Google acts cranky !!!

Have you ever used Google reader, the new crawler from Google which manages your subscription to blogs and news sites etc? With this you don’t need to remember/bookmark all your favorite blog sites, news sites and check for updates all the time. The dear reader does the job for you. All you need to give all the links you love, to it and sit back and relax. It will frequently check for updates and get them at your page-step. Nice utility I must say, glorified version of RSS reader I believe. Now being the ‘Google worshipper’, it is my first duty to utilize whatever they bring on. I use gmail, even though I know they might be indexing my mails for their commercial purpose. I am frequent to orkut, though it makes my personal life public, I am still sticking to Blogger despite people trying to influnce me a lot about wordpress… and of course the one and only Google search is life line of we softies. There is… No... there was almost a blind trust that whatever it says has to be correct until the reader gave me wrong entries.

This Sunday morning I open my reader page with much enthu to catch updates on all ma favorite blogs. I see whole 6 entries for a blog that I love reading and which hasn’t been updated for a while. I get very happy and read through the entries. The gal was whining about getting old and matrimonial ads and all. Wait a sec… didn’t she just get married couple of months ago. Is she writing about someone else? I recheck again… am I reading other gal’s blog who is at same state. Nope… It’s the first gal who got married. I check the date updated. Its today morning 10am time. There is one Friday the 13th post which makes me believe that these have to be recent posts (Last Friday was Friday the 13th …the evil day; if you didn’t notice :-) ). So I open the blog to see what going wrong and bingo ! Looks like the reader played April fool prank. They threw last year's 6 posts at me!

Beware people, there is a bug in reader… don’t trust it blindly :-D !!! Tomorrow it will give you news from yesteryears and you might not bother to check the actual info. Imagine you reading about blasts in Bombay and frantically calling all you relatives/friends to check on them when nothing has happened. Google can have that kinda influence you see!

Talking of April fool pranks; none can beat Googlies to come up with intelligent ideas. You all must remember the lunar jobs they were offering couple of years ago. This year there was TiSP(BETA)... hilarious concept. The way have explained almost makes you believe that such things can be true. Read more about it here

New Blog !!!

I have realized that I have been wrting too much about food these days. So I thought why should not I open a new blog and share my love ... like I already I have one for songs.

So here it is... my foodie blog

Hope you will like it :-)

When I go to Pune…

Yeah I was there again (Don’t ask me the reason why !!!) As I had said earlier Pune is a city which is expected to be loved by all Marathi people and it is assumed by all (including myself) that I will also be settling down there someday or other. The thought of going there scars me for no reason. My cousin claims once you go to Pune you can’t live anywhere. I used to think same for Mumbai. But I managed to survive in Bangalore, in fact I am practically in love with this city. I remember first six months of my stay here when I was frantically searching for opportunities to leave the city but the it hasn’t let me go yet :-). Who knows… I might like Pune, as well! Anyways who has seen the future!!! Let’s talk about things I did in Pune.

I had the whole afternoon to spare and was very very hungry till the time I was free. I asked cousin to take me to a place where I can have good Marathi food. I miss the food many times, you see. It’s not like I don’t like the food I have here but then … home food is after all home food. The taste you grow up will never leave you. Like for me, any dish is made perfectly when it tastes and smells just like mom’s. We went to this place called ‘Café Shreyas’ where they have dining hall. They have Marathi style thali with everything served unlimited.

Now the concept of typical Marathi food is vague. Like the language, Marathi food changes its taste every 10 miles. The western Maharashtrian food is the spiciest of all. Any thing prefixed with ‘Kolhapuri’ is the hottest food around. It is the kind of food that will heat up your ears and get water from your nose (That’s the kinda expression a friend uses; if a food items manages to heat up your senses particularly the ear lobes and make eyes and nose water it is hot; “Yaar yeh to kaan me dhua wala khana hai” she goes) The Kolhapuri mutton/chicken rassa (curry) is world famous in Maharashtra :-D. And Puneri food is the sweetest. They would put sugar in everything, from sabji to samabar. In the part of state where I come from, we like to put lot of garlic and onions in every dish. Ours is the region where sabjis are available only during rainy season, so we have habit of preserving vegetables year round. And the dried vegetables, lentils, different kinds of pickles are regulars in our food. My town being close to Andra and Karnataka border, the food has both the state influences. So the delicacies like ‘Bisi bele bhath’, ‘Puliogare’ were not complete strangers to me. The north Karnataka food is very close to the kinda food we have. In all, I feel specialty of Marathi food is that we preserve original taste of the ingredients and we use very less spices as compared to northie and southie food. I should actually try to put together simple recipes sometime.

What would be my idea of a perfect thali…?? Hmmm… let me think. It can be either Jowar roti (jolda roti as they call it in Karnataka), peanut chutney mixed with curd (aka yogurt), raw onion; that’s the ‘gaon ka treat’ or just aamras (mangoes from our farm are better than those five star alphansos) and roti or poori; or the elaborate festive food. The plate has sixteen vegetables (dry and gravy), at least 5-6 kinds of chutneys, 3-4 kinds of papads, bhajiyas, sweet rice, plain rice, aamti (marathi version of rasam), sambar type dal, plain daal and most important of all... weak point of every Marathi manus, the puran poli with loads of ghee on it. And yes every food item has to be served on defined place in the plate, and in defined order. So first and foremost there has to be a pinch of salt put in the dish. Vegetables are served on the right hand side and chutneys/salads on the left hand side of the dish. Ahhh… you should just see the way it is served, the site itself is fulfilling. Well I can go on and on about it, but lets get back to the description of food I had :-D

There was aloo curry, another curry (I donno name of the sabji in English or Hindi), aamti, daal with tamrind, dry sabji, cucumber raita (koshimbir), 2 types of bhajiyas, papad, masala poories, plain poories, phulkas, dal-rice, star of the plate unlimited dahiwadas aaaaand aamras (yummmm!!!). Wow… we must have hogged like anything. It didn’t digest for whole day. It all culminated with sweeet natural watermelon ice crème. To add to the foodie pleasures, I bought myself pack of bakharwadis and kaju katalis from the Chitale Bandhu. I had to walk back home from the airport to make a little room in my tummy.

I want more journeys like that !!!

Coffee time gyaan

Its usual coffee time and coffee place (gallery outside ) at office. There is a mango tree and raw mangos hanging all over it.
Guy1(pointing towards it): Hey see those mangoes. They look nice. (To me) You like them?
Me: Oh yeh. I like them a lot. They taste soooo good.
Guy1 (To guy2): I can’t understand how can they eat such things, raw mangos, guavas, tamrinds, chats. (To me) You must like them a lot
Me: Like them? I love all those things. I can’t understand how you don’t like them !!!
Guy 2: Girls always like weird things.
Me: Yeah… I think that’s why they like guys !!!

Weird ... !!!

Its 2 o’clock and I suddenly remember that I need to catch a train at 3. I need to go somewhere for very urgent work and I cannot miss the train in any case. The train-station is around half an hour drive from my place so I have half an hour more to get ready. Suddenly I realized I haven’t packed my bag yet… I don’t even have a bag with me. I search frantically in the neighborhood for a bag. A friend come to rescue and lends me her bag. I pray mom is not around cause she absolutely hates my last minute running around. She calls it “tahan lagali ki vihir khodane” (Digging well only when I am thirsty). Then I realize my cloths are not washed at all. Mom comes to rescue and puts them in washing machine without saying a bit. My heart beat starts racing and I get hysteric looking for my stuff. Interestingly I still of some more time to go. I start searching for iron (what the hell has happened to me since when have I started caring about all this stuff. I am getting late!!!) Mom gives me the cold look and helps me pack. I am frantically running around and I realize that there is just 10 minutes before the train leaves. I take the first vehicle and rush towards the station. There is huge traffic jam and it feels like ages before I reach the station. I am almost in tears; my heart is racing at Olympic speed. When station is near, I jump out of the vehicle and start running towards the platform. My train has given whistle and started to move. I run for the love of my life, my legs don’t seem like moving at all, my throat is dry. I am panting, sweating and dragging my luggage. The train seems unending and it is still there when I reach the platform. The train looks little weird. It has huge doors like Mumbai locals and berths like sleeper coach. I am about to throw myself inside the train when the doorbell rings and I need to answer it.

You got it right… It was just a dream. I only wish my life was so dramatic :-). This is one of the dreams I get very often, sometimes there is a train to catch, or a bus or a flight or a exam to appear for. And I get it when I am about to do one of these. Today’s occasion was a test at office for which I had reach really really early (8:30am is dawn for me :-) ). I find it weird to get same dream again and again. I think it’s more due to fear of getting late for anything or just my love for dramatic things :-), But my heartbeat is increased considerably whenever I wake up from the dream.

Memories of food

n;t This post is triggered from Shirsha’s question “do you have memories of taste?” I have the weird memory system. I never know what will be correlated with what. I have vivid memories of smell, like I had posted here. So is true about taste/food. I like to call them memories of a die-hard foodie.

Like with the book I read, autobiography of famous Marathi writer P.K. Atre(fondly known as ‘Acharya Atre’) called “Karheche Pani”, huuuuge book, I remeber taste of ginger. I read that book during summer vacations of 7th or 8th class along with ‘aalepak’. This is an interesting thing made of ginger + honey, to be eaten as mouth freshener. My aunt had got loads of packets for us. And I had them accompanying me all the time while reading the book. Whenever I see that book, the gingery taste lingers on my tongue. Yeah… I like ginger and garlic too, they are regular performers in my food preparations. Do you know that garlic is very good for heart patients (or people having hypertension problems) and they are advised to have it raw? And plain daal with garlic tadka in ghee tastes heaven :-). We are digressing here... no !

Another taste one is the sweet-sour taste of pani-puri (aka gol-gappe, puchka) that we used to feast on during college days. None makes pani-puri like that guy makes, puries stuffed with cooked black chana and filled with cool sweet water plus sour liquid with hint of pudina… yum! The sour taste is overpowering but the sweet would play little games with the tongue. I still remember that taste! I haven’t tasted pani puri like that anywhere else. There were days when we had only pani-puri for dinner. Or hint of dinner and loot of pani puri. Sometimes we would carry them all the way to hostel. Now I must tell you how far this place was from our hostel, it was like going to other town altogether. My college was some 20 + km away from that place. The best way to get there was the college bus which was available only when we were toiling (??) in college. Otherwise we would have to share auto ride and change at least 3 autos (yeah autos used tun like city-buses. ‘We will go only from this point to that… aana hai to aao nahi to jao’) which would cost around 12 to 16 bucks one way. (It was very very big deal for us those days). So we had to spend around 25 to 30 bucks to have pani puri worth 10 max 15 rs. And we had the back-to-hostel-by-7:30 restriction so we were always in short of time. Many times couple of us would go to get pani puris for all of us. Best part used be when we would gulp on the pani after having pani puris. It would burn our throat, bring tears to eyes but we were not the ones to give up. I still can picturize 5 of us huddled in my room, using paper as carpet, the paani-puri stuff spread all over and gulping down puris one after another.

Ahhh… those were the days. Another food thing I remember from college days is the yummiest tandoori-chicken. Yeah yeah yeah… I was non-vegie once upon a time and tadoori chicken was my beloved dish. Studying in a city with abundent Punjabi peoepl, we had access to most amazing Punjabi food. There was a dhaba called A1 tandoor which served best of all tandoors better than any of the 'star'y hotels around. One fine day me and a roomie decided to have chicken and ventured our way to it. With full josh we ordered for full plate of tandoor, chicken 65 and rice. The tandoor was really really huge. We were hell bent on not wasting single piece of it and ended up eating for hours to finish the tandoor. Not to mention we skipped food for next two days. Tandoor smell always reminds me of that session.
There were couple of dhabas behind the Gurudwara which served thick Punjabi parathas. One paratha would be enough for a meal. But the taste I remember more is the chai they served. They would give it in big lassi glasses, made with more milk and boiled a lot. It had the dhaba smelll… I want that chai!

Another weird memory is of the aloo sabji. In Mumbai, we used got dabba(tiffin) in office. Our dabbawala was very fond aloo (like all other mess-walas). He used make boiled potato sabji, the way we make for masla dosa, but with less spices. So it tasted like boiled potatos with salt and oil. Guys called it masala sabji and always used to joke that this guy wants to give us joy of having masala dosa.

Well... I can go on writing forever about these foodie memories. May be some other time :-)

Another good weekend goes by…

Alas!!! The weekend comes and swooshes away without even letting us sink completely in the pleasures of being away from office and all the work related crap. And you realize importance of weekend even more when you have to drag yourself and your bike, off course for close to 2 km in the noisy, crawling traffic (I was literally walking) and then climb flight of stairs all the way to 4th floor because all lifts decide to take a Monday morning break.

It feels like I am dragging life with the hope of getting good weekends :-D. The perfect weekend should start with perfect Saturday. For me, it’s a day when you finish all your weeks pending quota of sleep. I like to get up at late afternoon, get fresh, eat something and then again doze off. Maximum would be to go out somewhere for dinner. My lazy bone takes over completely this day (I think all my bones are affected by this lazy bone). I don’t even take the effort to cook if there is none at home. Earlier mom used to call me up on Saturday mornings and try to wake me up without any success. Now she has accepted it as one those ‘bad habits’ I have picked up as a result of staying away from home. But this Saturday was not one these perfect Saturdays (for my sleep). I had to get up early in the morning to finish some work by 12. So I was officially up by 8am but allowed myself to steal long naps till 12. Apart from that it was goooood weekend.

There were lots of movies watched. First one to be mentioned is ‘The Pursuit of Happyness’ (with a ‘y’ and not ‘i’). This has been on my to-watch list since long, strongly recommended by A. And I must say it was worth it. The only other movie of Will Smith I have seen is ‘Hitch’ where he is good. I have seen ‘MIB’ in bits and pieces and there was a series called ‘Fresh prince of Bell air’ made during start of his career. So basically I didn’t have too many prejudices apart from the fact that this is his Oscar nominated performance. It’s a story of transition of an ordinary guy from declared loser to topper in his class equipped with nothing but believe in himself, hardwork and dedication to his dreams. I love this dialog when he preaches to his son ‘If you have a dream. You got to protect it. Don’t even let anyone tell you that you can’t do this. Not even me’. Will Smith excels in portraying agony of helpless father, smitten by situation still hanging on to his dreams and working his way up. It has touchy father-son angle.

Another father-son movie, I watched was ‘Finding Nemo’, one of the best animation movies ever made. The father ‘Marlin’ is totally different from Will Smith’s father character ‘Chris’. He is over protective, over cautious towards his son ‘Nemo’. But finally he breaks all the fears to save him. Ahh… these my-dady-strongest type movies appeal me a lot :-). I love the character Dory in ‘Finding Nemo’. This is a must watch movie for all animation lovers. And so is ‘Cars’, another animation movie I watched this weekend. Its my third time and the more I see it the more I love it.

Been to Forum (‘the’ mall of Bangalore) after so many days. Once upon a time it was the place, I was found practically every weekend. Now it has lost its charm with too much of crowd. Nevertheless we had good time hanging around, shopping for cute stuff and watching the crowd.

This was a gooood weekend and Sunday morning encounter with expectedly unexpected (or was it unexpectedly expected) people didn’t hamper the fun a bit!

The main to-buy this weekend was ‘Kandisa’ CD. Indian Ocean is the music of season for me. They make amazing music. Interestingly I had to search 3-4 music shop before I finally got hold of the album. This is one CD worth having in my collection. The song ‘Kandisa’ rocks as always. ‘Ma Rewa’ is equally amazing. Now I am searching for ‘Jhini’. You can see the song video on youtube (Check it out here http://youtube.com/watch?v=NhKYn0dg-K4 ) but not able to get the complete mp3 version. Please pass on the complete song if you have it. I sing along with them whole day today
‘Ma rewa sssssss… tharo paani nirmal khal khal bahata jaye re…’

Why I like Wednesdays …

Wednesday is my favorite day of the week. Oh… I know that reaction… ‘What? You crazy gal? It’s not a weekend. It’s WEEKDAY… mid week day!!!’ Well that’s me, I like this day :-). Today was good as I got good food, good company and good news.

It was the sports day at office and all my enthu-team was to go to the ground to play. Somehow I didn’t feel like going there. Yeah, I am acting like one of those boring people who like to sit back in cozy place and do the boring work instead of going out and enjoying. You can delete the ‘doing work’ part for me :-). I don’t have any reason for not going apart from I didn’t feel like, however lame it may sound. Moreover its getting soooo horribly hot outside these days, the thought of stepping out during day time is unthinkable. I decided to stay back and may be run away home early considering that none will be in office during afternoon.

I was having chat with S and got myself company for lunch. Midweek-midday lunch with friend, how cool is that!! Basically I wanted to show off my nu-nu hair style (Am I getting to ‘show-off’y about it ??) We had lunch at ‘Mast Kalandar’ on CMH road. This place is couple of kilometers away from my office and interestingly I didn’t feel the sun at all while driving there. Now this restaurant is cool eat out chain mostly serving northie food, total ‘ghar ka khana’ type. The funky orange-green interiors totally live up to their ‘Eat Happy’ punch line. We feasted on gobi and mutter parathas, they too had some funky names which don’t remember at all. It was fun. We should this more often.

Do you know that this food chain is started by some softies*? And it is quite a hit amongst good food-seekers here. Gosh, I too want to start something like this before I burn out in the office AC. Back to office, I was surfing about this chain and came across these two burrp blogs BangaloreBelly and Burrp. Cool blogs. Must-check-out for those who like food and want try out different varieties of food. Also registered myself at Burrp as a reviewer too! Did you know about another techie restaurant called DalFryday in Bangalore. The name sounds pretty cool. I am gonna try it some day. What?? Don’t you know that I big time foodie and my idea of eating out is to try out new one and not to be regular member of same idly/pizza place next door :-D.

Back to office, I got the good news. I am gonna be masi in couple of months.. yay!!! This will be first child in my group...I am sooooo excited!!! Ahh… Wednesdays are always good, isn’t it ? :-)

Softie == Software Engineer and not the ice-cream type.

Lazy me...

Today I was checking my blog activity statistics and realized that it has gone down this month. Last couple of months I was posting practically everyday and this month all I am able to manage is writing about my weekends. If you know me very well you will say, ‘Oh… this is very typical of you, Ashley!!!’ There are so many things (and people) that fascinate me and I tend to take up that activity with lots of vigor. But also tend to abandon many of them once I lose interest in them (or when people start acting too smart). The graph curve changes its direction exponentially. Though there are lots of other things, I have been doing despite all the problems. Anyways… I won’t make blogging one of the things I give up. Recently, I have been getting quite many complements for my writing and who doesn’t like praise you see :-D. Consider it just as lazy lapse in productivity :-).

These days I am so badly stuck in work that all I can see is blue screen, crash dump, even in dreams. By the time I reach home, my mind is totally exhausted to think of anything. It just goes blank. I don’t even remember what I did last week or even during the weekend. It was the long weekend, and I wanted to celebrate New Year, ‘Gudi Padwa’ in total Marathi style and wanted to invite friends for lunch. But our maid ran away and I ended up making aloo-parathas and Shira (Suji Halwa in Hindi), which was not that bad menu for holiday :-). Apart from that there were lots movies watched. First the epic ‘300’, fundu story and great presentation, then ‘You have got mail’, I can watch this one thousand times and the sweetest movie ‘Sound of Music’. I watched this one for the first time and I loved it. All the praise I have heard about it is just right. Also finished watching FRIENDS season one and half of season two. I am obsessed with the series these days. Hmm… by this time you must have realized that I was glued to my room all three days. Yes, you are right. I didn’t feel like going out and seeing other people. Now you know exactly why I like Garfield so much!!!

But I was not in total seclusion after all... been to my favorite coffee place ‘Inch’ after so many days. I just love the ambience and beverages they serve, Mint and hazelnut flavored hot chocolate being my all time favorite :-). The food is also not bad though they have very less veggie options :-(. But we tried food at a different restaurant called ‘Hot Walk’ (or was it ‘Hot Wok’ ??), a Chinese place near CMH road, Nice cosy place with good food and good ambience.

And how can I forget the most important thing, the makeover that my hair have got. Sunday afternoon, my roomie declared that I must get a haircut. I thought of trying this hep salon a friend had suggested long time ago. We needed to take appointment to get a hair cut there! With the money I paid for my hair-cut, I could have bought myself round trip train tickets to my home. I know Mom is gonna freak out when she sees my shorter hair. But with all the compliments I am getting, I think the money is worth spent.

I have picked up Shirsha’s blog habit of describing about ‘how my weekend was?’ Here comes description of another one :-).
This weekend was the ‘movie weekend’, I watched close to 5 movies and a music show (yes!!!). I say close to 5 because I left the theatre in between for movie because it was too horrible to watch… Mel Gibson’s movie ‘Apocalypto’. I donno what has made him to make a movie like that; least he should not call it a movie and sell is a documentary on primitive human beings. It was the first movie I started the weekend with and made my cousin to leave the theatre within 40 minutes after they started to dissect human parts one by one (Ewwww!!!). But back home watched better movies. My friend’s husband is a great movie fan and has nice collection of cds/dvds. Oooh… I forgot to mention, I was in Pune this weekend… Yayy!!!
I had some work in the city so had flown in for the weekend and stayed with this friend of mine... a little bit of work to be finished on Friday morning and then lot of fun with friends, cousins and most important with dearest sis. She came down all the way to meet me. There were so many people to meet. Most of our time was spent in going from one place to another. We must have traveled complete length of Pune for more than once. The city is supposed to be a dream place for every Marathi person but somehow I never took much liking for it. The roads are pathetic and so is traffic and pollution. I felt like a total stranger there and missed Bangalore buzz. The friend said I have bad habit of getting attached to things. I guess she is right. I used to feel same when I left Mumbai.
This friend I stayed with, was my roomie in Mumbai and one of those caring roomies I am always blessed with. Those were the days when all I knew was to go to office and come back home and sleep. I couldn’t cook or clean, couldn’t even make a cuppa tea. Those two gals pampered me like a baby. The story of how good (totally burnt) rice I had made for a sick friend is still popular with Mumbai friends group. So when I went to her place this time, I so much wanted to demonstrate my cooking skills. After all the plans, we settled down on making aloo-parathas. They were yummy as usual.

Apart from ‘Apocalypto’, other movies I watched were (in the order of watching) ‘My Super Ex-Girl Friend’ (Funny concept), ‘Hitch’ (Can watch this one again and again), ‘HTPL’ (The kids wanted to watch it once again), ‘Remember the Titans’ (Really good one). And last but not the least was the song extravaganza ‘Ayushyawar Bolu Kahi’ (translated as ‘Lets talk something about life’), as innovative program started by two young musicians Salil Kulkarni and Sandip Khare. The man Sandip Khare is miracle with words. Its been really long since I have listened to such beautiful Marathi poems and songs. I missed attending it when they had come to Bangalore. I can’t help but recite this poem ‘Evdhach Na’.
“Evdhach na… Ekte jagu
Amach hasa, amach rad
Gheun samore ektech baghu

Ratrial kon duparla kon
Janmaala avghya ya purlay kon
Shwaasaala shwaas kshanaala kshanaala kshaan
Diwsaala diwas jodat jagu
Evdhach na…

Anganala kumpan hotach kadhi
Gharala aangan hotach kadhi
Gharaache bhaas, Anagnaache bhaas
Kupanache bhaasach bhogat jagu…
Evdhach na…

Aalaat aalat tar aalaat tumchech paay
Gelaat tar gelat konaala kaay
Swatach paay swatach waat
Swtach sobat houn jagu
Evdhach na…

Maatiche ghar maatiche daar
Maatich ghar maatich daar
Maatichya dehala maatche waar
Maatich khari maatich bari
Maatit maati mislat jagu
Evdhach na… “

I will try to translate it some time… Will have to use my linguistic skills at the best :-).

Happy Women’s Day !!!

Today’s the woman’s day and there is lot of halla-gulla celebrations going on all around the world, sellers marketing their product, government people making sugar-coated speeches and boys/men whining over ‘why is there only women’s day and why not men’s day?’. Some guy replied, it is men’s day everyday so let women have at least one day of their own!

Haah… that's very true isn’t it? Let me clarify first. I am not the ‘mahila-mukti’ types to start arguing with men and opposing them on each and every issue, I don’t even claim all the women are superior. But I do believe that women should get respect as a human being which is still lacking in most walks of our society and even all over the world. The need to celebrate a special day for them speaks of that isn’t it?
We still have abundant cases of rapes, brutal domestic violence, killing for dowries, eve-teasing, killing of female fetuses and newborns. A lot still has to be done to make the woman to be able to hold her head high and make a place for themselves in the world. Why is that, only girls have restrictions about timing and places to go? And why is a girl being blamed always if anything bad happens to her and not the man who actually does it?
I came across this blog cum project called Blank Noise. Here they encourage women to speak up about the harassments they face every day of life. There are many men who are part of this project and being a great help. Do read the part where women have wished what they would like to do. Most of the women have expressed very simple desires like being able to walk on the street with out any fear or just stand on the pavement without being conscious of thousand stares piercing at them. It might be shocking to read but it is true… very very small things that ‘only’ girls have to care about.
I too have a wish… I want to walk in the rain without caring for how my clothes will look like and without being conscious if any guy is staring at me

Today evening they are arranging a walk in major areas of Bangalore to encourage women to walk on the roads with out any fear and just be themselves. There will be men to show their support too. Be part of it if you can!

Here is wishing all the beautiful girls and women of the world a very Happy Women’s Day! And wishing for a future where we will not be need to celebrate separate women’s day and everyday will be celebration of the women kind… !!!

Amen!!!

Evening to remember....

They say… everything that starts well should end well…

So was true about my weekend. It started with the most amazing musical performance I have attended yet! If you know me you know that I am the biggest music lover… any kind of music be it rock or classical is good for me. There always song playing my head. Do all people have song of the day… like my today’s song is Numb/Encore- Lynkin Park!
So my roomie wanted to go for this show “Concert for Bangalore” (or something like that)… I agreed because my favorite musician of all times… Ustad Zakir Husain was going to play. All my study hours(though they were not too long :D) in school were spent with his music playing on the background. The man is pure magic on tabla!!! There used to other classical music performances in house too. Dad being big fan of classical music, most of our mornings used to start with Bismilla Khan’s sanai or Ravi Shankar’s sitar. But after leaving home, I was more oriented towards vocals than instrumental music.

So when I decided to go for this concert it was more of, ‘ok I can give her company…’ we managed to drag one more friend along with us (big time rock fan like me). Oh I forgot to mention the other musician, legendary Ustad Amjad Ali khan. Apparently they were playing together after more than a decade in Bangalore.

The evening started late due the traffic jams and all chaos. The ground was more or less full and I was surprised to see young crowd outnumbering uncles and aunties. We were sitting far far away from the stage. Everything there looked like colored dots moving around. Amjad Ali khan started the concert with the note ‘we haven’t even talked about what we will be playing tonight. Everything we play is decided as the mood sets and cannot be repeated again. Call it simplicity, magic or difficulty of our music. This performance is especially for you Bangalore!’ Wow… How amazing is that! And his fingers started moving smoothly on the sarod. The music was so enchanting that I never felt the need to stand up and ‘see’ them perform. It’s the kind of music that touched the heart and enlightens your senses… you can actually ‘feel’ it. There was kinda smile on everyone’s face that tells you are absolutely delighted, through out the performance and the heads were nodding automatically with every twist in the symphony. I have zero understanding of the ragas to tell what all they played. There was some evening ragas, holi raga and prayer to Ganesha. And there was the full moon to witness it all.

I have been to couple of live music performances… mostly rock. They were mind blowing. But the rock music bangs in the head, and this music plays softly with your heart. Ahhh… I am so happy that I was there. I still have that smile on my face. And the thought that I might not be able to attend the ‘Iron Maiden’ conert, hurts less :-).

The weekend ended with laugh riot called ‘Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd’ a.k.a HTPL. I haven’t heard people talking too good things about it but I liked it. It’s a nice concept, could have been better, but still… a good try. There was this scene which I should not miss to mention:

Background: They are the perfect couple. Been together for 16 years and never had a single fight. They have choices, likes dislikes, cloths and even bags too! Too sweet to digest!! One morning the gal discovers that her man has been absconding for hours. She get angry and they have their first fight. After lot of convincing, the guy agrees to tell her the secret. He takes her to a lonely place at wee hours.

Guy: Dekho, abhi job hi kuch tum dekhegi usase darna nahi. Always remember that I love you.
Gal: What are you saying ? You are freaking me out.
Guy: This has to come out one day. Please say that you won’t get angry with me.
Gal: Please tell me what is it? I am freaking.
Gal: Dekho sambhalke.
(He stands up and zooooooom. He is a super hero!)
Gal: Oh I am so happy.
Guy is puzzled. She stands up and zooooooom. She is the super gal too ! Bravo !!!

Gal: Isiliye hum logon me aaj tak zagada nahi hua. Super man aur super women 16 saal me sirf ek baar zagadate hai

Me was ROTFL :-) :-) :-)

In between there was Jalebi and Baigna ka bharta (yummy!), at ‘Chilly Pepper’. Though it has Chinese name, the place serves amazing northie food… truly ‘exceptional food’ as their tag line goes. And the huge soooper scooper at corner house… I just can’t get enough of ice-cream these days :-). Friends and F.R.I.E.N.D.S. were there all along to keep nice company. Though I missed a trekking trip… but will make that soon:-).

I am tagged...

Shirsha has tagged me! And I am prompt to finish it quickly :-)

Favorite Colors: Sky blue, light yellow sometimes bright colors
Favorite Food: Chats (pani puri), Marathi food. Other than that Italian, Mexican, North Indian… anything veggie, spicy
Favorite Month: No preference. May mebbe… thats the summer holiday time and has my b’day too !!!
Favorite Songs: Mera Kuch Saamaan, Everything I do, When you say nothing at all will do anytime. Other than that choice depends on mood from Jagjeet to Metalica… I am huge music buff
Favorite Movies: Dil Chahata hai, Animation movies and RomComs like When Harry Met Sally, You have got mail, Notting Hill
Favorite Book: In Marathi all PL Deshpande books. ‘Love story’ and ‘The Fountainhead’ in English
Favorite Sport: Kabbadi :D
Favorite Season: Rainy season
Favorite Day Of the week: Wednesday
Favorite Ice Cream Flavor: Most of them (including mint too!!!) and I have started liking chocolate a lot these days
Favorite Time of Day: Dusk

8 CURRENTS:
Current Mood: Its Monday again … *sigh*
Current Taste: Bakhar Wadi that my romie got from Mumabi... yum !
Current Clothes: Pajamas
Current Desktop: Ocean Blue
Current Toe nail Color: Colorless
Current Time: 7.22 PM IST
Current Surroundings: My room
Current Thoughts: zzZZzzzz

6 FIRSTS:
First Best Friend: Don’t remember
First Screen Name: Ashley
First Pet: N/A
First Piercing: Ears
First Album: Don’t remember
First Movie: 'Annadi' thats the first movie I remember watching in theater

6 LASTS:
Last Cigarette: When someone around me smokes :-D
Last Taste: Parathas we gobbled on at 'Boby da Dhaba' in Ulsoor ...
Last Movie Seen: The Angrez… too hilarious
Last Phone Call: To mom
Last Book Read: Shantaram

Have You Ever Broken the Law: Traffic Signals … many times even on phoren grounds
Have You Ever Been Arrested: Not yet
Have You Ever Been on TV: Yeah … when we were watching uncle’s marriage CD
Have You Ever Lied: Yup!
Have You Ever Kissed Someone You Didn't Know: Naah

5 THINGS:
Thing You're Wearing: Pajamas
Thing You've Done Today: Wake up late, dozed in office though meetings, came back early and now waiting for office servers to come up and blogging
Thing You Can Hear Right Now: “Paint my love” MLTR
Thing You Can't Live Without: Do water, air etc count ?
Thing You Do When You're Bored: Read, Listen to music, Watch TV, sleep, go out, bug friends

4 PLACES YOU'VE BEEN TODAY:
Home, Office, Southie eatery near office, bad bad Airport road and MG Road traffic

3 PEOPLE YOU CAN TELL ANYTHING TO:
Mom and couple of friends.

2 CHOICES:
Want to see mom and sis desperately
Never give up on anything in life

1 THING YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE: Travel all over India

And I tag Apoorv :-)

“Baaah Baaah Baaah…” someone I used to consider the most sensible person gave (or I should say tried to give) me advice of lifetime. I didn’t know what to say … should I laugh or cry. Words have meaning my dear, and they do hurt other people. I couldn’t help but wonder… Do we really have the right to judge other people? And then try to judge other “other” people based on these other people and the go ahead and give them the free advice? And if we get advice, should we really consider it? If somebody is giving you some advice does it mean that it has to be right? Ok, so you used to consider that person for a long long time, so does that mean the person has to be right this time too. People change and so do their views and our opinions about them!

Someone gave me a beautiful example about change of opinions,
You are madly in love with a guy and you see him raping a girl… will your emotions be same ?

Haaah… Its amazing life… You never know what will happen next :-).

This is to all those people who have faith in life and faith in yourself…

If you have dream, live it
If you have intuition, follow it
Be true to yourself
And everything else will fall in right place!!!

And let there be world peace!!!

The 99th Post

Its going to be a log weekend (Monday is Bangalore Bandh :-() and I am sitting at home on the Sunday evening. There are lots of thoughts crowding in my head and I am not able to think straight… I had a not so good start of the weekend. I need to write something… it always helps to disintegrate my thoughts. What should I write about? Was talking to my friend about it and she suggested why not write an autobiography… Ahh… now that’s interesting! I asked her, ‘name a single great thing that I have done that will make others read my autobiography’. ‘Why do have to be great to write it and why do you want others to read it? Do you always write for others?’ She asks me. That’s true, I don’t write for others… neither to please anyone nor to hurt anyone, till now I haven’t written anything ‘politically correct’. This blog has always been like reflection of my most dear thoughts which I generally feel very awkward to talk. I have been writing about stuff without caring for who reads it or not … and believe it or not, putting down thoughts on paper (webpage that is :-)) makes a lot of difference to whole thought process… and has helped me to get out of the bad phase of life when I started blogging. And this happens to be my 99th post. Yayy!!!

Let me write about some random thoughts I have been having this weekend. I was thinking what I want to do now. I am neither depressed nor sad… but in a reflecting mood (I guess I do lot of thinking every weekend :D). But for the first time in last eight years I am missing home. I am missing dad. I wish I would get to see him at least once and tell how much I love him. I never said that to him when I had a chance. I want to go back and be a good girl I used to be, responsible and sensible. Yeah… I was like that . These two years in Bangalore have been totally insane for me. I have done the most bizarre things. Interestingly every city/town I have stayed in has brought drastically different changes in me… I will write about them some other time!
Yesterday my roomie got idea of opening a hair salon in front of Barista on MG road looking at the different hair styles of guys there. And I got mehandi (Henna) done on my hand sitting on the footpath :D. I just looove the mehandi smell. We didn’t cook anything again this weekend and gobbled on free food at two friends’ place. I bunked guitar class again… finally my guitar teacher called me up asking whether I want to attend the class or not :-). I plan to practice tomorrow and attend the class next weekend… of course, only if my laziness permits. And tomorrow I need to do some office work which I have been postponing for weeks!
Will write more later !

Customer Service … Now and Then

Its amazing how the call-centre service is “evolved” over recent times

Earlier the calls used to be like this (when they were new and we were also new to it)

Caller: Hello, Can I take to miss Ashlesha?
Me: Yes. Speaking
Caller: Good afternoon ma’am. This is ABC speaking from XYZ bank. Can get few minutes of your precious time?
Me: Time for?
Caller: I would like to tell you about this very interesting Credit card our company has to offer you since you are working for PQR company. Can I talk to you?
Me: Yeah please go ahead
Caller: Blah blah blah.(10-15 minutes of convincing) So… it is very good offer ma’am. So can I send my customer executive to you today?
Me: Okie.

And we doomed ourselves with lot of credit cards!

Then came next change

Caller: Hello.
Me: Hello ?
Caller: Good evening.. err good morning sir … err ma’am
Me: Good afternoon!
Caller: Err… Good afternoon ma’am. I am calling from XYZ bank
Me: Yes ?
Caller: This is regarding personal loan.
Me: Well I am not interested. Thank you. (I do say that !)
Caller: Ok ma’am. Can I know the reason ma’am? This is very interesting offer.
Me: (meri marzi !!!) I am not interested... isn’t that enough?
Caller: Ok ma’am. Can you give any references?
Me: No
Though sometimes we give number of our colleagues to bug them :D!

Current trend

Caller: Hello. This is ABC calling from XYZ bank. It is regarding personal loan (In a single breath)
Me: Not interested
Caller: ok (Like he/she knew the answer already)

After some time they will play records of this like they used have poll campaign during the days of “India Shining”, when the dear PM would call and talk to you!

I must post something on Monday :-) !

Some time pass…

- If you are 'Indian Ocean' fan (it’s a music band for those who don't know :-)), you can download their music for free here http://www.indianoceanmusic.com/.
Listen to it … they are amazing!

- New blogger version is totally template unfriendly. I cannot put new template because it cries for some
XML parsing mismatch... though it works fine with the older version. I want my flexibility of changing template back!
Hellooo Googlie ppl are you reading?

- ‘Radio Indigo’ plays some nice music. ‘FM Rainbow’ tries to hog all the FM bandwidth around its area. So whenever I am listening to radio and nearing office I need to listen to mix of English + kannada songs :-(.

- I am getting sore fingers while practicing guitar. I am skipping guitar classes again :-D.

- New IE7 is launched. It looks exactly like FireFox (damn those copiers!!!), works pathetic. It hangs miserably whenever I try to open Google reader. Totally off my list of browsers. Try Opera… its cool.

- Popular rock band ‘Iron maiden’ will be performing live in Bangalore next month (17th March to be precise) !!!

- Bangalore people need no reason to put up riots. Like today there might be trouble due to Cauvery verdict. People … grow up!!! Earning your daily bread-butter is important than anything else.

- I hate filling up timesheets.

- My office network is terribly slow these days :-(

- Mondays are boring and lazy as usual :-

Customer Service :-)

Yesterday I got this call

Caller: Hello, can I talk to Miss Aaaasheeeleshaa (they do that to my name most of the time L)
Me: Yeah... speaking.
Caller: Hello maam, this is xxxx calling from Airtel. It is regarding the query you had placed with us for broadband connection.
(This was places couple of weeks ago I guess)
Me: Yes ?
Caller: I am sorry to inform you maam that the connection is not available in your area.
Me: Oh but it is already installed at my home.
Caller: (In little shocked voice)Err… what??? (Gathering himself together)When did you get the connection?
Me: I got it last friday.
Caller: Maam, are you sure that is an Airtel connection?
Me: That’s what the installation guy told me. I have the receipt and all too!
Caller: Err… but our records show that the connection is not available in your area.
Me: But I have it !!
Caller: (After a long pause and a bit of thinking) Thank you for choosing Airtel, maam. Sorry for this call and the wrong information.

I didn’t tell him that we had given wrong address :-D !!!

Arranged Marriage - Part 2

I know I have been talking/whining lots about marriage and related issues. But how can I write about anything else if this is the hottest topic in my life (at least I think so) at this point of time :-)…Just kidding :-). But after all this is (supposed to be) question of my life and I am bound to ponder on it frequently.

One of the freakiest things I found in the process of arranged marriage is “meet the guy”. Oh well let me clarify first, I am not against arranged marriages. I have observed love and arranged marriages very closely and one thing I am pretty sure of… it does not matter how you get together, what matters is how you go forward from there. I am obviously not falling for the arguments from ladies about “See our marriage has also worked noo !!! I saw him only after getting married. What is so much fuss about ‘right’ guy?” Dear lady, you might be right in you context but for not for someone like me. I am the introvert and tight-lipped one. Don’t get surprised…!! I might be blabbering too much on the blog and to few of my closest friends :-). But when it comes to talking to people, all my communication skills seem to evaporate in thin air. It is very rare of me to get along with someone right from the day one. And I have problem with 90% of people in the world :D. My friend circle is limited one… I mean there are lots of acquaintances but friends are few. And I am very fussy about my friendships :-).

Our ‘society’ still does not approve the idea of pre-nuptial meetings etc. They expect a girl to meet guy plus 20 of his relatives and not complain. I am in fact scared by this thought... What if I meet a guy and find him ok and they ask me to marry him the next day (Something like that had happened once :-)). I mean, I cannot just say yes or no in one go!! I am the adjusting, understanding (and oh yes I can cook very well :-))et all but what about the other person.
A friend had suggested me to consider it as a blind date… accha laga to good nahi to chhod do :-). Common you don’t date someone with marriage on mind and I don’t ‘date’ at all for that matter.
Ahh… is there a better solution to all this or I am thinking too much?

With all the unwanted things happening like me getting the mood swings, Bangalore people fighting for stupidest reasons, Shahrukh hosting KBC and making music-video for that (Ewww), Rakhi Sawant threatening to commit suicide on television or the news of possible single digit hikes (:-((()... a good thing has happened.

First there was a small poster on a sidey lamp-post in my gully. I started jumping with joy with just sight of it. I made a phone call... and it was done within 24 hours (technically it took more time cause I was not at home first time they came)... Yipppie !!! Finally I have the airtel broadband connection installed at home!

Do you remember, a couple of months ago (may be more than that) I was desparately trying to get internet connection from any possible ISP... just to know that no ISPs exist in my area. Well well well... that was wrong... the airtel one is there in the house next to mine from last 2 years. I was giving the wrong address! Do you know that there can exist a Lane and a Layout with same name in different parts of the city? Well... I didn't know that till Friday :-). I always believed that the area I live in is a Lane which is actually a Layout and the Lane exists on the other side of the road where there are no ISPs (haah.. How backward ! :D). Ahh these Bangalore addresses!

Anyways the it is here and it is working and I am blogging from home. Now I can surf as much as I want! I will be spending less time in office and more at home. Yayyy!!!