All of us crave for some free time doing nothing. Surprisingly, we enjoy these pleasures in childhood without being aware of it and then crave for it all the years of our adulthood. Not to ignite feelings of any of the readers, but it seems to be that guys seem to enjoy it more than girls, in their adolescence.
I was good at it when I was a kid, when I could coolly shut my eyes and ears off to my mom's sermons. Now it seems difficult. If I shut my eyes, everyone else still seems to be watching me. If I shut my ears, actually I would be happy if I could shut it off once in a while, but somehow it doesn't seem to work or I need to learn it again.
As a kid, I have stared in the bright blue sky hours watching the clouds float by. At nights, I used to gaze the stars and the constellations and had dreams of joining NASA. In our 24 hour train journeys, I used to memorize all the stations, including the small ones, where the train would halt. I had even noticed the animals sitting on the train tracks/platforms when the train stopped. To that extent, I and my brother composed a small poem
"Lalitpur ka kauwa,Itarsi ki gai,..(Lalitpur's crow, Itarsi's cow...)"
I have forgotten the other animals in other stations but it was a very fancy song for that summer vacation. You can imagine how much time we had in our hands to while away. Earlier, the earth used to rotate and make the day and night for us. Nowadays, it feels like we are spinning the earth, making the time go faster.
The best part of life when one can idle is the student days. Nowadays, with all the activities and tuition, even that seems to be a far thought. I have enjoyed summer vacations, which seem to drag endlessly, reading books/comics, playing and pestering my mom. I have not enjoyed such a pleasure for a long time but I know the culprit. It is my mind. The "Nothing" in my mind has changed to "Something" and since then, never given me rest. If it ever turns into "anything", I would be more than happy, or at least be at peace with myself.
Showing posts with label Good old times. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Good old times. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Monday, March 10, 2008
Tring, Tring
Phone has come a long way from being a luxury to becoming a necessity. Earlier days, there used to be one phone at home, which was used not only by the owners but also neighbors, incase of emergencies defined by them. Now we have a cell-phone for each member of the family.
When I was a kid, my dad's office provided a grey color telephone. He used to be very strict about using it. We could not talk much on the phone. Conversations longer that a certain time would be met by cold stares from my mom. The dial used to be the old circular one with numbers. The fun was to hear the numbers actually being dialed to connect to the other person.
The phone did teach me some manners. As a kid, I had this annoying habit of saying "What?" so loudly that it would startle the person hearing it. Many times, if the voice on the other side was feeble and I could not hear I would scream "What?" and the person on other side would just apologize and keep down the phone. The funniest part was even though (s)he would not hear what I said before, (s)he would clearly hear my "WHAT?". Finally, with some sermons from the family and my own common sense, I became more polite on the phone.
The amusing part was the amount of wrong numbers we used to get. One can literally get anyone’s calls from around the country. Of course, it was bothersome, but with some creativity, it was be fun picking up these phone calls. For sometime, we used to receive calls asking whether it was Tihar Jail. After denying it innumerable number of times, my mom finally responded "Which crook do you want to talk to?" This surprisingly put an end to it.
One of the other callers would insist on talking to a certain Mr X , who is supposed to live below our house. We said emphatically that there is no such person but the calls persisted. Finally I told him that we live on the ground floor (1 floor in US standards) and it is impossible for someone to live below us and if he still wants to talk, I would be the last person to go and get Mr X.
I shared many friendships over this phone. One particular day, while in conversation with my friend, I had to keep the phone down and she promised to call back immediately. When the phone rang shortly, assuming that it was her, I picked up the phone and said "Hello Devil!". There was a long silence and finally my dad's friend spoke “Hello beta(child), can you call your dad?". You can imagine my shock. I apologized profusely and requested him not to mention a word to my dad. He, being very kind, obliged and I am still alive to write this post.
This phone has heard various emotions of our life. It became more a part of the family than just being an equipment. Later, when features of caller id and call waiting became popular, we still kept the same instrument but did have another phone with all these features.
We finally had to part with it, when my dad retired. Even though I have used other phones and cell phones with all jazzy features, this phone still remains dear to me. I know its number by heart and wonder many times, to whom does it belong now.
When I was a kid, my dad's office provided a grey color telephone. He used to be very strict about using it. We could not talk much on the phone. Conversations longer that a certain time would be met by cold stares from my mom. The dial used to be the old circular one with numbers. The fun was to hear the numbers actually being dialed to connect to the other person.
The phone did teach me some manners. As a kid, I had this annoying habit of saying "What?" so loudly that it would startle the person hearing it. Many times, if the voice on the other side was feeble and I could not hear I would scream "What?" and the person on other side would just apologize and keep down the phone. The funniest part was even though (s)he would not hear what I said before, (s)he would clearly hear my "WHAT?". Finally, with some sermons from the family and my own common sense, I became more polite on the phone.
The amusing part was the amount of wrong numbers we used to get. One can literally get anyone’s calls from around the country. Of course, it was bothersome, but with some creativity, it was be fun picking up these phone calls. For sometime, we used to receive calls asking whether it was Tihar Jail. After denying it innumerable number of times, my mom finally responded "Which crook do you want to talk to?" This surprisingly put an end to it.
One of the other callers would insist on talking to a certain Mr X , who is supposed to live below our house. We said emphatically that there is no such person but the calls persisted. Finally I told him that we live on the ground floor (1 floor in US standards) and it is impossible for someone to live below us and if he still wants to talk, I would be the last person to go and get Mr X.
I shared many friendships over this phone. One particular day, while in conversation with my friend, I had to keep the phone down and she promised to call back immediately. When the phone rang shortly, assuming that it was her, I picked up the phone and said "Hello Devil!". There was a long silence and finally my dad's friend spoke “Hello beta(child), can you call your dad?". You can imagine my shock. I apologized profusely and requested him not to mention a word to my dad. He, being very kind, obliged and I am still alive to write this post.
This phone has heard various emotions of our life. It became more a part of the family than just being an equipment. Later, when features of caller id and call waiting became popular, we still kept the same instrument but did have another phone with all these features.
We finally had to part with it, when my dad retired. Even though I have used other phones and cell phones with all jazzy features, this phone still remains dear to me. I know its number by heart and wonder many times, to whom does it belong now.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Adieu
In last few weeks, two of Delhi's local attractions - Appu Ghar and Chanakya cinema have been closed down. Appu Ghar will make room for some of Supreme court premises and a new metro station while Chanakya will be converted into some multiplex project.
Though spending my entire childhood in Delhi, I must have visited Appu Ghar only once or twice. Reasons being first, family is not very enthusiastic about rides, second, I am fine with rides - I like them but not crazy about them and third, we thought we can always go, after all it is just half an hour from home. Not any longer though. I guess this just re-iterate the fact that we should not take life and anything for granted. Today, it is here, tomorrow, it might not be. I have visited its neighbor - Pragati Maidan umpteen number of times for various Book Fairs and Trade fairs.
Chanakya cinema, however is different. In my teenage days, it was one of the two theatre halls which would screen English movies - the other being Priya. I remember enjoying the Hollywood movies with popcorn and soda and my friends in these halls. When we were in college couple of years back, me and a friend, while having enough of the class lectures, decided on the spur of the moment that we needed a break and headed to Chanakya cinema, which was 1.5 hours from our college to watch "Disclosure". Speaking of movies, I remember couple of years later, in a different college and different friends, we again had a spur of the moment decision to watch a movie, which I think was "AirForce One". Since there was only 30 minutes for it to start and the theatre hall was 25 minutes away, we somehow managed to go, buy the tickets and seat ourselves a second before the movie started. I had a feeling that the trailer was getting too long and movie is not starting only to realise that in all the flurry, instead of getting tickets for "AirForce One", we got tickets of some cold war movie where US and USSR were at lock horns with each other. Ssomehow the movie did end or maybe I just fell asleep.
I am sure these places must be hosting memories for millions of people who have visited them. Closing them down gives a tiny pang of an era getting over. It also reminds me that I should short list the places I would like to see and start executing it as well. Life changes and many things may not remain as they were before.
Though spending my entire childhood in Delhi, I must have visited Appu Ghar only once or twice. Reasons being first, family is not very enthusiastic about rides, second, I am fine with rides - I like them but not crazy about them and third, we thought we can always go, after all it is just half an hour from home. Not any longer though. I guess this just re-iterate the fact that we should not take life and anything for granted. Today, it is here, tomorrow, it might not be. I have visited its neighbor - Pragati Maidan umpteen number of times for various Book Fairs and Trade fairs.
Chanakya cinema, however is different. In my teenage days, it was one of the two theatre halls which would screen English movies - the other being Priya. I remember enjoying the Hollywood movies with popcorn and soda and my friends in these halls. When we were in college couple of years back, me and a friend, while having enough of the class lectures, decided on the spur of the moment that we needed a break and headed to Chanakya cinema, which was 1.5 hours from our college to watch "Disclosure". Speaking of movies, I remember couple of years later, in a different college and different friends, we again had a spur of the moment decision to watch a movie, which I think was "AirForce One". Since there was only 30 minutes for it to start and the theatre hall was 25 minutes away, we somehow managed to go, buy the tickets and seat ourselves a second before the movie started. I had a feeling that the trailer was getting too long and movie is not starting only to realise that in all the flurry, instead of getting tickets for "AirForce One", we got tickets of some cold war movie where US and USSR were at lock horns with each other. Ssomehow the movie did end or maybe I just fell asleep.
I am sure these places must be hosting memories for millions of people who have visited them. Closing them down gives a tiny pang of an era getting over. It also reminds me that I should short list the places I would like to see and start executing it as well. Life changes and many things may not remain as they were before.
Friday, October 5, 2007
License to drive
My driving experience started in India. At that time, we used to own a white Ambassador car . My dad used to very attached to it and would say it/she was like his daughter. What ? When you have such a sweet daughter like me, why on the earth would you ever consider a gigantic Ambassador car as your daughter! My brother on the other hand would tease me that both me and the car were the "motuest(fat) things in the world!" Grr...
I learnt lot of driving from my mom and brother. In fact, I was the one who knew the difference between gears - 4 and reverse in the car. Anyone who has experience driving an Ambassador would know what I am saying. These two gears are so close in this car that many times, one would be looking back after putting the reverse gear only to see the car move forward ! I would differentiate between the clicks of the gear. When my mom wanted to reverse the car, she would wait for my approval to take her feet off the brakes. And mind you, the gears would be so hard, you need to put half your strength just to take the car out of the home.
For getting the driver license, I got enrolled into a driving school. The driving schools taught only in Maruti cars as they were getting very popular at that time. After having some experience driving Ambassador, driving Maruti was like driving a toy car. When the instructor asked me to put the first gear, remembering my good old pal at home, I used half my force to do what I was told. The instructor looked at me astonished "Do you learn karate? If you use this much force, the gears of this car will be damaged". It was a relief to know that driving will not result in putting Iodex(cream to relieve muscular pain) in arms.
Driving a Maruti was pretty easy and fun. Somehow, I was able to cajole my dad to buy a Maruti car. We bought a nice blue car from my mom's friend. They had kept the car in a very good condition and it was well equipped with music stereo and AC. What more can a teenager ask for! I have very fond memories of my college days driving it around. And yes I got my first license on Oct 9, a decade back. I remember I had to miss my dear friend Inder's birthday but having a license to drive was a gratification of it's own.
I learnt lot of driving from my mom and brother. In fact, I was the one who knew the difference between gears - 4 and reverse in the car. Anyone who has experience driving an Ambassador would know what I am saying. These two gears are so close in this car that many times, one would be looking back after putting the reverse gear only to see the car move forward ! I would differentiate between the clicks of the gear. When my mom wanted to reverse the car, she would wait for my approval to take her feet off the brakes. And mind you, the gears would be so hard, you need to put half your strength just to take the car out of the home.
For getting the driver license, I got enrolled into a driving school. The driving schools taught only in Maruti cars as they were getting very popular at that time. After having some experience driving Ambassador, driving Maruti was like driving a toy car. When the instructor asked me to put the first gear, remembering my good old pal at home, I used half my force to do what I was told. The instructor looked at me astonished "Do you learn karate? If you use this much force, the gears of this car will be damaged". It was a relief to know that driving will not result in putting Iodex(cream to relieve muscular pain) in arms.
Driving a Maruti was pretty easy and fun. Somehow, I was able to cajole my dad to buy a Maruti car. We bought a nice blue car from my mom's friend. They had kept the car in a very good condition and it was well equipped with music stereo and AC. What more can a teenager ask for! I have very fond memories of my college days driving it around. And yes I got my first license on Oct 9, a decade back. I remember I had to miss my dear friend Inder's birthday but having a license to drive was a gratification of it's own.
11 years hence I am still missing his birthday today on Oct 9 2007.
Happy Birthday Inder! Wishing you a wonderful life with your wonderful wife, Arc.
Friday, September 7, 2007
Good Old Days
One thing I really miss is my college days - the freedom, the casualness, the hopes and the dreams. I made some of my best friends in college. I used to love their company and we still get high when we hang out together. I remember the nights when me, A, I , M were up to "finish off our assignments" but ended up chatting about our lives, ideas and dreams. These were the golden times rare to re-live.
Last week me and V were able to re-live some memory of our younger days. After one nice, long tiring day, both our kids and dear hubbies were sleeping softly and quietly in their beds. I don't think hubbies were sleeping quitely but we were too excited to even take notice of that. V had got two movies to watch during the week. We tiptoed downstairs , got some munchkins, hopped onto the couch , made ourselves comfortable and switched on the DVD to watch Dhoom 2. We enjoyed commenting , dancing , singing along with the Ash and Hrithik. It was 11:30 pm by the time the movie ended and we both looked at each other with red shot sleepy eyes . We had had a hectic day and had some more chores to finish up the next day. But we realised that we would never get this precious time easily. So, I happily got out , made tea for both of us. We drank it to drive away Mother sleep and inserted "Mr & Mrs Iyer" into the DVD player :)
Last week me and V were able to re-live some memory of our younger days. After one nice, long tiring day, both our kids and dear hubbies were sleeping softly and quietly in their beds. I don't think hubbies were sleeping quitely but we were too excited to even take notice of that. V had got two movies to watch during the week. We tiptoed downstairs , got some munchkins, hopped onto the couch , made ourselves comfortable and switched on the DVD to watch Dhoom 2. We enjoyed commenting , dancing , singing along with the Ash and Hrithik. It was 11:30 pm by the time the movie ended and we both looked at each other with red shot sleepy eyes . We had had a hectic day and had some more chores to finish up the next day. But we realised that we would never get this precious time easily. So, I happily got out , made tea for both of us. We drank it to drive away Mother sleep and inserted "Mr & Mrs Iyer" into the DVD player :)
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