Jack and Jill

Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water,
Jack fell down and broke his crown and Jill came tumbling after!

It’s the song my mother sings to me every morning. I don’t like it much; it gave me an eerie feeling. I used to joke that she needs to update her song list. She just smiled and replied “it’s a special song; it reminds me of my greatest victory.”

Grandmother has been living with us for the past few weeks, I asked her about mother’s obsession with the rhyme, it seemed to distress grandma, and she said she wasn’t sure, mother had been singing it since she was a child.

A few days later I was watching a movie based on the tragic separation of twins- a brother and sister, the beginning was quite happy but I saw my grandma’s eyes widen at the screen and leave quietly. I followed her out and asked her about what had happened. She looked at me and seemed to make up her mind about something, “I’m assuming your mother has never told you about your Uncle Sam?” I shook my head in surprise. “He is, or rather he was your mother’s twin, he passed away in an accident when they were just twelve years old” I wanted to know everything about him and she also must have wanted to talk about him because for the next one hour she spoke about her beloved lost son. He and my mother had been very close; she was very protective of him. He was at his happiest at the time, he was going to boarding school, his life was just beginning but then the accident happened. I couldn’t get Grandma to talk about his death; I guess it was too painful.

I couldn’t help but wonder why mother had never told me about him. I finally asked her one night, she looked shaken; she simply got up and walked off. I think I heard her have an argument with Grandma later that night. I was hurt. What about this did she feel she needed to keep a secret from me? Mother and I were always close but after father’s death five years ago she has become my best friend. She was my greatest confidante so why did I suddenly feel like she was hiding things from me?

I am leaving for University in a few days; I think this is why grandma has come to live with us. I’m so grateful to her. I used to worry about how mother would get by without me. She is so protective of me, she worries all day long, and I don’t think she’s very comfortable with the idea of me leaving. I know grandma will help mother adjust to our new situation. Last night mother and I started bridging all these gaps that had appeared in our relationship. We went to our favourite Mexican restaurant and over quesadillas and nachos mother finally opened up to me about everything. She was scared I was leaving but she had accepted it. She told me that I will never ever leave her heart, just like Uncle Sam never has.  He used to love to hear her sing, just like me! She sings for him every day, maybe she would sing for me too! I couldn’t help but thinking that my mother is the best!

Tomorrow my life beings anew, University, new classes and friends I can barely contain my excitement. Grandma has gone to my aunt’s house and tonight, one last time, I’m alone with mother. She’s singing “Jack and Jill…” again.
“Mama, what is this victory you always talk about?”

“Oh! I sing this song for your Uncle Sam”
She has been talking more and more about him these days, maybe she is finally being able to think of him with some happiness.
“Was the victory you won…something over Uncle Sam?”
“Yes it was, and now he can never leave my side and this song has everything to do with it!”
I’m getting excited “What song will you sing for me when I go away?”
“Ring around the roses, pocketful of poses, ashes ashes we all fall down, Baby you loved playing to this rhyme when you were young. You will always be a baby for me. I will never let you leave me, my thoughts I mean”.
I beam at her; no one will love me like my mother does.
“Come Baby, put your head in my lap, and let me put you to sleep, one last time.”
I go gladly, and as she fusses over me and tucks me in, I can’t help but stare at her. I remember dad’s words- her heart is as big as her. He loved teasing her about her big frame. I’ve always thought she loves with all her heart. I can feel her love tonight!
She’s singing “Ring around the roses” to me, I’m drifting to sleep, I don’t even realise when her hands creep onto my neck and start pressing too hard. I struggle. My eyes are imploring her to stop. “Baby I can’t let you leave me. You will be at peace after this; just like your Uncle Sam was, after I pushed him down the hill. We would not have been able to bear being apart, this way he never had to go to that horrid boarding school, don’t you see? Even you needn't go to college. You can stay with mama forever”.

By Radha Agarwal

You're alone

You’re going to be alone forever. There is nobody in the world – hear me out- nobody who will be able to understand you completely,nobody who will see eye to eye with you on all matters.

We all have that one favourite book,song,movie,painting. Something that strikes a chord within us. Since I’m a book person,I’ll relate it to books. Think of your favourite book. You know those special lines, the one which make your heart feel complete,the ones you relate to so well that you want to show someone. You get that nagging in your head. Somebody NEEDS to know how you feel and how well its been put across here!

Nobody will understand. Even if you do manage to get someone to read it, all you’re going to get in return is a blank look or a quizzical look asking “so?” or at best a hollow “wow that’s nice”

You’ll want to scream at them, cry out “why hasn’t this impacted you profoundly? Why such an underreaction? This what I’ve just shown you holds one of the keys to my existence. It deserves more from you.”

But you can’t make them feel something they just….don’t.

You’re alone.

Nobody is going to know all about you- every little lane of life you’ve walked through,every thought or feeling you have about people, why certain things make you react a certain way, why you find some people so hard to trust. Nobody is going to know the inside workings of your mind-why you obsess over a drink just because it reminds you of a certain boy, what every reference or personal joke means actually, why you want to appear a certain way in front of some people, what demons have pursued you all your life, why are you pushing everyone away, why do you suddenly need to get away from everything?

You’re alone

There will never be one person who’ll walk in with the solution. Even if it feels like there is, you’ll discover soon enough that you’ve been kidding yourself. Nobody will have a mind that mirrors yours. Nobody will come in magically as the “soulmate” we all aspire to find. Someone perfectly like that does not exist. You have GOT to stop believing in the fairytale that you’re going to find somebody with the answers to every question you have,the same excited smile and spark in eyes you have when something touches you, the urge to navigate the inner reaches of your mind and stay despite everything they find. To quote Mean Girls “Stop trying to make it happen. Its not going to happen”

You’re alone.

The faster you accept it and make peace with it, the easier it will be to cope. It will stop you from dying a little every time you’re misunderstood. Trust me, you’ll have saved yourself a lot of disappointment.

Peace

By Nirmitee Mehta

Your love

When you  fall in love, do so in a crazy, incomplete, brilliant sort of way!

Like nothing else matters, and then make it into something special. The way I love you, its unfair, its so different from the way I love family, friends, work and passion, I don't know if I love you more, but I do know I love you differently. 

When you're there I want so much more from my life, to make it a little more worthy of you, I'd want to fill it in more, achieve all my dreams and fill as much sunshine as I can into it.. I'll glow brighter so my light fills your life too. Without you, I won't give up because its not what you'd want from me but it would just not mean anything,I'd see every colour in shades of grey!
You colour my every imperfection brighter. I'd forgive your every mistake just so you can make another. Maybe we are too young but you know I'd stand by you through almost anything. You're my strength, till you're there I'll remain standing. I hope I can keep this promise, I hope nothing that destiny throws towards us is so dark that I cannot bear it. I hope you're here so we can grow old together. So I can see you succeed. So I can see your smile everyday. Your smile. Your laughter. Your eyes! You know your my light, without you I'd be lost. I would have never found my way through the fog that had overtaken my spirit. My smile, that was long gone.You found me! My eyes twinkled brightest when I was with you. They still do.

They say we are the cutest couple, I say we fit. You steal my heart with every obnoxious self obsessed monologue. You're words echo in my mind. I remember every time, ever day you've told me I'm pretty. Every time you've  said I love you my heart breathes in a sigh of relief. I still can't believe your mine. I still, can't believe you're mine! I'll remember every walk down the memory lane, that day in the rains, that day I danced in your arms, every conversation, and  touch. I'll remember how you taught me to love more than I thought I ever could. I'll remember how you made me feel like most amazing person on earth. You make every other crush inconsequential. You're my baby, my sweetheart, my quirido, mon ami and the simplest most precious, my love.

Someday I hope the daydream comes true. Someday I hope I'll find you! <3

By Radha Agarwal

What it takes

She revisited that place tonight. Its been months since she was last there, but it feels like she's never left at all because she instantly feels safe and at home there. And then again it could have been years because she's changed so much and so has her life, its hard to remember the person she used to be in minute detail. The hopes, dreams and wishes dissipated with time. It was here that she had said farewell to the fancies of the young her before she stepped onto the threshold of adulthood. Back then she'd been craving something real in life. Living it in her mind in theory was something she'd had enough of. Her heart craved something that would turn the beautiful candy floss that her thoughts were made up of into something more than an illusion-give a more believable base to them.
Today she wishes she'd never looked beyond what she had then. Dissatisfied though she was, she'd been happy in her soul. She still believed in believing, in love, in happy endings, in the fluttering of hearts, of your heart feeling bigger than yourself, in having true feelings towards someone. It was these beliefs that had been her driving force-the sparkle in her eyes, beauty in her life, blush in her cheeks, dance of her limbs.
Right now, right here, that illusion and that she is shattering-it has been for quite some time now, like a glass wall hit by a car in a hurry. So it was with her, she'd been in too much of a hurry for the experiences that she settled for less and in turn got heavily disillusioned.
Every single time that she came here in the almost forgotten age, she'd write letters addressed to nobody in particular, each weaving a tale of her world, incorporating every whim, fantasy, dream, hope, belief. Its to find them that she's returned today, clinging to the last strand of hope which tells her that on reading those letters, some semblance of the lost her will be rediscovered. She scrambles over to the spot next to the willow tree where she'd kept them imprisoned, hidden from the world. Her hands start digging the soil, getting dirt underneath her carefully tended nails, which she does not pay heed to. Its the least of her worries now. One hand pushes back the long hair streaming into her face as the other, clenched in a fist against her heart tries to control its thud as she desperately wishes for the wooden casket enclosing them to remain. She feels a flash of joy as her hand hits wood and the familiar dark brown box with the tiny butterfly carvings appears before her. Her anticipation grows as she opens it and sees the small pile of colored folded sheets of paper. But as she picks one up, this changes into a feeling of dread. Her throat suddenly goes dry and her eyes well up with tears which without notice give way, blurring the words on paper. She can't bear it-her former happiness and optimism might make her feel more alone and lost than ever. What will she do if the largest piece of herself outside her body fails to have the desired impact and instead appears shallow to her? How much will that break her? Will there be anything at all be left after that? No. She can't make herself take this great a risk.
She now stands up, still holding the letters, dusts soil off her knees and skirt and walks into the water until she is calf deep in seawater and then holds them out in her hands till the wind blows them away, depositing them onto the surface of water where they float. Now her dreams are free to take whichever form they want. Now they are unencumbered. All of herself will come back to her when it wants to-when she is ready for it. Though this is not what she'd come here for today, she is more relieved and at peace than she's been for a long time.

By Nirmitee Mehta

Between the lines

She was pure, unsullied, naïve.

He was worldly wise, the “bad boy”, the player.

She was persecuted- the one everyone picked on.

He was influential, he controlled the waters there.

She found him obnoxious.

Her thoughts never crossed his mind.

Mutual friends got their paths to cross once.

She found him good natured and friendly.

He found her funny.

The ice had broken.

He started talking to her electronically.

She responded.

He was amused.

She was intrigued.

They spoke all day once.

She spilled her guts out to him and let him in, inside her life and mind.

He seemed sympathetic and told her he’d take care of it.

She began looking forward to their virtual conversations.

One time they left the digital haven to meet up in the real world. A flurry of rumours encircled them and their equation was misconstrued.

She shrugged it off as idle talk and continued texting with the same fervor.

He stopped replying as much.

She expected response.

He’d somehow stopped giving it.

She stalked his facebook profile as girls do.

She was aware of his presence always when he was nearby.

He did not show any outward sign of change or discontent.

He did not acknowledge her- no looks, no words.

She is afraid of talking to him in public.

She imagines situations where they would be thrown together and imagines how their conversation would go.

He couldn’t really care less.

She always falls for boys of this breed.

He will never know what it is like to love a girl like her.

She knows she should just forget about it all.

He hardly thinks of her.

She does not want to fall for him.

He never will.

By Nirmitee Mehta

Rain Defines Life!

It's raining it's pouring, the old fat man is snoring, he bumped his head into the bed and couldn’t get up in the morning, morning, morning!!! A childhood rhyme that I hear constantly in my head every time I see the rains,  “yes the rains are here, finally the rains are here!”.
This rhyme brings back so many… reveries!  It brings back the love for rain that I’ve felt since I was child! The pitter patter of the drops, the orange hue of the entire atmosphere that threatens to turn grey at any moments, the smell of the ground, the flash of lightning, the roar of the thunder, this one rhyme takes me back to the very greatness of rain!
Another phrase I’ve come to associate with rain is “Pune rains and Pune girls”. It’s a very romantic notion and brings to mind every love story every love scene that has to do with rains…The dark, unaccommodating clouds, a wet girl and a handsome stranger, a love story that we are all secretly waiting for! Rain is something I truly love and I could honestly write odes to it so maybe it’s just expected that for me love of any kind would find all its meaning in rain, especially romantic love! If I love someone I want to love them the way I love the rain, loyally, irrationally, inconveniently, love every imperfection that forms it, love the long wait through summer and winter, a love which even though it annoys me( because how am I ever supposed to travel on the bike when it keeps raining? Rain that’s killing my social life, and making me a perfect couch potato) but even so I love it and I know I should appreciate it because I have waited for it every day and would wait for it every day of forever and all I  know is without it I’m miserable, a love like that, never-ending! Rain defines the basis of fairytales in our harsh world; it takes me back to these words:
   “At the end of the day faith is a funny thing. It turns up when you don't really expect it. It's like one day you realize that the fairy tale may be slightly different than you dreamed. The castle, well, it may not be a castle. And it's not so important happy ever after, just that it’s happy right now. See once in a while, once in a blue moon, people will surprise you, and once in a while people may even take your breath away.”
 …and rain gives me so much faith.
There’s one other thing I love other thing I love about rain, it makes me realize the importance of art and beauty, all I can think of in the rains every time I look at it even when it ruins plans and annoys me is how beautiful it makes everything, how every colour is suddenly so much more vibrant, how green is suddenly the most beautiful colour in the world but then so is every colour that the rain touches! When we study environmental education one of the reasons to save our environment is listed as saving its priceless beauty, I always thought this as a little selfish I mean we should save the environment simply because we destroyed it so now it’s our duty to save it not to feast our eyes! But when I look at the rain I understand, beauty inspires us! And natural beauty has inspired people for eons, inspires to want better from life and inspires art and wouldn’t life be a little less meaningful without art?
And sometimes I forget everything all of this… elaborate meanings, hidden messages, and make my mind blank, cuddle into a blanket and eat something piping hot, like Maggi, in fact I’m going to do that now, maybe you should too because the rain really should be appreciated and made most of it comes only so often.

By Radha Agarwal

Of sweet talking and sweet eating

Chahita: Hi lovely
Nirmitee: Hey sweet pea <3


Chahita: My chocolate cupcake
Nirmitee: My sugarplum

Chahita:My honeybun

Nirmitee:My muffin

Chahita: My strawberry pie

Nirmitee: My apple pie

                  My dairymilk :-P

Chahita: My MOD donut <3 

Nirmitee: My lemon tart

Chahita: My chocolate chip cookie

Nirmitee: My maple syrup covered waffle

              <3

              My nutella crepe

Chahita: My chocolate syrup covered pancake

             My cheese fondue

Nirmitee: My brandy cream cookie

               My vodka pizza :-P

Chahita: Teehee :-P

             My chocolate bomb

             My tiramisu

Nirmitee: *giggle*

Chahita: My Ferrero Rocher cakeeeeeeeee

Nirmitee: My caramel custard

              My cheeeeeeeeeesecake

Chahita: My lindt chocolate :-P

Nirmitee: My chocolate croissant

              My garam garam jalebi <3

Chahita: My roshogulla ;)

Take me to Vienna

8811 kms.

          If I drive without stopping even once, Google maps assures me that I will reach Vienna in 4 days and 20 hours. This is one trip I’d go on in a heartbeat because Vienna is the city that holds the key to my heart.

          I started thinking of Vienna as more than just another of the many cities that populate the world when I started reading Eva Ibbotson. My love for her writing translated into a bigger love for a city I’d never seen, such was the power of her words and love for the city. Back when I first read about it, visiting Vienna was just a far away dream, out of reach for me, maybe because it isn’t on the “must see” lists of most people, it just made a place for itself on my bucket list.

          Then about 2 years ago when I decided to go on exchange and looked at a list of all the places we’d be visiting on the Eurotour, my dream of visiting this Hapsburg capital, this city of love and music did not seem as far fetched and without it, I began counting the days till I’d be there.

          Was it the rushing back of the knowledge of places I’d read about as memories from a distant life? Or was it the pure joy of actually realizing a wish or dream come true? Or was it our wonderful tour guide whose narrations about the places we saw bringing them back to life? I don’t know what it was but any of them or all of them combined to present before me a golden day, the kind of whose memories when thought back on later in life make you sigh contentedly.

          Looking up at the statue of Maria Theresa, the empress “who made Austria great”, on either side of which the Museum of Art History and Museum of Natural history respectively are situated, I could almost see Ruth from “A Morning Gift” visiting both of them throughout her childhood and returning to the Museum of Natural History when years later to seek asylum from the Nazis. I saw her again when we were shown a typical Viennese house built around a courtyard with a tree in the centre just as hers was and imagined it having been hers.

          I saw Ellen from “A Song for Summer” when we went to Demel’s famous Kaffeehaus where she’d enjoyed Vienna’s best coffee and éclairs. I saw her going to watch a Rosenkavalier gala at the State Opera or the Staatsoper when I was at the same place, going to watch La Boheme.

          Nearby I imagined Tessa from “Magic Flutes” at the Klostern theatre working for the International Opera Company without pay simply because she wanted to serve music.

          My Vienna special moments were mostly an amalgamation of what I remembered from the lives of Ruth, Ellen and Tessa. Maybe that’s because knowing them, having reading them over 15 times each I’ve started carrying parts of them inside me and in this incredible city I became a part of them as they of me and learnt what they knew all their lives living there. Maybe now it’s hard to tell where their memories end and where mine start.

          The one special discovery that I have a claim over in this city is of a little side street called Blutgasse or Blood alley which I immediately stored away for melodramatic moments in future stories.

          Even after all this there is still so much that I have to go back to this city to see and to do- see the Spanish Riding school with the Lippizaner horses, sit on the Prater Giant wheel in the Prater park, take a walk along the Danube, catch a glimpse of the river Wien after which the city is named.

So Vienna my love, take me to Vienna

-Nirmitee Mehta

We Talk #1 - Nirmitee And Chahita

Nirmitee: I'm confused :-S
See everyone says stop looking for love,stop asking for love and then
love will find you
But the secret* says that you have to ask for the things you really
want....which one of them is true?
[*The Secret is a book we're reading, by Rhonda Byrne, the central idea of which is that our thoughts attract things in our lives.]

Chahita: I have no answer to that...this whole idea of Love is so complicated
I guess you shouldn't exactly look for love but you should never give up on hope

Nirmitee: But what should you be thinking? So far I've only come up with-im not
looking but please let me find love :P

Chahita: You know what....

Nirmitee: Tell me?

Chahita: There are so many contradictory statements made by all these famous people
One person says live life like there's no tomorrow
While another one says plan for the future otherwise everything will
go haywire :P
You just have to choose a side, really

Nirmitee: So basically every advice u get is worthless coz there's some other
successful person who's done the opposite?you just have to choose
what's right for you...

Chahita: Yes exactly!
It all depends on you in the end
Every single thing happening in your life is because of you...

Nirmitee: It makes life all the more confusing....yet more fun because there's
no absolutely correct way

Chahita: So true...

Nirmitee: You can ham up as much stuff as u want to..

Love Actually :)

The month of February is upon us, and it is befitting I talk about love. No generalizations, no definitions. Only, the changing meanings of love to me. So I was reading an interesting article on the origin of Valentine’s Day and discovered that it was a day linked to denial, cruelty and death and not love at all. I thought to myself, “Wtf!” but read on. Saint Valentine (love doctor in Hitch anyone?) was martyred on 14^th February, 269 A.D because he helped to marry off couples in secret, even after the cruel Roman Emperor Claudius II had forbidden all marriages and engagements in Rome. He left a farewell note for the jailer’s daughter, (in love or friendship I don’t know) signed, “From your Valentine.” It was the forerunner for later Valentines, with 14^th February being declared the Day of Love. And thus begins the stories of the heartache and the heartbreak.

“My thoughts go out to you, my Immortal Beloved, now and then joyfully, then sadly, waiting to learn whether or not fate will hear us - I can live only wholly with you or not at all….”

When I was twelve, my art teacher asked us all to make a Valentine card for our mothers. She was met with aghast silence. The word boyfriend or girlfriend still set us off in a frenzy of giggles, having a meaning we were yet to be acquainted with. Our teacher told us that love existed between all bonds, not only between a girl and boy. Our mothers, who love us unconditionally, truly deserved the biggest Valentine’s Day card! And it dispelled my notion that it was a day to celebrate only romantic love. It felt most heartwarming when one of my best friends sent me a Valentine’s card, years later. (That the card got lost in mail is another sad story L.) Often, in friendship, we forget to remind our friends (and ourselves) how much we cherish them. (This year I’ve snagged a Facebook Valentine, a Twitter Valentine and a Skype Valentine!;) ) If you’re reading this, my friends (and you better be!), there is so much love in my heart for you. Erk, and before this gets too sappy, I’m moving on. :P

“….I am resolved to wander so long away from you until I can fly to your arms and say that I am really at home with you, and can send my soul enwrapped in you into the land of spirits….”

I bet I’m not the only girl here who has spent a considerably inappropriate amount of time taking Love Tests, calculating love on the Love Meter online, reading (badly written) romance and chick lit novels and analyzed what every word, look, gesture, yawn, scratch (and the like) of our crush means. Well, maybe not the scratching. :P I for one, have given unhealthy weight to romantic comedies, willing myself to believe that fairytale love does exist and that one kiss (oh, the one that makes you swoon, you ignoramus!) will set anything right. Ignoramus me, much? I would like to believe not, but that’s the conclusion I have drawn from my experience.  I’m not a cynic when it comes to love, nor am I bitter about love. What a way that would be to kill the romance! But I do believe it is important to keep things real. If things are too gooey, you’re gonna end up in a sticky situation. I read a refreshing take on love by a TV actor who was going to be married a second time. He said that in the long run the teenage dream love (ah, Katy Perry, you live a short-lived dream) goes out of the window and it is replaced by something more solid: commitment and respect. I liked that, the no-frills honesty yet I long for something different.

“….No one else can ever possess my heart - never - never - Oh God, why must one be parted from one whom one so loves….”

I have gleaned, from the endless conversations I have had with two of my closest friends, that each of us has a vastly different perspective on love.  We were like a first class level lever (…and I cannot believe I am using physics to explain this!). Friend A was the Load in the sense that she had her head on her shoulders even when it came to matters of the heart. Friend B, on the other hand, was the Effort, always making the ‘effort’ (bad pun :P) to keep the spark from dissipating, believing in everlasting, fairytale love. And I (the Fulcrum in my scenario) hovered somewhere in the middle, afraid to tilt on either side too much. I have learned much from both (you know who you are J), but yet I struggle to know what I really want, what this love really means to me. When you think you have it pinned down, this curiously elusive thing, it throws you off and you set search, yet again. Maybe that’s the beauty of love, discovering and re-discovering; losing and finding again. Happy Valentine’s Day!

“….Oh continue to love me - never misjudge the most faithful heart of your beloved. 
ever thine, 
ever mine,
ever ours."

Let's Smoooooch!

To keep up with the spirit of things, here’s a few links that might be interesting. J

http://in.specials.yahoo.com/valentine/lovebytes-detail/post/valentine_lovebytes/26/say-it-with-flowers.html

http://www.sparknotes.com/valentines-day/2010/1

http://www.someecards.com/valentines-day-cards/most-sent-today


- Apoorva Sahay

Why I Love People:)

I love people.
The more people I meet, the more I want to.
Our world is full of people. Different people. We read, we learn but we see just the darkness, it’s what shines through you know? I mean I’ll go to an orphanage and I’ll come back with a story about how it is really corrupt, how the clothes and toys you donate go to waste since they are just used on days when someone comes to see those children and the money goes to the pockets of the authorities but do we remember we go there once, just once, to meet those children but all we do is criticise? Does anyone realise that these children could just as easily have been on the streets, begging for money, at least now, they have some semblance of a home, of an education? Actually maybe we all know this, maybe we feel that though we are too busy living our lives, those who have decided to live it for someone else should do so without cheating,I mean how could they look into a child’s eyes and not give him/her enough money for decent food, decent education and a better future?I guess they do it the same way that, I can go once and promise to go again and never go back.We need to realise that we often contradict our own intentions. Knowing this i can still love people,even if they arent all perfect. Just sometimes we should see behind the worst, see to the minds of the people who steal. It’s a fascinating to try and see where they come from, their story. I’m sure they have one, I’m sure we all do. Whether it’s about an orphanage or a blog. So look behind the darkness a little, or look into it, but look. You may be surprised. I will not go so far as to say the world is beautiful but it’s definitely interesting.


There is so much I want to be, and do in this life, it is people i meet who inspire me. The ones that show me who I want to be. Who I can be. I can’t have every experience in this world. But if I speak to enough people maybe through them I can live a little more than I have, I can understand a little more than I already have and Maybe I can expect a little more than I already do form life, from myself. Just for that even the worst experiences I have with people are worth having.


Everybody has a weird preconceived notion of what is right and what is wrong and frankly that’s the one thing that gets to me. How can you decide what is right for me? Sometimes even I can’t decide what is right for me, but that’s life, trial and error, so live and let live. Be an observer without forcing your opinion on people, and you can learn so much more than you can ever imagine.


So like I said I love people, and the more people I meet the stronger the feeling gets simply because they are all so different and their opinions are so different. I know I am so different with everyone of them, at the risk of sounding a hypocrite, but honestly I think everyone’s personality just reacts differently to everybody else’s. The only way I can see of getting to know every aspect of myself is by getting to know new people.
So get out of your shell, let people know you a little more, so that they can tell you a little themselves, and open a new world for you.

:)

By Radha Agarwal

Falling for words

             My love and discovery of new words comes from my love of books. Ever since I was a little girl, I've always been falling in love with certain words-being unexplainably drawn to them and trying to bring them up in every conversation as long as I was obsessed with them. Often these favourite words have started meaning more to me than their intrinsic meaning and I use them with a smile on my face as the memories, emotions and little incidents related to them come rushing back to me.

             One of the first words that I got obsessed with was 'tacky'. My friend, let's call her Antimony, and I used it every minute of the day. Due to overuse its meaning for us changed from being cheap or tawdry to describing anything that displeased us in the least. Eventually we outgrew it and moved on to another word crush.

About a year ago, if you remember facebook witnessed a massive wave of colour based statuses by women according to the lingerie they had on that particular day in a (misguided) attempt to raise awareness for breast cancer. Seeing the array of over descriptive colours put up, a cynical friend put up her own colours ranging from custard blue to sunshine purple. It was the last of these that got my heart beating faster, my eyelashes flutter and me smile without reason as I had fallen in love with this pretty phrase that made me happy. There was something just so optimistic, magical and sparkly about it, something about its soul that seemed to quintessentially mirror mine and so it captured my heart. 

             My first encounter with the word disillusion was in the 9th grade while studying the Indian independence movement where the national leaders were said to have been disillusioned by the promises the British made. I was mildly fascinated by it but was not yet aware as to how much the word would later affect me. Fast forwarding to 2 years later where I had a crush on a guy, let's call him Alpha. Ironically around the same time we were doing a song called "Désenchantée'' (the French word for disillusion) in class. I was head over heels for him until one day at a party I saw him smoke. Now, to each his own but I abhor the habit and don't take it well if a person close to me indulges in it.

After that, the nothingness of complete disillusion set in. It broke my heart, not dramatically with a million tears but sadly and with the new understanding that a lot of times, people let you down not intentionally but just by showing you a facet of their personality you didn't know of and don't like.

             Sometimes it does happen. Words, even beautiful ones cause pain. Meanwhile, I continue reading, constantly finding new words and falling in love with them.

By Nirmitee Mehta

For Cities ♥

I read a lot, it is a hobby and life lessons and love and everything in between but every time i think of writing there is this one article i think of, it was a feature article based on my city and the authors unexplainable love for it. It's something that absolutely fascinated me, because it suddenly felt that someone understood my unexplainable love for a city or place.
Like Kolkata, I remember the 1st time i went there, it was dirty, it stank of fish, it was so crowded and so humid but then Mr Banerjee, the tour guide started telling us about his city, the pride in his voice the way he looked at it like it was his whole world changed my perspective. The life of the city,its spirit it spoke to me and suddenly I was in love with a city that i knew nothing about. So maybe love was but life and spirit.
I saw a movie yesterday "No one killed Jessica", in the movie Rani Mukharjee...in the role of "Mira" describes her city and her inability to understand it. Its complexity, power and struggle, its majesty comes out in the movie and now i want to live in Delhi, just for awhile maybe, just so i can see it all for my self.
So life attracted life.
Here i am writing from Pune and i can feel the love of my own city in me, its life, its unpredictable moods, its weather changes and life. Its small town touch, its cafes and thelas, its shady roads and and narrow streets. Its dynamics.
So love found love.
:)

By Radha Agarwal