Chandramuki

It was the time when great cine stars like Rajini, Kamal, Simran and Jyothika ruled the roost. We were teens during our college courses. Quite understandably our major attraction was cinema, Tamil cinema in particular, because Tamil movies were witnessed by the majority. So, we indulged in apt or inapt comments involving movies starred by the giants of Kollywood. Many of us discussed the acting prowess, style and looks of these stars. Comedians were mostly out of our purview, since most of their utterances hit to say the least below the belt.

As our group consisted of girls, we chose to discuss the looks and performances of Simran and Jyothika. A good majority often voted for Simran. We never knew that our appreciation of Simran would be consequential. It brought about a sea of change in one of our classmates. She imagined herself to be Simran. Just as Jyothika did in Chandramuki which was not yet produced then. She tried her best to walk, talk, smile and dance like Simran. At first, we appreciated her and encouraged her efforts. But soon, we noticed something peculiar in the behaviour. That she was losing her normalcy dawned on us shortly. Then we told her what we felt about her and tried to caution her. It fell on deaf ears. We then informed our HOD who tried her best in vain.

One evening, we went to her house and met her parents. There, our friend was very much at home and quite normal. No oddities were to be seen in her demeanour. In fact, she didn't even talk of Simran at all, nor did we refer to it in our conversation with her parents, even though we were waiting for the earliest opportunity to "lisp in numbers". But, we were only disappointed in not getting a chance. As we left, our friend who accompanied us for a while, gleefully laughed at us. Sporting a wolfish smile, she hinted at our failure to complain about her to her parents. We were really surprised at her being a bundle of contradictions. But, we were relieved to know that she was basking in oddities at the college deliberately and that was quite normal.

Our relief, however, was short-lived. Soon it was a bolt from the blue when we noticed another girl indulging in the same mischief. At this time, it was mimicking a male actor - Rajni. She copied the style of Rajni in several ways - throwing, catching, twisting, twirling, looking askance, laughing loudly and finally asking us "how is it?". She went to the extent of smoking. Once a lecturer watched her performance, unseen. She came out of her hiding, commended her and told her to  continue and improve it, so that, she could excel in cinefield. What we tried to discourage and stop was thrown overboard. We were helpless now and our only recourse was to inform the principal.

The principal summoned the lecturer first and questioned her ethical standard to advise a student to mimic a cine star and enter stardom. The lecturer faced the complaint nonchalantly. She merely said that the said girl was a genius in acting and that there was nothing wrong in encouraging her, in fact, the principal herself should encourage her. She added that the other girls were jealous of her talent and they were no friends; they were actually villains who tried to nip her in the bud. The principal was no at her wits' end. She then called the student and advised her not to imitate cine actors and politicians. The student replied that she didn't plan anything and it sprang out on its own and that she didn't make any effort to show off her talent. She couldn't help doing it. In fact, she didn't like acting in movies, though, she liked Rajni. In her opinion, Rajni was not an actor; he was a stylist - a designer stylist made money with his style whereas a stylist makes stylist. She went on and on. Finally, the principal called off the enquiry saying, "Don't forget your studies". Our friend came out unscattered and triumphant.

The next day dawned a surprise note. Our friend had completely stopped copying Rajni. In fact, she had even stopped discussing movies. She did well in exams and much to our surprise, she topped the class in the university exams and secured a gold medal from the Vice-Chancellor. The whole college was proud of her. The principal, in an aside, asked her how it was possible for her. She merely said that it was the democratic role played by the principal and the lecturer that made it possible for her; they allowed her, her own choice.

Reaching Ooty A.k.a. Udagamandalam

Mettupalayam pit stop!

I went for a trip to Ooty last week. It was a great experience as in, we all must be having one childhood experience when we visit the hill stations near out hometown. So, I couldn't help myself from doing "Ooty then and now". To be crisp, nothing much has changed excepting for traffic, budget and crowd.

We reached the Mettupalayam Jn early morning via Blue Mountain express. Just outside the station there was a big bay of cabs, they have fixed price to go uphill. We spent sometime in Mettupalayam as we had to wait for somebody to join us from Coimbatore. We had 3 hours time. So we decided to get a retirement room available in the railway station. If you have to book this, you have to act fast as there were only two rooms available. As soon as you jump down your train, you have to head straight to the station master's room. We paid INR 350 for the room.

We strolled through town for an hour.There was nothing great about Mettupalayam. There were lot of shops selling fruits and vegetables. We found shops selling "seempal cakes" (seempal - cow's colostrum). It was rare as I never get to see anyone selling it in Chennai. There was a fairly decent vegetarian restaurant called hotel Annapoorna. Mostly everyone who stop in this town eat there but for us. We finished our breakfast in the railway canteen as we couldn't wait!

We went for the railway museum to while way time. But, we didn't have enough time to visit Black thunder, a famous amusement park in Mettupalayam. We also missed to book tickets for the Mettupalayam- Ooty toy train, which starts from Mettypalayam at 7:30 A.M. We didn't know that the tickets were issued online through the irctc website. We got to know about it only when we checked with the station master. Only ten tickets were issued at the counter everyday! And the queue for those ten tickets!! You know what I mean.

It takes four hours to reach Ooty by toy train, which I'm sure, had I booked would have been a memorable experience for my kids.

We hired a cab from there and reached Ooty by afternoon. We hired the same cab driver for our local sight-seeing. That worked way cheaper than what was offered locally.

To be continued...

1. Touring Ooty....

2. The real jungle safari @ Mudhumalai.

3. Conoor and the rotten fruit expo

4. Avalanche @ Ooty

The Inquisitive Bubble

The Inquisitive Lot

Who is in this lot?

This lot contains bothersome relatives and neighbors, sometimes your old friends fall in to this category as well

Who is the target or rather victim?

Girls/ Women who have completed just their schooling/ Degree/ On the Job, Falling under 18-30 group

Characteristics of the Inquisitive lot

• Manage to run in to us once in two days/a week and invariably annoy you by asking stupid questions, mostly personal.
• Sometimes come up with intellectual ideas and stories of how well they managed a personal situation which they imagine that you’re facing now
• They turn in to instant relationship gurus for futile (sometimes imaginary) problems, mostly personal again.

Why do they do this?

That’s question I have been thinking of ever since I completed my college and couldn’t get a logical answer. May be they

• Are just jealous?
• Get a sadistic pleasure of irritating others?
• Are happy to have found a topic for gossiping later?

This sounds really silly but don’t know when on life this is going to stop. Let’s find out where it starts and what on earth really it is.

When it starts?

On completing UG:

Neighbors, relatives mostly all around you, whenever you happen to run in to them or vice versa, they asked this silly question – “Degree mudichachu, any plans of getting married?” the very same question was asked at least a million times to your parents. Usually dads were the worst hit by this bubble! They have to encounter not only the neighbors and relatives, but the whole lot of friends, friends’ friends, priests in temple, astrologers well known to the family (astrologers actually, eagerly await this opportunity)

It sounds like a simple yes/no question but often give rise to series of when, what, where why, type of questions.

Like for example,

If the answer is yes, then you can imagine the rise in the level of curiosity in this already overly snooping lot.

And if the answer is no, again, this would give them a tiny amount of dissatisfaction but ultimately that do not deter them from asking “why not?”, “ok, she is too young, what is she going to do?”, “then when do you have the plans of getting her married?” etc.

Again there are these people who seamlessly irritate you by suggesting/ bringing to your notice a few bachelors that they know of.

Why do they bother? (me to myself)Me: (Sigh!.... No answer)

On completing PG

So now this lot would have decided that you have no other go other than getting married. They cannot tolerate you getting that job you struggled to get through various placement interviews at your college.

At this stage when you finish your PG and you are placed in an organization, this lot is cluttered with a series of ingenious questions. Like, “does the job profile suit you?” “Is it a good company?” “What are the benefits like?” “Do you have night shifts? Oh! What kind of job is it!” worst of all, “What’s the salary like?” and the ultimate, “So its time to really get married?”

On the job

Now if you still haven’t decided to get married, this question becomes a nightmare in your life. You have to encounter this at least a zillion times a day. The more you grow old the more grows the inquisitive bubble.

Post marriage

Finally, you have successfully got rid of the nightmare. But wait a minute; the worst comes in the form of “Any good news?” You have to negotiate even your servant maids, office assistants, security guards, peers, (sometimes it becomes a peer pressure!) so on and so forth. Mostly these neighbors and relatives, they assume that your private life is pathetic. They, sometimes, even feel bad for your husband. This really is frustrating.

New mom

Now you are a new mom, a complete woman - as the bubble says, though they would never spare you without questioning. What the hell now? This one is about your career. “When are you getting back to work?”, “How are you going to manage?” “Your job profile won’t provide enough room for your baby?” etc

They often come up with numerous clever ideas like, “Why can’t you take up the bank exams?” “I think you can become a school teacher or a lecturer, that way you can easily manage family and work and also will have time to relax”

On job again and your baby’s first birthday

This time you have guessed it right, it is “When are you planning the next one?” This is too much now and the bubble often becomes a syndrome at this stage. Now we are much matured and consciously try to avoid such encounters. But, there is always no stopping them, they would go beyond the limit and bore you with their adventurous stories of managing three/four kids. They still go further and tell you how you can satisfy your husband’s physical needs and still manage two kids! How to develop companionship in your first child, blah blah

And why the hell do the bother?
Me: Startled (and No answer yet).

New mom 2

Now, you are almost relieved of the bubble, which just disappeared. Most of these people now won’t have anything to discuss about you. But still few manage to bring forth that stupendous question, “When are you planning to get back to work?” There we go again.

I don’t know what really bothers these people. Why are they so nosy? Please tell me if you know the answer.

iClicks!

Pelicans @ Guindy park

Lil shaky but good!

Greeneries @ home!

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It's raining!! It's pouring!!

I love rains.. But now it's getting too much in here, I mean too much of rain.. It's raining cats, dogs n even elephants.. Who knows! This never lets me go out and hinders all my tasks..

Hey!! You up thr, Pls send this guy called Sun here!!


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iPhone = iFun!!

"Luck" thats wat i call this!
"Have u ever seen a home maker using this?".. This is wat I asked my husband when he decided to give the iPhone to me!! Wat a fool!! Oops!!
Initially, I was a bit unhappy to say good-bye to my Nokia xpressmusic but still it's an iPhone that I'm getting!! Voddafone!! Sorry, Wat a phone!!

Wat a relief!!

It's Sunday and I dint cook anything! We have all been invited by our neighbour for having lunch.. time to relax before TV

A perfect day...

A sudden rain made me very happy today. I know I sound very tame by jus mentioning that “I’m happy”… couldn’t get an apt word.

I was sitting in my bedroom and was reading a magazine when I heard the sound of rain drops. Surprised, I went out to have a closer look. It got a lil heavy and a big bang of thunder followed. I cursed it as it startled my lil baby… but l8r, was very happy abt it, as it made the weather so cool and soothing for her. The roads were a lil flooded and the trees looked very pleasant after a month of sun’s tough regime. This was a rare scene in Chennai at this point of time.

It’s a day to rejoice and it really helped my mind to be at tranquil.

The book I badly want to read

Few months back I was reading a book called "Hour Game", written by David Baldacci... It was about a serial killer and full of suspense (till I read). I kept my eyes glued on the book, but unfortunately I couldn’t complete the book as I got very much involved with something else.

The killer was an interesting person and all his strategies were mind-blowing. The killer had adopted killing styles of different serial killers such as The Zodiac Killer, Son of Sam, etc. The killer used the code language and was very meticulous in erasing all possible forensic evidence from the crime scene. He was very notorious and had a strong urge to kill a cross-section of people; killing was just a sport for him.The book was really good; I will definitely grab a copy from the library as soon as I get time.

Something Special

I got up from the bed; the clock was ticking around 7. It was so cold and there was no glimpse of Sun. It was raining cats and dogs and I was lazy enough to curl myself up and prolong my sleep as much as I can - if and only if it was a normal day. Last night, before going to bed, I kept telling myself that today should not be a day filled with mundane affairs; it should be something new and something special. So, I came out of the bedroom and made myself a hot cup of tea. I sat down on a chair facing the balcony and started to plan the day carefully, with "something special" as the primary objective.

To read a book, was the first thing that came to my mind. I can't go out to library and get a book.. But, thank god! I had got a latest copy of Business Today, which was one of my favorite magazines. I stopped subscribing for BT last December and never got enough time to read one till date. I sat down in the afternoon and read it fully!!

To listen to good music, I managed to do it in the evening. I listened to all my favorite numbers.To LMAO (Laugh my a** out), for which I watched a spoof on the TV, it was funny but not like what I expected. Anyways that was okay!

And finally, to blog about something. From the morning at the back of my mind I was thinking on "What to write?" My mind was totally blank as there was nothing much to write. But I made it a point that I should write something (and kill people who read it!!) as this space gives me so much happiness and makes any day complete. I just opened the laptop and started to scribble on the notepad. Here I am feeling happy and contented with what came out.Feeling great and fresh… I'm charting out things for tomorrow, things that I couldn't do today.