TODAY I NOTICED an small snippet of an interview by an old lady. I usually scroll through such type of information, but what this oldy lady made sense. She said find something you like doing like a hobby and find a way to economize it. In that way you wont find yourself swimming against the current. There was so much of truth in what she said. Somehow I want to believe its important to find something you like. Why not go with something you don't like in your career. Well, I was in Marketing for a short duration. What I realized is that I feel like an odd one in a group of people who are good at small talk, infact I become so shy that I forget what I am supposed to do or say. They all behave so friendly and something about it makes me uncomfortable. I realized I am not for Marketing. The domain needs someone to explain their point of view in front of many people. I rather work in a small group or best not work with people itself. I like working alone. Do your work everyday without any small talks. Which brings me to the my next project, Virtual assistant. I bought this course hoping that I can own my own business someday. My husband gives me a sheepish smile each time we speak about the topic. I like the concept of virtual assistant but I have doubts about my selling skills, whether i will be able to sell myself well. I think it all depends on whether I like doing what I do. I certainly love learning languages especially French. I have been on it for almost two years now. But as a profession, again I really don't know. My family tells me to take up a job and work from there. But i am shit nervous especially because I have had a long break in my career. Really don't know what to do. 

It's all in the dust. 

Today I noticed red mud in my grandma's compound in Mangalore. We are in Mangalore for a vacation. We were in a rickshaw and stopped near my grandma's bungalow Kum-Kum. As we walked by I noticed the concrete was scrapped off. I tried to find something, anything to tell my husband and kids, that look, that was the pavement my grandma walked, watering her garden. The mango tree right in the centre of the bungalow, the concrete portion in the front, the big brown and white gate, the katta we used to sit and watch buses pass by on most evenings during our summer holidays. Everything was gone. It was all wiped off, like a picture erased from its era; the era of my grandparents had gone way like it never existed. It was the house coloured cream and brown I waited to come to every summer vacation. I was thrilled to meet my grandmother each time. She welcomed us and wrapped us in her arms and the house was filled with joy and laughter. I never felt that feeling in my house in Belgaum, ever. That feeling of belonging to someone was so special. The red-coloured flooring, the interconnected rooms, and a picture of my grandfather with his hair all white on the wall. Playing hide and seek in that house, where there were so many rooms and places, you could easily slide in. I remember running around in my undies along with my cousins, feeling unshamed or anything. We all played around, in the day and in the evening we were drilled to take a bath one by one, using a bronze huge pot. My grandma used to give us a small bit of halwa or chocolates, something like a treat after lunch, she loved sweets I remember. In the afternoons we slept under a fan, together or we were forced to sleep as only then would our uncle take us out, and that was his promise. When he took us out, we sat in his old jeep, and he took us around to the beach and parks and we had a ball each time. It was all gone. All my cousins were scattered some in touch and some busy with their own families. Those were the days, free, and happy. I cherish it to this day. But it had all gone. the one person and house that brought us all together, all gone away, in the dust. 

The best gift in life is time

So if you’re thinking hard what’s best thing you can give your loved one

Then, Give them yourself.

Because that’s never going to match up to the gifts.

The Girl with the white slacks.

If it were glass flooring, it would have cracked. With full vigor, dedication and steeping intensity she was practicing dance. An outburst of energy with no rhythm and not any close to an innate dancer was my first observations about her and I first found myself getting quite irked each time she tried to swirl with music, and it wasn’t anymore because of her dance moves this time, it was her slacks. Yes, her slacks seemed to peek furtively to see us dancing to the beats of “Jaatha hai tu Kahan” from “Yes Boss”. But later she was my private comedian and my subjects of wisecracks. Soon we got done with the annual gathering or rather an official send off for our seniors and for me; it was seeing my only sister off from school and final exams.

My grownup feet now reached the stairs and corridors of high school where all the “Girlies” (nickname for all the girls in primary patented by St. Joseph’s girls) then became “young semi-matured girls”, yes I reached standard 8^th and had this lady who happened to be our class teacher and who was called Ms. Mayrose, she was very decent, composed lady in her 40’s with her matching lipsticks which synchronized with the color of her each and every outfit and not to forget her weird and peculiar style of teaching. A girl would be asked to stand and read up the chapter and that was all! Back then it was weird but now it seems quite appropriate, I mean what more explanation would one need when the all the book dealt with which king conquered which territory.

Then I bumped into the girl in white slack as she this time after nearly 9 years in school happened to be my classmate, don’t ask me where she was earlier because I don’t have answers to it either. No sooner I got acquainted and warmed up; we seemed to enjoy each other’s company and started hanging out not only in school but at home as well. An ambitious, hardworking, extremely loving and helpful and very pretty thing who touted herself as a precursor of Afghanistan and she came from a conservative, Muslim but well educated and erudite background. But to me she was the one and only best friend I ever have and her name is Arshia Sultan Gurani.

Genuine Efforts.

Well, when you have 50 bucks in your pocket, and you want to eat nice healthy, tasty but ghar ka khanna food where would you go? These days restaurants serve you some really horrid, pathetic food, filled with fluff around the peripherals of your plate but the food that gets swallowed in, phew I pity my stomach! And no, it doesn’t depend on which restaurant, like most would say; even some of the best five stars serve you food which just only seems to titillate your eyes. Where are those days, when things were so cheap and so plenty? My mom used to tell me about half a truck filled with mangoes and oranges only for a family of seven and these days 500 bucks is a minimum for a dozen of mangoes. Everything’s gotten hell loads expensive and even more commercial with standards being compromised. With all this is my head and my stomach twisting and growling for yummy tasty food, one on my roomy gave us a taste of the food around the corner. A Dhaba called “Khana Khazana”.

50 bucks, that’s all we shelled out for 3 stomachs. Totally unbelievable, isn’t it? Well coming from a place like Mumbai, where you definitely get the best, unforgetting and yummiest chaats and street food and mind you that’s getting costlier by the day one can hope for nothing but some cheap unhealthy food in 50 bucks. But here you go, a plate with sufficient rice, thick black dhal perfected with enough tomatoes and onions and whole scoop of fresh curds, a good quantity of freshly baigan ka baartha garnished with only coriander leaves and savory of lime, and fresh soft delicious parathas, phew, all for 50 bucks. Yes, one can get tasty healthy food, but may have to go through those odds of ptomaine poisoning.

Ghar ka khanna type is the preparation in this Dhaba. But I like this Dhaba not only for the food it serves but the people who serve it. Unlike most restaurateurs, these guys (only 3 which include two men and one woman, all of them looking frail yet with a smile and the eagerness in their eyes to help and serve) work hard to make you satisfied and delighted. And that’s what I loved about them. They seem like a lower middle class family trying to make a living, but they don’t compromise on their standards. Simple but tasty food, they serve. One can see the efforts they put in and people notice it as well. That’s why, there a lot of crowd at this place and their food goes in hot cakes.

Yeah, it’s the effort that people see. You can be categorized by your efforts. Be it a friend or an employer or employee. It’s the genuineness that people remember. But there are a lot of them who try to put on a “good guy mask”. But you cannot fool people. People are smart and astute enough to see you through and through. Like the other day, I was very sick and felt handicapped on the bed. Unable to move from bed because I felt dizzy and got tired very quickly. But in all that I could see the difference between those who genuinely cared and those who didn’t. But in all the dark, there are sparks or rays of lights which fill in a dark room and I would like to dwell on them.

A soupy bowl of cheese!

My latest junction where my ship has landed is Bangalore.

Well, I suffer from this disease of food craving! I mean it’s almost like a pregnant lady craving for food and I am trying hard to get over it. And I could possibly do anything to eat what I crave for by which I mean I could bake the cake myself if no option. And for me that a good option!

So just last night I had this huge craving for Thai food which was bottled up for almost a weeks time. Usually it’s difficult for me to control that long but well in a new place with little pennies in my pocket, nothing can be done. Well I guess there are not too many options of Thai eatery joints in Bangalore. And I would love to be corrected, if wrong. So with very options and a huge distance to travel to and with a good ambience and a lively eating joint, well those are my criteria’s I settled for an Italian cum Continental cuisine fine dining restaurant called Spiga, located at St. Marks Road in Bangalore. Well the tension was building up in my stomach and believe me it’s a weeks craving. Terrible isn’t it?

So finally after my friend KVG suggested this place, we drove down to Spiga, one of the few good Continental Restaurants. So Spiga, Good ambience and for a couple it would work even better with the lighting's and the candle lights it would do great for quixotic couples. For me it’s more of the food that makes the place rather than the opposite! Without wasting much time we scan through the menu and in my mind I was trying hard to imagine what the taste would be like given the range of items in each dish to a point I called for some help. Good service, almost as soon as we raised our heads above the menu card we had our butler in place. We asked for a second opinion and placed the order.

Our first dish was fresh Seer fish cooked to perfection with herbs and mint green sauce. Deep fried fish is utter waste of fish. To me fishes are delicate and need a shallow fry and the moment you deep fry it,you kill the taste and that’s exactly what they did. Deep fry and that’s where it all started. Well I kept sipping on my white rum, my saving grace for the day! Our next dish was the main course and I ordered pasta i.e. screwed penne, with white sauce, basil herbs with rubbery prawns tossed with tasteless sun dried tomatoes. To which I asked for my favorite veggies, broccoli and mushrooms to be added. And there I was pretty much upset and quite disappointed. Set out to have pasta and ended up with a soupy bowl filled with loads cheese!

I learn't to swim.

Well, back in my childhood I remember my mother words “stay in a hostel, it will set you right” and I would brush it off. For me, the thought of staying in a hostel like every other tender feet cub was stirringly adventurous. The autonomy I would acquire was something that I was really looking forward to. And well the background that I come from was no way close to that of a silver spooned kid. So I always patted myself knowing the fact that I can rough it and get though. Callow and stupid, guess I was!

Bombay lured me with its thrilling lifestyle, in- numerous people, mixed culture, fast and furious trains and funnily its dirty beaches appealed to me. I hopped skipped and jumped almost three places in a quickie to finally park myself in a savaged, old fashioned Cottage. Well that’s the exteriors! Ten times of the length would probably get me fit that was the interiors with several antique furniture, sash windows resembling the ones in Goa, a well manicured garden, huge and spacious rooms, olden days swing and a shrewd old cougar who was the land lady.

Get familiar but not friendly, that’s the principle I tried to follow. But I couldn’t keep up to it for too long knowing the person I am. Well outgoing and friendly and a gossip mouth know I am. As usual I got very friendly with my housemate, seemed to almost love her company. An innocent and amicable with an extensive vocab and quite a generous girl she was and I almost got glued to her very soon. And she thought me to treat myself with beer. Till then I didn’t get the whole point of someone gulping down a liquid which tasted bitter. We cheered to beer and freshly fried fish and soon she fled the house because of her creeping ailments and I was again left to cheer with the old cougar of the house.

Then came a very shrewd, craft and astute young college girl and again a year or two younger to me. My privacy was halved right from the draws of the table to the cupboard and to the small table which was converted to a dressing table. My luggage needed to be compressed or we didn’t have space. As usual I soon got acquainted and warmed up to her. She almost seemed like an angel who got me out of most of my worries but she had another side to her which was extremely slick in manipulation. My mind, plans and thoughts since then were my own. Anyways we had a very cordial relation from then on but I never knew I could or would be cornered.

Well till then I thought I was the smartest little one but when you stay in place like Bombay, you tend to meet a lot of slick and foxy whales. Once you do, you need to stay away. Well I thought that but I didn’t know I was gullible. Well guess what to no ones surprise except myself got into untangled and squirmy quarrels. And well at home people I was known to be an argumentative kid full of tantrums who seemed to get her way out of most quarrels victoriously. But here I was in between whales, one worst than the other and I couldn’t help but be a prey to all of them. Severely rebuked and slandered by the old cougar (who I thought was reliable) and my housemates. I was the gossip and the most bitched about topic ever. Decided to quit the forest of carnivores one night. But almost the next night decided not to succumb and take this lying down. From then on I opened my eyes to see the skeletons hidden in closets. Kept numb for a few days and then played the same tricks and outcome temperature rising heated arguments but this I came to be victorious and then on I was never cornered and definitely learn t the tricks of the game.

Between all the heated arguments, itchy and audacious behavior of my roommates and friends I not only learn t to swim but thrive as well. I grew to deal with some of the toughest situation one could be in (tough because it’s a whole new world at work and at home).I grew to love them for the person they are and not their activities. Grew to enjoy and share moments, right from making some of the most delicious and scrumptious food to sharing it with them, to sharing whacky, electrifying moments, and thoughts I grew mentally stronger. With each day knowing the possibilities of somebody backstabbing or belittling you, I grew having the capability to fight the thoughts and people who don’t matter to me. Shed all the frills that I was brought up with to a world where anything is a possibility. A world where everyday is a new day and that’s when my mom s words hit me and I knew where to draw the line, where to pay a deaf hear and where I need to open my trap.

P.S.I stayed in house of whales for four long years having to deal with a lot many new whales.