Ganesh chaturti 2013

Finally I was going to visit my native village after 7 long years for Ganesh chaturti. I was super excited. This is the first time I was taking my daughter Anagha and I was very eager that she participates in the Ganesh Chaturti celebrations and experiences the fun we had as children. As we drove through the narrow roads on our way to my ancentral village, the childhood days flashed in front of my eyes and I started reminiscing about those days when we would all get together and celebrate the 5 day long Ganesh chaturti festival with much ado. We have a huge ancentral house at our native village in Panchawadi in Goa where my extended family (descendents of ny great grandfather's father) get together for this festival. With fond memories in my mind of singing aartis loudly and sitting on the huge balkav (patio) outside the house or playing a variety of games I looked forward to reliving those experiences all over again.
The moment I arrived in panchawadi I sensed a changed air but couldn't pinpoint my finger on what was it that was different. The balkav which at one time would be so occupied that we kids were made to sit in the older ones lap, now has a deserted look. The aartis have lost their spirit and are sung just for the sake of it.  At one time there used to be 2-3 pangats for meals now the few scattered people self serve food at sit wherever they find  place. It then struck me that the biggest culprit is time. Time has passed and along with it made changes that are irreversible.  I looked around and found that everyone has suddenly aged. All my uncles who used to be enthusiastic participants in the balkav conversations now have some or the other health issues thereby making the evening gatherings scanty.  Several of my cousins who used to be active coordinators in the games and other activities are now married thus leaving a void never to be filled.
I am feeling sad to see a once flourishing house decay slowly. I sincerely pray to Ganpati Bappa to restore this house to its past glory.

Proud to be a woman

Not sure when woman’s day is but thought of writing this post as a tribute to all the women I know!! The "I" below does not always literally refer to me but to all the women I know particularly my mother, mother in law, my sister my friends and others in my family. 

Ten reasons I am proud of being a woman

1.     My parents brought me up without making me feel inferior to boys.

2.     I am the mother of a most beautiful child coincidentally a girl.

3.     I am blessed to be married to a man who firmly believes that women are capable of more than just cooking and looking after kids and has never prevented me from doing anything I wanted to just because I am a woman. 

4.     I have the inborn ability to adapt to any situation a quality rarely seen in men. How else would you explain the tradition of women leaving their parents home after marriage and not men?

5.     If I set my mind to it I can achieve anything I want.

6.     I can do everything a man does and much more.  So while men can only scale heights at their workplace but act like a piece of furniture at home women can handle work and yet come home and fix a meal, do other chores read the kids a bedtime story and put them to sleep before calling it a day. 

7.     I love my parents in a way no son can love.

8.     I am compassionate and thoughtful and emotional. 

9.     I have the ability to multitask, so I can brush my child's teeth and prepare breakfast at the same time.

10. I am selfless when it comes to my family, the “me” is given the least priority.

A word of advice

The world is full of people who have an opinion for everything under the Sun and a solution to every problem in the world particularly when it comes to parenting. And I am sick and tired of such people sticking their nose in my life and pouring bucketful of free advice.

            For instance my daughter has a weight problem. I know every mother feels that their child does not eat but my daughter genuinely does not. At 2.7 years she weighs only 9.5 KG and is underweight by 3-4 KG. Wherever I go I am drowned in a sea of suggestions related to feeding and weight gain that leave me feeling overwhelmed. From suggestions to give her vegetable soup, to give her dry fruits, milk shakes to let her drink water during a meal the list is endless. As if I am some dumb mommy who doesn't know what is best for my child. While some people pity me, at times people have literally stopped short of accusing me of mal-nourishing my child. Sometimes I feel like pulling my hair out and screaming my lungs out asking these people to stop, I know what works for my child I don't need stupid suggestions that I know for sure don’t work on my child.

 Then my daughter had a thumb sucking habit which thankfully I managed get rid of but only after I was inundated with millions of pieces of advice.

Not only on child-rearing but people have advice on everything. And people are so judgemental. When I joined back work when my daughter was only four month old people were quick to condemn me for it. When I decided to quit when my daughter turned two people were again at my throat for throwing away a thriving career.

While having an opinion and expressing it in public is not something I disapprove, uncalled for suggestions and passing generalized statements without having an Inkling of the situation at hand irritates me to the core. Thinking your way of doing it is right and crucifying the other person for doing something differently annoys me extremely. People have to understand that every situation is different and what worked for one person may not necessarily work for another. Anyways if such people were so mature enough to understand this in the first place, perhaps there was no need to write this post.

So my friends, the world is full of people who are waiting for an opportunity to pounce on you and bog you down with their theories and suggestions and no matter what you say or do, there is no stopping these so called well wishers from offering their two cents on every matter in life. I don’t think there is any easy way to deal such individuals without insulting them or sounding rude, I guess you just reach a stage where you learn to live with it.

Down the memory lane

As I dress up my daughter for her first day at school the last 2.8 years flash forward in front of my eyes and I can’t help but take a trip down the memory lane. Time flies so fast. It seems like yesterday when my I held my little baby in my arms for the first time. And already it is her first day at school.

From a screaming infant to a curious toddler to a walking and talking robot to a  nonstop chatterbox the journey has been eventful and full of surprises, albeit pleasant ones. I cannot help but wonder when my gurgling and cooing baby turned into a little big girl.

There is a turmoil of emotions in my mind and I don't know how to feel. I find myself oscillating between elation and apprehension. One part of me is swelling with satisfaction and pride watching my little baby in school uniform while the mother in me is filled with anxiety. While I am extremely happy and excited that my tiny bundle of joy is on the verge of a new beginning, I also realise with a lump in my throat that my baby is slowly getting ready to spread her wings and soar high in the sky while I will slowly fade away into a distant spectator. On one hand, I am overjoyed that my daughter is taking her first steps towards adulthood, on the other hand I also feel sad that slowly my baby's childhood innocence will be lost and she will soon be weighed down with the responsibilities of growing up.

 But I think in the end happiness and pride overcome all other emotions and I can wish for nothing but the best for my dear daughter as she takes her first steps towards this new journey. 

Smile

A smile can speak a thousand words. This is so true. So often we see people for years and yet are afraid to smile or acknowledge them. The reasons may be varied, we may be afraid of the other person not reciprocating or we may feel embarrassed about smiling at a stranger. But the truth is we just need to go that extra mile. It takes just a smile to break the ice.
Everyday I would take Anagha to the Ganesh temple near my house. There is this lady who visits too. We would see each other but pretend not to recognise and would see past each other. And then my trips to the temple became fewer and whenever I did visit I would not see her which got me wondering if all was well. Yesterday I met her after a long time, though we were both hesitant for a while both smiled at the same instant and the ice was broken. She enquired about Anagha and me about not seeing her for a long time. Nothing uncomfortable, on the contrary it felt like I had known her for ages. Just like that a new friend was made.
This and numerous other such experiences have led me to firmly believe that sometimes it just takes a smile and a kind word to not only make new friends but also open closed doors. So the next time you see a familiar face but are hesitant, just go ahead and flash a smile, and more often than not you will get it back.

Evolution

While the title is evolution, don’t be put off thinking that this might be another elaborate post challenging Darwin’s theory about the transition of the homo sapien species from ape to man. As I am writing this post with a stylus pen from my new Samsung galaxy Note II, I cannot help but admire the transformation that a cell phone has gone through. From heavy weight gadgets to today’s Android/Windows/iOS smart phones, from being a luxury which only a privileged few could afford to a household commodity owned even by vegetable vendors and auto rickshaw drivers, the humble cell phone has come a long way. Today it has become a necessity that we cannot live without, and so I decided to dedicate my next post to this wonderful gadget.
The first ever cell phone I saw was way back in 1997-98 where my dad brought an AT and T Nokia phone home. It had a huge antenna, was the size of a walkie-talkie and weighed like a melon. It could be used as a paper weight. Nevertheless the idea that you could place a call from anywhere was by itself so exciting that we could not help but admire this small wonder.
My very first phone was a Nokia 3100.In those days owning a mobile phone was considered to be a status symbol and I would proudly show off my phone wherever I went.
Soon a new species of phones with colour screens and cameras came around and my black and white phone started appearing outdated. So my next phone was a Sony Ericsson K700i. How I came to buy this phone is a long story, but to cut a long story short, the true Virgo that I am, I launched an in depth analysis of all the phones in the market in my pursuit to own “The best” phone, putting down the pros and cons of every phone in the market, deciding on one phone one minute and switching to the next one in the blink of an eye. And then one fine day my younger sister went out shopping and bought a Nokia 6600 as casually as she would buy a new item of clothing or a pair of shoes. With a colour screen, built in MP3 player and camera it left me feeling sore. And that is the story of my Sony Ericsson K700i, bought in a last ditch effort to outshine my sister’s phone and that I did for with a colour screen, MP3 plus real media player, camera and 32 MB memory it was a class apart. At work people would stop by my desk to take a look at my cute and small (small phones were trendy in those days unlike today) phone and I would proudly show off all the features.
There was an old Pepsi ad that went "Yeh Dil Maange More" which very well depicts the human tendency of never being satisfied and I was no exception. My next phone was a Nokia N73, gifted to me by my dad, saying he had no use for such a “high end” phone. With 64 MB RAM, 3.15MP camera it was the thing in vogue and I could not let go of it.
Next, touchscreen phones caught my fancy and being a true Nokia fan, I bought myself a Nokia C7. With a touch screen, 8MP camera, 8GB ram it was a beauty. The best part was the web and email accessibility, with an internet connection on your phone; you no longer needed to rely on having a PC around in order to get online.
Then Andriod and particularly Samsung hit the market big time. What started as a casual fling with my Dad’s Android phone turned out to be a serious love affair and to my dismay I found that life without Andriod was colourless and grey.  Dad then gifted me a brand new Samsung Galaxy Note II (My present phone using which I am writing this post). With a 5.5 inches screen,  8 MP camera, Android OS, v4.1.1 (Jelly Bean),  Quad-core 1.6 GHz Cortex-A9 CPU, and a stylus pen, it is the phone of the moment. It reminds me of the Onida ad, "Neighbours envy, owner’s pride!
So that is the story of how I transitioned from being awestruck about my black and white Nokia phone to feeling depressed about my touch screen Non-Android based phone. Yes, technology has evolved and so have we. While I am at the risk of sounding too philosophical,  is it not true that not so long ago we would write letters, call people on their home numbers or stop by a neighbour to say hello. Today SMS and emails have become a way of life and we cannot live without this little gizmo.

A few words of wisdom

A child can teach you so many things. We play this little game with our daughter. Every time she finishes a meal, we ask her to pray to God to give her a toffee in her Dad’s pocket. She very religiously does this with her eyes closed, hands folded, while I quietly slip the toffee in my hubby’s pocket. She then comes to check her Pappa’s pocket and is so overjoyed on seeing her toffee; the expression on her face is worth watching.  That is it, she will not ask for more, she is satisfied.

It makes we wonder why we adults are never satisfied, whenever we get what we want, we always crave for more. Why can’t we look at the positive side of things and enjoy the present moment? Why do we always need something to look forward to in order to feel happy?

I quote, “Feelings are not emotions that happen to u, Feelings are reactions you choose to have”. Happiness is a state of mind. In our pursuit to achieve happiness, we often tend to ignore the things that we already have to feel happy about. So often we run after some illusionary future where life will be perfect and we ruin our present by comparing it with that nonexistent future life.  That perfect life is like a desert mirage. Even if you get what you want your life will never be perfect as long as you keep on longing for more.

I may sound very preachy here and I know it’s not very easy to practice, but try it. The next time you are fretting about an unhappy situation, just snap out of it and remember that nothing in life is permanent.  This is going to pass. So instead of wasting precious time being hassled by things beyond your control, focus on the positives in life and feel thankful about them. Believe me, it works like magic.