Adippaavi.. I'm scolding myself.
Sitting in SCI (that's my school) and reading blogs with no care in the world. Another 45 minutes and I have a sad tutorial coming up; I'm trying to read more about Singapore's Free Trade Agreements for the economics presentation on Friday; (padupaavi, yevan thaan idhellam yosicchu vechano theriyala, ellam en thalaiya vandhu uruttudhunga!)
Waiting to go back to hall.
To do more work.
Seri, I'll close this blog. Feeling guilty. (No, well, actually it's like other people in the lab who were studying are looking at me now because I'm busy typing something!)
A whole week of fun and laziness getting over.
My recess week is getting over! :'(
Back to back breaking and irritating work, and getting up and running to the lecture theatres for 8-30 classes. Back to shivering in the cold LTs and labs.
Wwwoooaaaaaaaahhhhhhh....
Ohhhhhhh!
They just burst a bomb.
My university is situated dangerously close to the Singapore Firing Area and the Singapore Air Force Training Institute. So we get regular doses of firing, bomb and flight training exercise sounds. In the beginning it was irritating, and at times scary too. But now it has become a regular part of our lives and I tend to think what's wrong if I don't hear any of these sounds for a day.
Just imagine, hearing sounds like these for a whole day. Planes tearing across the sky, making a screeching sound, making sure you don't hear anything else as long as it's passing....It was good fun in the first semester here to go to the areas where my university hostels and Live Firing Area share the border. There'll be a lot of red signs showing a man with a gun pointing at another with his hands up, saying "Restricted Area", and we used to conjure up stories of what could happen if at all we went there. Now it's something we don't pay heed to, of course.
And now, as bombs burst at odd intervals, my room window panes rattle and my tubelight shakes.
I've always found my room warm and funny. It is effectively in the eigth floor from the road, though due to the *amazing* hilly terrain of the university, it is supposed to be in the third floor. By the time people reach my room, you'll see them panting and puffing, half dead, but alive enough to curse me for calling them up to this room, while some are nice enough to appreciate my perseverence and strength that has to go in for me to reach the room everyday.
I'm now glancing around the room. One roomie with a satin bed spread and pillow covers, and never coming to the room (good for me, my music is always blaring!), two beds, two tables...ok ok, let me look at just my side of the room. One softpin board crying to be left free, it's that full of holes and pin-ups...a three plank shelf on top of the pin up board full of random stuff. I look further left. Two huge A4 sheets full of "Work to be done during the recess" with just about a quarter of them ticked with a "completed" beside them. A photo of me and my sister and my class batch photograph with all of us beaming...(that photo is always amusing to me; it was taken on 14 Feb, 2004 with all teachers wearing green sarees ;) ), then a cupboard bursting with stuff inside. Ha! I forgot my desk! This is another object in my room crying for space to breathe, so full of stuff.... A huge television like looking flatscreen monitor(it's unfortunately a CRT, I wanted to get an LCD, but these Singaporeans.....oh my god, it wasn't fitting into my budget! If you are wondering why I'm groaning about Singaporeans if it was beyond my budget, it's just like that...) Then my bags, water bottles, clock, speakers, extension boxes, pens, books, and my plates! This table has an edhaiyum thaangum idhayam as it bears with patience all my activities. I eat, read and sometimes even sleep with my head on the desk.
But what steals the show is my amazing tubelight, above my desk.
Everytime a bomb bursts, I look up immediately to see how the tubelight is reacting. It shakes.
It's not fixed to the ceiling, but hangs from it; and that's precisely the problem. The delicate tubelight of mine shakes in the wind and is always moving to some rhythm, slowly (and looks scary too!)
As it precariously hangs over my computer monitor, I always feel like extending a hand to catch it in case it falls because of some vigorous shaking-to-the-beat. Not only the shaking, it's even getting lower by the day. That elastic like thing they've used to make it hanging has almost lost all it's swirls (I hope you get the picture, it now looks like an extended spring!) and I dread to think of the day when it'll lose even those bits of string (or whatever it is) and crash down into the table. I only pray it's after I shift so the hostel authorities will finally realize it's time to change the lights. At least it's ok for me, there are some rooms in which the light is slanting (because the strings haven't grown old together and one has lost more swirls than the other) with the result that one end of the table gets more light than the other. I'm thankful my tubelight doesn't give such kinda problems.
On the whole, my room is one of the really adventurous places to be in.
What does this show?
That rooms in Singapore can also be bad! ;)
I can still feel the cheese and chocolate in my mouth. (Fine, maybe it's an exaggeration, but, by jove, I don't want that taste to linger any longer!)
It all started with this $10 gift voucher I got from Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf here. You could say it's a more posh version of namma CoffeeDay. And it was expiring on 28 Febraury. So I decided it was high time the voucher left it's place on the soft pin board where I'd put it up so that I could see it everytime I go out and therefore use it(though this idea has never worked) and put it in my bag and set out.
Two of us there, two vouchers.
One for the 'Brew of the Day' and the other a $10 voucher to buy anything with. So my friend took the brew of the day black coffee and I ordered a slice of cheese cake (that's $4.90, man!!!) and a mug of hot chocolate. The two things I'd ordered were below the $10 limit, so the lady at the cash counter graciously asked if I'd take a cookie. I had one look at the cookie. It was the size of our kalyana murukku and I was sure I'd be in bed if I ate it.
No, thanks.
How about "up-ping" (read increasing) the size of your hot chocolate?
Oh sure, why not.
I'd taken regular and now she offered medium.
No problems.
I realized the problem only when the tall mug came.
The cheese cake and coffee were no better.
My friend had a piece of cheese cake and asked me to have one too.
Oh boy!
Maybe it's because I don't like cheese all that much, but even then, the cheese cake wasn't as good as it looked on the display. I made a face and didn't touch it after I'd had that one piece. My friend did all to make me eat more, so I took one more, but stopped again. It was bad!
Yeah, now back to my frothing hot chocolate. It looked delicious. What a tall and beautiful mug!! It looked elegant and I was eager to drink it. I carefully pushed away the foam (I don't like it) and started drinking it. It was quite good!And I happily kept sipping for what seemed to be about 15 minutes and I put the glass down. Surprisingly, it was still heavy and my hands were aching holding it. I looked at the glass.
HORRORS!!!
Not even a quarter of the glass was over!!!!!
This was when the "ugh" feeling started coming over me. I stared helplessly at my friend, and then I started laughing.
She was struggling too.
"The coffee's too bitter.." she said.
Of course, it's black coffee, I said.
Why don't you put some sugar from there.
Two packets of Sweetex and no change, she said.
We both laughed at the irony.
Cheese cake and sweetex, low calorie sweetener.
Hahaha...
So we lingered on in CoffeeBean and Tea Leaf for another 15 minutes, trying to be decent and finish at least half of what we'd bought. No, it was a difficult job!
Finally we decided to call it quits. No, said my friend, we'll give it a last try.
We both held our breath and sipped as much of our respective drinks as we could and put it down, panting.
YAY!!!!!!!!
Half of it was over!!!!!
This was the limit. We quickly and quietly left the place, all ordered things unfinished.
I was thinking if I'd ever have done that if I had bought all this stuff with my money. And then I realized I was quite capable of doing it even then.
Because eating all this stuff is just not being me.
Whether it's Chennai's Quicky's or Singapore's CoffeeBean and Tea Leaf, I doubt if I would be able to eat all this stuff to the fullest.
Sometimes I try to come out of my realms of rasam, thayir and verum saadam and eat other stuff. Sadly, whenever I've tried all this, most of it's been an utter failure. I convince myself saying I got lot of time left, and that I'll surely learn someday. One perfect example is one of the campus canteen's vegetarian stall. The first time I bought some vegetarian thing looking like dal (it's not an Indian stall, it's Chinese vegetarian) and had to throw the entire thing because I couldn't eat more than two spoons of it. But I'm able to eat it now and do eat it often when I don't have the time to go to the Indian stalls.
Maybe according to my friends, I'm slow at experimenting new stuff, but I don't care.
Wait for a post quite soon about how I finished a tall mug of hot chocolate, enjoying every drop!
The first time I came to Singapore, I was surprised by the number of things they gave free here. And this was especially high if you are a student....thousands of offers, discounts and thousands of flyers everywhere! I'm quite sure that this is the only place wher I've to hand out flyers to people passing by near the canteens as part of my extra curriculum work.
About a week after the university opened, there was an ECA fair held here. And every stall I went to gave me something free. As though these weren't enough, there was a huge queue for one of the stalls which gave the people a nice folder with lecture pads, pens and other stationery for just flashing your id card to them. All of us were finding all this enjoyable in the beginning, but now it gets on our nerves when somebody gives us a flyer asking us to go collect goodie bags.
But one thing to be appreciated here is that these goodie bags usually contain really interesting stuff and are really appropriate. My hostel(called halls here) gave away goodie bags last november; these were called exam goodie bags and guess what they had? Ready to eat noodles, ready to make coffee powder packets, pens, water bottle, Chinese herbal tea cans(Jia-Jia ;) ) and some flyers having numbers to contact in case you need some bread or milk etc. Innovative!!! My roomie dutifully collected one for both of us and gave it to me...."They were giving these away for free, so I thought I'll get one for you too...", she said.
Bless you!
Oh man, every event on campus gives us goodie bags. Recently there was a Student's Union Welfare Fest, where SingTel came up giving goodie bags to everyone. And hey, not just goodie bags, there were free T-Shirts(quite good ones, you know..), free muffins, free CDs and so on....and they were having umpteen number of stalls giving a lot of things away for free, just see this list!
Cotton Candy, popcorn, X-box games, free earrings, body art, tatooing, caricature drawing, bracelets, wire art, etc. etc. etc.!
Whew!
I had my own fun that day eating blue coloured cotton candy, a little bit of sweet popcorn borrowed from a friend, and even ventured to stand in the queue making free bracelts...sadly, the queue refused to move for an hour and I lost patience to stand in it. Boy, even though these things are free, they're of absolutely good quality, and that really stumps me. Rich nation, man!
Now all of us know what to use from these goodie bags and what to throw. There are usually some wierd Chinese noodles which very few of us venture to eat, and lots of coffee packets which again are usually dumped to the guy who drinks a lot of coffee.
This "free" culture is actually very interesting to observe and I've often been wanting to find out where and how people actually get these deals from. It would make a very exciting research topic for my project!
Long live Singapore's "free" culture! :)
Note: The idea for this blog came up when I read a fellow blogger's experience of mixing some cocktail with his friends. Sorry for borrowing this idea!!

July 31, 2004, 7 P.M., Canteen 1. Just finished dinner and sitting with some batchmates trying hard to make a conversation; we all were "trying" because all our minds were busy thinking what the seniors had in store for our ragging tonight.
And there came a second year guy, asking all of us to buy a drink (the normal ones, guys!!). I went and looked at the drinks stall: Qoo(lol..what names, man!), H-TWO-O(read H2O), RedBull (Energy Drink, maybe I needed it!)...ya, finally something worth trying, Sunkist Orange. I quickly left the Jia-Jia Herbal Tea(God only knows why the Chinese have every word twice:Jia-Jia, Xing Xing, etc.) and Iced Lemon Tea and paid for the orange drink. I saw that all the girls and most of the guys had some "edible" drinks. Then the senior who had asked us to buy the drinks came along and looked at our drinks in utter dismay. Only Sunkist Oranges, Cokes, Pepsis and Iced Lemon Teas.
"Keep these back", he said,"and get grass jelly drinks, each of you."
I looked the other side. I didn't want to get 'grass jelly' drink!!!!
He came to me though, and I cursed my rotten luck.
"Go return this and get a can of root beer" he said.
Oh Damn! Not that thing!
Well, for those of you who've been fortunate enough not to taste it, let me tell you how it tastes. Mix a teaspoon of Iodex in water and viola! you've got root beer! It's no exaggeration, it really tastes that bad! My apologies to anyone who likes it, but I must admire your taste buds if you actually like it.
So I sighed and bought root beer.
Who were these people to tell me what to buy, dammit! (I didn't know that this wasn't to drink, but for something else!)
So as was the usual procedure, after dinner we all queued up to be taken to the Sports and Recreation Center. (For those of you who'd like to know what happens during ragging, excuse me.."orientation", you could read the blog "My Orientation Experience" in this address.)
Once we went there and the usual ragging procedures started, soon there arrived one of my batchmates, struggling to walk. We all stared at him. Of course, he couldn't walk because he had a huge red bucket covering his head. We all controlled our laughter with great difficulty as seniors took good care of him. (Laughing is a great, terrible offence in orientation!) And we listened to him explaining what all he used the bucket for: washing his clothes, dumping his dirty clothes, etc., all the while wondering why all this was being asked; isn't it quite obvious what a bucket will be used for?
Soon we also came to know why we weren't allowed to drink the cans we had bought. That's the sad and actually hilarious story.
We were all lined up and made to sit on the ground. And one by one, each guy and girl should come and pour his or her drink into the red bucket our batchie had bought...and how should it be done? Going round and round the bucket, singing and dancing and also pouring it. Bloody, you spill a drop and you are in for it.
So all of us did it and by the time each person had poured his or her drink into the bucket, we were all dizzy with going round and struggled to find our ground.
This was condition number 1.
Condition number 2 is to sit with the empty drink can on your head and not drop it. No laughing, no movement absolutely and hence, no dropping the can. We all would have looked quite a scene to all the chaptas walking nearby. Sure, squatting with empty cans on their heads, who wouldn't?
Condition number 3. The most horrible one. Drink that (shit) we all had poured into the bucket. It was properly mixed so each of us would get the nicest taste possible. This again, was to be done in order. As we watched the reactions of our first few batchmates who were drinking the 'cocktail' we all feared our turn. And seniors standing right next to the bucket made sure our cans(which we had kept on our heads all this while) were full with the 'cocktail'.
"Yyyyyyyyyuuuuckkkkkkkkkk!!!!!!"
Chill, one guy had just puked.
I held my can and peered into it. There were strange things floating inside that brown mixture inside. I held my breath and took a sip.
I spat it out. It was one of the most horrible things I'd ever tasted in my life.
Seniors standing beside us were enjoying the show. Some of them were encouraging enough to make puky sounds when we were about to sip that nonsense.
And while I was holding my nose and drinking it, something strange went inside my mouth. I looked around and saw that others were staring helplessly because they'd tasted some solid inside too. We all looked at the guy who'd brought the bucket. What on earth did you do with your damned bucket?
After taunting us for a while by trying to tell us what that solid thing could've been, the seniors told us that it was grass jelly.
Whew! After what seemed eons, the drink of mine got over. I was shaken and my whole body was shivering. Seniors looked at me and were pleased. The drink had done it's job properly.
Yeah, it had.
Never to drink any cocktails, any, mind you, I vowed.
And never buy root beer or grass jelly drink.
Anyone interested in this cocktail?
The one thing I hate is to be misunderstood; of course, nobody likes to be misunderstood, but sometimes I feel I get quite a lot of this share of being misunderstood. Take some time, people, don't jump into conclusions. See me the way I am.
Does anyone who's quiet have to be shy? Is just talking the sign of being a jovial person? Why I'm always branded as a shy person is something I've never understood. Just the fact that I don't go talking to every soul I meet is NOT a winning formula to conclude that I'm a shy girl. Wait, you don't know me yet, don't jump into conlusions; I'm not how you perceive I am.
Does anyone who's quiet also have to be calm? This generalization surprises me like hell; most of the quiet people I know almost forever have a turmoil raging in their heads, and this sometimes includes me also. Not every tensed person has to show her anger by screaming or running around and pulling the whole place down. If I'm quiet, beware, I'm angry or I'm tensed and NOT calm, by jove, no way. Don't jump into conclusions.
And what is this thing about me not being confident or taking initiatives? A confident person doesn't have to go about with her head high forever, looking at the sky...a person willing to take initiatives doesn't have to go out of the way asking people things, just to take initiatives; people, are different. Wait and know me, don't jump into conclusions.
And what is being conservative and what is being open and modern? Is wearing hep, revealing clothes and drinking vodka modern, and is wearing the nicities and smirking at drinks conservative? Again, each of these words have their own definitions; I agree, they vary with people, but before you brand me into any of these, think twice; you don't know me, don't jump into conclusions.
I don't know why, but there seem to be a lot of things I miss in life because of this erred shell that people cast me into; I'm not a conservative, shy, calm, a never-confident, a-never-takes-initiative- girl......I'm quite the opposite...me and my sister, sometimes seen in the same frame, just because we don't show our characters in the way people usually perceive them; again, people, I am different, you don't know me, don't jump into conclusions. Take the time, see me the way I am, before you put me unfairly in any of those wrong shells where I was never supposed to be.
See me the way I am.
Well, maybe ignominy is too powerful a word to describe how one feels when wearing glasses, but it just describes how I felt when I knew I had to wear one.
It all started with a trip to Ehrlich's in Chennai before coming here, for a complete medical check up. I stared with disbelief and anger as I struggled to read those black, huge letters on the white board. I CAN'T BE SHORT SIGHTED!!!! Sadly, that was the fact and the doctor was surprised as he asked me how I'd not realised all this while that I had a problem.
Mom offered an explanation. Frequent complaints of my headaches were ignored as we thought they were due to the highly 'strenuous' (!!) work of 12 std. And I didn't really bother when I couldn't read what that teacher with the tiny handwriting had written on the board. So the thing finally came into light in June, way after I had given all my life-deciding exams.
So followed the sad processes of choosing the lens and frame. Though I tried to convince myself that people who wore glasses looked smart(I know very, I mean, very few look good!) I was depressed. All this while I had prided myself on the fact that I was the only member at home not wearing glasses. I had to give up this status now! :'(
So finally I chose a black square shaped frame. It was Chennai's in-thing then. Wow! Didn't those black frames look cool and hot! Boy, I was so impressed and ordered them.
Back home, I proudly enter with my glasses and my sis starts rolling with peals of laughter, much to my dismay. Gone! Now I hated my glasses even more, and my ideas of looking hep with those were lost.
Now here, I remember that I have to wear glasses only when I go to the lecture theatres and realize I can't see the powerpoint slides properly. That black (curse) sleeps patiently in the case and rejoices when I wear it once in a while. I find it so odd to look at the world through something else, not my own eyes....I was really determined to switch over to contact lenses this vacation, but I doubt if I'll be patient enough to remove it delicately, dip in a thousand odd solutions and wear it. And I can't sleep in classes with peace if I'm wearing lenses! I'm reminded of my friend who lost one of her lenses when she dozed off in the lecture! ; )
Well, wearing glasses is ultimately such a problem, man...some people here make fashion statements with their glasses. One girl in my lecture has pink frames, which remind me of the toy cooling glasses that the balloon seller sells on the streets! Boy, they are horrible!!!!
But cannot help la!Singlish style... :p God made a mistake with my eyes...at least it's not worse!!!!
Well, don't think what it means....it's not our Indian rikshaw-wallah or paper-wallah, or the famous kabulli-wallah...it's the Singlish language.
Oh my god, here in Singapore there is another breed of people happily killing english.
What the heading means is "what-la" spoken fast. (I'm sure you all know 'la' is the trademark Singapore-Malaysia umm, huh...I dunno what!)
The people here are very to-the-point; no round about ways please.
Ask "Till when is the shop open?" and they give you looks like you have come from some alien land speaking alien language.
But ask"When do you close?" and they beam, "Oh, you ask(ed) that-ah?"
God only knows why they can't even understand some simple stuff.
One of the very first tastes of Singlish I had was on my first day in the university. I let my relative wait outside and was enquiring about my hostel room in the hall office. Then as a precaution I asked the office attendant if it was OK to take my cousin to my room.
She stared at me.
I repeated, slowly and clearly.
She said, "I can't understann (read understand) ah...wailla...(wait la) " and called another lady. I groaned looking at the other lady she'd called. An old lady. I lost all hopes of getting myself understood.
Finally, I summoned all my patience and said word by word, " My friend, outside this room, waiting. Can take her to my room?"
Wow, this worked miracles. The two burst into peals of laughter (dammit, as though I was speaking wrong english all this while! ) and said "ya la, ya la, can!!!"
My woes began in full swing as my classes started. Most of the time I could not understand if my friends were talking in english or chinese(as most of them had a tendency to suddenly start chatting in chinese, ignoring me) and it took real careful listening with pointed ears(!) to follow what they were saying.
Well, now it's much better (my understanding, not their language, by jove, no way!!). I can even fit in a few singlish words like Kiasu and Jia you and converse. Guess this language is too much in their blood...they looked at me with surprise as one of the lecturers asked the class how a semicolon is represented (I stared with surprise when the teacher asked this; later I found why, as the whole class stared at her as though she had asked something she shouldn't..) and one or two even ventured to ask me, "How do you know so much-ah?"
The nicest thing is all Singaporeans are proud of Singlish, they think that this is the unifying language in a place where people speaking a multitude of languages exist, and are proud to display their Singlish skills...things are so good that professors don't advice using "yeah" but have no problems with "la".
Got bored ah la?
neve minn!!!!
I got bette stuff wif me la!
Finally..
My computer is working!!!!
(or so I think, but let me be optimistic!)
It took the sudden brainwave to take my CPU to the university computer center and let them see it themselves...and viola! It works now...all the pesky work of some viruses and ad ware stuff!
Thank God!!!!!
Thanks.
Ok, so before any of you get absurd ideas, let me tell you what I'm so desperate about...my computer! That mad thing never seems to get right and today it's exactly a month old, and it hasn't given me anything but problems ever since I got it. Problems with installing the OS, installing MS Office, activating this and that, getting anti virus softwares, anti ad-wares and spy-wares (whatever the heck they are!)... whew! This thing has driven me so crazy that this is the second blog I'm writing on this topic.
And now some testing for it: I've pulled the computer's CPU out of its cozy, warm place and stretched out the cables and am testing it with my room mate's network(she'll be in for quite a shock if she comes in right now!) and periodically giving responses to the university's computer center. They won't send any guy to look up at the problem unless it's a fault of my network point.
Well, I think, let me review the whole problem from the beginning. The damned internet works as soon as I switch the computer and miraculously disappears after 5 or 10 mins, though my messengers still work. Surprising, and I'm dumbstruck. The poor guy in the computer center's helpdesk whom I've been bugging has said everything his tiny mind can think of, but none of these could solve my problem. And every batch mate and every senior I know has told me something.... but my haughty computer refuses to budge and start functioning properly. I've now done everything(almost, I guess!) in my power to try to get it working. I've exchanged LAN cables with my roomie, changed settings to the n different number of settings my friends suggested, downloaded all possible free anti viruses and anti spywares and refreshed the page a thousand times. At the end of it all, I do as my last resort, bribing God to the little I can : simple prayers don't seem to help! No, even God doesn't seem to respond I guess, He is enjoying the good show.
As I try to complete this blog also, all I'm doing is keeping my fingers, toes and everything possible crossed, praying that at least this experiment gives proper results and ultimately gets my computer working. Well, one first step towards my prayer to be fulfilled is this blog getting published!
P.S: Sorry for those who got bugged in between.
And for those who came till here, thanx!!!
Oh my god.. Its almost 12 midnight and I've not done my posting for the day!
Ha, I was reading my horoscopes post and was finding one of the last few sentences very funny, the one about bringing the chapta boyfriend home and marrying him....(well, for those who don't know, chapta is how we here call the chinkies)
Hmm..I don't ever think i'll have a chapta as a boy friend... boy, I never will!
I've been teased a great many times for my conservatism, and comments that I've been brought up in a very rigid family....well, i don't quite agree. My family is just traditional, I tell them, and not conservative. We've had a lot of freedom and I know that I've been brought up in such a way that I know what to explore and see in a different world. They've seen to it that I'm not lost when I'm away from home, at the same time not rash enough to enjoy my new freedom like a caged animal let loose...I know my limits and know what to do when and where. Thanks, amma and appa!
Well, so going back to the chapta guy...I've often been a victim of taunting from my friends about how difficult it'll be to find a boy friend for me..."Vani, "they say, "will first ask him if he is a tam bram, then if he is vegetarian, and then if he smokes or drinks..anything in the negative, no way..." I laugh it away. But what's wrong with these conditions anyway? Not that I'm intent on getting a boy friend or anything now....but I surely have my own preferences with some things in life...and I don't want to waste time in a relationship with a person I ultimately won't like to last long. My friends ridicule me for looking at a person strangely if I know he or she drinks or smokes, they say, its all natural in today's world, and that the guy or girl won't be an alcoholic or a chain smoker, but boy, how can I be sure of that? And worse than that, how can I know that this person won't try to persuade me also into the habit? Well, well, nobody agrees with me..
Whoa...I can't think of a heading for this blog...it doesn't speak of one thing in particular!!!!
Huh? You don't listen to Metallica?
I shake my head.
So what at all is the english music you listen to?
I tell them BSB, MJ.
They sigh.
I don't know why we have such kids here, they say.
Well, what's wrong, I think.
And why this obsession for english music?
You know what, my friend says, once you've left India for studying, there are some things in you that you got to change. You have come to a place that is increasingly becoming American, and it's best you change too. And in a place like this where you've got so many international students, you have to listen to such things to maintain your image and make friends.
Why??
Why do I have to give up my essential qualities just because I'm no longer in India?
And this obsession for high profile english music...my god, it gets on my nerves (ha! you could make an entire list running for pages, about things that get on my nerves!) Why should I 'have to' listen to english music? Yes, I do accept that there are some things you have to do when you've left home. But surely that doesn't require that I've to give up being me.
I'm personally a person who prefers Indian music. We are no less than anyone. Of course, I do listen to english music because I know there is good music there too. But I hate it if there are people who tell me this is kiddish, that 'sucks', this rocks, etc. Who are they to decide what I listen to? What I've written in the beginning of this blog is something that happened during our 'orientation' in college. I was shocked and dismayed by the way people so easily dismiss another's interest and place their's as superior.
I for one, beleive that you should know about your country and culture before you start appreciating another. True, every culture has something in it that has to be enjoyed. But it's a sad thing to know that some others appreciate aspects of my culture that I myself don't know. I'm ashamed to admit that speaking all this, I don't know so many things Indian culture speaks about, but I'll make sure I know them, and don't have to face the embarassment of some non-Indian talking about yoga to me.
Ugh, this is such a disorganized outpouring of thoughts...I've wandered from one theme to another...but well, this is what I think!
Well, its just an obsession this minute. As I struggle to start my next weekly report which I have to submit in less than 12 hours from now, my mind wants to type some random crap in the blog. So here I go...
Hmm....indha rendu jathagamum nanna porundhirku, 90% poruttham, aana idhu vendaam, ivvalukku kalyanam panni vechelnaa eppomey sandai pottundrupaa... So rambles on the astrologer (not that I've seen him do this, but I'm sure my karpanai is right!). I can almost picturise the scene perfectly. My mom and dad exchanging looks, nodding vigorously, noting everything down, putting back the horoscopes into that green bag specially set apart for this purpose....boy, I can make a whole movie with this script!
And as they return home to tell my grandparents whatever the astrologer said and start discussing the possibility of an alliance with that "90% porunthina boy", I groan. What a business! The whole prospect of getting my sister married off to a guy, with good qualification, "decent" background, in India, "proper" background, blah blah....god only knows when they will change. Ok, see all these things to a certain limit, but when amma comes back and discusses with patti saying the boy will be a -------- engineering student, will be based in -------, I think why the astrologer left to mention his name so we can easily filter the horoscopes which flood our way. And boy, look at all those endless prospects we get every day! Pakkathaathu mami, melaathu mami, paatu mami, and who not! Horoscopes which didn't match for one girl exchanged with ours, height differences, weight, did the boy's parents get back, how they sound....oh my god, I feel dizzy.
And no offences meant, as though these troubles aren't enough, there is this "boy's side" which sometimes adds fuel to my irritation - "Can you please send the girl's photograph with the horoscope after you match it with my son's?"Bloody, why can't they send the photograph of their son with his horoscope? On top of all this, a statement like "Oh, glasses? Hmm..my son doesn't prefer glasses.." The glasses are hers and not your son's, sir. If he will be that bothered, why not he get her lenses after the marriage? Again, I know there are girls who could get this fussy too, but its just from another girl's view so it'll be biased, so forgive me, and don't get offended! :) The one thing I can't understand is why parents put up with all this trouble even though they don't like such comments too. Then there is this culture of the "boy's side" not getting back even after the horoscopes match. It ultimately takes a number of calls from home to actually know that the horoscopes have matched and that they have to ask the boy if they can proceed. Heck, if they don't get back, isn't it a sign that it's something they are not interested in? And surely my sister doesn't need a home which will not take the initiative and interest to pursue a simple thing as horoscope?
Well, I try to get all these feelings of mine across to my parents, but all that their looks tell me are "Your opinion is not asked for in this matter; you may go to your room." Boy, I'm old enough to give my opinions on these matter, I tell them. No effect. My next retort is to threaten them that they better not try all these gimmicks with me. If you do, I warn, I'll bring a chapta boyfriend home and marry him!
That's enough.
INTO YOUR ROOM!
Well, the door closes...
And it's high time this blog does, too.
Back to Influence of transnational television on Asian culture.
Bye.

5th Febraury, 2005. My first performance for NTU outside the campus. I was thrilled to go sing elsewhere, and that too for a noble cause, Tsunami Relief fund raising.
All dressed in "ethnic wear"(as Anto put it), we cabbed our way to the place where the event (we thought) would be held, only to realize we had come to the wrong place and went about searching the tiny streets and malls of Singapore before actually finding the actual venue.
I went in and had a peek at the place we were about to sing. Gosh, it was huge! I was excited. A nice, wide stage and a big room to seat hundreds of people. (How many actually were filled is a different matter...)
After all those setting up work was done, Vijetha and I peeped into the audience seats from behind the screens...God, there were just about 80 or 100 people filling up the seats randomly here and there.(I'm quite sure they were parents of all the students taking part in the event!)Never mind, we at least didn't have to sing to empty chairs.
So started the song. No fears, I was surprised, as I happily waded through the song with Vijetha.(I could have been a trifle bit louder though, putting the mike closer to me)With all our performances from NTU's Sruthilaya over, we went on to fill the seats and watch the others perform. And boy, what a show it was....There was absolutely no touch of the show being performed for a fund raising for relief for a tsunami....All loud and jarring noises and dances, and I was thinking why we chose to perform subtle songs and keep it low. I would fairly conclude that ours was just the one performance that was meant for a dignified crowd. (How the crowd was, is another issue...)
The ten minute interval made us happy as it brought us closer to food. Some packets were being given away and hungrily, we took them and settled down to eat them. And oh dear, the food...It was some plain sevai to be mixed and eaten with coconut and some orange powder, which none of us understood what it should be used for.And after struggling to push at least some of it inside, we escaped out to enjoy some good food. Off to Serangoon, and there we ate some amazing tandoori food, leaving our plates clean. Oh man, what a striking difference it was to the food we had eaten just an hour back!
And one of the funniest experiences there was the "Chennai vs. Bangalore" fight. I was really stumped to know there was actually another person in NTU as mad about Chennai as I am! I listened on, giving inputs at times as Vijetha and Vikram were getting into a really heated argument, and Sreejith and me enjoying the good show. And after some random shopping and looking around in Mustafa, we were ready to leave.
As we cabbed back to NTU, I was thinking of all the fun I'd had this day....Being the first such, I'm eagerly waiting for more such days!

A 24 year old girl asked me why my blog did not really contain any mention of her. So, this piece, written about two months back, goes out for her.
The earliest memories I have of my sister I have are when I was two or three years old. But earlier photographs carry pictures of a smiling me being held by a beaming sister. Hmm...maybe she was beaming then, but how would she have felt when I was born?
Well, going by the norms, I can guess that she would have been a little(a teeny weeny, little bit) jealous of all the attention given to me. But that girl is also said to have cried on my naming ceremony, refusing to go to school, finally getting a slap from my dad. (Yeah, who wouldn't make a fuss, with a darling like me around?)
Things did go on fine for a couple of years or so, as she laboriously pedalled me along with her on her cycle to and back from school. But soon things turned and it was my turn to be jealous of her. This happened as she progressed to higher levels in school - to her ninth and tenth grades. I was green with all the attention she got while studying, going for her exams, so on and so forth, my favourite line of argument being that one could go to higher grades only after doing well in the lower grades (as though nobody knew that!), while demanding that more attention be given to me. This jealousy reached its near peak when she finished her school and was all set to go to BITS , Pilani for her college education. The very preparations for her college were enough for me to throw tantrums everyday - her new clothes, her new shoes, new EVERYTHING!- i wanted everything too. My anger was great enough for my parents to hide all the new stuff they bought for my sister then. The scenario turned for the worse when they left me with my grandparents for a week, while they accompanied my sister to her college. I couldn't believe what was happening! Can't that "grown-up" girl take care of herself! Why leave me, the baby, the kid, all alone without dear 'momma' for a week!
Well, this will pass, time said. And it did. As I progressed with time, all my sour feelings for her were reducing. And what developed was a wonderful relationship with someone whom I had never recognized with this face before. Who was once a girl I considered my source of irritation now became into a nice soul.
Soon blossomed one of my closest friendships with anyone in my life. Now as I think of all the fuss I made, I smile. She is now my closest confidante, one whom I can trust most of things with, one whom I can share anything with. Jealousy? Ha...
Neither she nor I can believe that we have come to trust each other with some things....Guess it's all a part of maturity from both our sides....This is for you, akku!