Stayfree

I enjoyed college. .  But again not as much as mindtree days. .  Life back then was so simple. .. So uncomplicated. .  Extremely ideal family wise n surreal when I look back. ..

V had super duper fun... Shila DJ n me. .. N then Manju n me. .. Ravis n d Jayesh's n d Shenoys n d Dpubs n d Garudans.... Moses.... N d lovely lovely friends for life. .  Pri.... Lead. .  Rags. .. Manju. . So many of them.... 

As if d people weren't enough. .  D experiences were varied n fun. .. How I wish I cud relive those times. .  N have my father by my side

Execute

Sometimes it feels good to do things on d spur of d moment without too much planning.

Got a call on Monday asking if we can sponsor Amulya's b'day.  I was shocked when the Surabhi co-ordinator told me u can skip d cake n snacks n get her a gift.... like a hair band. .  Hair band???... No way!!

So I decided to do it my way. .

After my friend gave me d go ahead on d funds required. .  Left office. .  Picked up my 3  year old and took a cab to a cake shop. .. Hitched a ride back to surabi centre on a just bakes cake delivery gadila with my son n d cake. .  My son overheard me tell d cake wallah. .. Full on circus v r doing n he tells me later that he enjoyed our circus....

Got Amulya a jewelery kit and her pals loom bands. .. Something that I thought young gals wud like. .  N something I wud have liked getting gifted. .


I always place myself in other people's shoes. .  Sometimes it's a good thing. .. Sometimes it's not.... Phew.... Wisdom time!!!

I hope they enjoyed d small surprise v gave them. .. But my fella n me surely did.

Amme n Ache

The moment she hears that I am carrying a heavy bag .  . My mother catches an auto to get her pregnant daughter back home from the bus stop. . Amidst heavy rains. . N d usual power cut aftermath. .
When I scolded her for taking the trouble. . All she said was. . Hello . . I came only coz u were pregnant . . Or else u think I wud have come?. .
I still think she wud have come.   . even if I weren't pregnant...

My parents did so much for me both as a child and when I was growing up and even when I was all grown up....

Everytime my phone used to ring at work, my friends at work used to know that it had to be Seema's dad....who used to call me religiously atleast 2 times a day...to enquire if I had food...and to enquire about how Im doing....I so so miss my father now:(..but you wont believe it...my bestest friend...Manju...when I told him that I miss my dad calling me....made up for it for 2 years..almost every other day....asking me if I had food and if I was doing OK...sometimes I wonder do ppl like Manju really exist?

My parents used to surprise me on my b'day with gifts....they have always respected my line of thoughts...n taught me to be an independent decision maker...today I might take a million opinions before I do something...but I take the final decisions...as my wise n not so old aunt once told me...U make ur choices in life...but always remember u made them..so u gotto take whatever comes with it!

Feels so alive to be blogging again

n Im so gonna spam my blog...have missed writing so very very much Man!!

Child labour rephrased...

Snacky Gifty:)

Ever since 2006, Christmas has been a very special festival for me. December is usually one of my busiest months in the year, where in there is fund collection to do for Christmas gifts for the schools and orphanages we work with and also the bestest thing everest..buying and wrapping gifts:)

U may have noted that I use superlative degrees any way I want...but then let me not digress from the story I want to tell...

Over the years...there have been times when I have wondered if we will collect enough funds to do all the gift and snack purchases...but somehow every other year....we never run short of money...

This year, we collected a total of 30,000 INR and were able to buy snacks and gifts for 350 kids:)

Snacks shopping was a breeze....Rumna and me did this in Metro....n v got good discounts too..

For the gifts, this year I went to multiple shops....found this small shop in Yeshwantpur, where I saw a whole lot of toys hanging outside ...the shopkeeper was a young chap....but he was extremely polite and courteous..that being the one good reason why I thought of checking out the shop in the 1st place...I hate rude shopkeepers and always make it a point not to buy anything from them...

When I told him..I was looking to buy 350 nos. of toys and gifts for children from orphanages, he told me that he would offer me a good discount..n he actually did!!...he also delivered all the stuff back home and gave me 200 gift covers for free, something which is not only hard to find ...but which also costs atleast 5 bucks a piece!!!

For the 1st time in years, I decided not to be kanjoos while buying gifts...d only thing I was looking forward to was...If I were a kid...wud I like getting a dart gun or a nail polish or a bubble gun or a neck chain or a loom band or a tennis ball as a gift?

The shopkeeper told me that loom bands were very popular among the girls...so v got that...nowadays I see them everywhere...n one shopkeeper told me ki yeh cheez toh daudthi hai...when I asked him if loom bands bahuth chaltha hai kya?

After shopping for around 150 gifts....I bought nail polishes, stickers, fancy looking clips and chains and was done with shopping for the gals...

Have u ever noticed how easy it is to gift a gal...n how u easily run outta options trying to shop for guys!!

Ceej came home and helped me pack the gifts in Ceej orderly n mannerly ways...n we were done with over 100 gifts of packing in no time!

I absolutely enjoy sitting around with friends and family wrapping gifts....Back at home...my Achan, my Amma and even my sister's mother in law have helped me wrap gifts...

A pal of mine once told me this...arrey ...y do u run around so much...take all this trouble....But the fact is...that doing this ignites a part of me...which makes me very happy and content...I think anyone who cares about me knows that I do this more for me...than for anyone else...

Alas...alas....turned out that I spent all the weekdays in the coming week accompanied by my 2 year old son in toy shops...trying to buy gift wrapper pouches...while my son n me had a blast....v were also running from one gift centre to another and then to steel shops n then to plastic shops doing the search for gift wrapper pouches..I finally came to the conclusion that they cannot be found in BTM....tats the place I stay in....

So, I bought 40 colouring books at a gift centre and had them do the packing for me then n there...yes..yes...urs truly had a blast setting people off to work :P

Happened to goto Jayanagar BDA complex and the 1st shop I asked had the gift wrapper pouches...this is one place which has everything under the sun..I tell U

Majority of the packing was done by my amma n my maid.....I would tell them..I need this gift to be mixed and matched with that....n they would dutifully do all that...while my son ran around with the kitchen sets and the doctor sets and the chains...:)

When I took the final count and segregated the gifts for the boys and the gals...our total number of gifts was 360:)

My final moment of joy came in during the Christmas party, when while distributing the gifts...the volunteers were trying to figure out what was inside...n I was like showing off big time...Oh that gift...tats a loom band...or that...tats a gun..or this...this is the doctor set:)
 

Yahoo Pregnancy

Yahoo only had pregnancy related news items!! ...n this was like 5 outta 6 stories..looks like celebrity birthing is the hottest topic offlate....

 

A traditional love story:)

We started off in 2006! It's been a 8 year long journey. Im not going to write further about there being ups and downs...so dont see that coming. Coz its only been a joyride, every new occasion always more fun than the previous one...every event more joyous than the previous one....every festival ...a reason to smile and look forward to with warmth and affection!

 

Ok ppl...will stop with the build-up and get to the point. Christmas is fast approaching and so is the carnival at Bubbles school for autism. To those of you, who have been there already...you definitely know what to expect. To those of you, who dont, in a nutshell, you can expect to have a lot of fun and also experience creativity at its simplest best!

 

Pampered!

Its strange how ppl treat u when u r carrying....u invariably end up getting a lot of attention....I have had ppl open doors for me at work n wait patiently  ...while I happily nudge along...carrying food and trying to put up a sheepish smile as I try miserably to acknowledge their courtesy...

N then I used to get some very pleasant surprises at my desk at work....talk abt ppl leaving dabbas of upma[my all time favourite dish] or pulao or bisi bele bath or or egg curry or andhra all greens curry or masala dosa  or sweets....thr used to be a point when I used to wonder if the dabbas belonged to a Vanita or a MS or a Jayashree or a Megha or a Madhur or a Manju...

I kinda made it a point to meet some of my friends before I set out on leave n the moment MS got to know Im going on leave the next day onwards....he had got upma n gulab jamun to office on my last day at work :)

Talk abt Badri...n I m short of words already....he comes up to me on my last day at work for now ...n hands me 6-8 dairy milk chocolate bars...wishing me "Happy hols!" !!!:)

Archu has this aunty who makes the world's best tomato bath n pongal...n everytime madam gets this for lunch....she happily offers her dabba to me n I usually torture her with my cook's chapathi n sabji combos:P

Have lost count of the number of times Saurabh has treated us to ice creams...n the number of people offering to buy me food....n how can I forget the ever so generous Ravi here....:P

Well...u get so pampered to the extent tat one aunty staying in our apartment complex offered to make me anything I wanted ...all I had to do was to just name it :P

Y only sday...my neighbour aunty happened to c me walk on the road...n she told me...I have made some bisi bele bath...shall I send some over?.....she said it wud make her feel gud if she fed me:P....U think I have any probs eating my fav stuff even if it makes them feel bad :P

Ditto with ganda n family....its like they arent even waiting for me to ask.....My sister has baked cakes, cookies for me... those yummy vadas......pulaos... .my mother, the rice ladoos....the only sweet I like....my in-laws have sent fish fry n fish curry knowing the craze I have for it...

Im also told the pampering stops after the baby is born....n while I might be enjoying the last few days of being this highly pampered in life...its made me very happy while it lasted :)

Boy or gal...

Im sure that almost every other post of mine will mention pregnancy somewhere or the other....for obvious reasons....so bear with me :P

After 38 weeks....I have no clue abt the sex of my child....as here...it is a crime to let out this bit of info before the child is born...owing to huge incidences of female infanticide...

The hospital I go to...is so strict that after my last visit...they have stopped allowing another family member into the room where they do the scan n they always make it a point to make u sign a declaration before the scan stating that u wont ask the person doing the scan the question regarding the sex of the child...

Infact they show you the baby in such a manner...that till date....it has always looked like an alien enclosed within an oval looking space...n everytime they do the scan....as the monitor is always away from me...all I get to c is the technician's face...n somehow they have such expressionless solemn looking faces....that even if they raise their eyebrows...it scares me ....

So the only option left is to turn to family n friends....a lot of hot shot predictors as they call themselves based on the shape of tummy...the glow on the face....n also on sheer intuition have predicted it will be a gal....

But then the day Manju...who claimed to be an expert in palmistry ...took one good look at my hand...n predicted it wud be a boy....I have kinda disowned him whenever v discuss abt this in office :P

Then people talk to me about seasons...when u hear only abt gal babies being born or boys being born...I almost LOLed at the season theory n was pleasantly surprised to find a link: http://www.babycentre.co.uk/tools/baby-gender-predictor/ which has a disclaimer: Just for fun!!

Well...boy or gal...will know it soon...

Beaten!

Ye...Im jobless ...not that Im complaining too much...its officially been 2 weeks...n Im glad I dont have to bear the backaches ...I do miss people though....n they better miss me too :P

The last break I had like this was when I took 2 weeks off from work to visit my sister with my family in Singapore. But then my father was there .....

Now...I kinda miss him a lot more than I have in all the years he was alive.......

I get to watch a lotta television...hope my child doesnt end up in front of it all its life :P...n today happened to watch a programme on Amma's mallu channel abt a daughter beating up her old mother in extremely poverty stricken conditons...

The victim here, the mother used to manage a meagre income until abt 6 years ago...after that she fell ill....n tats when her daughter started beating her up to vent out her frustration given the fact that she can neither take care of herself or her family....

The programme interviewed the mother-daughter duo...the neighbours....on the callousness of the "beating up act"...on what can be done......n all of that....but there was just one thought which came into my head...


Forget the delivery pangs or the pains that parents take to bring up their kids...Im not gonna get into all tat senti stuff....But one thing I can talk abt now is abt all the senti stuff I feel abt the pangs of pregnancy!!!

I dunno if some women have it easy...but for the entire duration of my pregnancy...whenever I have had to endure a pain thr or one here....or when the baby inside moves...or when I have to drag myself out of bed ...or when I cant sleep coz of breathlessness or coz I can literally feel the baby move to the sides I sleep on n hear the sounds of fluids inside....I appreciate my mother a lot ...a lot lot more!!!

I know its not easy raising a child..after all ...it will have its own personality once its out...but no matter what...to me...its unforgiveable...... biting the hand that fed u!!