Nandu is.

Vinayakachaviti

This festival has always had a special place in my heart. One of the festivals that I love and has more to it rather than just cooking and eating.
This was our third consecutive vinayaka chaviti @ KL and maybe the last one here. And this year we had friends visiting us and so all of did the puja together.
Dhriti had a gala time trying to replicate whatever we were doing. She had a glass (with water) and a spoon and was pouring water in my hands all thru' the puja!

this is how our Ganesh looked...and no we didnt do the puja in a jungle :)

An outing

We have friends visiting us here, so we went out last weekend. Its a newly (relatively) formed state within Malaysia with all the government offices there.
thats called Putrajaya and its really very beautiful. Some of the snaps taken during that visit..




Dhriti is a big girl now...she actually went, sat there and asked her dad to click a photo!!

Pilla gang of the trip, only after taking this snap Dhriti told us that it was "veedi" (hot) on that stone that they were sitting on :) We didn't realise it till then and this girl wouldn't tell us till we took that snap!!!

Few more snaps on the yahoo photos here

Krishnashtami

Our own lil Krishna....celebrating Janmashtami @ home....

Flirting!

Yeah, that's a very suggestive title...but then why not??
Okay...when was the last I flirted with somebody....hmmm cant even seem to recollect...actually haven't even talked to anybody about this off late..
That is quite strange considering the fact that that was the ONLY thing we did when we were at college...flirted and gossiped...:)
Today...I was generally very very bored...and was surfing orkut and found quite a few "old flames" there :)
And the fact that they sent a request for friend and scrapped was an added nudge to this post...!!

Sometime back Putchu sent me a cassette (yeah those were the days no cds yet) that we'd gifted her on her b'day when we were at college. I was listening to that and realised that there is not even a single person whom we haven't teased...
Each and every one in our gang (all girls gang) spoke to putchu,wished her and dedicated a song (their fav) to her as her b'day gift.
But quite surprisingly, we teased each and every girl with some or the other guy...some of them so bizzarre that I was like..."oh...sheesh...we teased her with HIM then, is it??!!!!"

After so many years, when I read this scarp in orkut I find myself recollecting everything...and all that seems so very long long ago...

Those curious glances/cat calls when on of the girls in the hostel would shout...Sirisha, final year,Civil someone's come for you!!

Those days when we sat in Sammy's room and looked out of the window (we choose that room specifically for that window facing the outside of the hostel) and saw who came for whom on Val day (and why nobody actually came for us)

Those days when we used to tease poor Putchu with the most ruthless guys in the campus!!

Those days when I went out for a movie before the final exam.

Those days when we quaralled with day-skis for not having shared their feelings/stories/thoughts with us

Those days when we had fights...

All those strange and unknown people we teased each other with....

Man...how I miss those days!!!!!

So..what's happening??

Dhriti is down with cold and a little fever.Now that I've got that cold hopefully she will be on road to recovery and getting back to normal soon :)

She was dressed in her new dress (the one sent by ammamma all the way from Vijayawada) last Friday. She looked cute in that one asusual.

Here are some photographs...

Some times...

she behaves like the best child in the world, so cute..so innocent...so irresistable..

This is a photograph taken with Shiva's mobile, and that's one of my fav dresses...

After a long long long long time

Yeah its really really long time since I've literally fallen for a song. Long long ago, when we were in REC, during the first year...there was this movie called Maachis. The songs of the movie were a craze amongst a close group of friends. We used to play them non-stop (even if there was a power-cut using batteries!!).
Then there was Zakhm which had a similar effect. Some of us at college were so very addicted to those songs that even today if I hear to one line of any of those songs,it brings back a flood of memories.
And I am bound to have a heavy-heart for the rest of the day...remembering those good old days...

I am not a songs person at office, I somehow don't like the idea of listening to songs with headphones....but I was so very addicted to these Omkara songs, that I put them on a continuous loop and listened to them all day looonng..

And looks like I'm going to be in love with these songs for a life time....

F.R.I.E.N.D.S

No..this is not a post about the "all-famous" sitcom, yeah though we watched the early season's episodes yesterday night...The post is still not about them.

Okay...this is about the friends I've managed to collect and also neglect over a period of time.

When I was a small kid,my friends usually were from the relatives gang, my cousins et all..There were 2 cousins of mine who visited us from hyderabad. We were (atleast I was) in awe of them, they were from a metro and we were just small town kiddos. I can't even correctly recall their names and don't even know where they are now. Last heard, one of them was a good cricketer!!

And then in school, over the years I formed a kind of a close bond with a few friends of mine. Swapna,Sreelatha,Sailaja, Pujitha and many more. There was Chandana, a sports person who got "assigned" to our school. She was a basket ball player and had a tough time staying awake in the classes. I used to help her with her studies and all that and though we were quite different we caught on fast and became best friends. I even attended basket ball training :) But then post school, we had to part ways. Yeah she was still very much in town, but lives had already drifted. She contacted me sometime back, but "that thing" is not there, no sparks. She had to go through a lot of bad times, had really rough patches. All I can do is hope the best for her and maybe meet her once I am back in Hyderabad.

Post school, I attended a gruelling course for my Intermediate and life was full of extra classes, tests etc etc. I never liked even one bit of my life there. But that inventually got me into REC and that's a different story!
During that phase, we were a gang of four. And yes, I'm in contact with all three of them,though not regularly. Only times of that college that I can vividly recollect are the movies that we went to after our Sunday tests and the trips we made to each others houses. I still wish I was in more regular contact with them, more a part of their lives but somehow can't make it....
I never thought we will have to depart, never ever imagined how life would be without them. That was when one great person told us, you will have to depart now to meet new people and hope that you'll be there together for the rest of our lives. I believed in him.

Life in REC, Warangal started. Did I forget the good, old days in Vijayawada. No, not really, but who in the world had time for anything else?? Life was a roller-coaster ride. And I don't think any post would do justice to the friendships that I formed for a lifetime there. The guys, the gals, the FAFO (we called a gang of 4 of us FAFO, fabulous four)
Once the 4 years ended and we'd taken up our eventual courses of life, all 3 of them headed towards the greener pastures (!!) i.e. the US and I stayed back all alone in Hyd.

Yes, there were friends after that, there was fun, there was life but nothing ever ever ever was going to be the same again.

We still try and keep in touch, we call, write emails, send some gifts (oh,okay only Putchu sent...!) but still its not the same.

For now, all I can think of and visualise is once all of us turn 50, retire and stop being the money churning machines that we are now, we would have time for each other. Hopefully all of us would settle down at the same place (in Kazipet!!). Then that's what I would call L.I.F.E!!!!

What to do?

When there is work to do, but you dont feel like doing it?
When there is a BIGGGGG document that needs to be written, but you are in no mood (and you actually have no clue!!)
When you are not feeling hungry, but just wish there was something to munch on (but again you don't know what to munch on...)
When you want to go home...but you know you can't coz there is work at office

Oh well!! I might as well ask someone who is going out for a break to get me a coke..
and if I am still not tuned-in to work, I might aswell call for a meeting

Afterall, there are some advantages of being a project manager!!!!

I just can't take them

...yeah I just can't handle, can't tolerate people who are pushy, stepping on others toes kinds. They really suck and this spoils the environment especially at work!!
God...how I wish I could tell them on their face. But then there's something called "diplomacy" , got to live with this as an "occupational hazard"

Strange but true

Its amazing when certain totally not-at-all-possible, generally-for discussions kind of things, turn into a reality.

Yeah, really,true....
When we were @ college, we used to live on Top Ramen noodles. The food in the hostel was bad and though we finished our dinner by 8 (mess closes by 8), we used to get a Top Ramen, just in case types, and finally cook and eat that late in the night.
And if the food in the mess is really really gross, we always had our Top Ramen to fall back on.
Back then, we used to think that once we have our own kids, we might aswell tell them that maggie/top ramen is our staple food. It used to be the joke of our college times.

Little did we know that it could actually turn into a reality.

Today, my not-even-two-years-old daughter, is all "fida" about this exquisite dish called maggie.
She gets up early in the morning and says...Amma...maggie pettamma (Give me maggie)
She doesn't eat anything for the whole day, whatever you cook and give and bribe. Don't worry we have a saviour in the form of maggie..

Was what I ate for 4 years of my life so very huge, that it literally was carried to the genes and came back to haunt me in the form of my daughter????
Does it really work that way??

Life sucks

...when you don't have a lot of work to do at office
....and when you've finished reading most of the blogs online that you are aware of
...and when you've covered all the news sites+movies sites including idlebrain.com

Oh and what a mess!!

This was the general reaction yesterday as we started to "toilet train" dhriti...

We have to take the trouble of taking her to the loo every 1 hour (without fail) and ask her to pee...This actually works fine till the time we forget about it.

And add to that the fact that Dhriti has become kind of averse to diapers, you can get her to wear a diaper ONLY when she is sleeping...

At times I am like...why she behaves as if she is SOOOOOO intelligent,why cant she be so good at this also...Why does she have to take more than 1 day???

Goddddddd.....grant me some patience...and on top of this aunty (she looks after Dhriti and is doing most of the work actually!!) tells me every other kid of Dhriti's age is already toilet trained...Why....why...why compare???

Some random thoughts

Now when I see another mother with a toddler at tow I stop, look up and smile...We both know why, we share this common joy of being mothers..

Now when we are at a public place (a hotel, a plane, a gathering) and I suddenly hear a squeal from a kid, I dont snigger, I know there's a kid somewhere there

Now when there is no work at office, I dont feel like inventing new work to do.I just buy some time before its time to pack off...

Now when there is a new movie in town,we dont rush. We patiently wait for a DVD, wait for a weekend, wait for Dhriti to fall into a deep sleep and then start watching the movie. Gone are the days, when I used to watch a movie 1st day 1st show and also watch movies back to back

Now when there is a weekend, we look out for kiddie places, or places not too far away coz i cant just hold Dhriti in the car for a long long time

Now when we are in mood to eat food outside (which anyways sucks in KL) we still cook and give Dhriti her food before we end up at a hotel. And I dont remember the last time both Shiva and myself sat together to eat a lesuirely and casual meal

P.S: I was jealous of Shiva using this picture in his blog so copied it here :)

Yuppieeeeeeee

Shiva started blogging...........!!!!!! Check that out...and we might start quarelling about who puts Dhriti's best pictures on their blogs...
And other-wise life's okay...updated Dhriti's Chronicles and yes she is doing fine..

Singing Sensation

Presenting to you the latest sensation on the arena of music...Dhritiiiiiiiiiiiiiii.........

If you can excuse her fondness for a particular thing called "Light", the attached video promises to be pleasure to the ears..

We tried to record using a phone and if this sounds/looks ok, we shud be able to do more of this sorts....

Touching an all-time low....

June 8th:

Dhriti had high temperature and this fever resulted in what is medically called "Febrile Seizures"
Now I know what people mean when they say, I wouldnt wish this for the worst of my enemies. Yes, I really wouldn't want any parents to go through this trauma. It was quite a scare to see Dhriti...the pretty pretty one go so uncontrollable and then limp...God, that was one scary day.
By god's grace, she is fine now, doing good and we are also coping up with the fact that yes, that had to happen, but life will go on......
For all the parents out there....watch out when your kid is having fever...closely monitor them and ensure that you do padding with cold water and bring down the temperature soon...
And if against hope of hopes your child does have seizures try and stay calm...though it is very very very difficult.
This is common problem with all the toddlers and one in 25 children have this problem, its just scary and it is NOT AT ALL harmful.

Chatter Box

More than a chatter box, she is a parrot. A sweet one at that...she keeps repeating every word that you utter.
I have a feeling that she learns her words fast...
some cute things that she says...
Umpty dumpty--Her version of humpty dumpty in a definite sing-song fashion
Hi...and Babbaaaiii--No one in the lift is spared, everyone gets either a Hi or a babbaaaiii...the lucky ones get both!!
Chooos-Shoes, these days she wears one pair and carries one pair in hand
Sam-mam-mam--Meaning "sambandham", she picked this word during some conversion we were having @ home. And now, we keep repeating just to get her attention and make her repeat it..:)
Babbu-luuu---Thats Bablu, the cute little kid , I wonder if she mistakes him for a toy...

and you can get her to repeat any word that you want, she'll definetely give it a try...a best shot!!
These days we are into learning tounge twisters...
"Betty bought some butter...but the butter was bitter...so..Betty bought some better butter to make the bitter butter better!!"
She's trying her hand at this now...keep up the good work

And life goes on.....

I've been putting off writing this one since quite some time...
Everytime I see this or any other blog, I feel like writing something...but ultimately dont do so...coz I just cant get myself into writing this..
6th May, I got a call from Aps in the morning...asking me if I got to know the news...I was like what...she said about A.S...I said No...half expecting her to be pregnant or something like that...
and then she tells me..A.S passed away on 4th ee...
thats the most shocking news I've heard in my life time....how..when...why...just too many questions...too many visions...too many thoughts...
and finally we got to know the details...actually there aren't much..
she was fine...doing good..they were planning on getting a car during the weekend,moving into a new house next month, starting a family next year and things like any normal 25-30 year olds would do...
And then suddenly one night she comes home from office, has dinner, watches TV (yeah she was into TV serials bigtime) and then before going to bed goes to the rest room, but never comes back.
Doctors say it could be massive heart stroke (but why in a 26 year old lady with no tensions in life!!!), or extreme fits...(Is that really possible!!!) or something to do with blood clot in the brain...

Life is such a mess...so very unfair..
they've had some of their toughest times in life...convincing their parents..extended families...getting all of them to agree...and then finally get married...V & A.S the best couple we've ever known...why would anybody want to do this to them? Why take away something that they've just begun to enjoy and cherish...why give them something in the first place and take it away so rudely..so suddenly...but why...??

Images keep flashing across my mind...the times we spent togther, the songs we sang together, the stressfull times we had while she was admitted into the hospital during our college, the life after REC in Hyd, the fight we had..the only friend that I make a point to visit whenever I am in India..the only link I've got to my most treasured past...my college life..but why her....???

And then suddenly...the most toughest question hit me in my face...Why V...? Yeah agreed it was sudden.. she could have had a better life...but now she is no more...but V is alone here...with just a few years of memories to drag him along for the rest of his lifetime...how...?why...? will he ever be able to get back to normal...will he ever enjoy listening to a song and not remember her sweet voice...???If, afterall, I am not able to do that...can he...?? How come one incident in life shatters a person...reduces him to a sorry sight..why him...? why him??Life's so unfair..
What have they done to deserve this kind of treatment...? Is this fate...?Should it be so brutal...?

Now when I hear someone singing...laughing...having fun I am reminded suddenly of things that A.S cant do...things V might not be able to enjoy till maybe quite some time...
And what is it that keeps us going...? What have we done better to continue to live and enjoy life..?

Life simply goes on...even if it means it will be blown away like a candle suddenly one day...

She loves ......

playing in water... One such photograph from the water world, where she had a terrific time...even had her milk while sitting on the float. What else does she love...

1. Yes, her "banana". Not a single day passes without having a banana...and she picks them up whenever we are in a shop!!

2. Her chair, we bought her a chair recently and she loves that. The best combination, when she puts her "duppati" (blanket) in that chair and sits on it!!

3. TV stand.You just cant pull her away from the stand. These days she tries to "climb" that stand

4. Running out of the house. Out of the house she is elated...cant catch her.

But the award goes to "shoes". Be it her shoes or our slippers at home. We are allowed to remove her shoes only while she is sleeping

Sit back and enjoy!

Long before I started writing this blog...I was already reading many other blog sites (which these days are simply all over the place)

I've often wondered at how gifted a few people were with "words", really how well they write.
Maybe that was one reason why I couldn't get myself to start writing. Seems strange but somehow I didn't want to be underrated, I didn't want my writings to be inferior when compared to theirs...maybe I felt I wouldn't be as good as they are when it comes to "expressing thoughts in words".

Doesn't this happen quite regularly with most of us? We keep saying we don't want to be compared with anybody. I used to say this very often when I was young, when my mom told me about my cousins et all and when my aunts used to tell me how I should try and emulate my cousins and come up in life!!
(Actually there was this great big cousin of mine, who asked me what the turnover of my company was and when i said I didnt know, he was like "How can people be like this???" Sorry,but maybe I am not your kind.)

This "comparision bug" bites very early in one's life. As a kid you are compared to the kids around you, why are you not as active as the other kid is...why are you not getting as many marks as the other one is getting...
Even at school, we as children try to compare...how many marks did you get? Even if you dont get a 100 on 100 thats ok as long as you've got the highest in the class...
Atleast as kids we are our own self. If we are pissed off at the other kid even though he is your best friend, if he doesnt give you a toy, if he is not sharing a choclate, if he gets better marks than you, you can scream,cry and SHOW you are jealous.

But as you grow old, you can't do that. It's always "I'm so so so very happy for you!!"
"That's ok, even if I don't get it, you got it right and you are my friend"
How many times did I say that???!!! but at the bottom of my heart kept feeling...What if I were in her place??!!!
Why is it so bad to feel jealous and also show it?

I've often wondered why some people are "more gifted" and why I am simply an "above average girl" (not the brilliant one or the genious!!)
Maybe that was for my own good, maybe that was my destiny, yeah it really helps to believe in destiny (you can always leave the complex things to that!!)

Maybe if I was more intelligent, more smart, more whatever, I wouldn't have been leading the life I am leading today.
And I am perfectly happy with the way things are (yeah maybe I would love to learn swimming,french,horse riding, golf and spend lots of money building my wardrobe...,not worry about my bank balance...but who cares!!)

So, see using a simple theory I've come to terms with it. Every person is different from the other. And everyone needs friends and wellwishers (and it helps if you can hide your J feelings from this gang!) and these are the people who will appreciate anything that you do, these are the people that will give you a pat on the back when you've done something good, these are the people who will be there when you are down...
So, sit back enjoy and look out for building this group.

Dhriti-The Menance

Ok...I am making a deliberate attempt of not writing anything about REC or my friends there :)

Today moning I felt unusually lazy (not that I am at my best every morning,but today saw more of my "badhakam"). I didnt feel like waking up at all and even Dhriti was asleep so I was like what the hell...!!
And then...

Shot I:
Suddenly she wakes up says "Papa","Babu"...and then she starts off with her antics, starts flying like a bird (we taught her that recently and she is very good at that!!) and then gets off the bed and starts dancing...
Once all that is over and after pulling at my hair real hard and ensuring that I am fully awake she gives me this BIG "hiiiiiiii".

I felt on the top of the world...my daughter is the cutest one...the best...(Shiva actually says bestest,but I'd settle for best!!)

Shot II:

I am finally ready...good to go...and doing some puja...she tags along and throws the kumkum on the floor (she was actually trying to put that on her face), eats some, goes and gets the slippers that I left and eats them tooo and then goes near the TV and pulls off all the wires, eats my mobile and when I put her in her high chair screams at the top of her voice...

And I am like....Gooooodddddd...what the hell is she doing, why can't she just sit and stay calm at one place...

Shot III:

I am off to the office and she gives me a flying kiss and says..."Babbayyyyiii" (her version of Bye Bye!!) my euphoria is back again...!!

I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow...how different she is going to be...what she is going to become in her life..and all that..
But for now..every day...every moment with her is so very different...

Home after home - My LH

The day I entered this place and my parents left me there I cried...and the day I had to leave this place, all my friends and the cozy world that we've built there I cried again!
My LH, ladies hostel in REC, Warangal. Wow...what a place that was!!!! Under the roof (or the one that it didnt have) of this place, we had some of our best times in the world.

The ragging session that we attended...all standing in a "semi-circle" and then in the "center of gravity" of a block when we were giving our intro.

The scintilla that we let our hairs down for the first time...and the fun we've had!!

The freshers and the farewell parties that we had...

The mess that we went to...where we ate for 10 mins but sat down for hours togther

The phone calls we attended and the "calls" we attended from the guys waiting outside...

The exam tensions...results tensions...the happy and the sad times...

The avvas and saarus of the place...

The friends we made for a life-time....

I am sure everybody has got some great memories of this place...and it is still making people staying there alive!!

This is one place I would love to go back ...

Sirisha. P
CB 207