Teachers day! :)

Some of us know and a lot of us don’t know that it’s Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan’s birthday which is celebrated as teachers day on September 5th of every year.

While in school, this meant something entirely different to me… We would start practising days before, for a dance… Irrespective of whether we gave the performance or not, we would religiously practise.
And teachers day for us was that day when they were supposed to be special, we didn’t know why when we were really young, but still we genuinely wished them and bought them flowers and gifts, without expecting anything but love in return.
I think for a teacher that is the entire purpose of being one, when a small child comes upto her with a flower in her hand and says “Happy teachers day miss!” She will be elated to no bounds.
And when we were the children doing it, the fact that our “miss”  felt so happy was something that made us happy. Wow! Such wonderful emotions and such thoughtfulness exhibited at such a young age, starts waning with age, unfortunately.

If you ask me, it’s just about the quality of the teachers. At Baldwin Girls’ where I did my schooling, the teachers were angels. I’m still so overwhelmed when I think of each one of them.
They were really people who were dedicated to the children, who wanted to make sure that each one of them was carefully and beautifully moulded.

Every bit of who I am today is owed to the teachers at my school. From day one, they made me feel at home. And I think I can never forget those days. And anyone who reads this blog will agree that they loved their school days the most.

I wonder why… Do the quality of teachers itself start to dip as we go higher or is it just our attitude towards them? I happen to believe it’s the former…
Cos in school, teachers were awe inspiring, when they taught you listened. And they were so dignified and commanded respect and love.

Sadly for me, after school. I’ve met few teachers who have inspired me to learn, who have immersed me in the subject they taught and showed me the way and held my hand and walked along the road, not just people who pushed me into the darkness. Atleast, where I’m studying, teachers are more like predators, who don’t want their students to prosper in life. Or even if they aren’t that bad, the most they can do for the goodwill of their students is, not care!

Today I sms-ed a school teacher … Mrs. Rozario, who taught me english at school replied with so much love, I don’t even know if she remembers my face, but she thanked me and blessed me and told me that she had still stored the message that I had sent her last year.
Mrs. Rozario, who taught me Julius Caesar so well that I can still quote. I remember that much. She was the one who instilled in me, the love for the English language. If I am considering writing as a career option today then it’s only because of her.

All the teachers from Baldwins… (I just want to mention all their names… No rewards for reading it!)
Mrs Bhama, Mrs Sharmila Dutta, Mrs Pramila, Mrs Shylaja Robins, Mrs Esther Shobha, Mrs. Lourdes- My primary school teachers.
Mrs. Arujah, Mrs. George, Mrs Esther Kasim, Mrs Shailaja, Mrs. Manjula Chatterji, Mrs Savitha, Mrs. Leena Daniel, Mrs. Jean Pinto- My middle school teachers.

Mrs Suma Charles, Mrs Linda Peters, Mrs. Sridevi, Mrs. Vandana Dayal, Mrs. Beena Samuel, Mrs. Raju, Mrs. Bhadran, Mrs. Rozario, Ms. Nathan, Mr. Mitchell, Mrs. Parvathi, Mrs. Elizabeth Rajaratnam, Ms. Rebecca Jacob, Mrs. Pratima Rao… My high school teachers.

They all played an important role,

Especially the late Mrs. Raju- who taught me that studies were not the most important thing in life, it was will power and courage.
Mrs. Rozario- Who just taught so English so well, that she made it look all the more beautiful. She literally breathed life into each character and story she talked about, my favourites being Wordsworth’s Lucy and Brutus from Julius Caesar.

Mrs. Pratima Rao- who told me to think and set my priorities right. She was the smartest person I ever knew, really!

Mrs. Dayal- who was SO kind…

Everyone, really… I miss them so much and remember them and am ever grateful to them.
Happy teachers day!

A random post on absolutely nothing!

I’m posting after a month, it’s been a LONG month because I had exams, which kept me continually stressed out. And I think the more stressed out one is, creativity gets blocked and hence the inactivity on the blog. I don’t know if anyone missed me at all, but I certainly did miss writing.

I realise writing is such an important part of my life, I think it’s part of my life. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it, but my blog is something that is completely mine, I’m not answerable to anyone here. This is my own little world where I get to be who I am without any obligations, without any commitments, nothing. I can express myself as well as I want to and alwa know that there is someone out there who understands. My blog is one thing that completes me, helps me grow as a person. It has honestly changed a lot about me and my perspective to life!

I guess everyone blogs for different reasons. And I blog to express. I want people to know my opinions. I’m very opinionated! (not good! As I have more opinions than information quite a lot of times!) And be it about movies or books or anything. The knowledge I have I want to spread and I want to gain some in the process too…

Well, for the last one month I just sat at home, and tried to study! In the process binged a lot. I think my nerves are directly attached to my appetite glands. As a result I’ve put on an unhealthy amount of weight that I’m embarrassed to carry around. I’m seriously planning to do something about it. Usually I’m not one person with a strong will-power when it comes to such things, so the best option for me could be a yearly gym membership, thankfully at least I’m economical and might end up working out religiously for the amount of money I’ve spent!

Besides that I’m having backaches (and other issues related with old age!) at age 20, so I’d better get moving! I lead such a passive lifestyle (At least during exam times) that is SO unhealthy. It makes you feel awful about yourself. What’s worse? You look much worse than you feel. I feel like I’m lugging around a person behind me when I walk past the mirror! And my dad’s just taken to advising me about weight loss every time I cross paths with him!

My exams are almost over and I’m going on a break for a fortnight to Mumbai (which was incidentally on my short term bucket list for a long time! )but it’s increasingly seeming like a bad idea now because of all the rains! But once I’, back I’m totally kicked about getting into shape! It’s my heyday and I gotta make best use of it!

Well I sure wanna know wassup with all you guys! I’m surely going to visit you right away and catch up!

My friend!

In standard 1B of Baldwin girls’ high school I met this young and very tiny girl called Rashmi, this was 14

Rashmi was always a very bright rank one student. For the last 14 years I’ve seen her and she has always achieved high academic excellence, but this is not the reason why she is one of my closest friends.

She was the model student. She was helpful and was a good leader and everybody liked her! She was always miss. Popular in school. But this was not just it, she’s exceptionally talented. Somewhat musical can play the keyboard and the guitar. She’s also good with art and craft! An extremely intelligent girl and damn smart too! All my life, probably I’ve NEVER accepted, but I’ve always looked up to her. Be it in academics or even things like clothes preference, tv shows, books, movies or anything. If Rash gives a recco I’m sure to follow on!

Though we’ve always been in the same class, it was somewhere during the 7^th or the 8^th that we got somewhat close.. But we got really close in the school trip in standard nine, when we would discuss enthusiastically, harry potter for hours on end!

We both sort of possess this joint quality of just talking a HELL lot over the phone during exam times! And that’s what brought us even closer!

I think more than a quarter of the telephone bills both our parents have paid in the last 6 years is cos of Rashmi! I can talk anything under the sun with her! Ranging from south park to intense philosophy and books to food! From girly gossips to problems, and to cooking up vague words and names for other people! She’s my wall! If I’ve anything in the world to tell! (and trust me I “tell” a LOT) I go to her! If something happens, even a minute thing that probably has absolutely no significance whatsoever HAS to be told to Rashmi, not a day goes by where I haven’t randomly ranted to her about a million different things!

Even after school, though we went different places to college we’ve always been awfully close, we don’t need to meet each other or anything. We’ve just remained close.

There’s some kind of an inseparable bond between us. We’re dreadfully similar, ranging from our family backgrounds (only child, both working parents etc!) to the usage of words! That’s what has kept us together. And we’re not similar cos we were born that way, we’re similar cos we grew up with each other and we’ve been around each other for too long to be different!

As you turn 20, I couldn’t think of a gift to give you in return for making my life this way, cos if you weren’t there I wouldn’t have been like this. And this is the least I could do. I don’t think any amount of words can express what kind of friends we are. Just a feeble attempt!

Happy Birthday Rashmi!

It’s just a personal thing that I had to write, I don’t expect any comments or anything, cos “I don’t need any, I’m just expressing myself, cos my blog is where I put up whatever I feel

Those tiny things!

Today it’s raining cats and dogs (and a lot of other things!) I’m just a complete water baby and absolutely LOVE such weather!

I came home, all tired and it was SO hot today, I wasn’t feeling good about the weather at all! Until this! Besides nobody was at home which was a good thing cos my mum who’s all paranoid about my health would’ve played party pooper and sent me inside the second I went out in the rain!

What I did: I took some music and went out into the rain and was dancing there like a complete maniac!
I was on my balcony, which is somewhat private, no one on the road can spot me, but my neighbors who weren’t there like  a boon!

I just got super drenched in the rain and was enjoying myself so thoroughly I absolutely cherished those moments! I couldn’t care less if anyone saw me or if I was going to fall ill later! All that mattered to me was the beauty of that moment! In addition to all this, there was some neighbor preparing biriyani and the aromas were teasing my sense all the more!

After just losing myself in all the shower I came inside and my mother came and me some fresh home made hot hot sandige! I sat at the door, drying myself, gorging on to some yummy food! Wow! It was amazing!

These are a few things that make life worth living! If we wait for our big happy moment, we let all these tiny moments pass! These are the ones that make you smile and they’re moments of such joy! It was beautiful!

How I forgetted the englees!

This is the direct result of having extremely vernac profs who can’t talk english and still make wannabe attempts towards it, thus making our lives miserable. It would just be better if they spoke kannada, I mean, most of us understand Kannada and for those who don’t… It’s high time they learn!

We’ve a host of dialogues that our profs have used, got us extremely confused with and sent us into peels of laughter!

We’d a teacher who said “Are you visible?” What she meant of course was “Is it visible to you?” (NO I’m invisible, I’m being awarded the Nobel for this great invention! )

“Outernal” for “external” “Jaaa- for  Jaw” etc!

Articles are just out of the question, I believe all the people in the world have forgotten/ never learnt the difference between A, An and The…
Bring me a an textbook.
Where is the your book?
Why are you writing in the pencil?
(I SWEAR I’m NOT exaggerating)

The other common ones are, differences between as and has. And they use the wrong one more often than not!

Has you can see…
This part as to go there!

And  other “alien” mistakes like, “you has to putten it” and “you has to putted it!”

Past tenses and plurals have taken an entirely new meaning in the dictionary…

You see-ed the project?
Where is you going?
It affect the machines if you don’t use oil.

Sometimes teachers want to use specifically complicated words and end up using the wrong words instead…
Somebody wanted to say “Please use technical words in the paper” and ended up saying “technical words should not be nullified in the paper!!!” You’ve no idea how much we laughed!!!

There are also “These respects (for aspects) should be kept in the mind!”
Why are you going into the inner ( for finer) details?

But this one has to take the cake!!! A teacher once said instead of “Can you make out what I’m showing?”
“Can you see me making out?”
That was ultimate! Damn, how minor mistakes  like this can give such a dreadfully different meaning!

Really, if somebody wants to teach, they need to correct such tiny mistakes rather than get themselves embarrassed. I mean, how can they not figure. They have to do something about it, if they’re in the profession right? They don’t need to be literary geniuses but at least basic communication skills is necessary, isn’t it?!

I honestly after going throught this feel I’m forgetting english. My thought flow and usage of words and even sentence formation has become weaker. It’s not that I was ever great, it’s just going from bad to worse and I don’t like it.

Working woes

Why I haven’t been blogging for a long time now, is A) because my mum’s been ill and I’ve had to take care of all the cooking and cleaning and B) I’m forgetting english. I swear, the next post on why I’ve FOGOTTEN english!

Well, My mum was in the hospital last week due to lumbar spondylysis which means she had lower back ache. And I didn’t come home. Was shuttling between hospital college and cleaning at home.

She got discharged and got home. Of course she doesn’t need 24 hour attention but she needs 24 hour bed rest. Which means I have to do all the work. Damn it’s a hell lot of work.

It’s just a hell lot more than what meets the eye. All of us who don’t do the housework just take it for granted that there’s nothing much to do throughout the day, but every nook and corner of the house needs attention.

Early mornings are the worst, when you’re a late riser like me… I’m already late to college and I’ve to follow around the house helps and supervise them. It’s all the more tough for a person who lives in a duplex house like me… You’ve to run up and down the stairs atleast 50 times. Boy it’s tiring…

There are clothes to be folded, vessels to be kept back in their place, food to be made and served (three times a day) and water and other stuff to be carried every now and then… etc etc!

I can’t believe how mothers do it every single day, especially working women like my mother! Kudos!
Less than a week through and I’m already very exhausted. I have no clue how I’ll do this for the rest of my life once I leave home and get married and all… Leaves me worried

The power of prayer

I have a friend who doesn’t believe in God. Well he claims he’s not an aethist but an agnostic. This post is for him and the likes of him!

Today I got my results… My 3rd semester exams got over in January and I’d done reasonably well in all subjects and particularly done well in the internals and practicals, except in one subject. I was positive I would fail the subject.
All my days after the exam were spent praying to all kinds of  Gods to pass me in Mechanics of materials. I was actually pretty good at the subject and had scored 23/25 in the internals. I just screwed the entire paper because I just got too tense. Well I don’t even know why I got so nervous.

I had mentally prepared myself that I would fail the subject, but had refrained to tell my parents, my mum I knew would be devastated and I didn’t have the heart to tell her beforehand and I didn’t even know how to face my parents who had expected so much out of me. I knew how much me scoring a good mark meant to them.

I was out when I recieved the result and got to know I had failed in M.O.M, but had still managed to get a 61%. And I called my dad and told him. He didn’t really react. Initially I burst into tears, I got really scared as to how to face my parents.
But as I was riding back home I was contemplating what I had done, I realised I had done pretty well cos I’d scored more than a lot of my counterparts considering I’d passed only 5 subjects. I suddenly didn’t seem too sad or scared.

I believe all my prayers have paid off. Probably not in the same way as I expected but though God didn’t pass me, he gave me courage to face my parents, he gave me assurance that I had done well this time too. And most importantly he gave me hope that there is a much brighter next time.

When I got back home, my parents said nothing, they sort of understood. And I have the belief that I can do a lot better in the subject the next time around.

Anyway, there is no point in denying the existence of a God, because a person like me to have taken my failure well is rather a miracle!

Viva Experiences

One of the most dreadful experiences of college life, for anybody… Is Viva-Voce! It’s like the one experience that gives you nightmares and sucks the living daylights out of you! However well prepared you are, things will NEVER go right for you. There are different kinds of 3^rd Degree torture the examiner might put you through. And different things, that could make it worse for you. (Note: It can NEVER go well!)

The Lone Soldier!

When you’re forced to go alone or the extremely patient/sadistic examiner wants to fry you all alone. He stares at you in the face and tries to kill you with his looks and his incessant volley of questions, most of which you’ve probably never even heard of in your life! You’re grilled and of course he thinks you’ve no clue about the subject!

The nerd partner!

If your examiner is slightly soft and decides to call 2 people at a time. And your partner turns out to be the “Hermione Granger” who is bouncing up in her (it’s mostly female; guys aren’t capable of doing that!) chair  to answer all the questions. Well that doesn’t leave a lasting impression of you in front of the examiner, so there go the marks right down the drain!

The Stupid partner.

Don’t be so happy that you have the stupidest person in class as your viva partner! You’ll still screw up! That person’s knowledge is zero about the subject. And if you know a teensy weensy bit, the sum total of answers given are still very low, so not only is your partner getting flushed in the drain, he’s pulling you along too!

The “gumpnalli govinda” viva.

That literally translates into “lost in the crowd” You’ve gone with say 4 people, and that clearly shows, the examiner is BORED! And a bored examiner NEVER translates into more marks. The fact is if he doesn’t care about the viva, chances are he won’t give a rat’s tail for your marks either!

You’re roll no 1.

If you’re called first/voluntarily go in to give your viva first, the chances are you’ll be screwed the most. You’ll be the standard benchmark for the mark allotment for the rest of your batch. So he wants to know fully well about you!

It’s time to go home

This sort of examiner is in a hurry to go home, and asks you questions like “nimma uru yavadu” (which place are you from) and your entire viva marks depend on that. If you’re a localite and speak the local language (kannada here) chances are you score brownie points! Otherwise, the generally regionistic examiner, doesn’t care two hoots about you!

The I’m not asking questions examiner

He’ll make YOU do all the talking and ask your partner questions. Or he’ll make run errands for him or do him other favors (don’t get me wrong here) I don’t think people are so corrupt that he would take monetary favors, but general stuff like, let me use your laptop (I’ve seen this happen!) Or bring me this or write that for me etc…

Essentially every person would have been placed in one of the above categories. And heaved a sigh of relief when he got done with the viva!

One piece of advice though. NEVER go drunk for your viva (inspired by five point someone!) Trust me. You’ll be in a LOT of trouble!

A tag! ;)

 (Sorry for being offline forever now, I had bad internet problems. I promise I’ll read all your blogs! )

Here are the rules -
1. Put your music player on Shuffle mode
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer
3. Write the song name no matter what
4. After you’ve answered all of the questions, tag 5 other people and let them know they’ve been tagged.

If someone says “Is this okay”, you say?
Haule Haule

What would best describe your personality?
Zehreeley! (Oh NO!!!)

What do you like in a guy/girl?
I’m leaving on a jet plane.

How do you feel today?
Hallowed be thy name!

What is your life’s purpose?
Ye ishq hai, baithe bithaye jannat dikhaye!

What do your friends think of you?
Shut up and bounce

What do you think of your parents?
Vande Mataram!

What do you think about very often?
Nagada Nagada! (don’t even know what that means!)

What is 2+2?
socha hai, yeh tumne kya kabhi (evidently, I’m NOT as dumb as my playlist shows me to be!)

What do you think of your best friend?
Kabhi Kabhi Aditi Zindagi

What do you think of the person you like?
Mauja hi Mauja! (yeah! )

What is your life story?
Daastan-E-Om Shanti Om! (OMG!!! I’m SO not going to take re-birth!)

What do you want to be when you grow up?
Sindbad the Sailor! (LOL! )

What do you think of when you see the person you like?
Jaane kyun… (YEAH!!!! TOTALLY!)

What do your parents think of you
Pappu can’t dance saala! (I don’t think my parents think I can’t dance!)

What will you dance to at your wedding?
Yeh tumhari meri baatein! (nice! J )

What will they play at your funeral?
Yoon Shabnami pehle nahi thi chandini! (poor ol’ me!)

What is your hobby/interest?
Shano Shano (My playlist portrays me to be some weird thing!)

What is your biggest secret?
Balatkari!!!!!!!!! (ooosssssshhhhhhhyyyyyoooooooo… nooooooooo!)

What do you think of your friends?
Gum Sum! (not at all!!!)

What should you post this as?
Country roads take me home! (What?!)

What do you think about this tag?
nazrein milana, nazrein churana

Forgetfulness!

I’m generally a careless person and tend to forget and misplace my things. The usual objects that I lose at the most important moment are books, phone, spectacles and such small items. I’d written a blog on one such incident earlier… But this one takes the cake!

Yesterday was a Saturday and I usually take my bike to college. And it was no different today! I went to college as usual, with my dad yelling nervously (as usual again) behind me to ride carefully and send a message once I reach college! I attended 2 classes and decided to go to my friend LP’s house to spend the afternoon.

My friends LP, K and I caught an auto and went off to her house. I sat happily ate and were constantly talking… All of a sudden I had a realisation!!! “EUREKA!” I had forgotten my bike in college! How I laughed at my complete mindlessness!

Of course I didn’t bother to enlighten my mother about this little incident cos she would’ve ranted on about how I should be more careful! Forgetting where you kept your keys, phone etc is something… But forgetting your bike is of an entirely different magnitude!

Anyway I’m off to Goa for a week… I’ve been having an awful bout of the writers block of-late… I hope to have fun! And I’ll post on my trip as soon as I get back! Cheerio!