The Road to Success

If you want the thrill and excitement
Of roads seldom traveled,
Of novelty, ambition ,
May be a  morsel of fame

In paths un-traversed by men.
Foot prints , mark your own
Reach for the stars , the sky,
The end of the blue horizon.

It will be a long journey ,
I must warn you though.
And it is not for quitters
Who stop when things get rough.

May perseverance be your virtue
And hard work be your friend
The fairy tale will come true
You will succeed in the end.

Adulation , admiration , will follow.
Future will , in awe look
But you will be the pioneer
Of a route that no one took.

Words - A Haiku Trial..

Verse , rhyme I wait for
Why do they take so much time?
From a (writer's) block away.


My first trial  at Haiku. Not even sure if I got my syllables right.. :)

Monsoon Memories - A Thunderstorm Saga

"Sun , it has come . Finally..". Her eyes were shining in excitement.
I looked up from my book and smiled
"Perfect. And it is Friday too".
"Did you ask if it is available?" I asked , slightly doubtful now.
"It is bound to be. If we don't get it today , some one else will and we won't get it for a week."
"Let's go now then. ". I said , discarding my Famous Five on the wicker chair in the porch.

Thunder rumbled in the distance.
"Amma , I'm going out with Deeps. We will be back soon. ".
"Don't get wet." she called out . "It looks like a thunderstorm is on its way."
"Don't worry Amma , we 'll be back in no time.". I called out, starting to get ready.

We looked for our black umbrellas , but could only find one. The other remained stubbornly out of sight. "Fine , let's just go with one then." I said as I put on my Verlon sandals. We started walking. A cool breeze was blowing . The rain had left the ground wet with an aroma of freshness that made me happy.We walked faster than usual , taking the shortest route possible to reach our destination. We made it just in time before the shop closed.

"I was about to close the store , but here, I have placed it in a plastic bag , take good care as it is the only copy I have."  He said as he pulled down the shutters and got on his bike to go home before the rain started.

As soon as we started on our way back , it started drizzling. Suddenly with the sound of exploding fireworks, thunder boomed , and a streak of lightening seemed to hit a tree  nearby. Rain was falling by the buckets and the roads were flooding. Walking through puddles and water filled potholes, our return journey was slow. And then the wind decided to play naughty and take our umbrella away. Now completely wet , we tried to chase down the umbrella which had overturned and was collecting water inside like a huge bowl. Deeps covered the plastic bag with her dupatta while I chased the umbrella that the wind was moving away from us.

"Got it . "I said as I caught up with the flying umbrella and desperately tried to put it  back in shape. We were almost home now. "Let us make a run for it , We are wet anyway". She said , and I agreed.

Photo Courtsey (http://www.kerala-holidays-and-hotels.com/images/Kerala-Monsoon.jpg)

We dashed down the mud road, into our houses , completely drenched , right into my Amma and Valiyamma (aunt) who immediately started scolding us for our escapade in the rain. But we knew that no scolding could take away the happiness of the possession in the plastic bag that
we had so jealously guarded. "Let's go change into something dry first .We'll watch it when the rain stops. " Deeps said. Her words were drowned by the bang of the next thunder bolt . Electric sparks flew from the electric post nearby and then all went dark. "The transformer was hit. It will probably be a day before it gets repaired and power is restored."  Our hearts sank as we heard this oft heard proclamation from my uncle who had gone out with his torch to investigate.

 We looked sadly at each other. For all the trouble we had gone to get the video cassette of Baazigar , we wouldn't be able to watch it after all..

In the candlelight , we sat on the verandah , staring at the dark moonless sky playing Antakshari as there was nothing else to do.

"Oh Mera ...Baazigar O.. Baazigar Tu hai Bada Jadugar". I sang  ."Your turn , sing with Ja".

N.B : This post tried to picture a typical monsoon incident in my childhood.  While all of it may not have happened in one single incident , it happend some time and chasing umbrellas , getting wet in thunderstorms , and playing Antakshari during power outages were part of my childhood monsoon memories in Kerala. Hope you like it.

N.B: This  was written as an entry for discussion topic Monsoon Memories in Darlings Of Venus

Lost Verses

The rustle of fresh leaves,

The white spring flowers..

The breeze that brushes

my hair against my cheek

With an ever gentle swish

The calm solitude of pleasure

I try to hold on to for ever

As words dance to their 

Sweet melodious music

Across my mind's 

Green windy wilderness

Woken into reality

From my distant dreams

Pleasure turns into anger

As my verses get lost

Falling into the vortex of my 

Tumbling thoughts

Again..

Give NRIs a break!

After having seen at least 3 variations of the same post bashing NRIs on my Facebook ,  I decided to take things to my own hand and answer to some of these common allegations against NRIs from USA by the so called perfect people back in India.

21. Tries to use credit card in road side hotel -

It is very rarely that I have to carry cash in my purse when I'm in the US, so excuse me if I make that mistake in some road side hotels. And yes times have changed now in India so much since the first time some one wrote this piece that many road side hotels actually accept credit cards these days.

20. Drinks and carries mineral water and always speaks of health conscious.

My family drinks tap water in our Minneapolis home But I would like the Desi who wrote this and all those who laugh and nod in ascent at the cleanliness of the NRI to swear that they never buy mineral water, not even in railway stations where the tap spews brown colored water ,  or even in urine stench filled road side rest areas that the private buses from Bangalore stop, or when the water that the tanker brought to your Rs 15000 monthly rent paid apartment looks yellow and smells bad. Do that and I'll agree about who is being health conscious and who's being obnoxious.

19. Sprays deodorant such so that he doesn't need to take bath.

I could say that about almost every alternate youngster in the country , so please..

18. Sneezes and says 'Excuse me'.

      OK, the next time I sneeze in your presence , I will sneeze a whole menagerie of germs unto you and walk away as if nothing happened. Will that make me a good resident Indian?

17. Says "Hey" instead of "Hi".

says "Yogurt" instead says "Curds".
Says "Cab" instead of "Taxi".
Says "Candy" instead of "Chocolate".
Says "Cookie" instead of "Biscuit".
Says "Free Way" instead of "Highway".
Says "got to go" instead of "Have to go".
Says "Oh" instead of "Zero", (for 704, says Seven Oh Four Instead of
Seven Zero Four)

The next time somebody returns from Delhi and says "Yaar" at the end of every word, or when someone returns from Bangalore saying "madi" at every second sentence , I will start calling branding them as being different from the rest of the herd. English is a language that has been butchered by every nation in the world. Getting an American accent is as natural as getting a North Indian accent in Delhi and a Tamil accent in Chennai. Accept it if you can.


16. Doesn't forget to crib about air pollution. Keeps cribbing every
time he steps out.
As if you don't.

15. Says all the distances in Miles (Not in Kilo Meters), and counts
in Millions. (Not in Lakhs)

Wait till you are here and people look at you with a puzzled expression and ask you what the heck a lack(!) is.

14. Tries to figure all the prices in Dollars as far as possible
(but deep down the heart multiplies by 43 times).

Might have been true a couple of years back , but with growing inflation , it is cheaper to think in dollars these days.

13. Tries to see the % of fat on the cover of a milk packet.

Who doesn't like to be optimistic and think that Indian products would start doing it some day. I also look at products hoping to see an expiration date.

12. When need to say Z (zed), never says Z (Zed), repeats "Zee"
several times, if the other person unable to get, then says X, Y
Zee(but never says Zed)

It took me 3 years  to change myself from Zed to Zee.
Wonder how many it will take for me to go back.

11. Writes date as MM/DD/YYYY, on watching traditional DD/MM/YYYY,
says "Oh! British Style!!!!" 

Ditto.After having forced oneself to say dates in MM/DD/YYYY to every other customer service call it is really difficult to get back to the other format. I almost resort to saying the months in words to avoid format confusions.

10. Makes fun of Indian Standard Time and Indian Road Conditions.

Come on, just because I lived for a while in  another country , you are not mean enough to keep me out of joking about the two things every Indian jokes about. It is a habit we grew up with. Our culture  and our upbringing.

9. Even after 2 months, complains about "Jet Lag".

Dear "Person who has never stepped out of your house ", Jet lag wasn't an invention of some moron who wanted extra sleep on his vacation.Though I'm certainly jealous of the person who gets to stay 2 months on vacation in India to complain about Jet Lag for that long . But it does last a week in some cases , air plane journeys being what they are today and granted that all of us aren't rich enough to afford business class.

8. Avoids eating more chili (hot) stuff.

I'm not sure where you got that from , but people like us crave chilli and pickle when we come on vacations. Although our kids who are used to American cuisine may be a different subject altogether.

7. Tries to drink "Diet Coke", instead of Normal Coke. 

   If something is available , what's wrong with watching your weight. It is not like normal Coke is some special nectar in any case.

6. Tries to complain about any thing in India as if he is
experiencing it for the first time.

When you are in India , you don't have a yardstick to compare with , and you still complain. Do you wonder that people who have seen better things do the same albeit a little more? Mind you, I'm not saying it is right , but just saying we are like ninety percent of the population who complain and offer no solutions.

5. Pronounces "schedule" as "skejule", and "module" as "mojule". 

   Same as point 17 though I 'm not sure if the second part is right, may be it is another dialect that I'm ignorant of.

4. Looks suspiciously towards Hotel/Dhaba food.

    May be some people do , but people like me make a list of hotels/dhabas to eat during a much awaited 3 week vacation , only to be ddiscouraged by people at home citing horror stories like the Shawarma that killed someone in Trivandrum.

Few more important

3. From the luggage bag, does not remove the stickers of Airways by
which he traveled back to India, even after 4 months of arrival. 

People are lazy and believe me , if Indian Railways or KPN travels ever had luggage tags , a huge majority of the travelling public would we walking around with luggage tags.

2. Takes the cabin luggage bag to short visits in India, tries to
roll the bag on Indian Roads.

Do you expect me to buy specific smaller bags to travel ingenuously during a 3 week vacation? Or carry my stuff in plastic bags titled "Pinky Textiles" and the like? And what's wrong with giving more preference to your back over your bag, by rolling it as much as possible?

Ultimate one

1. Tries to begin conversation with
"In US ...." or "When I was in US..."

Reminds me of the Malayalam movie in which the character played by veteran actor Thilakan starts every other sentence with "Pandu njan vardhayilayirunnappol..." (When I was in Wardha.. ). Boasting is not the monopoly of NRIs. There are inflated airbags every where , but staying abroad does provide a major catalyst , as does foreign travel , money and any number of factors which provide their own unique tag line.

Think about this before you make fun of us NRIs . The chances are you might end up working for one. Or more likely depend on one as a customer or financier for your completely Desi enterprise.

Snow Times

We stepped over the frozen snow.
Making foot prints in glee
I was so happy then
Like a child of three

In the cold and in the rain
We held together strong
We were one , you and I
We could do no wrong

In your joy, that knew no bounds,
I saw my world go round
Until one day I gave away
And you fell down the ground

Since that day , I wait and wait
For another snowy day
May be play one last time
Before you throw me away

Love,
Snow Boots

Lunch Nostalgia

I went up the familiar vendor in the cafeteria and stood in line , thinking about the meeting I had to rush to afterwards. 'Two soft tacos as usual' . I said 'and No meat' ,I added as an afterthought. I looked around and found an empty table for myself.  As I looked out of the fourth floor window into the snow covered grounds, I was struck by a wave of nostalgia .

I remembered the school lunches , where it was a race as to who would finish eating first and rush out to play catch catch , police and thief, run and touch the coconut tree and so on.

I remembered the lunch breaks in high school and 12th grade where we would gather around a cycle shed , post lunch , gossiping , and planning mischief until the rendezvous point had to be abandoned because of an allegation that we punctured the tyre of a teacher's son's bike.

In to my mind came the lunch times in college , where we would go out to the canteen to buy a vada or sit for hours at stretch at the Indian coffee house with just a coffee or a lime juice. And the awesome times we had at birthday treats where you gorged like you'd never seen food before and then with out batting an eyelid gave the name of the rival college , when some disgruntled restaurant owners asked us where we were from.

At Infosys , my first company , we had a small gang of friends who always had lunch together despite being in different projects and located all over the huge sprawling campus. As more people got busy with personal lives , the number in the gang dwindled , but the ones who remained followed the request acknowledge mechanism using emails and missed calls to have lunch together wasting minimum time.

As life took me through different jobs and different places , lunches became more of a time of introspection . A time to be with myself in my busy schedule. No missed calls told me that it was time to have food any more. My current routine was to rush to the canteen , usually minutes before they closed , get my usual food and find an empty table overlooking the window.

Wistfully , I longed for those lunch times when there was laughter and fun and jokes on the table alongside food. And friends to share them with.  I was jolted back into reality by the phone of the person at a nearby table and as I rushed through the rest of  my meal , I made a mental note to myself to call some of my friends from school soon.

I hope this time , it will not buried once again in the continuous monotony of life.