Pinku-Enchanted Life

Old sayings abound of how the ordinary and the mundane are ignored for the more exotic until that day when suddenly they disappear from your life. And that’s when you stop, look around and then get into acute agony over the loss. Recently I have had two such incidents which brought this fact home to me. The first was sudden loss of hearing in my right ear soon after my flight took off from Bangalore. I was travelling on work and alone and having my hearing reduced by half and me trying to lip read and second guessing people feels funny now but then it was quite an ordeal. In Delhi I waited for a couple of days hoping the blockage would go off on its own. It didn’t and then a visit to an ENT specialist gave the scary news of fluid buildup inside my ear drums which if medicines didn’t help might need surgery also. Suddenly something which till now I had laughed off as a stupid irritant grew to worrying proportions. As the medicines continued for the next two weeks I suffered f

The virtual world has given me many friends. Some whom I have met and others who continue to hold my hand and heart over internet connections. Most of my virtual friends came through blogging. Years back when I first started penning down my thoughts on this blog and someone would come along and empathize, criticize or generally comment. My happiness and thrill knew no bounds. With time some of those visitors became friends and while writing you almost wrote for them. You knew which line would elicit a smile from whom, you also knew which friend would frown and tell you to take a re-look at whatever it was you were discussing. Not meeting these people, never seeing them didnt dampen spirits at all. Infact the fact that they were faceless, distant at time gave you the courage to discuss many a n intimate issue you would rather not discuss with real friends for fear of being judged or worse still bitched about in the immediate circle. Over the years I have had the chance to meet

A trip to Oh! Calcutta  is usually greeted with a lot of enthusiasm by the team at work. So today was no different when on a whim I asked a colleague to join me for lunch at the Nehru Place restaurant.   Oh Calcutta the specialty restaurant with multiple awards won over many years is a name that almost all gourmets in the city recognize instantly. We walked in hoping, nay assuming that good times lay ahead of us. A hilsa /eelish festival was on there,though we didnt see anyone ordering the same. Most patrons chose to stay with the buffet spread and having had decent food the past few times, we too chose to stay with it too. I tried the Dal shorba and found that while it was nice - it did taste suspiciously close to the kind of dal we have at home with alu bhaaja and saada bhaat  (rice). They also had alu matar tikis and chicken cutlets for starters.we tried the cutlets - they were ok - just about. The main course had fish paturi, cholar dal, a

The bangla word for a relative is aatiyon . What it really means is someone who is close to your aatma, your soul. Someone with whom you feel a sense of solidarity, wholeness. Pishi, my father in law's eldest sister was someone I heard about a lot through stories relayed by my in laws and husband long before I had the chance to meet her in person. I also tasted some of her awesome cooking from the portions she would thoughtfully bring across for her brother whenever she visited. My first introduction to her happened about three years ago, when finally my father in law chose to tell her about my existence. It was a moment which I had both dreaded and anticipated equally. Comparisons, remarks, judgement all of it would have been natural and to be expected. Yet the complete openness and ease with which Pishi met me allayed my misgivings and gave her a special place in my heart, for keeps. My subsequent visits to her place on various occasions only helped strengthen my image o

Pim, Pimpum, Chota, Chotkas, Hiya, Kutti, Rini, Rinush, Pumpum, Aarini You answer to all these names. You have the wickedest grin and the cutest smile You can say Byeeee and Hieeee with a glee that’s unmatched You grab me and give a tight hugga that makes my heart burst with joy. Your mimic call to  your Dad "Marrieeeeeee" to rhyme with my Parryieee lights up his day Your curls bother you too much and the sweep of your impatient hand delights us all You give AC a glimpse of the daughter he never had with your cuddling up to him Sanchali wears a bindi just so you will take it away with your lil fingers You bring a smile to your ailing Daddum Even your otherwise silent Thammam always has something to say to you Diddum thinks you are the smartest, naughtiest, cutest, bestest girl on earth Buttercup feels you are the only one around whom she has to be careful You my dear miracle maker are all of this and much much more. Today a

Dear Baba, Its Father’s Day this Sunday and all the advertisements are telling me to remember you, tell you that you are the greatest DAD, write you a letter to mention that you were, are and will always be my original Superman, etc. Yesterday the Archies show window in a mall had so many Best Dad gifts that for a moment I thought why would anyone need so many? And then the wicked thought came that perhaps with divorces so much on the rise, kids would need to buy for different dads – the best one, the better one and the fun one. Something like that. Oh by the way I hope you know that I have started the letter all wrong, I am supposed to call you DAD not Baba. Baba is old world, its unfashionable not like Dad – Dad’s smart and modern. Anyway I am too old to change my ways and since you haven’t been around for about twenty years now, I have no way of changing it and getting you to respond to ‘Dad’ so Baba it will be for me. I have been missing you a lot lately, it’s

Four years and a few months ago, I had rushed after work to the eastern part of the city to house hunt. We were planning to get married and one essential part of the plans was to have a place of our own to start with. Till then both of us were living with respective parents. It was an attempt at trying our hands at setting up home a second time having tried our best and failing the first time round with other partners. Everything about this second attempt had a bitter sweet tinge. The bitterness came from already knowing that marriage is not a ‘happily ever after’ and the sweetness from the fact that we had grown to love and respect each other and were expecting to remain friends above everything else. He had checked out a couple of places already, some too dingy, others way above what we could afford. The property dealer took us to the gates of a corner house late in the evening. The landlord an elderly Kashmiri gentleman asked his man Friday to take us around the first floor whi