Therapeutic Week

Not very long ago I swore off retail therapy of any kind, so that means no shopping for clothes, books and music, even though the last two evolve into another source of therapy - I'm sticking to that, irrespective of the fact that I bought a new patch-work leather bag to replace my rather well-worn and over-used Kashmiri leather sling pouch that I carried around everywhere from class (as a student and now as a teacher), to casual rendezvous to more formal occassions. That was more necessity than therapy so, I'm not taking into account its therapeutic values even though I'm uber pleased with my purchase!

So this week I'm indulging in different forms of therapy - Number One being Sleep. It's not like I've been sleep-deprived (I have been getting an average of 6 hours per night, which isn't the preferred 8 hours but it's sufficient to keep me from turning into a zombie after a few days). Sleep is important - I've never been able to stay up late studying/working. Back in school and college days my mind would shut down at 8 p.m and I couldn't study any more after that. That did change during M.A when I was juggling it with French and was basically out of the house from 9 a.m to 9 p.m. My brief encounter with insomnia came at a time when my inner reserves where at an all-time low - those who knew me back then, generally describe me as walking around in a dream-like state with this touch-me-not aura to myself! Anyways getting back to the topic, insomnia is one thing I don't have to worry about in Pune, for I usually fall asleep within a few minutes of shutting my eyes. Pune, if for nothing else, is definitely good for curing insomnia ;-) The last couple of days I've pretty much competed as much as I can with Sleeping Beauty. Early to bed and late to rise, long afternoon siestas. Restful, dreamless sleep. Rejuvenating.

Books have always provided the much-needed refuge and have been my closest companions ever since I was 2 years old and I learnt the ABC sitting on Papa's shoulders as he read the morning paper or peered over Bhaiyya's shoulder as he read an Archies comic. Despite being a student of English Literature I was never conscious of my choices, reading whatever came my way and pleased my mind and my senses. I'm even guilty of enjoying the much reviled Mills and Boons. I guess I won't be able to display any literary snobbery for some time, having admitted to this sin - but hey I aint reading those for their literary value. I completely aknowledge thier complete lack of literary value, but I also give them credit for providing me many an hour of mindless amusement when all I wanted as a book in my hand and not really have to use my brain. Same applies to the few other works I've read in the popular genre. The last few years has seen me conscious of what I'm reading as I grew increasingly appalled at how little I've read and how ignorant I am... I've been merrily reading several ridiculous romances simultaneously with a collection of Eugene Ionesco's plays and I have to admit I'm enjoying both of them equally!

Music. I say it's my porn - and many people have come up with incredibly interesting interpretations to that statement. ;-)The last few days it's been a true companion as I've dug into my Collection of CDs and pulled out ignored albums for a heart-warming session, or simply tuned into World Space and grooved to the latest hits. Gwen Stephanie, Peter White, Kayne West, Chet Atkins, Paul McCartney, Fool's Garden, Creed, Prem Joshua, TLC, Beyonce, Ottmar Liebert, Sean Paul, Bon Jovi, Vanessa Mae, Tears for Fears, GNR.... it's an instant lightening of spirits as I begin to hum under my breath, swing my hips and tap my feet to the beats.
{Playing right now - Maria Joao featuring Cal Viva and Ermenio De Melo)

Art. Well not exactly the hi-brow kind; just the stain-glass painting I indulge in once in a while. There's something immensely pleasurable about spreading newspaper and my painting gear all over the dining-table, tracing designs onto the glass and then swiftly filling in the outlines with that translucent paint. I had borrowed an Old Monk bottle from Titu Dada (he was using it as a make-shift vase for some rather ugly plastic flowers), saying I'll paint it and if it turns out good I'll gift it back to him. Magnanimous soul ain't I? Anyway for the longest time it just lay rather desolately below my writing-desk. This morning I finally picked it up and sat down to transform it into a glowing vision in warm orange and yellow. Perfect for the season. It's come out awfully nice, even if I say so myself. What say people? If you like what you see, and have a nice bottle lying around under the kitchen sink/bed or behind the curtains or even hidden below piles of lingerie in your cupboard, send it over. I'll be all to happy to transform the ugly duckling into a beautiful swan ;-)

I've oft been compared to Monica Geller of F.R.I.E.N.D.S - reason being my fetish for organisation and cleanliness. So, for the past two days re-arranged all the stuff in my room...shifted the computer out of the room, moved furniture around, dusted the shelves, re-did my cupboards, not to mention my book shelves! Dusty work - am sneezing like a mad hatter today - but also satisfying.

Gardening. My mother finds it very relaxing, so I thought I'd lend a hand. But after getting my finger-nails all dirty and my hands scratched by the thorns in the flowering plants, I decided this is one form of therapy I can do without ;-)

SO - all said and done, I guess there are other forms of therapy that work much better than retail therapy - and they work just as well, if not better! :-)

Soliloquy of a Maudlin Mademoiselle

Yes that's what I am feeling like these days...usually the gloomy days don't last this long, but this time they simply refuse to fade away into the hazy bank of forgetable memories. All the old feelings of self-reproach, doubt, confusion are back - and boy are they back with a vengeance. Problem with this mood is that I'm not exactly the happiest person around (now isn't that obvious my dear Geets?) and so I can't deal with happiness. I'd love to take that short-cut to temporary happiness by adopting the escapist method, but I figure it's about time I dealt with my demons and slayed them once and for all. (Don't you just see me leaping around in the air slashing my hands around à la Buffy?)

Sarcasm apart, I'm not happy. Yes I seem to be searching for answers, but none of them deal with any of the great philosophical truths of human existence. What I'm questioning is what I've wanted for so long, my choices, for I can't afford to take the wrong decision at this point in my life. It does make me a difficult person to deal with - my friends can vouch for that. I'm uncompromising, I'm nasty and yes, I'm even prone to strike out where it hurts the most without realising what I'm doing. It's why I'm keeping my distance - I just hope that they understand, for only one of them actually reads this blog and knows how to read between the lines...and I thought it would be easier this time, since I've been through this before. Yeah right baby, you've sure have high expectations from everyone, including yourself!

The last few weeks have been rougher than most - what with my plans to visit Bombay being thwarted thrice and me having to swallow my annoyance each time. End result is that I'm in a murderous rage and I want blood (that, incase you don't realise is a hyperbole. I'd actually be satisfied with a chance to vent several years of disappointment, anger and frustration verbally...maybe a slap or two would ease that anger faster, but I am a lady after all)! The arrival of my 18 year old nephew who is actually a nice, sweet, fun guy turned my routine upside down and left me even more irritable. The complete lack of time to myself, the forced entertainment sessions didn't exactly help.

Now that Christmas vacations are here and I have aboslutely no obligations (social or professional) I'm working towards resolving some of the issues turning my mind into a frothing cauldron of emotions and I do so hope that I can begin the new year with a calmer, more peaceful and content frame of mind. Highly doubt it, but well for now hope is all I have...that and the promise of visiting Bombay and spending quality time with my friends sometime in January...

Merry Christmas!

It's that time of the year again when people bring forth their best festive cheer and warmth, leave their worries behind and party like there's no tomorrow - for the coming tomorrow! Wierdly enough, Christmas and New Year's Eve has never held that much importance for me - sure the festivities usually manage to sweep me along and I usually allow myself to be swept up by the enthusiasm of my friends. But this year, I simply can't get myself to dredge up the least bit of enthusiasm for any of it - the farce of it all seems too tiresome to bother with.... I had planned to visit Bombay in between the Christmas and New Year's eve and meet my friends (old and new) - it's been two months since I visited and I've been missing my friends, not to mention the city. But it was not to be... :-( so no plans. None what so ever...

Can't believe how estranged I've been feeling. And how let down by the people who meant the most to me...

On a different note - Merry Christmas! May the festive season bring around loads of warmth, glee and cheer to your hearth!

P.S Make sure you set aside some cookies and milk for Santa when you hang up those stockings! ;-)

Words from the Economically Dependant

Sometime back, Aristera and I decided that Chamique's blog is one of the more sensitive, honest and intelligent blogs around. No pretensions on this blog - just some great writing on issues that touch the writer. A recent post had me nodding my head vigorously in agreement - oft have I wondered over the same issue myself and been accused of ignoring the good the recnt change in our society and work culture has done to our economy. I can't say it better than she has, so I'll leave it at that. However her post does brings forth this outpouring of sorts from me -

In the past one and a half years, ever since I completed my Masters and moved to Pune, several people have questioned me about my future plans and made many suggestions regarding lucrative jobs. Some have even tried (rather unsuccessfully I may add - I am stubborn bitch after all!) to coerce me into taking up a more ambitious and paying path - to the point of badgering me endlessly about my apparent lack of amibition and how wierd it, since my father continues to work at the age of 65 and whose ambitions know no end. Most of them don't know that my father has never and still doesn't work so much for the renumeration as for the satisfaction of seeing the job completed to a perfection and knowing it was under him that it was accomplished. But that's a different story - we'll talk about that some other time.

Most people wonder why I want to 'settle' for a teaching job, in an era of BPOs where technical writers and language support (translators) earn so well. Why would I want a thankless, frustrating job that doesn't even make me millionaire at retiring age, forget at 30! Don't I atleast want to pursue a Ph.D and make my mark in the academic world? Write a book, churn millions in book deals? It's with great difficulty that I've explained to people that there are some people in the world who simply aren't cut out for the rat race, and can't run after the green paper like it's their very oxygen. I'm not saying that one can exist without money...I know I can't. I am accustomed to a certain standard and know life is very difficult without money (or even less money). Hell I say that retail therapy rocks - but there are other forms of therapy as well.

Why teaching? Because I never want to stop learning and I also want to share the knowledge I have. I do believe I have a certain aptitude for doing this. Why at Alliance Française? Because it gives you the space and freedom to use your imagination and creativity in planning lessons. Because it doesn't follow the rather restrictive, exam-oriented, rote-memorisation method of teaching, normally followed by schools and colleges. Because I have always been interested in European culture, specially French, having spent over 2 years studying the language...and because I hope it will give me the opportunity to go back soon. Not forever though, just a trip. :-)

Then there are those who think my job at Alliance Française guarantees this rather glamarous job with an excellent pay right at the start! (Who cares that I have no experience, am basically a stagiére/intern and am taking only one freaking class a week?) Let's not forget the French hunks (point them out to me please...could do with some eye-soothing exericises right now!) and the super glam and rocking parties where wine flows like water! (Umm, in Pune water flows rather sporadically from taps and the water that flows in the river, well I'd rather not acknowledge it at all!)

The job pays very less, but I didn't expect much more at this stage - and no the parties aren't all that glamorous. Fun yes, and rocking, but no glamour. And guess what? I'm not unhappy about it. I didn't want glamour - I wouldn't be in this profession if I wanted glamour. As for the pay - it will improve. Most of my colleagues are still studying - if I hadn't believed in taking one step at a time, I'd have been past this stage and taking the regular courses by now - and earning more. But then, there is such a thing as waiting to get your dues.

Sure sometimes I feel terrible about still being dependant on my folks when most of my friends are completely independant and thinking of investing in cars/property and making trips across the oceans. It's one of the reasons why I'm holding myself back from indulging in retail therapy and from travelling when I so want to do both. I've promised myself I'll splurge the day I get my first decently big salary - till then I'm reining in those expensive desires.

So current status - moving from merely observing and assisting to taking class by myself from January 2006. Two weeks back we had to prepare this board-game for the kids to learn the modes of transport. My associate asked me to simply photocopy the images and get them enlarged and then colour, cut and paste them. I got so enthusiastic about the affair I sat up half the night, drawing and painting the images! Sometimes I can't believe that ME - the one who always ran away from kids is doing all this! Yes I am having fun!

Still one class a week, so I'm going to set myself to follow some dreams left dangling for way too long. Content with the job scene as it is developing - more than willing to give it time to spout wings and take off :-) And yes, not the least bit rich...

Co-incidences?

- A phone call and a few clues later, my mind raced as I tried to put the clues together. "No way - it couldn't be! The world can't be THAT small" - just to be sure, I send an email the same night asking - I was right! So that's another blogger I've come across with whom I have some common links - hell I've actually met her, so what if she doesn't remember meeting me! Back then (and it was a long time ago) I didn't make much of an impression on people, generally fading into the woodwork. I think that has changed a wee bit not! I hope...

- Pacing up and down a street waiting for Daddy dearest to arrive and ferry me home, a girl passes me. I normally wait elsewhere for Papa and rarely ever look at the people around me, so involved am I in my thoughts and berating myself for being early and him for being later. A second later, something clicks in my head and I backtrack to catch a glimpse of her face. "No it can't be" I tell myself and go back to pace. A minute later, I'm back staring at her back as she waits (apparently) by herself in a restaurant.. "Could it be???" Two minutes later I was crossing the street. A simple SMS had confirmed my suspicions. It was who I thought it was. I was right - when am I ever not right? ;-) LOL...so I went and surprised an old-classmate from University. She was in town for a project for her course in International Labour Relations. Never one of my closest friends at University (but then I had very few of those) but definitely someone whose company I enjoy and someone I can count on for a lively conversation.

Co-incidences or not - I like. Forced me out of my self-induced shell and gave me a reason to smile again. The world just continues to shrink, even as it seems to get more and more out of reach. Maybe there's reason to keep hoping...
(GAWD I'm turning into melodrama-queen aren't I?)

Currently -
Listening to Stickwitu by the Pussycat Dolls (I had my objections to their group name and to their first song, but hey it's fun and great to dance music! )
Reading Nothing! :-( Just being very lazy and sleepy - and nursing myself back to health after this misreable cold. The only thing I miss about it when it's not dogging me, is that husky voice that comes along with it. ;-)

*Recently heard somewhere - Hope makes good breakfast, but terrible supper.

Time For Another Catharsis

It's an awful day today. There's a wierd chill in the air and it makes me feel terribly cold inside. Been roaming around in rather dark colours as well; never the right thing to do in such weather. Just makes me feel all the more misreable. The sweaters don't ward off the chill, neither do the innumerable cups of steaming lemon tea I've had today. Trying some good old adrak chai - let's see if that makes a difference.

Been in a rather diffident, almost belligerent mood for the past few days. It's actually been growing steadily - this strange feeling inside me. Questioning why everytime I set my heart on something (or someone) it is taken away from me. It's happening with a rather alarming frequency this last month and I've become incredibly superstitious about talking about what I want and what I dream of achieving.

Time and again Martin Luther's words echo in my head :
Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance & conscientious stupidity.
And...
In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

I'm perpetually berating myself for not knowing more - talking to friends, fellow-bloggers I'm uncomfortably aware of my appalling ignorance. Ok I'm not the popular blonde in class, not the complete dim-wit around and definitely have more in the upper storey than most unfortunate individuals, but damn it's just not enough! Not by any stretch of imagination!

If it's not that, then I'm wondering why it seems like I don't know my friends anymore and vice-versa. Why do I get this wierd nagging feeling that I'm talking to a stranger every time I pick up the phone to talk to the people on whom I depend the most? Why are my friends not seeing through that composed façade I present to them? Makes me hesitant to pick up threads of newer relationships - makes me question why I want to meet these people and why they want to meet me. Makes my rude and hostile.

No you won't see this on my face if you meet me - that's a big IF there; I'm getting habituated to my solitude these days. No I won't admit this if you ask me if I'm fine. Yes I bloody well am. I just need some time to get thing knocked back into shape inside my head (and heart). And I just want my friends lingering around at close distance, ready to offer that shoulder when I need it. Selfish and demanding? Well yes, I think I deserve it. I also think I'm coming down again with one of those awful Pune colds. Blech.

French songs I cannot possibly allow. People always seem to think that they are improper, and either look shocked, which is vulgar, or laugh, which is worse. But German sounds a thoroughly respectable language, and indeed, I believe is so."

- Lady Bracknell, Act 1, The Importance of Being Earnest.

No, I haven't turned traitor and given up my love for French, I've just been reading Oscar Wilde. :-)

- Planning a post on Virginia Woolf and Mary Wollstonecraft for my Literary Mosaic. Hold your breath darlings! :-)

- Tickled pink at Abhishek B's hip-hop rap act in Bluffmaster. That man is the yummiest eye-candy we've got in Bollywood. He just gets yummier. :-)

Link Me

Sometime back a very dear friend from Deutschland sent me this blog-link to check out and maybe follow up - Tales to astonish - 100 things about the Retropolitan. It snagged my attention. I recently started compiling the list - it's quite an exercise in getting to know myself! :-)

Today she sent another really interesting link to the 50 Book Challenge...I wonder if I should take this up? Perhaps it will add the much needed accelerator to my book-devouring pace.

Another Blogwhore succumbed to the temptation and started her own blog. Kitana - you've read her comments. Now read what she has to say about love, life et al! Bienvenue to Blogger mon amie!

Soul Food

Well ideally speaking, it's loads of pasta (which I did have today) in creamy sauce, salads, cheese cake and chocolates, all washed down with some excellent wine. ;-) But for now it's music and books that are acting as awesome substitutes.

Swinging my hips, shaking my leg and grooving to the beats of -
Hung up (Madonna), Spun (Flipsyde), Someday (Flipsyde), My Humps (Black-Eyed Peas), We Be Burning (Sean Paul), La Torutura (Shakira), I Don't Care (Ricky Martin) and more...all thanks to World Space Radio :-)

I still haven't figured out on what channel and what time the classics are aired. There is Orbit Rock, but then they only air Classic Rock. Ah well, till I figure out, Vh1 fulfills my appetite for Retro music. Today's quota included Dressed for Success (Roxette), Addicted to Love (Robert Palmer), Crazy for You (Madonna), Father Figure (George Michael)....

Devouring my book on mythology. The more I read, the more I realise how less I know and how much I still have to learn. Why didn't I realise this earlier? Like maybe when I was in college, or even better way back in school? For now, I must placate myself with the adage Der Sahi, Andher Nahin.

Did you know how the Egyptian custom of embalming the dead came into being? It started off with Osiris - Pantheon has a small write-up. Not very satisfactory but it does shed some light on the origins of the custom. Wikipedia has a little more to offer...but then it is Wikipedia after all!