The Matrimony Chronicles- III

Lets call him , Q. 'Coz if he's following this blog , he mightn't know.Well err yeah , mostly he wouldnt know.I'm told most people don't know their quirks even when they're told about it.Take Amma , for example.She thinks she's got a great sing song voice.She doesn't.Whenever my Dad's friends call up , they think she's him.
Anyway,back to Q.

Q lives two streets away which is why I thought there'd be some hope for the alliance.Imagine!! 2 streets!And so,I agreed.
After the initial Hi , I studied till 10th here ,my family are descendants from this rhesus monkey etc etc, we moved to Phase 2 i.e the boy girl chatting meeting stage.I mailed him my email id and mobile number, for which he replied saying he was , hold your breath *phone-shy*.Now , none of the full bodied matri men Ive met so far have been phone shy.I thought men usually jumped at the thought of having a girl's(ANY girl's) phone number.Hmmm , this must be what Amma kept talking about.That men get senile after a certain age.Serve me right for not having married when I was 23.Q added saying it would be a good idea to meet.Ahhh I thought ..he's a cut above the rest , he wants to meet instead of just talking ...oh wait there's some more text.What's that? He wants us to meet online at 9:30 Pm on Yahoo messenger.And his id is "yahoomessenger009".I imagined what his other ids would be "skype4u_010" , "gtalk_4u_4frm_me_011".In this day and age , with a zillion messengers , it must be hard to remember IDs.Right?

The last time I had an online appointment when I 17.When sameer_bhatia_punjab_da_puttar from PnJaab told me that he had an online crush on me (he loved my fonts).I forgave Q for this faux paus.After all , he lived two streets away.How bad could he be.

A week later (I forgot to keep up the said appointment .. I really cant think why), I got a mail from Q.It read " Hi *Seren's full name..uh oh bad sign*, I was online between 9:15:53 to 9:45:51 .. nearly half hour (actually 29 minutes 58 seconds)and you did'nt turn up(Really?Are you sure I didnt!) , I think you must've mailed me the reason .. but for some reason I didnt receive any mail(Err yes Post man chacha misplaced it and mailed it to Oklipuram instead) , I am sure you have reasons for doing what you did(Yes , would you say the same if I broke a vase on your head? Please?), can we meet online today at 9:15 PM?.Now, you know ,I hate statistic keeping whiny people.Normal whiny people I dont mind.But oh!Two streets away!

Recently I received yetannoder mail from him asking if we could meet.I said 'Sure!How about coffee at Kalmane?'And pat came the reply 'I hate the smell of coffee and jasmine , could we meet at someweirdcontinental restaurant at 6'.*Sigh*.If a coffee filter were to be male and tam brahm , I'd consider marrying it I say , and dude hates the SMELL ?SMELL? If I were to be in coma(touch wood) a good way to bring me back to senses would be to bring me some coffee.Sere.I'm being spoilt.Yes , so please sue me.

Hmph.

Sigh.

Two streets = 5 minutes from Home.

Ok , I go meet him and see.He can't be too bad.

A trip to Maddur

Some weeks back , I decided I'd take the geriatrics to to Maddur.Why Maddur? 'Coz of the famous Vaidyanatha Temple thats a few kilometres from the town and also the Ambegal Krishna temple at Doddamalur , near Chennapatna.
Now , lets talk our language.
We set out at 7:30AM laden with biscuits , fruits , dates , Filter kaapi flask , hand towel , leg towel, towel towel , newspaper , 3 library books(which were stored carefully in a separate 'book' bag in case they got lost/damaged/lost and damaged),iodex, amritanjan,shampoo hair comb, paddle hair comb, soap,dettol.
Suffice to say , my Mother's previous birth must have been that of an ant.A wary one at that.
Car driving always puts me into a bad mood.The pressure of having to save one's life , one's dependent's lives(which includes Petunia's as well) is a little too much to handle.Especially with Petunia , she's certainly not a morning person.There was a maddening jam at the Mysore road junction , a demented Sumo guy came and hit my bumper and sailed forth after showering abuses on ME!I showed off my vocabulary rather well , only to find two horrified faces looking at me wondering what they had done wrong. Sheesh! Sometimes there's no winning , is there?
Once out of Kengeri , the highway broadens into three and that's when you really start enjoying the drive.At this point , I felt like the girl from the Sumo Victa Ad , any of you remember her?She's the one who drives a Sumo Victa with her entire family dozing behind her.Found it.
An hour later , we stopped at Kamat Lokaruchi(Lok-aa-ruchi as Gee calls it in her Punju accent :)) for breakfast.You have a choice of a breakfast-Buffet versus singal-singal order.Buffet it was!We were served little glasses of fresh pure grape juice , 2 hot idlies , crispa vadas , hot pongal,the kharabath-kesaribath duo, and quarter pieces of hot masala dosa, with chutney and sambar.That's one thing I love about Karnataka.The food.Its a vegetarian's paradise.
We washed down the breakfast with a cup of hot filter kaapi , found ourselves smiling dreamilly(obviously because of the breakfast) and sauntered into Janapada Loka which is right next to Lokaruchi.
Our next stop was to be the Ambegal Krishna temple at DoddaMalur.Ambegaalu in Kannada means "to crawl".Legend has it that it was after visiting this temple that Purandaradasa composed the famous "Jagadhodharana Adisidalu Yashoda".It was my favorite composition during dance practices.Coming to think of it , all songs describing Lord Krishna enthrall me.

What struck me most about the temple were its walls, walls that had probably seen history unfold.
Old.Majestic.Sanctuary , yes , thats the word to describe it best.

It was around 11 when we set off towards the Vaidyanathaswamy temple in Maddur,which is about 20 Kms from Chennapatna.You need to branch off into the Maddur Main road from the highway and take a detour that will lead you to the Vaidyanathapura road.There on , its a straight course.Ask any native the way and they'll go "Straight hogi madam , then swalpa yeda , matthe balagade ondu sethuve sigathhe , alli hoga baradu.. " and so on.For those lost in translation , that meant "keep going straight, turn to the left a *little* , turn to the right and you will find a bridge..that's where you mustn't be going :D.

In any of the Vaidyanatha temples , the pooja involves immersing some jaggery and salt into the Kalyani(to indicate that the disease will vanish just as the salt and jaggery do into the waters).

I watched as my Mom and Dad vanished into the temple before it closed for lunch and stood at the head of the steps.From where I stood , I could see forests, paddy fields and the river.. all at once.Sometimes , you don't really need a temple or an idol to pray to.

Come 1'o clock and we reached Maddur town.I insisted on stopping at the Maddur railway station.It brings back memories of my childhood when my entire family would make a trip to Mysore , our ancestral hometown.And my uncle used to make it a point to stop at the Maddur railway station for the famous Maddur Vadas.The railway station is so much from a scene from Malgudi days.So idyllic and sleepy.

The station guard sauntered up to me while I was clicking away and asked me if I was press-avaru.I told him I'd put it up on the internet , would he like to strike a pose?He blushed a brilliant red and changed the subject.He pointed to a poster of the ' Fairy Queen' and told me very sadly that steam engines were a thing of the past.
As I slowly pulled out of the railway station towards the highway , I could hear familiar voices in my head , that of Patti describing to me how my great grandad had to sell our Mysore home in order to treat a great aunt's illness , how Thatha used to come back to a *rented*(she would sigh at this time) house in Mysore , some more about the mango trees and the jackfruit orchards.Somehow that entire stretch from Bangalore to Mysore is like a cord that connects me to my past , familiar names -Chennapatna , Maddur, Mandya,Srirangapatna , T-Narsipur(we had old barren land there -but catch me calling it that in front of Patti) and then finally Mysore.

yesterday all my troubles seemed faar away ..!

Yesterday was just lovely.The entire day.
Morning started off with rigorous gymming , after which i settled down beside a colleague with a plate of hot poha and chutney sent by Mom and a cup of steaming filter coffee.

The evening was cloudy and windy (typically Bangalore after 3 days of touching 35 degs) , my cab mates started playing DC and one girl had t he *gasp* audacity to ask me if I was good at acting.*GASP* . I wondered what Mom , Dad and Alt would sat to this .. . i still cant get over it! Seren , can you act??? can i act??
Oh well . I got quite a difficult word to "act" .. its just that my team cracked "illusion" in just about errm 10 seconds.
Thank you very much.
Anyway , evening saw me reach home by 6:30 , there was no power and I popped upstairs to have a dekho on all my potted plants.. I still havent posted about them , no? I have pictures too .. will post asap , ok? Anyway i have pots that I planted with my own little hands(yes , i am this cute) theres marigolds , petunias(which is also the name of my car) , theres a rose plant , jasmine , all of which i potted. Myself.
I came back and sat with Appa in the verandah , swung my legs and ate whatever Amma had left for me in the microwave(She had gone to the temple).It was windy and there was a touch of a drizzle .. i could smell the wet mud and some upma in the mouth.
:)

All my Bags

I'm not really a 'My bag needs to go with my outfit' kind of person.I'm more of a 'I will carry whichever bag I carried last night' kind of person.This is understandable since I need to catch a cab at 7:50 AM everyday and shifting a wallet , ipod,mobile,mobile charger,hair brush and a couple of other sensible utilities is too much to do that early in the morning when my To do list for the day reads
1.Don't leave without a bath
2.By leave , I mean to office.
Anyway , an avid shopper that I am, I can never think one bag more, is too many. Please find below, photos of my veritable bag collection and the tale that they have to tell.

The Shantiniketan Bag

Alto had the same bag in red (Do you still have it , Alt?) and I loved it.So much that Mom gifted me this bag on my birthday, I think it was my 18th.




The Do-it-yourself Bag .Gifted to me by Alto.The cutest bag I have.It came with all the stickers and my favorite is the yellow smily.

The corduroy bag , in my favourite color , red!Gifted to me by Alto(you will find this sentence used to bits in this post).Also Mom's favourite.

Byraka Mountain Gear

My college bag , lots of sentiments , trips, results, pani-puri tales,dust,bike-trip memories attached. I havent the heart to give it away :).

Kauko!

Gifted to me by Vi on my birthday. The multi utility ruffian bag.Vi and I used to keep yelping 'Kauko!' to each other whenever I carried the bag for a few days after that.

The twilight bag

I love this bag because of the wordings on it.The owner of the boutique we saw it in convinced me that since I'd given my heart to it in the auspicious twilight hour , I had to make it mine.By paying 800 odd bucks.Vi maintained that it wasn't auspicious but suspicious and it didnt really take twilight for me to be made an ass of.

Oh well.

Copper Nicus

The only trendy yet sensible bag I own , bought it at a sale at Brand factory.

The twin bag

It so happened that Alto had ordered the cream bag to be sent to me on my birthday and it didnt come through or so she thought , and ordered the maroon bag.Ta-da! Both landed on the same day.Being an ass must be heriditary :P

The crochet bag

Goes with my jeans and is uber-cool.The only non-rag cloth item that I found at Fab-India

Cleo the clutch

Gifted to me on my birthday by Gee and SRC.Im still waiting for the right time to team it with a black gown n ink-blue shoes :D

Red woolie bag
Hand made by Mom.Its too lovely too be carried!

Came with the tamboolam at somebody's wedding.Looks fab with a with a silk saree.

That's enough about me.Now tell me , in detail mind you , which is your favorite bag and whats the tale behind it? Tell Tell?

And oh .. happy V day .. heres hoping Ram Sene can do what my Mom hasn't been able to all these years..get me married!!
Heh

Retail therapy

A visit to the Home Store on a Sunday evening , cups of Latte and Cappuccino and plenty of 'family gossip' with the Mom make a looming Monday not so bad..

Results are out!

My engineering results have come .. after 6 and a half years .. from Sivaji TV.com.They renamed Bangalore University to Visveshvaraya Tech Univeristy , that I knew .. maybe its like how they renamed the MG road circle to Anil Kumble circle , err this meant Rajni Saar visited VTU?
Hmm .. oh look ..I flunked CS1303..

A trip to Kerala

Happy New Year deeeer readers :) , here's wishing all your dreams ,hopes, aspirations come true! What did you guys do on 1st night? Me?Well, errm I slept.No, not 12.At 10.There's only so much of Ronit Roy dancing that you can take, no?

A lot has been happening that I haven't updated you on.One of them being a trip to Kerala.Needless to say , it was beautiful.Munnar has no specific place that you need to stop and take pictures of.Every bit of Munnar is breathtakingly beautiful.Now I know why all the mallus I know call themselves Keralites with pride.

Day 1:Munnar.
We had made reservations at the Royal Retreat.The hotel is situated atop the Kannan Devan Hills.The hotel itself is very quaint ,picturesque and extremely clean.There is no specific place in Munnar that you can call scenic , every stop seemed straight out of a picture post card!
But oh! The food .. BIG PROBLEM.I thought I was being smart when I had listed down all the vegetarian joints in Munnar , only to find the Saravana Bhavan there is a fake one , and had nothing to do with the original!And guess what happened at a restaurant the driver forced us to get into!
Seren to Waiter : Ermm can you please clean the table?
Waiter: "It is clean"
Seren:"No , it isn't.. there are rice grains all over the table cloth!"
Waiter: *Promptly takes out the table cloth with a sweeping gesture , dusts everything to the floor and puts it back with an Einstein expression on his face*
Seren: *Stomps to the door*

The drive from Munnar to Thekkady is just breathtakingly beautiful ... endless green mountains , tea plantations , flowers in every possible color in full bloom , fresh air , and little waterfalls and dams tucked away here and there.It is precisely then that you ask yourself a question: What the hell am I doing slogging away my night and day in the 10th most polluted city in India, when all I needed to do was to buy a little cardamom estate right here by that nook, drink bad coffee, sip nice cardamom tea(home grown),have wild rice for lunch and call my Dad Achan.
Ans: The said estate would cost about 20 lacs and that doesn't even include maintenance and the fact that I have just one use for cardamom - In my tea.

Day 2: Thekkady
The Kathakali Centre day,the highlight of the trip.We were called one hour before the act so we could watch the artists dress up.
Altoid:"Whats happening Seren?"
Seren:*Hushes two american kids who dared to laugh at the 'artist'* "Can't you see? *Hushed tones* The artists are dressing up !"

The male artist(MA) finished with his green make-up and started to fervently tie a fat rope around his belly.The ticket issuer guy(TG) started to insert empty cement covers and rice bags under the rope.Ta-dah! This is what flairs are made of.

The artists:

MA : Male Artist

FA(Duh):Female Artist who is actually Male

The story:

This performance revolves around the story of Narakasura, a vicious demon and Jayantha, the valorous son of Indra (King of Devas). Nakrathundi, Narakasura’s sister gets attracted to Jayantha and approaches him in the guise of Lalitha, a beautiful woman. Jayantha rejects her love and the disappointed demoness takes her normal form and attacks him. He injures her and a shocked Narakasura vows to take revenge, only to find himself punished for his wrongs.

The performance commences to a very enthusiastic audience.MA quivers eyebrows , cheeks , nose,eyebrows and every quiver friendly facial part to show that he obviously is Narakasura.Meanwhile , Narakasura’s sister(FA) winks(??),raises eyebrows coyly,winks again,pouts with large orange lips,feigns a kiss and yes , winks again.I had expected Kathakali to be a lot different from Bharatanatyam , but for the life of me , I could'nt imagine even a demon's sister breaking into a majestic-hooligan-going-aie ice ice baby act.

Winking? Really?

Ok, FA was now prancing around the stage lustilly winking, quivering,shaking hips and winking all at once.She was in lowww , mind it.

My gaze shifts to MA , he is eh??? Adjusting his nails and his costume calmly..like oh where am i? Oh right, the stage.If u don't trust me , look at the pic on the extreme left.

I was getting rather bored with all the quivering when a diversion came in the form of a late comer.He calmly walked up to the stage and asked MA where his seat number was.MA stopped quivering , ushered him to the right row , walked back to the stage , put his feet up on the stool(prior to the diversion he had had one leg up on a rock), adjusted his flair and sword and continued quivering.From this angle , one of the aforementioned cement covers screamed out an advertisement for Coramandel Cement.I looked on in disbelief.

At the end of the 'performance' , the stage was thrown open to anybody who wanted a picture with the 'artists'.MA and FA quivered some more as the honeymooners hugged them and each other and said 'Cheese'.

I avoided Alto's smirking eyes on the way out and shushed my Dad rather loudly for wanting to come back for a Kalaripayattu show.

I was quite looking forward to the trip back to the 10th most polluted city.

Day 3:Thekkady

Periyar Wildlife Reserve.Altoid and I rented binoculars which costed about 100 bucks for two hours.The boat took off and I enthusiastically started scouring the lake with my binocs.Just then , a family of about 20 plus who were seated next to us went 'Bete bete kya karen , karna hai kuch kaam ..lallalala .. antakshari leke prabhu ka naam'

I set aside my binocs and concentrated on the yes .. of course!The honeymooners.Needless to say , we spotted no tigers.

Day 4: Allepey

We had rented out a speed boat for about 3 hours.And I must say , this was more soothing than the much touted Ayurvedic Massage that Kerala is well known for.While I'm on this I must tell you about this conversation that my Dad had with the driver who took us around.

Driver:" Seren and Alto , how about going to the ayurvedic massage centre"

Alto whispers to Seren: " Say no , that place looks shady"

Driver to Dad:"Achan(great , now the driver is our brother?), shall we go?"

Achan:"Sure , I've never seen a massage"

Seren:" Achan , you cant see a massage , its not like a museum tour.You need to get one"

Achan to Driver firmly:"Then , no"

Seren:*Makes mental notes to tell Mom about how Achan wanted to see a massage..hmm*

Ok , back to the backwaters.Alto enjoyed it the most , I think.She always has this list of things she wants to do and apparently the backwater tour was one of them.Really , I have no tongue in cheek comments about the cruise.It was the perfect ending to a perfect trip.

A lot of houses are situated either on islands or simply bang in the middle of the backwaters.. the people living there work on the paddy fields nearby and sell coconut water to the boatees(people on the boats:D).The boater(:D the guy who boatfied us around) stopped running the motor and our boat was generally bobbing around aimlessly.I looked around wondering at the life people led here, so different from the crappy things that I did back home ,so different from my world of incessant cribbing.

"Ipdiyum oru olaham irukuma?" (Like this also one world-a?)

Its that day of the year ..!

A hurried visit to the tailor , lying about the date , hurrying back with a newly stitched unironed Kurta = lots of effort+300 Rs







Two wooden block prints bought at Dastkar Mela , Chitrakala Parishat+ Fevicryl Fabric Paint +Wooden bangles bought at Fab India= Rs 500

A perfect ensemble all ready for the birthday = Priceless

Happyy Birthday to me !! :)

guess what happened

TGIF..

Terribly over loaded this week :D

Sometime last week we had a late night call , and I had booked a cab at 9:30 PM.The call got over sometime around 9 and I was walking towards the pantry for a cup of coffee.Our floor is the first .I was walking all weary eyed towards the window with my cup , when I suddenly saw a pair of bright headlights zooming towards me at breakneck speed.I stood rooted to the spot.I was on the first floor , how does that explain headlights at my level??

9/11? Was it a plane? Was I gonna die??

Then I realised ...

That we have a building with multi-level parking in front.

:D

On a more serious note , I am disgusted and sad at the same time , with whats happening with the world.There must be some form of retribution for this dastardly act.

A tag and then some

Alto has tagged me , or rather I forced her to .
So here goes,

My oldest memory:
Is of putting my hands between the elevator doors while on a visit to our relatives place in Bombay.Amma said ' DONT put your hands between the doors' and at that moment I did do exactly that.
....Tch Tch , Amma never ever learnt , did she ?

Ten years ago:
I was younger , a lot more naive , a lot more innocent and a great deal more irresponsible.
Ahem. Yes.I would like to think I conquered all that.

My first thought this morning:
Do you think the alarm is going to ring now? or now? .. now?


If you built a time capsule, what would it contain:
Hmm ..mt family my wardrobe , my trinket cases , my mobile .. you know what , it would have my house in it .. and the garden .. and my CAR .. and my bike .. and ..

This year:
Has been the 'One with the big ones' ;)

14 years from now:
I will be SO old!! And so will u! And so will our blog :)

I pass this tag on to Amma , she might like to do it.

On other news.The company transport sucks and there have been many heated exchange of mails , and I did put my rather caustic tongue to good use , wanna see how ? :)

My partner in crime was S , who managed to unearth about a zillion odd reasons and quite a handful of fancy sounding words like 'fulfill our duties at work and home' 'disruption of mental state' 'no state to apply mind and soul' koff koff and the likes..Here's a snippet ...

1. The cab did not turn up on Friday, 31st of October. We were told to huddle up and wait for one. We were doing this for more than an hour, and then decided that it was useless to just huddle up and wait for a cab to turn up. We had to barge into the first empty cab we saw after 7, and asked the driver to take us to our destinations. Thankfully, the driver obliged.

So much, for organized transport!! Please note, we were waiting till 7, for something to be organized. I reached home at 8, I am not sure what time the last person to be dropped that day reached!

2. Monday morning.. A 52 seater bus turns up, late, that too, to pick about 20 of us who use the cab service. The driver is super slow. Since it’s a bus, we have no hopes of being picked up at our respective stops, because the bus cannot go in small roads!! We were also not dropped at our stops for the same reason. Many of us had to take auto back home. We reach office and home late that day.

3. Tuesday morning.. The bus is late again! My pick up is at 7.42. The bus came at 8.05. I was dropped at Le Meridian, so I am not sure about yesterday's experiences.. I am sure people would like to add to the continuing list of woes.

4. Wednesday.. No surprises here. The bus was late again. It turned up at 8.05. I am not sure what time I will reach home or where I would be dropped!

Please note, for route 25, we would be picking up people even at 8.15 with this new system. We reach office at around 9.15, against 8.35 (our previous cab used to be here by that time).

Please understand that there is no way a person can be in a state of mind to work, after waiting for his/her cab for 15-20 mins and sitting in the cab for more than an hour. This has been affecting productivity to quite an extent. Many of us have things to do when we get back home and families to attend to. If our return time is 7.15 - 7.30 (as is the case for the past couple of days), we would be too tired to fulfill our duties at home too.

To which yours truly replied :-

"I’d like to add some more detail for what happened on Friday before I get started on the other days.5:40 Pm is surely not the time to be putting up stickers on the buses , so much so that we had to organize search parties for our buses. And added to that , the drivers of the cabs were plain rude and refused to take us on the assigned routes. Some of our friends had to hijack buses only to find the driver walk away. I understand that there might be a few hiccups when the vendor changes, but in this case, we had absolutely no one around who was trying to even help us out until came.

Regarding the present bus for Route 25 , the present bus is too huge for us 10 or 15 people. The bus takes forever to reach office/home and I would suggest a smaller vehicle which could reach faster. My stop is at 7:50 and I reach there a good 10 minutes early because I have no idea when the driver might turn up , on Monday he turned up at 8:25."

Two days later , I was waiting at my stop when I saw Juniper's cab go by , ok 2 mins more to go I thought.Nokia's was next and then Philips' and no sign of my big green unwieldy bus.And then , the ming started squealing.
'Get into the Sumo behind you' said a disembodied voice.
Seren: *Sinister voice* 'Who is this and what do you want!'
DV: ' Aren't you Seren'
Seren ' I might be '
DV: ' Eh? Get into the Sumo!'
Seren: ' I will not do that!! I shall call the police!!' *panic stricken*
DV: *Obviously a tam* ' Aiyoh! Kaduvule! Madam , we belong to the company transport dept! We changed the vehicles for your route'
Seren:*looking sheepish* ' Ehehe..ehhehe .. jesht kidding ..hehehe'

I get into the Sumo and ask the driver to please put up the print out that reads my route number and company name.. for some weird reason , he's sporting a peaked cap and a jacket with the collar turned up ..then my eyes wander to where the driver's credentials are listed..

'Ace Detective Agency' it screams .. 'If he’s anywhere in the universe, we’ll find him'

I rest my case.They had to hire a detective agency's cab?

Really?