Pinku-Enchanted Life

Late October, the chill just beginning to make itself felt, a gathering of people from all walks of life and the staging of an amazing piece (I use the word Piece for calling it a mere play would be to confine it to the rigidities one expects in the genre). It was called Mein Istanbul Hoon . The occasion was the celebration of the 50 years of the National school of Drama and the topic chosen was momentous too – a glimpse of Istanbul past and present as reflected through the various books of Orhan Pamuk – the Nobel Laureate. The stage put up on the lawns of the Indira Gandhi National Center for Arts had as backdrop the huge peepul trees and the slowly growing dark winter sky. It began with a beautiful musical composition which instantly took us to the streets of Istanbul as if on a flying carpet. The young Pamuk and his angst at being misunderstood by the world at large, his mother’s high hopes for her son, whom she wants to make an architect are beautifully shown. The tinge of sadness ...

I want it to be monumental. I want it to be different. I want it to be something I can come back to read after writing another 99 posts. I don’t trust myself to write something that good. So I asked a few blogger friends to write down their perception of me and my blog. They were really sweet and inspite of their very busy schedules (what with Diwali close) they actually took out time and wrote a few words. Here, I share it with you: Phatichar : Pinku, one who leads the enchanted life. When I first started speaking to her a few months back, she seemed guarded. But that is only natural in this online world, isn’t it? Gradually that guard was dropped and pretty soon we got along like wild fire, common interests fuelling our conversations everyday – books, movies, food and a whole lot more. And then I went back and read all her posts. And after reading that, from a good online friend, she instantly transformed into a figure to respect. It was not just the writing; that is awesome anyways....

Girl meets boy. Likes him for what he is, his smartness, his foolishness, his awkwardness, and his cuteness and promptly falls in love. Boy meets girl. Likes her good looks, the way she carried herself, the perfectionist mind and attitude, her knowledge and even her pretensions at times, finds it all so very adorable and promptly falls in love. Boy and girl profess undying devotion, love and tenderness. Then they get married. The guy’s smartness starts to rankle when the wisecracks get targeted at her. The girl’s good looks are a matter which sees money drain into Beauty parlours. The guy’s foolishness tastes dour when it means overlooking the obvious. The girl’s poise is cause to lose repose. The guy’s awkward comments aimed at her family or even friends are difficult to swallow The perfectionist mind is now settled on dusting cobwebs There are children to be look aftered, clothes to be darned, utensils to be washed and food going bad in the fridge. The dream turns into a nightmare n...

She was a stunner, green eyes, great body and an exotic dress to boot. Anyone would give her a second glance even a third. She was selling cowboy hats at the Chirag Dilli red light, wearing them all one on top of the other as she walked through the maze of cars. Everyone from the autowallah to the bus passengers to the car drivers and their owners looked out to see her gliding past. She made for a good shot for me while I waited for the red light to turn green. And then we all went our ways forgetting her, forgetting her plight. She belongs to a tribe from Rajasthan that had to move from their ancestral dwellings in search of money and food. She is a bewildered person, who has been made poor and a destitute by the unthinking, uncaring attitude of the powers that be. She is someone who has recently joined the ranks of the poor in Delhi. How do we help? Buy one of her hats perhaps? Does that really solve the problem? Today an initiative was on to talk about poverty through Blog Action D...

Thanks everyone for the responses to the last post. From your comments I sense two things: 1) We are ourselves to blame for the relaxed attitude to law and order and even basic hygiene and good manners that we face in India. 2) A better enforcement would ensure more compliance I have only one suggestion can we get to work on it right away? Who better to enforce any law than our own conscience? I am listing here 5 things we could do to bring about a change.These are very small things and executable on an individual level, hence not dependent on anyone else but us. That should make it easy to achieve success isn’t it? 1. Garbage goes only into garbage bins – this includes no dropping of nutshells and empty bottles out of your vehicle in an attempt to keep it clean. 2. Using Mobiles necessitates knowing mobile etiquettes and FOLLOWING them. 3. Use minimum plastic – look at an option where you can carry an eco-friendly bag with you so that you can say no to those extra plastic bags while ...

I received the below letter as a forwarded mail, it said that this is the speech that President Dr.A P J Abdul Kalam made. Whether that be true or not, I feel the issues raised and questions asked are immensely relevant today and each one of us needs to answer them. Spare ten minutes and read on, it may ensure a better tomorrow for our children. Why is the media here so negative? Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our achievements? We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but we refuse to acknowledge them. Why? We are the first in milk production. We are number one in Remote sensing satellites. We are the second largest producer of wheat. We are the second largest producer of rice. Look at Dr. Sudarshan , he has transferred the tribal village into a self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and failures and disasters. I was in Tel Aviv once and I w...

May the Goddess destroy all evil and give us all peace and prosperity. May she teach us love, brotherhood and tolerance. May she give each of us the ability to see things from the other's point of view also. May she make us a superpower not because of our ability to harness nuclear energy but cause of our spiritual strength. May she unite us not by painting us all in one colour but my making us resemble a beautiful collage of unity in diversities. May she bless us with wisdom.

Its Gandhi Jayanti….(hurray a holiday in the middle of the week and if you can afford to take the Friday off, you got a long weekend infront of you to relax, shop or prepare for Durga Puja too). Gandhi, a much abused in private and revered in public, man. When I was growing up I blamed Gandhi for dividing the country into two and creating what seems like an eternal enmity between two countries. It was stylish to say things like: Gandhi: that guy who spoke of abstinence and couldn’t walk without the support of two women under his arms. Gandhi: who with his blackmailing techniques of fasting didn’t allow any decisive action to be taken and would hold the country to ransom for the smallest thing. Gandhi: who slept with his thirteen year old granddaughter to check whether he has been able to control his body completely. Gandhi much like God was to be blamed for everything that was wrong with us. But now that I am on the other side of thirty and I see the rampant violence that’s engulfing m...