La Tomatina

Yes.. You guessed it right. It was a little "La Tomatina" in my kitchen. I was preparing the tomato pickle, for which, I had to blend the tomatoes to a pulp. May be, I had over loaded the mixer. The moment, i tried to turn, after switching on the mixer, the lid of the mixer went flying, i was splashed with tomato sauce and the entire kitchen, got a " La tomatina'' decoration. I started to clean away the mess. When I was half way through, I got the idea, as to why not photo graph the same. This this was the result. Alas, I did not think of photographing myself. I would have made a good specimen of the tomato festival - though, at home.

The noodle story

He was foodie.Or rather should we say a gourmet, since he does not take interest in the preparation of food, if it is already available in ready-to-eat form.He can travel any great distance, if he gets a whiff of tasty and yummy food - be it vegetarian or non-vegetarian,South Indian or north Indian.He loved momos and noodles (chowmein) too. He is ever-ready to try out any new cuisine. And thankfully his gang of friends were also as foodie as him. If let loose, they can devour a restaurant's food clean to the last bone of chicken.May be,to be his friend, being a foodie is a necessary qualification. He is good at cooking too, which he does only if there is no other easy option available. He has the menu cards of almost all the restaurants, which provide door delivery service or have a Take-Away facility. He has the phone numbers of all the restaurants which serve his favorite food, stored in his mobile, so that he could  book a table whenever he chooses to. Such a gourmet he was, he can go to the extent - of having soup and appetizers in a restaurant, the main course in another and dessert in a third one. He would like to complete the meal with the Banarasi paan. The travel required for travel to four different locations does not dishearten him at all. He would use any mode of transport - bus, train, auto- rickshaw or his own bike. He makes it a point to attend the marriages of all his friends, so that, he could enjoy the wedding delicacies. And that is Arya to you.

The first thing you notice about him is his boyish features and beautiful eyes. Yes, he was handsome too.And reserved. You can be sure - he will not be the one to start a conversation on first meet. And when he does speaks, it looks like he is on a ration on the number of words.He maintained an air of superiority about himself and stayed mostly aloof, even among friends, speaking only if addressed to personally. But he was a great listener. He could listen to any boring lecture with apt attention, as if it was some gossip story involving a movie star. This was a reason that all the talkative people found a great friend in him.His silence did not mean that he was not knowledgeable.He could give you a opinion - only when asked - on any topic under the sun(or the moon for that matter), which could last for half an hour. 

Arya and Ghazal met each other at a 15 day conference on Environmental conservation, which they were forced to attend by their respective organisations.Ghazal was very much outspoken and could lighten up the place she is in with the non-stop chatter and witty comments. She would enter the room like a tornado, managing to speak to everyone in the room, noticing every new thing about everyone and passing her comments and judgement on the same.

Just a glimpse of her five minute presence in the room - there were five people in the library reading room that day, including the librarian's shy assistant Jitu. Ghazal entered the reading room to collect her ipod from Prita. This was how it went. She entered like a whirlwind - her duppata flying, heels clicking, bangles jingling, long earrings swaying, and continuously pulling up her handbag.First to fall prey to her all noticing eyes was Joy - " Hi Joy, kya baat hai?!! :-), you are dazzling like anything? white shirt, blue jeans. Which girl are you trying to impress? Dressed like a Bollywood hero, haan? Or did you already get a girl friend, who is it,who is it?? I will not tell any one.Tell me." All the while, poor Joy was opening and closing his mouth like a fish, looking for a chance when Ghazal would stop talking, so that he can say that it was his birthday. Alas, he dint get one.Very much contradicting her name, her voice is high pitched and shrill. The entire floor could hear her even if she is talking to one person at a time. Next, her eyes fell on Gayathri, who was struggling to solve a Sudoku puzzle, which was her favorite pastime. "Hey Gayathri, I saw your brother yesterday with a girl. He has a girl friend or what? She was not that great looking though, oh, you don't know? then you should give me a treat, I am the one to give you the news, you see; now you can blackmail your brother". Next was Jitu. Jitu was short and fair with exceptionally yellow and zigzag teeth. It looked like each of his tooth pointed to one different angle. And he wore exceptionally white shirts. He can star in any detergent ad, as long as he does not open his mouth. "Hello Jitu sir; what washing powder you use. Are you married? No? You have to try the new tolgate toothpaste. They say in the advertisement that it will give super white teeth. Then it will be matching matching with your dress.Hahaha. Only then you will get married''. Jitu moved away embarrassed. She stopped near Prita, collected her ipod. "have you uploaded all the new movie songs? that is the price for letting you use my ipod once in a while''.And she took an about- turn and started to walk away, stopped mid way and noticed, satish. Hey Satish, here, take this, I need to give you two rupees, fifty paisa. You paid my bus charge while we were going to zoo, know.'' And she banged the change on the table and left. All this happened in a span of 5 minutes. Only after she left, you will notice how silent the place is. Yes, after Ghazal leaves, it looks like calm after storm.


Their friendship started at the end of conference, when Ghazal as was expected out of her, commented on Arya saying that in the 15 day duration Arya would hardly have spoken 150 words. May be, Arya liked Ghazal's non-stop chatter.Ghazal liked some one who could listen to her, without interruption. She lured him further, saying that she could make yummy noodles and cook mouth watering and finger-licking non-veg dishes.And as if to further enhance the friendship, Arya's friend, Atul, lived near to Ghazal's hostel. And whenever Arya, went to Atul, he made it a point to meet Ghazal as well. Sometimes, when Arya would be waiting in the bus stop for Atul to come, he would call Ghazal to the bus stop, where they would sit and chat (Arya sitting and Ghazal chatting), till Atul turned up. Ghazal became a pastime to Arya, to kill time waiting for Atul. And he was waiting for a day when Ghazal would rent up a house(she was staying in a hostel,remember), and invite him to taste for all the goodies which she claimed she could cook.Ghazal, who, never had a person listening to her chatter so keenly, mistook it as love. But she did not want to raise it to Arya and get rejected. She was afraid of on-the-face rejection. That is the reason she introduced Kathy to Arya. Kathy is short for Katyayini. She wanted kathy to befriend Arya and find out if he really was in love with her.


Kathy, who wanted the best for her friend, did as she was told and with passage of time became good friends with Arya. Reserved that he was, she was unable to get anything out of Arya for Ghazal. Having lost patience, she straightaway asked him if he was in love with Ghazal. Arya's  surprised and baffled expression gave her the answer that he never had such thoughts towards her friend. She felt sorry for Ghazal, who was expecting that she would be successful in making Arya, profess love for her. She did not want to disappoint Ghazal and kept on saying she did not ask him yet.


In the meanwhile, Ravi, who had also attended the conferance, proposed to Ghazal. And Ghazal without really thinking much accepted. Kathy was looking for a house to rent, which she planned to share with Ghazal. Arya, helped her in searching for a house, with the hope that, once Ghazal and Kathy moved to a house, Ghazal would prepare noodles and invite him over. Ghazal, on the other hand was reluctant to share the house with Kathy, as Kathy did not get along that well with Ravi. Kathy was happy for Ghazal that she found her love in Ravi, and she rented a house on her own, while Ghazal continued staying in the hostel. She invited Ghazal and Arya to her new home for lunch, one day and prepared the dishes, which she was good at. Though she failed to  satisfy Ghazal, Arya was impressed. Kathy loved it if someone appreciated her culinary skills. And though Arya did not say it verbally, he gave her the message by completing the food and asking when the next invitation would be. And thats how it began.. The saga of home cooked meals at Kathy's home, which all started with Arya's yearning for noodles. And as it is said a man's heart is through his stomach, eventually Arya fell in love with Kathy and proposed to her.

Mobile Phone Mania

I am not going to say about all the ill effects of mobile phone. I feel this is one invention, I wish had been invented a little earlier. I love my mobile phone and all the things I could do with it. My mobile phone is just not a phone. It is a companion. Besides helping me keep in touch with my loved ones via a call or sms, it helps me do many things. I take pictures of whatever fancies me the very instant. I could listen to music while I drive. I could watch a movie while I travel. I could read a book. I could organise my "things to do". I can remember birthdays, anniversaries and appointments.I can browse Internet.I can email.I can play games.

Just a recap of how my life was before mobile phones :

1. I used to carry a pouch full of one rupee coins to use in any coin phone booth to inform home that I could be late from school/college/tuition.

2. When I moved to Chennai - away from my home town and started staying in a hostel, I had to stay in a queue in a phone booth near my hostel to call home every night.

3. Internet was still new. And not all my friends used to use it. So, I used to write letters to them almost every alternate day( this is something I miss now; that intimacy and closeness, which I felt in writing letters is missing in emails). The letters would contain the details of the forthcoming meeting place and time.

4. I carried a copy of Chennai map( I still have the copy) in my bag. It had all the bus numbers with locations.

5. I used to call my friends in their office landlines, hostel land line and used to wait till my friend(s) are informed of the same. This resulted in each friend having many numbers - office, client(s) office, home, hostel etc. And all this numbers were noted down alphabetically in a phone book, which I carried in my bag.

6. I used to write a diary. I miss that healthy habit now.

The above is just a short list of things before the mobile phone era. Though I do miss some of the things which I did in that period, I should say, mobile phones have made the world smaller and more accessible.

Having said all that, my real idea behind this post: things I would have loved to capture in my mobile phone camera. Here goes the list with a brief description of the incident.

1. Open Quiz at Science Centre in Tirupati - Those days, when I was in school, some of us used to cycle to Science Centre in Tirupati, to participate in an open quiz conducted every week on a particular day. On one such day, I answered a question -"What is Hemophilia". No one in the hall of around two hundred people knew the answer and I was the only one who had raised the hand. I would have loved if someone had captured that moment when I answered it correctly and was called on stage.

2. When we were kids, my two brothers never stayed at home after school. They were always in the ground playing. This was the time, when they were ready to be off to the ground after school.One of them used to cycle, and the other would become a pillion rider. Both my brothers are tall. It so happened that, one brother sat on the pillion and the other started to cycle away. The bicycle had gone forward, but the brother who was (supposed) to be on the pillion was sitting/standing in sitting position on the road. The three of us had a good laugh.I wish I could have captured the jolly moment.

3. My brothers innocent childhood scenes. I would need a separate post to write all those.

4. The smile of a baby, when I held her finger in a crowded bus.

5. My first venture into kitchen - burnt omelet.

6. All my childhood paintings.

7. My younger brothers toothless grin in childhood, when taken on a ride on his tricycle and when colorful balloons are left into the air.

8. My toys collection.

9. We live near a railway track. My father used to work in railways. Sometimes, my father used to travel in the train which passes on that track. The three of us - my brothers and I, used to run near the track when the train passes, to wave to our father. He used to wave back. Though I do not have any photo of this, the memory is as clear as any video.

10.My younger brother's - chappal train. When my youngest brother was a kid, and had not started going to school yet, he used to play by himself, till we return from school. One of his activity was to make a train out of all our foot wear. I think he would have been a year old then. He used to arrange all the footwear based on size. The engine would be my fathers black shoes, followed by his chappals, then my mothers, followed by mine, then my first brothers and at last his shoes.

I could write till here. I shall keep updating this post, whenever I recollect an incident.

Clash of the Titans

I know it looks a little weird title for this post. But looking at the severity of the war(s) waging in school, this seems apt.

I am a proud ninth standard - "A" section girl student. You shall understand the reason I am stressing on  belonging to a particular class once you read through the following upcoming lines. Let me first explain the importance of being in ninth standard. Being just year below the highest standard in the school, made us sort of powerful. That was because, we already had started commanding the "senior" respect from all the students( the tenth standard people were too busy in the upcoming public examinations and had little time to deviate from studies; so we were the uncrowned queens and kings of the school). And unlike the tenth standard students we had ample time at our disposal, which we effectively utilised to show our "seniority". Though they could not do anything to help it, this was scorned upon by the standard ten students and they demanded that we accept there seniority( and their so - called superiority) at each possible opportunity. Though we respected our seniors, we could not always stand their "we-know-all'' kind of behaviour. This lead to clashes between the two standards- which, thankfully could not grow big due to their studies pressure.

And within standard nine, there were two sections- based on the preference of second language. I am in section A. There is always rivalry between section A and Section B students on whatever possible competition it be. It may be anything from scoring highest marks in all subjects, or coming first in the sports or winning the affections of the school beauty queen(of course this applies only to boys). When between Section A girls and Section B girls - the war would only be verbal. But when boys get involved it becomes nasty physical fight.Interesting thing to note is that even though there is always clash between girls vs boys in the same section - when it comes to clash between sections, this rivalry is forgotten and the whole class of a section stands against the other as one. These raging wars between sections always ended us up in uncomfortable circumstances - like mass punishment of the whole classes, stinky letters on bad behaviour to parents, scoldings and caning from teachers, awful visits to the Principal's room; but the war was on; there was no stop to it. Only a small incident was required to rage it again and again to a furnace.

As I mentioned earlier, our dear seniors(the tenth standard students), were ever busy with there studies and had delegated the participation in inter- school competition to us.These competitions are usually held during holidays.That is holiday for standards other than standard nine and standard ten.This was the practice in most of the Schools in the city, including the strawfort school.This was also the period when the cold war between the two standards would be at peak, fuelled by the feeling that we had to come to school when our your brothers and sisters are enjoying their holidays.The burden was on our young shoulders to represent our school in the inter school competitions and ensure that we win decent number of medals for our schools.In addition to our standard students,a few tenth standard students who were too good in athletics and were sure- wins, also were to participate in the competitions. The gem among them - Swetha, who is a sure shot win in any sports activity, and who also is one of the top five rankers in studies, and to add to it who was drop down gorgeous, was also participating.Swetha was an exception to our hatred towards our seniors.All of us respected Swetha and admired her.

It was during these competitions that a guy from the strawfort school taunted her. When one of her classmates tried to talk sense to that guy, he was slapped, insulted and beaten. These stawfort guys were aware of the waging wars in our school -  standard nine vs standard ten, and in standard nine - section A vs Section B, and also girls vs boys. That was their reason of their courage to taunt Swetha.

Some of the tenth standard guys seized up the strawfort guy who had insulted their classmate and beat him. They were in turn surrounded by the strawfort guys.Since the competition was happening in strawfort,our seniors, who were just a handful, stood a small chance to live. We still do not know how the information had passed on to students of our school.What happened in next few minutes happened so fast that it looked like a whirlwind. Around two hundred students from both ninth and tenth standards crashed their bicycles in strawfort and formed a bigger circle around the strawfort students.None of us imagined that this incident would trigger some dormant feelings within us - the feeling of oneness. All the enmities were forgotten. We were one. We were - "Our School". There was such a fight that if had been shot through a camera would have been no less than any bollywood movie fight. All of us were injured. But the strawfort guys lost in their own ground. We did not fight - we defended.That was one of the reasons why we were injured more that the strawfort guys. But we over powered and cornered them to a corner of the auditorium. By then our school principal and strawfort school principal arrived. Our Principal delivered a lecture on good behaviour. Strawfort's principal appreciated us for having handled the situation without fighting back. We were asked to disperse immediately. This incident made us one.Once we came out of the auditorium, to our bicycles, everyone was laughing, patting each other and appreciating each other.There were no clashes - no A section, B section; no boy,girl; no ninth and tenth standard.

P.S. :- In the second term of the school, Swetha joined strawfort as her mother got a job as a teacher there. This bridged the gap between the schools and  students of both schools together represented our city in inter city competions. All is well that ends well.