Punjabi Takkar Marriage Diary #7

This is a story I have not told many people. Even I came to know a few years after my wedding day. It fills my heart with pride and my eyes with crystal clear tears! It is about the Boy and what a stand-up man he is.

So I was at the wedding venue at 7:30 pm. Like all Punjabi baraats, this was late as well. My day had been really normal – some Pooja, some haldi, getting my face painted with 25 other brides at the parlour, the works. Frankly, I wanted this day to end. Yes, it is unusual for a bride to say this, but for me, my wedding day was a terrifying event. I hate being the centre of attraction, and this was exactly how it was meant to be.

Over the years, I had never imagined being a bride. I had weird thoughts of settling down in a farm with my own field and animals. I even have a diary entry written in code language mentioning how I want to live my life! I had my childhood issues and not good ones at that.

When me and the Boy decided to get married, the only worrisome thought I had was the wedding day itself. I knew I could manage the rest, but this, this was nightmarish. And so I decided to remain as calm as possible and take one single moment at a time.

I’m proud of the fact that I did exactly that. When I was waiting for the baraat, I chit-chatted with all my friends and relatives. Someone or the other kept bringing me snacks and I kept hogging. I asked my cousin to check how high the stage was, since I had trouble climbing it. She went out and told me it looked fine. I took her word.

The Boy had his problems at home. The Delhi board decided to switch off their power and all their ceremonies were delayed. At last he made his horse run to reach the venue by 11:30 pm!

His other problem was his embroidered Sherwani - it kept hurting him on his neck and he just couldn’t bear the pain. I saw later and he had bad rashes. Anyway.

He and his bandwagon entered the wedding hall. I was still in the waiting room. Now this is the story my mom told me a few years later which reassured her that she was giving her daughter to the best man possible – as soon as the Boy entered, he called my mom and whispered in her ear that the stage looked too high for my comfort. My mother immediately called my brother and he arranged for a small step that would make the climb easy. Actually a tray covered with cloth because nothing else was available at that time.

My immediate family and best friends – all of them knew how difficult this was for me. Yet none of them could notice it in the few hours that they were there. The Boy, on his wedding day, with several things on his mind, noticed this the moment he entered.

When you know that someone cares about you this much, you can do anything for this person. You can love him and care for him more than you do for yourself. Love is not in the Rolex you buy as a surprise, it is about sharing the discomfort of your partner. For in that, true love and true character is revealed.

We are going to be 7 tomorrow, and I cannot thank God enough for the precious gift He has given me. God Bless you Sumit Takkar! I know I am annoying and irritating and dominating and weird, but the way you manage me and still love me is praiseworthy. You are a rare gem and together (I think!) we make a great team. Here’s to us – cheers!

Make a Change, Now.

How do you feel when you see floods in Chennai? What comes to your mind when you see mass murders in Paris? What happens to you when you hear about a missing plane in the Indian Ocean? What is your reaction when you hear that 20 crore people in our country sleep without having dinner?

 

I feel scared. I feel what if it happened to me? I find ways to do something better for the world. I feel grateful that God has not put me in a trying condition.

I try to write for the sake of humanity. I pray to God to lessen his fury. I use less plastic to decrease the effect of global warming...

When you read about history, you find that the world was and always has been a difficult place. We have had world wars. We have had wars for independence. We have had droughts, earthquakes. There have been train and plane crashes. Yet no history can lessen the effect or prepare us for what is happening today.

What we need to do is NOT spread negativity. We don’t need to go on twitter and start fighting with each other. We need to fight together. We need to fight climatic changes by changing our lifestyle. We need to inculcate values in our children so that they don’t turn into terrorists. We need to end these Hindu-Muslim differences. A lot in this world is against us – the least we can do is not turn against each other.

We never think it can happen to us until it does. We cannot live with an attitude of ‘If it has to happen, it will’. We need to be prepared. And more than that, we need to change.

The intolerance debate only indicates that we are increasingly becoming rigid. The floods tell us that nature is not happy with what we are doing with it. Spare a thought - what can you do?

And while you are at it, feed a mouth which might have not eaten for a while now. Recycle bags. Don't throw garbage on the street that can clog drains. Hug a friend from a different religion. Switch off that light. Don’t wait for others, make a change. Now.

Organizing a Decade of Memories

December Resolution – Day 2

Remember the day you bought your first camera phone? Well, I just have a faint memory of it. I can’t remember if that phone had the ability to transfer photos to the computer. And because of that, I don’t have some of my most precious pictures.

My second phone came in December 2006. I clicked hundreds of pictures from that one and made videos as well. My Nokia N96 lasted for more than 3 years and I could back up everything on the laptop.

Since then I have changed 3 phones and have collected thousands of pictures. We don’t realize but we click numerous pictures of the same thing. At that moment it seems worthwhile, but do you want to keep it as a memory? Would you want to look through lakhs of pictures 10 years from now? Won’t some pictures be your favourite but you wouldn’t be able to find them since they will be lost in the pile of pictures you have? Same goes for videos.

So last week I took up the mammoth task of organizing my photos and videos. I made a folder with sub folders sorted by year. It was fun to see pictures that were 6 years old, the new ones were still fresh in my memory; sorting the gallery from 2008 was easier than sorting 2014!

I even saw all the videos and labelled them! If I need to find a video from my college days where me and my friends are dancing in the car – I can find it in a jiffy. I can find the video where I am singing on a date. It's a hard task to find a video when they all are marked by numbers and you need to open it and see what it is about.

I did find some hidden gems - some absolutely adorable videos of me and the Boy and my niece and nephews. I found a video from my first day in Bahrain (June 2009) where I was cribbing why there is no fan in the room! I found a video from Kuwait 2009 where we were talking about the city. I found my dancing videos. I found videos of the Boy and his friends totally sloshed and doing the weirdest things! Oh, it was fun. *note to self - make more videos*

This weekend, I encourage you to take out all your pictures and put them in a hard disk. Find ways to organise them. If you are like me, you would have a decade worth of precious memories hidden in different binaries of your laptop. It needs your attention. You would regret it later if you don’t organize it now.

Just do it, I say!

December Resolutions

This year, I am making resolutions at the end. Or, how I like to put it, one month before the beginning of the next year.

It has been a weird year in many ways. I have questioned my existence much more than before. Maybe because I have had way too much free time. I wasn't writing and I wasn't concentrating on my health - the two things that I always prioritize. I ended up watching more TV, socialise and involve myself in stupid things rather than meaningful activities.

So December is my last chance to make 2015 count. I have decided to write every single day (except maybe weekends - Friday and Saturday). You will be swarmed with my incessant banter and sometimes, inherent wisdom. I will write poems and stories and anything that comes to my mind on a particular day. Imagine my laziness - I haven't even written trip reports this year. What the hell am I doing?

I have also kick-started my diet. Endless eating binges have increased my weight by 1.5 kgs which is way too much than what the doctor has recommended. Ideally I should be 10 kgs less than what I am now. Now if one more person tells me that I am thin and I don't need to lose any fat, I'll start with '10 years ago I met a renowned doctor...' - yes, I am done with secrecy regarding health and all that shit!

So peopless, watch this space to read my thoughts and help me do well. If I skip one day, please let me borrow a post :p

See you tomorrow!

Movie Review - Tamasha

You will read a lot of negative reviews – my facebook feed almost made me regret that we had already booked tickets for Friday evening. They are not all false. Yet, there is a lot in the movie which is likeable and would not disappoint you.

All of us wear masks. All of us are who we are not. All of us do some Tamasha. The movie explores a character whose life is probably a much bigger tamasha and how it affects his entire being. If you see a little bit of yourself in the story, which all of us will, you will love the movie. If you don’t, you might trash it like a lot of people.

I would say you need to get through the first thirty minutes for the movie to actually look good and make sense to you. For me, even the song Matargashti, which is introduced in the first 15 minutes, could not cover the boredom I was feeling. The first sequence in the movie doesn’t make sense, atleast in the beginning, and you tend to worry what is the fate of your next two hours!

But once Corsica ends, which had super-hot Deepika Padukone and even a hotter Ranbir Kapoor and beautiful locations, the real movie starts. You will realise that the movie is deep and meaningful and much more than a love story.

I don’t want to say anything about the story because the way it unfolds is actually interesting. The highlight of the movie is Ranbir’s acting – it is flawless. He made me admire his talent once again and the director, Imtiaz Ali's, ability to extract that talent out of him. The songs fit well into the movie. The pace is fast moving. I especially loved an emotional sequence between Ranbir and Deepika and also a scene between a particular story-teller and Ranbir - it all came out so beautifully.

I’ll give it 3.5 stars just because of the boring and difficult-to-understand first 30 minutes. I loved the movie otherwise.

Happy watching!

13 things from 33rd birthday

1.Finally, I have accepted that I am over and above 30. Wisdom has taken over and I have realised that we should be grateful to God for a healthy, long life rather than sulking over the fact that we can’t party till 4 a.m. anymore

2.I deleted my birthday on Facebook to see how I feel when my virtual friends don’t wish me. But a birthday tag started a string of wishes and frankly, it felt better than FB telling you ‘It is Nisha’s birthday. Help her celebrate’!

3.The Boy bought me flowers on the birthday eve. It was the sweetest thing.

4.I planned my day to the T. So much so that I asked a friend a day before to go for lunch adding a gentle reminder at the end, that it was my birthday! She is unconsciously forgetful and I am very considerate!

5.Wishes poured in from everywhere. Every word made me smile.

6.I even danced to ‘Abhi to party shuru hui hai’ early in the morning.

7.New dress? – absolutely!

8.The Boy got me swanky sunglasses earlier in the year and a more swanky laptop 3 days after my birthday. I think I can’t ask for more gifts this year and can never say that he never gives me anything.

9.I went to breakfast with a bestie and had a ball.

10.I went to lunch with another bestie and heard her share secrets which now worry me.

11.I went to dinner with my ultimate bestie – the Boy – to the most swanky restaurant in town. (Now those are 3 swanky things in the post!!).

12.This birthday managed to have its own story – we went to this newly opened restaurant which is set on 50^th floor in the centre of the city with the most amazing views. It serves authentic Asian which is not our favorite cuisine. So we went overboard and ordered the set menu so that atleast something would suit our taste buds. Within 30 minutes the smell from the kitchen made me feel nauseated. I had to leave the meal midway and walk out. This is the first time we spent so much money on a meal and this is the first time we left it like that. The dessert which the waitress packed for us tasted absolutely divine.

13.My most favorite wish came from an old bestie with whom I talk only 2-3 times in a year. She said that I am still her loveliest friend and best advisor. Another bestie wrote that I was her soul-mate and that she truly loves me.

It is so amazing that when you hear genuine comments from your closest people you feel life is worth every little thing that it is made of.

I am grateful to be 33 and to have gathered so much love in this short life. I am also grateful that I look so awesome in the pictures below!

Well, some things never change, do they?

One from the New Laptop

Once upon a time when we were in school, a new subject was added in Standard VI - it was the very exciting and extremely difficult Computer. Our teacher came and explained ‘What is a computer’ to us. It was followed by history of computer, description of a CPU and then the much awaited practical class which started with LOGO.

We proceeded to BASIC and the C++ by XII standard. Frankly, unless we had an inclination to become a programmer, this all seemed worthless. At home, I was introduced to the world of Internet by a cousin who stayed next door. I didn’t have a desktop then, so I had to sneak into her room and go online.

Internet just meant chat rooms that time. We didn’t have much to study from the Web since its access was in limited homes. Within a year my parents got me a desktop as well and my world expanded virtually. I was 17 then and loved every bit of my new found toy.

I used this desktop till I got married. It was placed in, what we called, the computer room upstairs. My mother, poor thing, checked on me even at 2 in the night. No checks, however, could stop me from doing what I was doing. I was a tad spoilt in this area. And well, if I wasn’t, how would have I found my life partner!

After we got married and I was at a new home, I needed a laptop for writing. So we hired a taxi for a few hours and went to four stores to check various laptops. I still remember that evening because it was so exciting! We wanted to find the best value for money laptop. We eventually bought a Sony Vaio and was extremely satisfied with it.

It has been more than 6 years to that purchase. Our laptop just went blank once which was sorted by formatting. Starting over solves all the problems in these devices, doesn’t it? I use to hit my CPU very hard whenever it troubled me and it always started working fine after a couple of slaps!

Anyway, now the Vaio was getting old – it was a core duo, windows vista and the works. The exterior had started to break as well. So we decided at the beginning of the year that we would purchase a good one soon. Our search had started months back. The sale started a month back and we went from store to store in our own car.

Life has changed. We could now look for the best specifications and the best models. We could even afford an iMac. But since we are against all fads, we wanted to choose what we liked best. Sooo, here I am, typing on my new Lenovo Yoga 3 Z 14. It’s a sleek, fast and extremely sexy device which would see my life change in the course of next 5 years atleast.

That’s how I see my previous laptop as well. It saw me as a new bride. We were inseparable in hotel apartments when the Boy was out on consulting assignments. It saw me blog. It has various documents titled book ideas! It made me win prizes. It helped me discover various countries and make varied itineraries. Frankly, my laptop has seen me laugh, cry, bored and happy - just like a best friend would.

I’ll be giving this to my maid’s son who is 14 with a hope that it helps him in his education and give him the same memories it gave me. Funny how a laptop can have such significance in your life! It definitely had the biggest hand in keeping me sane all through these years.

Dear Lenovo, please be kind like your older step-sibling!

New is Silver, Old is Gold! Just metaphorically though!