Its been long I have moved from this blog... Am on wordpress now.

SANJUKTA.WORDPRESS.COM

Most of my readers have migrated already, if you are wandering around...just follow the link above.

Thanks for being with me all these months.

A heartfelt

Blogging Outreach Project

Participants at the 1st Blogging outreach workshop

I believe its time I write about the Blogging Outreach Project I had designed and am now looking forward to take it further.

Outreach is a term which means to reach out to those sections of people with something which originally wasn't there domain to begin with. By that meaning this whole project is wrongly nomenclatured. I am trying to reach out to the less privilaged, socially, economically, culturally and so on, with the concept of 'blogging' an amazing tool of new media which although is being used by some handful people belonging to an elite class, is actually meant to be used by the most ordinary. So it would be wrong to say that blogging is a domain which originally doesnt not belong to all and therefore outreach is required.

This has been for long in my mind. Such an amazing thing blogging and people hardly know about it. NGOs try to reach out to a larger number of beneficiaries, funders, supporters etc by mostly putting up information and writeups on their website but somehow that hardly leaves an impact. They can achieve better networking by blogging and other social networking sites.

Then there are students, young professionals who have an easy access to internet, they spend a considerable amount of time on the internet emailing, orkuting but that's bout it. It occured to me that they sure would take up blogging once they know about it.

I want to tell all of them how by blogging they can reach out to the largest global commune, the internet, in real time by just a push of a button without requiring fancy equipements or technical expertise and incurring almost no cost. The information delivered is first hand and untainted. So, the life and time and voice of a prostitute or an HIV+ person or a farmer or a destitute child can reach to the whole world whenever they feel like reaching out, even if they themselves are not blogging, but if a bunch of enthusiastic bloggers having the time and resource to blog and therefore does blog on their behalf.

While the thought was always on mind the project was actually designed when I heard about the Global Voices Online Summit 2006. It was encouraging to see that they were also trying to answer the same questions that I had in my mind. Over the past couple of weeks I, another friend Swagat who is a film maker and a great champion of new media and one of his students Kamakhya, a budding documentary film maker, we all worked towards the first outreach workshop which was successfully conducted with a group of students on 10th December 2006.

That's Swagat talking to the participants

Blogging outreach can be done with anybody and everybody from students, to civil society members, young professionals, faculty members at the college and university level, retired personell and so on. However the first workshop being a pilot workshop we had focused on students and civil society members.

As a first step of this project an interview sheet was prepared to assess the Student's accesibility and understandibilty of internet and secondly, their desirability to pick up blogging and do it for a cause. The interview sheet was also supposed to work as a filter to form a focus group of students who would really want to know more about blogging. However the responses to the interview was quite encouraging and we pretty much called all who responded to the workshop.

There were 10 students from 3 different educational background and Broadcast Journalism, Mass communication and Social Work.

The workshop was conducted in a Reliance Web World where all the students had access to a pc with internet. The workshop content has 3 major parts.

1. Blogging: What is it all about? Why it is the most talked about new media in today's date. (Session taken by me)
   
2. How to Start a Blog of Your own (Session taken by me, Tutorial was given on Blogger.com being one of the most simples)
   
3. How can you integrate blogging with other social networking tools. (Session taken by Swagat)
   

At the end of the workshop the students were given the task of creating one collaborative blog where they promised they'd blog about their experience from various field activities. We intend to have one collaborative blog from each of these workshops which would help us follow up with the participants as to how are they utilising the learning and if they are disseminating or not.

The first workshop was just a pilot project. I intend to conduct a series of such workshop and want to make it a bigger project involving a considerable amount of funds. The expenses of this workshop was bore by all of us in our personal accounts.

I was charmed Yesterday

I wanted to cry today. Just cry. Not for any particular person or reason. I was charmed yesterday Damn I hate sequels. Anyways since my friend asked...what happened to the man who charmed me............

I don't know what love is? But I have always wanted to fall in love. Wanted to give my everything, from body to mind, all my pride, all my fears, all my weaknesses, all my anger, all my laughter, to this one person who would take care of all of them. All my dispositions are meant to find that one person. I didn't know who would he be, didn't know how he'd look or sound...just knew this much that he would be some one who stands out. So everytime I came accross one such person who looked different I would wonder...if he is the one.

In my early 20s I used to think when I find one such person I'll marry him. With time I got so cynical at the institution of marriage that everything about it started bothering me. Now am about to turn 30 and have lost all intentions of ever getting into a marriage. Some may say that this is because I could never find that man. May be. But the point is, by mid 20s my mind set was such that any man walking the tried and tested path which led to a home, wife, kids and car, ceased to be some one who stands out in my eyes. In effect, on today's date, men in general fail to impress me.

However there are always those original sins I am tempted to commit. A 'desire' to be a part of that man's life..whose life I find unusual. Men who didn't and wouldn't walk the tested path. When I come accross one such man I casually befriend him (keeping my exitement of having found him very secret), Keep a safe distance, lest he gets concious, but keep him in my mind nonetheless.

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Now what happens when one such man walks into my life on his own and knocks on my door? Hard to resist such temptations. Not that I don't try.

So I asked him,

"Who are you and what are you doing with me? What, a guy as dazzling as you are is doing with a girl like me. Still trying to figure out why is lady luck
suddenly so glad at me.....

And I wondered

may be you are trying to grab that last streak of freedom slipping out of
your hand.. may be you know u are in the last stage of your bachelorhood and
that's why trying to make the best of it.... by being with me for a while....

And I said

so am not sure if this conversation went grt from ur side coz u were trying
to find a sponge...or r u always good at conversation... if it's the former...
chances r we'd be talking for some more days.......till u come out of a
phase....and if it's the latter chances are we could be good friends...

So he gave very convincing answers to all my worst fears and why won't he... after all he is some one 'I' found outstanding. Of all the things he said one was mentionable...

u decide....wat u want to do ..sam.... if u dont want me near u...then am
gonna miss you..but i am gonna keep an eye out for u sam..like it or
not...

Finally I could negotiate (with my fears) at a time period of 3 months...maximum that he is gonna be around...interestingly we did not (rather he did not) keep in touch for more than 10 days. I was back at wondering what went wrong....why just 10 days. So I go back to our chat conversations, emails.....

I think I know what happened... I did the mistake of being honest with him, of telling him what was on my mind. I told him he was like my dream man walking straight out of my dreams. He got scared. Scared of me pinning hopes on him.

Said

i get the feeling that i might be doing you more harm than good by just
hanging around you...and it was never my intention to harm or hurt you
Sam...!!

I wanted to explain him that I am not your average girl next door waiting to catch a big fish (read suitable boy), tie a knot (read marriage) and rest in peace (open to interpreatation). Wanted to tell him meeting my dream man means nothing to me for I don't know what is to be done with these dream men. Are we supposed to marry them when we meet them? are we supposed to fall in love? what is love? what do we do after we fall in love? Marry? Wanted to explain him I was not going to cling on him or create trouble for him by gettomg into an emotional hysteria.

But I couldn't tell him these [and therefore I am blogging?]. We didn't really talk. He suddenly got this so called feeling and started distancing [compared to whatever closeness we had for a week] himself from me. He thought phasing out was the best idea.

The irony of the whole story is this......He did tell me he was into a five year old relationship which had turned bitter.... and the bitterness started when he got scared of marriage.....and that he was still scared....... But he never told me his marraige was just round the corner...... 10-12 days from now. If he would have told me I wouldn't have answered any of his knocks. Damn!

In today's world of connectivity its hard to wipe off someone's existence from your life. So I deleted his number from my cell, but the sms were there, deleted them and realised the number was saved in call records. Cell is clean now but I got him on orkut and Gtalk. Assuming I delete him from there also I can always bump into him in the Courts....like I did into Ronnie. Its a small world really.

All said and done the truth remains he charmed me......... with everything, his sensous voice, carefree attitude, sharp looks, intelligence, confidence...... Having met him just once..... I felt I was wrong when I said "love can never happen one sided", I could identify with the feelings of that friend to who I always adviced, "dump him he doenst loves you". To me, he came accross as someone who can be as jerky as he wants and yet the emotional fool in me would want to give him my every thing to him.....
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To you, if you reading this, this is my truth, my bitterness and compliments all packaged together for you, we might never meet again in this life, She must be some one really special and deserving. Take care. Good Bye. Could have mailed you. But no. You get to know me only when you make an over effort to know me i.e. read my blog.
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Updates on my life otherwise:

Oops I did it again. Have quit my job again. Don't feel good about it but have a strong feeling whatever happened is for good. I might shift base out of Delhi... wow seems like those hindi film situations......one of them getting married and the other is rushing towards airport to catch a plane....duur kahin ek nayi zindegi ke talaash mein.... Kahani puri filmy hai veeru.

The other charming man of 2006 my good friend is getting married on 29th of this month. I might not be attending. I am on a spree of not attending any wedding celebration. Had already missed one. Two more are lined up. A school friend 20 years of strong friendship. Then there is my closest cousin bro.

Been 4 days at a row have spent time only with myself. Didn't step out of home, folks gone to calcutta for cousin's wedding. Been at loneliness 100%. Feels good.

When the night comes

When the nights come
keep me away from you,
from everything that could lead me to you
casue I would hurt you.

When the nights come
all my worst fears
like victorious soldiers of the war
drag me to the dance floor.

When the night comes
I find an uncanny pleasure
in celebrating my fears
being scared of every nice thing around me.

When the night comes
I turn ugly to fight my fears
and so I hurt them
those who claim to be nice to me.

Life at the T point

I always stand at a particular place on my office terrace, to have my sutta. There is a T-point there accross the road. Off late I have picked up an interesting habit to stand there 'combusting the significant 5 mins of my life' while keeping an eye on that t-point and everything that happens there.

A t-point is a point on the road from where you can either take a left or a right, there's no going ahead. The first time I casually had a look at it, it struck me how in life I have had to stand in so many of these t-points. You can't keep walking from here on, you've got to think, take a decision and then take a new direction.

I see cars, scooters, tempos, cycle rikshaws, bycles and pedestrians coming along the straight path hitting the t-point and then taking a turn. Some how I can relate it to the journey of life.

All motor vehicles have to slow down at this point before they take a turn. The bigger the vehicle is the larger is the fall in speed. A car coming at the speed of 5o have to lower down to 25 to take the turn. While a two wheeler, a bike specially, coming at 50 would only slow till 35 and take the turn. In life when these turning points come you need to slow down. You need to think about the consequences of your decision...direction. If you are alone you would take the turn differently than you would if you have a family with you. If you are big in life, you have people who watches every move of yours, you have followers, you have people who depend on you... taking a decision is all the more difficult then. While if you are a small insignificant soul no one cares what you do you are more free to take your decision.

Most people already know which side they'd take, they have already changed their lane accordingly and when the point comes they smoothly take the turn. Few of them however seem to be lost when they reach the point. They look around, some of them take a look at a piece of paper which might be an address, some don't carry address, they follow their gut feeling or at the most they ask some one around. In life it helps to pre decide where you want to go, it's best if you carry the address of your destination. But if all of us did that no one would stop for a while. No one would connect to another soul at that point. No one would ask and eventually there would be no one left to answer.

I see most take a left turn. There is a market on the left side, on the right there are only houses. Market is the place where we all have to be. You have your bread and butter there and the money to buy them. You have the bricks to build your home, you have blood and sweat all there in the market. Home is where peace is. Yet we spent most of the time of our life in the market always longing to reach home.

And then one day I thought when I write my autobiography I'll call it "Life at the t-point" Interestingly a T can also connote a woman figure, also a vagina.......well that makes sense, my biography would have a lot of sex talk, it would have my tryst with all the men in my life, it will speak scornfully about how relationships are all about sex, which is not so bad *wink* after all..... Yeah right, what, a soon to be 30 year old virgin, would write about sex I wonder. Well who cares how much of it is gonna be biographical so long as it sells…I will cook up something… *wink* and *Grin*

Holy shit (btw who coined this phrase of exclamation) too much of thinking, that too such scandalous thinking, over a silly t-point. If this kind of unethical literary torture continues on my blog next thing we'll hear is they have ordered to block my blog and remove all t-points from roads of Delhi.

And this is the final blow. A poem (or so I think) I wrote today. Next post.

"Met a great guy today...he was wow...simply wow.. am charmed."

When was the last time I said that...lemme go back in time... checking out the archives of my blog would suffice. Some where in the mid of Feb this year here is that post. Two in a year, not bad, its progress rather, given the fact that the february crush happened after almost 6 long years. For the records I am talking about this feeling of being charmed instantly, it's not like in 6 years I didn't go out with or see any body.

As always the twain shall never meet, they didn't meet, they won't meet, in fact they don't meet ever, not in flesh, blood and sweat and tell you what...they need not meet. The twain are both lucky to even have come accross each other and that's what matters. Really??
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If anything has influenced my life it is my own continuous thirst for adventure, variety and experimentation, and it’s this drive that has changed my whole life over the years. From being an ordinary middle class girl, as naïve as she can be, ready to fall in love, get married, I transformed myself into a rebellious feminist, a cynic, an atheist, a creative writer…non believer, non conformist, all being results of my own tryst with concepts like love, lust, sex, desire, beauty, morality, marriage etc.

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"We get married because we want a witness to our lives." - Susan Sarandon said in Dance with Me. I blog, or say write for the same reason.

Shall we censor?

I know the blogdom is full of people who vouch for freedom of speech and expression and talk passionately against censorship. I got one thing to say to them. *Bull Shit* Get real no body wants freedom... all of us so badly need censorship, you know why... Cause we are so fucking wild..we have no control on our's and no respect for other's freedom of speech and expression.

Seeing a sudden furore on the DBM mailing list, triggered by a mail (about a job opening) posted by one member today made me spend the whole day going back to all those mails on this list where I have been a victim of such censorship, of a few members thinking themselves to be so full of wisdom that they think its their moral responsibility to decide what's fit and what's not for this whole group. I went back reading and recalling how being vocal about a certain topic bother other members so much that they leave this forum forever, how initially this place was so full of ownership egos and it was so well defined who is an outsider and who insider. How there has been occassion when democracy has been completely repudiated on this list when moderators took policy decisions on behalf of 100s of us. I created a google note back copy pasting each of those mails there word by word making doodh ka doodh and pani ka pani. But I don't intend to share that note book coz then a lot of dead would be unearthed. Bitter memories would be refreshed not only in my mind but also in those with who I have patched up now.

But I would still make my point here. Umpteen numbers of time I have been told and have seen those wise men telling other rebels like me that there are certain kind of mails which are NOT to be posted on the mailing list (a public forum) and instead should only be restricted to personal blogs. The punchline of censorship. Shall we challenge it?

I would just quote the very latest in this regard. It was a post wrote by paavani on her blog. I expressed my opinion on that on the mailing list. Of all that followed, the most significant was this conclusion, that my biggest mistake was to have written what I wanted to write to the entire mailing list and not restricted myself to Paavani's blog ONLY. And such virtual attack followed inspite of me having given a proper disclaimer in these words

"Hi, This is my reaction to Paavani's post. First I started writing in her comments section, then I thought of mailing it here. Then I thought it would be safest to post it on my blog since it might have objectionable content. Seems like its bad luck day for me... blogger.com isn't working again...can't even publish so am mailing again."

The first reaction to the mail was outrage from so many of them in so many ways. I ask, to restrict myself to my blog and not use a public forum to express my angst over something, if *that* is the right thing to do then how can we argue against censorship of blogs or media on the whole by government. The logic on mailing list is that irrelavant off topic mails at times containing personal grudge gives rise to flame wars. Government have the same philosophy behind blocking blogs, movies, books, they contain material which outrages the sentiments of certain section of society. Internet is the most public of all forums. If we don't control what we publish on the net utter chaos might follow just as a simple mail regarding a job posting is followed by exchange of malicious mails. Or some one's opinion on a certain something may lead to 2-3 members leave the DBM list.

Message No. 2193 is a farewell message of a member where he clearly mentions he no longers wishes to remain a part of this group because he doesn't like some member expressing too much.

He says

I almost left the group when the whole alternative DBM issue happened bcos I didn't agree with a lot of vocal members who "protested" for whatever reasons against the new group.

Goes to show how difficult it is to express yourself on the list. Seems like people here are sitting with their sentiment in hands just waiting to be hurt. Just about 200 of us and so much of tention already. What we write in our blogs affects the entire nation. And we think that need not be controlled?

Coming to another side of this whole issue. What is Topic to begin with so as to decided what's off topic. Now this is where lies the philosophy of control. Those so called wise men, those flag bearers, those who think its important to keep certain things in certain order and therefore telling us DO NOT do anything which is Off topic, off tradition, off culture, off religion. They don't trust that every adult mature person have their own sense of right and wrong. On this list I am aware of instances (Msg no. 1065) when one member has requested the moderator to throw a certain non acceptable member away from the list and a third member taking stand against such a request (msg no. 1088). So who decides what's right and wrong.

Let's take the present example. The logic is that since each mail that is shot on the list reaches inboxes of 100s of members who then get annoyed by off topic mails. Ok agreed but then when they agreed to recieve mails in their inbox they should keep some space for some off topic mails also. No one is perfect. So assuming X has shot an off topic mail, the rest have only few options (1) ignore it. (2) Ignore it but at the same time inform this person nicely in private that you didn't like the off topic mail. But that's all one can do and if that doesn't work well just bear with it, he is a fellow member. Of course if things go way beyond tolerance, if such (so called) off topic mails become too frequent then one needs to think of a way to put full stop.

In today's case am sure this guy is well aware of the purpose of DBM List (personally I am doubtful if we even have any purpose or not but that's a different issue) and he knows where to draw the line. His mail so didn't deserve to be backlashed by around 15 more mails (all off topics coz they are about a off topic mail) within few hours of his having shot it. He thought of shooting one mail and stop there but the rest of the group so very wisely have ensured the off topic is continued even as I write this post.

My simplest of expression in this list (Msg No. 1484) of having made some new friends and a note of thanks to them have been objected by the then moderator and few other members (privately thankfully). I was softly told I should avoid posting such mails as then the other members feels left out.

I can go on and on but my eyes hurting now. I virtually spent my whole day doing this. I am not always politically correct. I take sides and have no fear saying Prashant's mail wasn't that off topic and Joydeep and Priyanka's mails were extremely uncalled for.

Diwali 06

This existence in the cyber world can at times take a toll on you. I don't mean my blog to be a digital diary, so I don't write about every day things on it. But then every time I meet someone online they ask me the same questions bout my life and I find myself typing the same damn lines over and over again. Fingers ache man. The latest being 'so how was diwali'...Uff why don't people understand. For them its a casual opening line to a chat conversation which should ideally be answered in a monosyllable... good, bad or ok. But people, I can't do that. That's my problem... if you ask me I would speak. So finally I thought I'd put it here for one and all to see..everytime they ask me I am gonna give this link. Or better still, I will put the link up as my status for few days..till the time they stop asking that question to me. I am seriously so sick and tired of repitative questions.

Here's what I did. I don't like crackers. I hate the noise it makes. My dog Jango, he hates them too. This diwali he was sitting quietly culred on the sofa, head hanging downwards looking at the carpet, lost in deep thoughts when the first cracker of our colony burst. In a flash of a light he jumped out of the sofa and in one giant leap reached the balcony and started expressing his angst at such sudden nuisance in one long waoooooooooooooooh followed by many small wao waos. He had hardly expressed his utter bewilderment on human being's weird of idea of fun when more happy kids blasted more funny crackers all around our house. Jango just couldn't take it. With multiple wao wao s he kept running from one corner of the house to the other, trying to put accross his point to the happy kids who are now joined by their proud parents in the fun. Round and round he went hardly stopping for a breathe or two.

I could so relate to Jango. That's exactly what I feel like doing when at one unexpected moment a loud blast scares the shit out of me. Not just miniature bombs of all sorts even the charkhis make noise these days. Found out only this time. The charkhi glows, goes round round and also makes a noise similar to that of a missile launch...uff....

I like the lights though, like the fireworks in the sky. So I took along my sister and drove around Dwarka to see the lighting of the various societies. Dwarka has many empty sky lines looking at which you can see many fire works all at a time. We then to India Gate. Idea was to just drive around but not park, reaching near Maurya Sheraton I was reminded of a friend who lives nearby. Called him. Since he joined us we could park there at India Gate, he treated us with Ice cream...more nice fire works there in India Gate. At around 12 we pushed off to RK Puram to be with some of our old friends. That being our old neighbourhood, a place where we had lived for around 19 years before we moved to Dwarka.

Why catch up with old friends at 12 in the night. The day when diwali is celebrated we bengali perform Maa Kaali Puja. The worship of Goddes Kali, the goddess of Shakti (Power) Kaali a name associated with black and violence, this goddess is worshipped by dacoits, soldiers, tantirks etc. The puja is essentially performed on an amavasya night. The ceremony only ends at late night and is traditionally concluded by a goat being sacrificed at the goddess' feet. The devotees then have a major feast on that sacrificed Goat.

In today's times of course the sacrifice is no longer done at the puja pandal. But we still have the feast at around 3 in the night. All devotees stay awake throught the night to have the prasad. Pathar Mangsho (Mutton Curry), Cholar Daal (Pulses), Luchi (Puri in North India), Pulao, beguni (pieces of brinjal dipped in Besan and deep fried), chatni and rasho golla being a typical Kali pujor prasad.

Besides catching up with old friends in RK Puram I also got to have a glimpse at my longest lasting crush - 18 years.

Was back home at 2ish. Since then everytime I tell some one how did I spend this Diwali...its freaking them out..."You were driving around on a Diwali night!!! Ahem well I didn't realise it was such a risky thing to do...we are dare devils you see.

The Minutes of DBM XIV

Minutes of XIV Delhi Blogger's Meet

The meeting was held at the same time and place as announced. It was attended by 12 members with 5-6 of the old and regular ones and rest new faces. Compared to last couple of meetings this time the attendance was low but the discussion was much more constructive than before. Let's see where do we go from here.

The agenda was of course to discuss a blog camp or somthing of that sort event here in delhi. As we started our planning we were posed with few basic questions

(a) What kind of event are we looking at? Is it going to be a huge affair with lots of sponsors and propoganda or do we want to keep it simple like our meets are. I guess we all agreed to make it big (attendees correct me if I am wrong)

(b) What do we call it a seminar / blog camp / a workshop / a meet etc.? Most of us don't want to call it blog camp and its not just about the nomenclature we don't want to repeat the chennai thing....we've got to do something different and new. something that hasn't already been dealt with.

(c) what kind of audience/participation are we expecting? We can either try to reach out to people who are not into blogging by doing some thing very basic..what's a blog..its uses, handyness and effectiveness, or we can keep it amongst the circle of those who are already blogging but focus more on issues they still would want to know bout. We understand that the two groups are mutually exclusive and we can't expect a event to be atteded by both kinds..so we have to promote the event accordingly. We haven't really reached to a conclusion on this.

(d) What are we going to do in the event? After a lot of brainstorming we have more or less catagorised two kinds of activiities.. som sort of research papers on topics which are very very off track this will give new perspectives and round table discussions where we would debate some of the exisiting notions and trends on blogging.

Topics for Research, anybody can volunteer to take part of conduct these researches.

1. Personality of the blogger v. the blogger [suggested by Lijo , Prashant, Sanjukta] a more flashy name for this is Indentity Management through Blog or the Psychology of the blog. A case study on this cannot be done unless a guineapig has volunteered for it.

2. Education, Abroad studies and blogging - A students perspective. [Mayank]

3. Shall we censor | Darker side of blogging [Sanjukta] I want to know how reliable is the information on the blog, given the fact that blog owner can control and tamper everything..date of publishing the post, comments on it etc. Should we then really have absolutely free flow of all kinds of contents. Shall we allow inflammatory blogs in the name of freedom of speech.

4. Blogging trends accross nations - interaction / comparison with Indian Blogsphere. [Twilight Fairy] country for case study Pakistan. We are similar so are we really similar. We can find that out though there is doubt as to how much a blog reflect the country and its people. I guess at least we can compare two similarly placed bloggers...say journalists or software engnrs or activiists etc. Fairy can explain this more.

Topics for Round table discussion.

1. Raveena Tandon - why are you not blogging? [Harneet, Yogesh] I think they are trying to say something about celebrity bloggers....or may be they were just kidding....guys pls explain

2. Blogs, a threat to certain Industries [Prashant] job of travel consultant being replaced by travel blogs, and somthing about banking also he said. Prashant can explain this more.

3. Horizontal Blog [Prashant] where one person is blogging about everything under the sun.

4. Frequency of Posting - effects on quality of blog [Prashant]

5. Blogging Syndication and their impact on freedom of expression [Nikhil] Its like this, a jaana maana blogger express is PoV on something and everybody else in his group tends to agree and only agree..let us ask ourselves are we really exercising our Freedom of Expression. I personally find it interesting though I think it goes for other media also. After all most of us are taught to conform to notions and ideology preached by our peers.

6. Sun V. Microsoft - The technical art of Blogsphere [Yogesh] He would have to explain this.

Topic on which guest speakers can speak and also discussion

1. Business Blogging [Lijo] this I think have been discussed quite a few times before. However one can speak on any breakthrough changes in it.

2. Blogging in Regional languages - Support and technology [Lijo] He knows farmers in Kerela who blog in regional language. It might be interesting to find out about all the available technical and other support for regional blogging.

3. Ways of improving aggregation of blogs to better reflect quality content. [Nikhil] He would have to explain this.

4. Usability issues with mobile blogging [Nikhil] as its gonna come up big time in the next couple of years this is the right time to start talking bout it.

Besides these topics there's general expectation from the event, common between me, Harneet, Fairy Mayank, Lijo (pls add ur name if am leaving u out), to reach out to those sections of people who are part of the same frame and yet unaware of blogs.

- Media that reports on blogs
- Govt. agencies, they have access to internet, power to regulate but don't understand blogs.
- Students
- Creative minds at home..the home makers, retired persons etc. got access to net but not utilising
- social activists, i know so many of them who have faintly heard bout it and wanna know more about it.
- Basically Anybody and everybody...as Chota Amit said anybody can blog.

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So we really had a fruitful discussion yesterday. Now the next step. As of now we have all promised to blog exhaustively about the topics we have suggested. Let's first have a reality check, how easy it is to conduct these research. I suggest we set up a community blog (on blogspot Beta) for this purpose and have a Wiki also.

Time now for the group to speak.

List of Attendees

Lijo Isac - http://lijoz.blogspot.com
Amit Gupta2 - www.amitgupta. in
Prashant - http://www.knowprashant.blogspot.com/
Rohit Malik - www.delhievents.com/
Roopak - http://03.indiatimes.com/wallflowers
yogesh - ?
Nikhil - http://mixedbag.blogspot.com/
Harneet - http://harneet.blogspot.com/
Twilight Fairy - http://twilightfairy.rediffblogs.com/
AmitKen - http://amitken.wordpress.com/
Sanjukta - http://sanjukta.wordpress.com/ (I have shifted to Wordpress..actually am at both the places..i keep cross posting)
Mayank - http://mayankchauhan.blogspot.com

DBM XIV

Ok I know I am tad late...actually too late..but still...at the nick of time... Announcing DBM XIV and this time we do have an Agenda...huh finally

DBM XIV

Date : 7th oct'06
Time : 4:30pm (it gets dark by 6pm)
Venue : Steps near audi, (BBC meet waali), IHC, Lodhi road.
Agenda : planning a seminar style meet, progressing onto a blogcamp.

Participation: Be there if this announcement sounds interesting to you

See you

Did this translation long time back....just thought would re post it today.
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Shyama to Bajrasen -

Forgive me my Love
What is the curse for the sin I did,
Let the almighty bestow upon me
You forgive me
My sin was not in thy Book,
sinner I am in God's feet
There God shall unleash his rage,
retribution be silently accepted by me
never shall be able to bear your unforgiveness
Forgive me

Bajrasen -

Forgive her, I could not
Forgive my feeble mind my Lord
My love was crying, My love was dying
of shame of remorse.
Alas! I could not take her in my arms
I hurt my love
Sin I did to punish sin
Forgiven she would be by thee,
she who falls tumbling on thy feet
of shoulder loaded with sin.
Know I this my Lord,
that thou shall never forgive me,
never forgive me for my mercilessness.

From 'Shyama' by Rabindra Nath Tagore

You called me beautiful

'You' called me 'beautiful'

surprised

I turned my ugly face at you

I looked up,

I looked around,

'They' called me beautiful

looking back at you, i could only find a smile

you were gone

I still collect the smiles.

workshop on CEDAW

Every little bit have been taken care of. Its been a lot of hard work and I just hope it goes great. Talking about the South Asia Training of Trainers on CEDAW workshop to be held in TERI Gurgaon from 25th to 29th September 2006. The event is being funded by UNIFEM and executed by PLD.

South Asian lawyers working in the field of women’s rights issues are here to participate in the training. We have participants coming from Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and Bhutan.

Now what is CEDAW. Its an international Convention on Elimination of all kinds of Discrimination Against Women. Most of these south asian countries including India is a signatory of this convention. CEDAW is the parellel of UDHR (Universal Declaration of Human Rights) and is the only source for women rights. Why women rights when we have human rights. To know the answer to that question one needs to understand the text of CEDAW which is as complicated as it can be. Lawyers take time to understand the convention so one can imagine how difficult it is for a grass root level activist to weave the CEDAW principle into their work. This is where PLD have had a major contribution, training development executives on CEDAW.

For the first time PLD is going to have a training for trainers. This time the participans are of higher level and they are further expected to disseminate the training obtained here development executives in their countries working in the relevant fields. We have also prepared a very enriching resource package.

I would also be attending the training as a participant. I have worked hard for the event. Officially I wasn’t in it earlier but then things kept coming and I kept taking them and ended up playing a major role in coordinating the entire event. Have not been getting any time for blogging.

Lots of ideas came in mind but never got the time. Also thought of a Nation wide campaign for right to education on 14th Nov. Let’s see what can be done.

Blog Camp...

Ok I may be a tad late in talking about the Blog Camp Unconference...but its never too late.. I cannot even begin to explain how much I would have loved to be a part of it and how much I have got to talk about blogs and blogging. Regular readers of my blog would know why... May be soon we should have a Delhi Edition of Blog Camp and then I would be an active participant.

Only yesterday I had another lecture in AIMC on Media and Law, but the students were more enthu to talk about blogging given the fact that their Swagat Sir has been influencing them 24/7 about powers of blogs. Swagat is always so exited about the blogs and is always trying to be innovative about its use. He wants all his students to share their class notes. He wants me conduct a one day blogging workshop with his students.

They kept saying India have to go a long way in blogging well not after such a huge event like blog camp. The list of participants is as glamorous as it could get including Sunil Gavaskar on board. I would be mailing Bill and Julian regarding the Blog camp.

So if you are in Chennai on 9th and 10th September you better be sane and attend it.

An article I wrote for AIMC Seminar which not many read am linking here again given its relevance to this post. Click here. My efforts to put some sense and direction to the DBM is also of significance once again. I cannot believe how a bunch of around 150 bloggers who have been in this community for a little less than 3 years now still cannot think of doing anything more constructive than sipping cofee and 'meeting new people' in their meets. Every time I have tried to talk about it those guys have blamed me for thinking too much and getting too serious with something so casual as blogging. One of them actually sent me hate mails blaming me of being a cheap attention seeker. For once I thought I would put up his derogatory mails for all to see but then I thought why should I get dirty myself.

I fail to understand with the government banning some blogs, the RTI applications and the media attention how can blogging still remain a casual matter an avenue only to meet new people and socialize.

Anyway

It was an awesome rain that delhi had today in the evening and its awlays a beautiful sight to see those shining blades of water falling on the concrete road and the car splashing by...the traffic obviously came to a halt all around and I waited almost an hour at the Jungpura stop for a 727 before I gave up, took an auto to CP and boarded the metro to Dwarka. But what a well spent hour it was.......last year I only wrote about it....this time I clicked and captured....

MORE PICS HERE

I am hating wordpress. Except for one good thing that it allows me to add Pages, wordpress overall is giving me a pain in my ass. It's so f*^&ing slow... everytime it asks me stupid questions..........you are being redirecting to no secure connections.....blah blah...even before logging in to wordpress it would ask these questions. I wonder if the source is non secure why the hell am I trying to log in to it.




It doesnt allow me to delete my posts, it says I don't have permission to perfom that....who the hell would give me permission now. Its so damn irritating. I thought of shifting from blogspot to wordpress so that I can organise this large blog into proper categories and that bugger won't let me edit or add new categories now. I have been only able to rename the default 'uncategorized' thing

I am in the process of moving to Wordpress

SANJUKTA.WORDPRESS.COM

That page is still under construction. Facing some technical difficulties. Would give a final notice here before leaving this space. Meanwhile keep visiting.

Good Bye Kakan

I had always romanticized the idea of an early and famous death...my friend had it and now am 'living' her 'death'....

I have wondered how would it be to be suddenly gone...what if people who knew me loved me finds out I am no more... will they cry for me? Of course they will.... what about those who don't keep in touch with me any more... will they cry for me? The men who broke my heart and never looked back.......would they even come to know? May be not... I am always wanting to be famous just so that when I die the world knows. The idea of a lonely death scares me...

Am always wanting to tell my sister that if I die suddenly call everybody that I ever knew and say bye to them on my behalf..... I don't know if she said the same to her bro... but I know there are people who would probably never come to know or may be would know it after a long passage of time, unless I tell them today...

So I told them one by one - Somewhere near Rudra Prayag in Uttranchal is a place called Siyalsaur...there flows river Mandakini... on 14th August 2006 Kakan went swimming in the river... 3 other friends were sitting by the river bank. Suddenly they saw her being pulled in the middle of the river and then withing few seconds she disappeared into the water... Its been 8 days they still haven't found her body. She is gone. We have lost her.

And now I am living her death. I am witnessing how it feels to leave suddenly. I have been witnessing how her casual friends who she used to meet once in a while took it, witnessing her ex bf (not much official), the Lets go group members, her new found close friend and although I didn't actually witness what her parents and bro are going through but I can make out.... I look helplessly at her orkut page, people scrap her "hey kakan what's up" scraps that would never be answered, pages that would never be updated again, mailing lists which would no longer hear from one of their members....and they would never know what happened...why the silence.

I read her mails on the Let's Go list....the ones she wrote right before leaving for the trip...

All sounds cool !!! Am really quite enthu about the trek ..hope I dont
breakany bones...

she says

I am gonna be carrying dettol and band aid and few first aidstuff

In another mail she was discussing the schedule

16th august : We would be reaching back to delhi ( hopefully we would have
survived..hehe)

I met Kakan her in MARG in August 2003 we were coleagues for just one month. Since the day one I knew she was of my type may be because we both were aquarians... but then how deep can your friendship grow when you are coleagues. Oh but we did have some great drinking and singing session she used to love to sing...and she was a great singer. She specialized in Child and adoloscent psychology and started her carreer by giving counselling session on a child helpline.

One of the songs she used to sing every now and then those days I am listening right now... Allah ke bande has de - Kailash Kher.

She didn't stay for the whole project left too early on some misunderstanding with other members on the team. I, in anycase am never the one to call up people to keep in touch. And the way she left I had more reasons to leave her alone for sometime. But then she herself called. She took a job in London and wanted to meet me before she leaves. She had invited all the other Margees but none of them came only I did. Honestly, I wasn't too enthusiastic about it but couldn't turn down her...the way she would look at you with her chirpy giggle and innocence, you really can't turn her down. The way she used to that is.

Through her stay in London, the annual breaks in which she came to India and after her return couple of months back, she had always been the one to keep in touch. She used to always call and find out how I was doing. She was some one who would want to help you with everything. Once she wanted me to meet me and I wasn't in the mood and so I said I wasn't feeling well she said, "what happned to you, I can get medicine" (her father is Delhi's renowned homeopath Dr. Kalyan Banerjee)

They have a story on her on Sunday's Hindustan Times (20th), Monday's (21st) TOI and Tuesday's (22nd) Indian Express. May be some of those friends of her who even I don't know would read the newspapers. I think I know how would they would react but lemme not get into that.

We don't have time.......no time to live...let alone fight, hold grudges, have differences, prejudices....its so often that we don't call our friends and keep in touch...we believe they are there and then suddeny one of them is gone... As I feel helpless with my eyes running out of tears for her I am reminded of one of her comments on this blog

Cheer up samy ..its never worth losing what was not yours .. you always
make me believe that.. shouldnt the same go for u too.. what wasnt yours cant be
worth anything when its lost..

U inspire life ..remember that..Cose you gotta gift of doing good ..

Life will go on Kakan, we all would move on, I know that's the harsh reality of life...we all want to live..... but you left a space in some of our life that would never be filled. Rest in peace beloved freind...guess you were a fallen star and weren't meant to be in this world full of misery and pain for too long...guess that's why you were so full of life always........since you weren't meant to stay.

A week later, no trace of drowned girl’s body

A close friend's tribute to Kakan

Those who would want to get in touch with Kakan's grieving family can mail me for the numbers.

All are requested to pray for her soul and her family's well being.

birth of a smile

Two drops fell from her eyes
Landed on a feather passing by
Were carried to a place unknown
touched an ailing soul
and a smile was born

People sometimes act so cowardly and Hypocritacilly. I once wrote this testimonial for some one I knew. Asked for his feedback on what I had to write about him. He read it and got so panic stricken, left offliners for me, comments on the blog itself and then spoke over the phone asking me to do the needful editing. The reason for panic...only the following words

the rest of his time is spent in drinking and shopping.

I haven't written drinking what...haven't mentioned anything like he drinks a lot and is a drunkard. Just the mention of drinks is defamatory for him. He is an IITian and an MBA has spent 3 years in abroad (Ameriaca, Singapore etc) holding top notch corporate position and yet by those words I have put him at the risk of loosing his reputation in the eyes of society and family. This is what he had to say (Yahoo Messenger Offliners)

SP: dont forget internet is an open book! u have to be careful about what u
write else people can make 1+1 = 4!
SP: oye madam ... yeh kya kya likh rakha hai aapne logon ke baare mein! no
one here drinks like a fish or shops like an alcoholic! all we do is have a
party or 2 in a month! KIndly edit as not only my friends/bros/sis are net savvy
but also this sends a wrong message across!

A wrong message??? Coz I said drinks? Reputation of what? Since when did drinking become such a taboo. Who are you fooling man. Don't the people around you already know that you drink. And a friendly testimony, in which, of the many things there is a passing reference to your drinking habits would be taken so seriously by your friends and family? Strange!

Grow up People of India. Open your eyes to things which are of much more significance than mere reputation, tradition, culture, morality, sanctity, decent indecent...there's much more to the human existence. Log kya sochenge...kab tak hum is sawal mein uljhe rahenge...can I not find one person who isn't burdened with this question, whose soul is free. How can we close our eyes to things which are too evident to proclaim that they doesn't exist.

Probably your Net-savy sisters also drink and if they do....big deal... shouldn't be an issue with your parents or family.

Yet another DBM

Time for another DBM. I am not too sure where is this powerful community of bloggers going with these series of Meets...two and half years and we still figuring out what is the substance of our commune...

Nevermind, I in anycase am always looking forward to all of them. So here is welcoming all delhi Based Bloggers to the meet...its a bit too short notice I know... was decided hurriedly...

The 'others' are also having a meet on Sunday. The twain shall never meet...Such a new genre this 'bloggers' and such lack of unity already.

This is ours XIIth and theirs must be 5th or 6th I don't know. Interestingly we do meets in every two months or so and they do it every month so pretty soon they are gonna outnumber us on the total meets they have had although they started two years after we did. It's not about competition, its about an excellent idea being pre maturely lost into oblivion due to lack of enthusiasm and ambition.

May be I think about it way too much for the reason that blogging and this Blogger's group is one of the best things that has happened to me. I cannot even begin to talk about what all have changed in my life, how I have re-discovered myself ever since I started writing this blog. I was recently on CNN IBN talking bout hte ban on blogs issue. Glimpses of me was on NDTV and was interviewd by The Guardian, Deccan Herald and Indian Express. The hype I got at the last DBM...my guest lectures at APJ...Can't deny it all feels good... am not at all one of those humble souls for whom fame doesn't matter...
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Anywhichway

So Cafe Turtle, Khan Market, Lodi, New Delhi is where I would be tomorrow, 29th July at 5 pm meeting some of the delhi based bloggers.

Come along if you are around
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Current Song - Mujhe mat roko, mujhe saajan ke ghar jaane do from Gangster.
Don't I always say I am gonna be "gone too soon", time for me to move on please don't hold me back, I like it when you do but let me go...

Remember that old wrapping paper?

It’s been years, you were quite young then, it was your birthday. One of your friends gift wrapped a present for you with that paper. What was the present, I guess you don’t remember anymore, you probably don’t even remember who gifted it, but that wrapping paper was nice. Wasn't too glossy neither was it too colorful, it had a soothing pastel shade which actually doesn't even look much attractive at first sight. In fact, you didn’t even bother to be careful while un wrapping the gift and so it lay tore, twisted and crumpled from all sides as you threw it on the desk adding to the pile of all such wrappers tags etc.

I remember you took note of it only the next morning when your mom was cleaning up the room. She was trashing the paper bits, the deflated balloons, the gift cartons, the chocolate wrappers, the paper plates etc. in the bin, when that wrapper caught your eyes. You quickly took it out of the pile and kept it carefully in your book shelf. You thought it would be of use some day.....may be in a collage or might even be used as a wrapper in case you forget to pick one from the stationary......but then, you lost sight of it.

You had a habit of saving things for later use... And so it too got dumped along with many such small items that you had kept. In your cupboard it lay purpose-less, help less... all it could do is wait... wait for you to some day take a look at it... It kept waiting wishing and praying you pick it up someday with a smile and give it the worth for which you originally saved it... days passed, months rolled, turned into years and went by but the wait seemed to be never ending. The cupboard seemed to be filled with more and more such stuffs... it was pushed towards the bottom, deep down it tried to remain in sight but couldn't.

Are you looking for it today? Is it that wrapper that you are crazily searching all over your room, in your cupboard, book shelf, lofts, old paper bags, old ragged files...and you can't find it. I can see you sweating and exasperating, you are so sure you kept it right there on that inner cabinet but it’s not there anymore. You are getting more and more irritated for you just can't figure out where it went.

Oh c'mon why don't you get it? You simply lost it. You won't find it ever. Wonder what made you think you will continue ignoring something, which you once thought was precious, and it will still be yours.

Thus Speak Me

"Give me my share of tears and I shall leave you alone"

These golden words, refelecting upon my penultimate wisdom, which is given to me by all mightly to save the world of all its misery, are framed in the wonderful invention called Yahoo 360 under the series "Thus speak Me". So keep visiting my Yahoo page for more of these quotable quotes uttered by this fascinating personality at those rare glorious moments I reach after sufficient amount of vodka and rum...

Disclaimer:

Purity of Gold not guranteed.

Definition of wisdom you are free to form your own.

Misery shall not include those hazards occured by reading my words.

ENJOY PEOPLE

No, you are not out of my mind. There isn't a single 'free' moment of the day when I don't think of you, you are the first thought when I wake up, you are the last when I sink in sleep. Just that you don't know, and you would never know coz I won't ever tell you what's in my mind unless you ask me.

Took me 6 years to find, and probably for the first time in true sense, a man who appeared to be some one I can spend time with...wanted to be with you, thought we can give it a try, thought we would be good for each other, but you turned me down. And then my dreams were broken. And the only thing that's real in my life embraced me with warm open arms. My pain.

You were very fond of reading this blog. Every now and then everything I said you said "I know, read it on your blog". You read everything, you knew everything and still you went ahead and did exactly what they all have been doing......... you left me in the middle of no where with endless questions and no answers....... you never felt it was necessary to have a talk... I opened my heart to you layer by layer... and you remained silent like a stone...indifferent to everything I said.... kept me wondering.... why? Why didn't you stop me? Why did you on the contrary did things to encourage my feelings?

And now, with every passing day of your indifference towards me the wound is only getting deeper and deeper... you are always there in my mind reminding me of my defeat, what is it that I don't have, why is it that I failed to even be a "friend" of yours... True you said we'd be friend but there is an ocean of difference in saying and doing. Action speaks louder. I am nothing more than a mere aquaintance to you...... some one you smile at if you accidentally bump into... every day you make me feel how lonely i am... you make me feel I am not worth considering... I am not worth spending time with.... so you see you are never out of my mind...

But that doesn't mean I can't pretend I am over you..... I am good at that. I will pretend like nothing happend so that 'you' don't feel uncomfortable when we meet in a common group. I will pretend that it was just a convinient crush which got over as things became inconvinient. I will pretend I wasn't hurt and everything is just the way it should be. With time we shall drift apart...... words unspoken, questions un-answered will forever remain with me.....

-----------------------------------------------------

The purpose of starting this blog could never be any more justified than this post that I worte today. I took a look at the series of events with him, how we met and how I felt, how hopes were build and dreams were weaved, how smiles were planted on my face and everybody around me, how I spent my time being happy about every sms he sent (which he now calls as 'kidding myself') how with every small step I became more and more sure about me standing a chance with him and so I told him bout my felling and what happened next...... I wrote a blog post in each of those moments... my initial apprehension that it was just a mirage, my dilemma whether I should tell him or not, my final decision that I won't tell him, how I decided to give him hints, told him "I wrote this testimonial for you"........ and today at the end of it all this post only proves how uncertain and short lived it was... As always.
--------------------------------------------
The reason I wasn't blogging for some time was becoz I couldn't have helped writing this post and I didn't want him to read...now that considerable time has passed I am hoping he won't visit here any more... but if you do..... then well what can I say.... This is my truth... you gotta handle it.

I don't want to write this blog anymore.

Coming back from work today (Dilli Haat after work) I felt like driving till the end of the world. Wished the 6.5 Km long road connecting Dwarka to South Delhi never comes to an end, felt like taking the NH8 to jaipur and from there to some where else. I just wanted to go on and on and on... Me and my thoughts on the run.

Dino called ES while she was sitting with me in the car, he was discussing the trip to Gharwal. I asked him yesterday if they can postpone it till the last week coz I would like to go, he said "talk to Amit he is organising, not me." Another chapter closed all it took to close it was just a turn of leaf.

Why can't things be left at vague....why does it have to end? All stories must have climax and a The End, that's why.

I really wanna take those roads one of these days...

Some one asked me today if I was happy. I never ask this question to myself surprisingly the answer was quite simple. Yes I am. Any body who reads my open heart here on this blog would think I am one of the most unhappy. Well it just occured to me its actually so easy to be happy in life, all you need is just a little tact. I am happy being unhappy. I love my loneliness and my pain, they make me a special person, they are my muses, my source of inspiritation for my writing...... they make my life worth living, some day they will make my life worth reading......... Given a chance I would not want to change anything of life. Really I have no regrets, I believe everything that I do or have done is unique and special in its own way. I stand out and that's what matters to me. No fun being the happy go lucky girl next door......... They laugh at me, think I am fooling myself, may be i am but let it be, I am happy thise way.......... They think I live a life full of false presumptions, I see world through my eyes only.... so what if that makes me feel good about the world and about myself, that serves the purpose.........

I am not talking sense. Stop here. End post.

I take pride in having arranged the XIth Delhi Blogger's Meet with Bill, Gareth and Julian all the way from BBC UK. The event was a gala event, one of the most significant in Delhi Blogger's community. I think for the first time The indian blogging community got such a projection at the world level. Post my interview with bbc they have linked the Delhi Bribe Rates Blog on the main BBC page. Since then the blog has been getting a tremendous traffic inflow from US and UK. I can't ever fully thank Ankur enough for associating me with this Birbe delhi Blog. I owe it to him. When I said that to him he said but had you not arranged and attended the meet it wouldn't have got the hype it got. True. We both kinda have complimented each other.

Mean while the BBC Radio show Digital Planet went on air today with Me, Twilight Fairy, the professional Blogger Amit Agarwal, Snigdha aka Encounter Specialist, Mayabhushan and Monica talking to Gareth the presenter of the show. The event was attended by around 30 Bloggers in Delhi.

The entire edition of Tuesday's Digital Planet show can be downloaded as a MP3 File of 11MB size from here

The highlight of both the event and the show was this culture of blogger's meeting up in person. A culture very unique amongst internet users in the Indian Metro and also amongst bloggers accross the globe. As Gareth said the blogger's were trapped in their respective homes and then one fine day they decided to meet and actually quite like it.

Next highlight is Bill's understanding of the Indian Blogging community. Inspite of being the blogging expert of UK he wansn't here as an expert, rather he was here to have some cultural exchange with young and vibrant people in indian blogging community and this is what he says after he met us, "It’s too easy to have a western technocratic view of the world, and having to defend my views in front of this articulate, argumentative and skilled group of practitioners was great exercise." One of the major difference that emerged out of the discussion was that we, Indian bloggers, don't, as of now use the blog as a medium for net activism, as much as they do in US or UK. We have much more variety of bloggers writing about hundreds of things from being personal to public. One of the reason behind this could be (a) that we have other effective media to exercise our freedom of expression, (b) We are other wise also talking about politics and rights issues so blogging need not be the only medium to inititate movement.

Amit Agarwal was undoubtedly another interesting part in the meet. He is a an IITian who quit his job to take up full time blogging. Makes some couple of thousands of dollars per month, "more than what he could have earned in an MNC", he says, just by bloggin.

The show digital planet also featured, the election commission of India whihc has been since long using electronic voting machines.

More later......

I happen to know this person through Yahoo Messenger who is married, is a father to a daughter, loves both of them truly but is looking for one night stands without having any strings attached. When asked why such weird desire he says coz he can't ask his wife to fulfill his fantasies.

I see a social problem in him. Sex is one of the biggest truth of nature after probably death. Nothing else is as certain as the desire and need for sex between humans, animals, plants and all other organisms. It comes so naturally to us that to try to fight with our sexual urges and curb them down would be an act extremely against the order of nature. Good sex they say can keep a persons body and mind healthy and just as lack of vitamis and minerals affects our health, non availibility of a medium to satisfy our sexual urges also affects our mental and physical health. This is so because the sexual urge that we have is a part of the many systems that works in our body. We have been given these glands which would natually secrete hormones and when that happens our body reacts natually to it. This is all chemistry.

When two people get married, of all the things they promise, they also promise, whether directly or impliedly, to fulfill this most natural need of each other. But in India sex is such a taboo that a man who might be more sexually charged than his wife is actually ashamed of it.

In our culture even husband wives can't talk bout sex. Not only that, some times we have such stupid traditions making sex more and more a topic of shame and indecency. In joint families the bolted door to a couple's room is supposed to be opened up early morning before the elderly members of the family wakes up. They have to pretend they didn't do it last night. Particularly for the bahu it is a matter of embarrassment if she is still with her husband behind closed doors when rest of the family has woken up.

Another weird habit is the hush hush tone we use when a woman is found to be expecting a baby. Why? Because the fact that she is expecting makes it evident that they did it...... duh.... Otherwise the people in the house were under the impression that the couple were just kidding themselves......... So we have these stupid cliched movie scenes where this wife is getting all red blushing to such extremity that I don't even know how to explain, while she break the news of her pregnancy to the family members and to top it all, to her own husband. I mean what on earth is there to be embarrassed of or blush...

This guy never fully told me what his fantasies are so I don't know how weird they are but whatever it is, I feel he shouldn't have any hesitations to ask for it from his wife. If she is ok with it, nothing can be better, if she isn't, they can talk about it, think over it, try to find some way out, may be see a therapist. But here we have him thinking its gonna be indecent on his part to talk about sex with his own wife and therefore indulging in adultery.

I have noticed this in some traditional bengali families that once the children are in their teen age and the parents are in mid 40s they cease to sleep together in the same room. It is considered indecent to give out this impression in front of the rest of the people in the house including the grown up kids, that the parents still enjoy their marital intercourse. How unnatural is that. I just don't get it.

I know this guy for more than 6-7 months now and yes our chat conversation did start when he popped up my PC with this proposal of his. He didnt want to talk about anything else, didn't even want to know anything about me or my life, just wanted an answer to his proposal in Yes or No. Being the smooth talker that I am, I managed to start talking and since then we been talking. And over time I found out he is actually a nice guy and not some pervert, is sensitive, caring, responsible, intelligent, loves his wife and would never want to hurt her...but then why?
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Lemme ask this question to all of you here.... do you think this person is an one off case or do you think there are many such persons around...... just that they don't talk bout it honestly........?? And do you have a sexual fantasy that you are embarrassed of?

With a spectacular Charm and a brilliant smile he is every woman's dream come true and yet he isn't the one for you...or may be you aint the one for him.

A little loud...some times rude too...but at least no pretentions...that's the first impression that will probably be built by him on you, a man whose every move is not guided by how much attention he can seek from the gorgeous girl in view. A man who can be friend with anybody and everybody in just a hello, a man who belongs to a group and yet keeps his identity aloof, someone who listens to everyone, tries to help, but seldom talks about himslef, and yet keeps asserting he is the GOD.

Long after he has gone his smile still remains fresh in your mind. Every time you call him, you are greeted with a wide smile which you can actually hear over the phone, and a long hiiiiii, he makes you feel good that you called. He is very busy but he tries to keep in touch with the large number of friends he has... he allots his time accordingly, some of his freinds keep calling him and complaining "You never call" he says "Sorry, I should call, will call" and then tries to manage his time again.

He is someone who you know is gonna be a friend forever but he is some one who you can not keep to yourself for too long... he is someone who belongs to the whole world and yet doesn't belongs to anyone... he is always on the run, talks and walks fast, like a butterfly you just can't catch him. He comes like a flash of light, brightening up your ngiht, but you get so little of him and you always long for more.

He doesn't really know what love is, yet he is looking for that eternal love and cause he learnt it over the years that it doesnt exists, he will do all he can to deny that he is looking for it....

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If you just change all the *He* to *She* you'll get me........
One small tiny step at a time...everything seems to be blurred.....

The XIth DBM went great. Here is keeping a track of all the write ups and pics of the event...till the the time the official blog is updated... I can update the blog since I have the password now, unless of course they have changed it... but the original creator of that blog has issues with me updating his blog...so I won't. Apparently its better not to update it at all than let me do the so very needful.

The latest edition of Digital Planet is a special edition on Delhi the Indian Capital. We, Delhi bloggers were expecting the meet will be covered by Julian and his team in this edition and admittedly there is a slight disappointment when it didnt so happen. But then they have put a pic of our meet on the program and well, let's say a photograph is worth a million words. Besides of course Bill himself has extensively blogged about his first visit to India, his visit to hardware market Nehru Place, the blog meet., the old city etc. He also have so generously named me in his blog and also linked me. I am so happyyyyy.

BBC UK
Twilight Fairy
Solzaire's first step in Delhi blogging Community
Great pics taken by Amit Aggarwal's
Paavani's Account
Amit Verma
Varun's accout
Ashish Kumar
Asit Ranjan Mishra
Mayank Chauhan

For the pics of the DBM visit our Flickr Account.
Delhi Blogger's Group on Flickr

XIth Delhi Blogger's Meet

Time again for the Delhi Blogger's Meet and this time I made it a real special one. It all started with just some 4-5 lines of mail written by Julian Siddle to me...I took it up from there. Told him when he comes we would have a blogger's meet and here it goes.

We would have Julian, Gareth Mitchell and Bill Thompson, all the way from BBC UK, with us.

Julian is the producer of BBC World Service Technology programme Digital Planet. Gareth is the presenter of the same show. They would be here to shoot a special edition of the program, on India. Culture of Blogs in India is an area Julian would be particularly looking at and would be trying to find answers to questions like "Do you have a particular view on the use or effectiveness of your blogs? What do you think about the use of IT in India or its potential? The country is often seen as being in the grip of a technological boom, is this the case from your experience?"

Bill is one of Britain's leading authorities on blogging and Net activism and advises the EU. He has a regular column on the BBC's website. Bill would be here to share with us his expertise over the subject that connects all of us here...Blogging and also Net activism. Inviting all the Blogger's in and around of Delhi to be a part of this special Meet.

Date: Saturday, 6th May 2006
Venue : The Amphitheater, India Habitat Center, Lodhi Road, New Delhi
Time: 6pm
RSVP : Me @ the Comments section here
Participation: All you old and new, fast and furious, slow and steady, arose and awakened, dreaming and dormant bloggers out there...

Please confirm your participation in advance.

This is one of the hardest thing to do...and I could never do it properly.

To know everything you want is right there infront of you and not being able to reach out and have them. And yet not being able to get over it and move on. You don't stop wishing you could have them, you don't stop wishing and praying, you know there is no hope and still you try to hold on to that weak string of hope... Has it ever happened to you?

This is what is happening to me these days... And I can't even fully write about it here cause some one reads this blog quite regularly... Although that is the purpose of this blog, here I say things, which I can't say at your face.

I don't know what to do?
Wait and watch?
Get over and move on?
Express?

I too was trying out and then I found something which is like the best I could ever afford to have, now I want to stop trying and zero in on this thing that I have found. Again, that's what 'I' want.
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Life otherwise is going great...been partying almost every weekend. Thanks to all the special friends, specially you ES. After a real long time I once again have friends in my life. Otherwise I am mostly surrounded with a crowd. we make a great group and its fun to be with all you guys RM, YD, AG, AB.
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The Delhi Bloggers Meet is happening once again and this time it is really special for me. Life takes such unpredictable turns... just at the wake of me completing one year in blogging I got this mail from one Julian Siddle from BBC UK. Apparently Julian got my email ID through one of the Community Blogs that I am a part of. He is coming down to India to shoot a special edition of his program Digital Planet and wanted to get in touch with me and my blogging coleagues (that's how he wrote in his mail) to get an idea bout the blog culture here in India.

The mail took me completely by surprise. It once again (previous being the AIMC Seminar) puts me under the spotlight so far as blogging is concerned. Both the community blog was started by Ankur and he has more number of posts on them. Both of us have our mail ids up there, it probably was just a matter of chance that they contacted me. And here I am coordinating the meet with everybody asking me, "how did you manage to get BBC on the event?" Everyone around speculating all the high funda connections I must be having in BBC.

I could finally get the password to DBM's official blog. Ever since Harneet left the group it hasn't being properly updated. Will do it hence forth. Have already done the necessary updates. Why do I do all these I don't know. I guess I just assumed, for no reason, that I am the moderator of this group. I was nothing more than just another member who joined the list via the blog and there started yet another eventful chapter in my biography. The fight over the name Delhi Blogger's Meet with Shivam Vij and Co., the differences with Harneet, the then moderator, his exit from the group, his exit being blamed upon me by Amitken......and more.....and then all was calm followed by some low profile meets attended by few new joinees. The January meet was good though and hopefully this forthcoming meet too would have some good participation.
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The dilemma about choosing between all the available options in my career has come to an end and I am joining Partners for Law in Development tomorrow. Its a legal NGO. We are into social mobilization, capacity building training in Law for development executive, lobbying, PILs etc.

I realised the first option that of joining a corporate as a legal executive won't work... They just don't like my profile and I don't like theirs. My 3 months work in FS was the worst period of my career and I don't wanna go back to a corporate structure again.

The next option, starting independent practice..... that's not easy. Its a task getting a client and then proving your credibility to him. All litigants are apprehensive about a young lawyer. Besides, I have acquired the habit of advising people to appear themselves, in front of the court instead of wasting money in hiring a lawyer, wherever it is technically so allowed. I have been cautioning my friends about the various crooked means these lawyers adhered to...to extract every bit of money from the client. Two people's fight... which ends when both of them loose, one looses his money and the other looses the case, cannot be the source of my income. I would take up cases when I see some serious miscarraige of justice happening. As I get some time I'd take up some of the women's cell cases. Till then litigation would only be part time.

The third option....joining a law firm. I have been plain unlucky in this... or may be destiny have something else decided for me. This is a profession of cut throat competition. Here both the employer and the employee pay and they both earn. Only those juniors are taken in a law firm who can pay....... either by their contacts in the judiciary (the law firm gets the verdict in favour) or in the corporate world (the firm gets heavy pocketed clients). I don't have any such contacts. Neither does dad have. Dad is a one person who doesn't even belongs to this world..he lives in his own world. He doesn't keeps in touch. He doesnt know how to build contacts and keep and optimise them. He has served 40 years in the Government of India and have been througout surrounded by lawyers and yet he doesn't have contacts. In the past 2-3 years I have visited quite a few of the Delhi's Elite lawyers but none of them have been too keen to take me in their firms. I have been inflexible myself as well... have always been maintaining I don't wanna do Exise and Customs cases..... and most of these lawyers I have visited were experts in Customs and Exise. So, no luck in law firms.

Finally, the socio-legal side. A field I am passionate about, a field that allows me to work as per my rules, allows me to be creative, to take initiatives... a work where I get to travel and meet people, where I work not only from my mind but from my heart... The NGO Sector is a sector where I have good contacts, I have so many people who knows and appreciates me, I have great recommendation letters from firms like MSI. This is my place. This is where I would be.
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The new workplace is 30 km away from home. The perfect reason for me to move out. Have already spoken to mom and dad. They are not happy but they don't see any option. I am quite determined this time. Would start looking for a one room set soon and then........
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Lawyers don't win or loose...the clients do

Phew........

Today 10th of April marks the completion of one of year of my active blogging....(huh big deal)

As I was going through my old post I realised in this one year life has come to a full circle and am back at square one...once again stuck with that same diealma

This one year of blogging has made remarkable changes in my life....blogging is by far the best chance event of my life...gotta say a lot about it...will do later...
Meanwhile here I repost my debut post...

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Sunday, April 10, 2005

This is my first post, i am trying out this blog to share my strange but wonderful, bizarre but happy life with everyone out there. I have seen 28 winters so far. Although not very successful and happening but my life has been great a roller coaster ride so far and i am pretty sure i have a lot of interesting things to share. i take life as an experience and an experiment. i constantly thrive for change and novelty. i havent met many people of my type and hope to meet them thru my blog. if any one out there finds my posting interesting get in touch.

All of u watch out for this space cause you gonna get a peep in my life and its gonna be a one heck of an experience.

Truth is stranger than Fiction. I strongly believe in these lines. I also have done some value addition to it. Truth not only is stranger but can also be far more scary and bewildering than fiction. Whosoever said these words must have been a person as bewildered and confused as I am trying to handle truth.

What is ‘truth’? Its something that’s there, has occurred or is occurring right at this moment. I was born is a truth, the earth is revolving is also a truth. Something that’s bound to occur - truth. For eg. Sun shall rise tomorrow, or the water in the ocean shall still be there tomorrow. Truth is sometimes known to us. Things we know as a matter of fact or matter of our senses. Rose smells sweet is a truth. Sky is blue is a truth. It can be a combination of things we know and we don’t. JFK died. He was murdered, a truth who killed him? We don’t know. But someone did kill him that’s the truth even though we would never know who.

Coming to ‘Fiction’. Fiction is something that we imagine. Free from all inhibitions. There is no limit to how much one can tread into the world of imagination. I am free to imagine that I was born with wings but my parents thought it wouldn’t be a good idea have such a charming daughter with wings so they snapped them off. So I wont fly away. I can also imagine that one fine day I wake up and find that I live in a room with walls made of roses roof made of silvery grey clouds and floor made of turquoise water. Strange it is.

How strange can our thought process become while we create a fictitious world. I can throw a challenge to one and all. I’ll give all of you a situation and then will ask you to make your imagination run as wild as you possibly can. Lets see how strangely can you think. Then in the end I will tell you my truth. Truth that I can bet will defy all fiction. Truth that you haven’t read in books, or read in mythologies and legends, truth that no poet wrote about or no painter painted.
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I still have'nt written about this truth. Will do.

My Favourite Men

Aamir Khan

A man who has always stayed away from the media, rarely attended a Celebrity Show, be it awards or other cause, in the past decade, his movies comes after a gap of 3-4 long years, he endorses just few products........and yet is always ruling the Indian Movie Goers mind. In an industry where you are only as good as your last release, where no one remembers if you don't stay on the charts, where there is Shah Rukh Khan is the king and Amitabh Bacchan is God...Aamir has managed to grab a place so special, so high up above, so strong...that he is beyond all comparison.



In one of the Coca Cola Ads.

There's just nothing that can beat this man. A self made success, if I have a role model that's him.

Robert Deniro

He needs no introduction, if there is any actor in Hollywood who is synonymous to versatality that is him. From being funny to scary to romantic to satanic he has done it all with equal ease and style . Can't get enough of him...



Aka Don Vito Corleone. I think I liked God Father II more than part I because of Robert.


And that's his famous famous pose..."I am watching ya"

Tom Cruise

The ultimate good looks. I can't ever fully explain how good looking do I find him. Ok I know he isn't the tall dark handsome kinds...but there is something about him...simply irresistable...and some how I feel he is a great person too...

Oh c'mon isn't this the most good looking face on earth?

As Lt. Daniel Kaffee in "A Few Good Men". This is the time when he looks blankly at nothing giving that one last thought in his mind "This is it, I have to do this" before he puts Col Jessup on the Stands...
One of the reasons I like him so much is because he played both of my favourite male charecters for all times past and present. Lt. Daniel Kaffee and Jerry Maguire.

Ronan Keating

Was in my late teens when I first heard Boyzone's cover of 'words'. There opened a door to a new world. The romance with these 5 Irish Hearthrob continued for 5-6 years. We went through a lot of ups and downs, been through love and hate...

Those were different days back then, Channel V and MTV weren't colored basanti yet, they used to air informal inteveiews, biographies, News...Me and my sister used to do late nights to watch the MTV Indonesia Programs....everything about them was of concern...from their toe nail to their pet cat, their girl friend, parents....it was crazy....

Ronan inarguably the most talented of the bunch flied solo one day...my focus gradually concentrated on him alone...and is till date one of my fav singer.


Ronan has associated with quite a few big dadys in the industry, his first album had a collaboration with Bryan Adams "Its the way you make me feel". The Fourth album which contains the past hits had him collaborating with Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens) on Father and Son

However, inspite of hits like "when you say nothing at all", "Life is a Roller Coaster".... Ronan has a long way to go. Personally, I think he has got excellent vocals and would sure make a mark for himself some day.

And oh yeah he is one hunky guy too....... :P

And finally 'You'

Coming outta that dream world.........

Lemme talk bout the first man in my life whom I have looked at and felt he can be the one I can spent the rest of my life with. No, not in love yet, no butterflies in stomach or anywhere either, just find him special. If there is anything called "liked a lot at first sight" its that. Just known him for 2 months now, but we happen to connect great we both like each other. What next?

I don't know. Ideally I would want to be into a realtionship, a commitment, see each other for couple of months and then may be ask him "where are we going?" At the moment would want to be a little more than just friends..... But then we want so many things in life, how many do we get, and we only get what we are destined to........

A good friend common to both of us have been giving him these hints bout what I have in mind, hints to such extent that even a donkey would know who is she talking bout....

him - tell me who is she
my friend - She is one of x y and z
him - is it x
my friend - No its certainly not x
him - and it certainly can't be y
my friend - then who is left?
him - [silence]

Tell me do you still need to hear it from me. Why do you wanna know? What will you do? Did you ever ask the sun who does it shines for.....you long for the warmth of sunshine, you go get it.

I have faced rejection thrice. Twice at my face, once through one common friend. All petty crushes, I got over too soon, but what I felt while being rejected was too painful. I carry all my baggages with me. I act apprehensively. Men, I have been romantically inclined towards, have only hurt me. Most of them are too coward to face the girl from yesterday and I hate loosing friends.... I don't want to loose your friendship.

Sometimes a man can be very shy he doesn't wants to make the first move, then the girl makes the first move, he makes the second and they move on. Then there are other times when a man doesn't wanna make any move at all because he have got nothing to do with her or her feelings for him, but he would still wanna hear it from her mouth just cause it boosts there ego. I don't know which kind are you. You are too secretive about yourself and I don't wanna take a risk...No am not such a dare devil.

Every incident in my life alters one of my traits forever. Rejections made my feelings for someone reciprocative. I might have feelings for someone cause he said he have them for me. In those rare occassion when it doesn't have to be reciprocative, when I myself tend to like someone I try being extremely secretive about it. Like I mentioned in one of my previous posts I have been liking some one for more than 15 years now and he doesn't have a clue. I can't reach out. It's very difficult to seek. Am making a lot of exceptions in your case, thanks to blogging... am saying a lot. Hope you get my point.

One heart beats somewhere
One soul longs
One mind thinks
One for one
Could that be me? You ask
Don't wonder
Ask your heart
whom does it beats for?
Follow it
The twain shall meet if destined

You

If this was a perfect world, This man would have been my perfect man and we would have fallen in love so very perfectly that we would have lived happily ever after....

Thanks god this isn't a perfect world

Talking about dazenamused. I have been reading his blog for quite some time. Though he has deleted most of his previous posts now.... a darn honest dreamer, wishing every moment of his life could be that perfect moment of ecstasy.... but realising everything is just a dream not for real. Like a kid he is ready to give up everything he has for a small little nothing, say a smile on that special someone's face, but lost his innocense in being wary about every thing and being around. He tries in vain to be ruthless, to reject the extended hands, to scare away all of them...and when his defence mechanism doesn't work he sheds silent tears and burts into cruel laugh...

To you, that's what I could gather bout you from your blog...that's the way you are in my dream, don't try to correct me even if I am wrong, let it be....

Mirage, this feeling
Beware, fight it
Stop
Look behind
What did you get last time
Remember
Hope is a fool's sweetest dream

I have been loosing all hopes of ever falling in love and having a relationship. It seems the two shall never meet, my parameters of what I want from a man and his parameteres of his woman. It all seems to be a long distant dream now of meeting someone, liking him, dating him for sometime, spend some nice quality time with him, get proposed by him, actually hear the words "I love you" in a real person's voice, have those silly fights and then plant a kiss of sorry on each other's lips, those dreaming together of a home....none of these sweet nothings are ever going to happen in my life it seems.

Go f*#* yourself....

I am so sick and tired
of people throwing tantrums at me
of people taking me forgranted
of people hurting me and not even realising
of people lying to me through their teeth
sick and tired
of myself
of my silence
of my acceptance
of my not so fake smile
of that ache right in the center of my heart
of that star in my eyes
of that touch in my hands
why don't you all get it
I am for real

Some times I wish I could truely express myself. wish I could yell at the top of my voice tell you how much I hate you, tell you how I hate you for the silent tears you brought to my eyes, hate you for the way you took me forgranted and gave me crappy fundas "Expectations are wrong", I hate you for telling me you will make it upto me someday, after turning me down on a day as special as my birthday......... I hate you for lying to me through your teeth and thinking you are actually fooling me... I so want to tell you "I always knew you were lying".

I wish I could get back to you and tell you what I really think of you.... I wish I could tell "you are a coward and a hypocrite, you can't stand by your own words and you accuse me of being double minded, you have no spine, its such a pity you are ashamed of your own feelings for me, such a pity the only way you could fight with those feelings was by escapism..."| "you kept on pushing me, I told you don't start anything I am keeping romance on hold for the time being but you kept insisting, you would call, chat, meet and then one day when I ask you, you said I never caught your attention, that you were never interested in me...who are you fooling? Get a life."| "You are so full of negetivity yourself, you can hardly find anything good in others, you are sick, all you can do is sulk, fret and frown about your situation you have no guts to get up and change it and then you blame others"| "You are nothing but a parasite, you use people, all those times you were with me twas only because you needed me. You kept saying one day you'd do anything for me, today when I am telling you I am going through a bad time I need you, I don't hear from you." | "when I had expectations from you was exited bout meeting and spending time with you, you didnt have time for me, I wondered and wandared around, I passed by your door morning evening and you never had time to take me around, why should I do it for you now?

there are so many of 'you' there.... I hate all of you

but I hate the way I forget how much I despise you everytime I see or hear from you. I hate the way I smile back at you, forgive you even though you didn't seek forgiveness. I hate my silence. Hate the way I forgot everything and gave everything I had and everything I could everytime we met.

I wish I could hold grudges, wish I knew how to take revenge...there is a fire within me which wants to come out and burn everything, but it can't seem to find its way....... one day it will... trust me you can never be happy over my tears....I have that in me

"Ode to Blogging"

Yeh Kahan A gaye hum yunhi blog karte karte ……..with all the 'celebrity bloggers' of India Uncut and Desipundit out there It was me who was giving a presentation as a Resource Person in a One day Faculty Development on “New Media Concept and Applications” conducted by Apeejay Institute of Mass Communication (AIMC). I was there to speak on the topic “Blogging – Individual as a global publisher”. I had the honor of sharing the panel along with Director, SPIC MACAY, Navin CR Khilnani, Director, Educational Multimedia Research Center, IIT, Roorkee, Dr. R Sreedhar and Knowledge and Management Consultant, Sairee Chahal.

The program was attended by the faculty members of various Media, communication, tech and B-schools of Delhi and the NCR.

Dr. Sreedhar, a National Award winner for Science popularization through electronic media, have over 3 decades of experience in broadcasting. He has served with AIR, Doordarshan, IGNOU, Anna University etc. and is presently the director of Educational Multimedia Research Center, IIT, Roorkee. He spoke about ‘New Media : Radio and TV.’

His presentation started with the Radio and TV scenario we had in 1970s and how conventional interaction has evolved through the 90s, to the 21st century audio streaming, video streaming, audio on demand. Dr. Sreedhar expressed his discontent with the Government’s policy which has not been properly utilizing the power and resource of the EDUSAT launched in 2004. It has 7 transponders, 5 national beam and 5 regional beam. The national beam is being used only by IGNOU, UGC, NCERT, AICTE and ISRO. His presentation had a lot of hi funda tech talk, which I failed to follow that closely, I got the gist of it though. New and alternative media is happening big time these days with all sort of latest technology coming to India in reasonable prices. The most interesting of all these being, how interactive radio (convergence of satellite, terrestrial and IT modes) can help in disaster management and how the MS Swaminathan Reseach Foundation driven project “Information Village Research Project” in pondicherry have actually saved thousands of lives at the time of Tsunami in December 2004.

The lack of government’s initiative with new media specially in the field of education and awareness was a constant focus of Dr. Sreedhar’s speech, which was later addressed by me in my topic “Individual as a Global Publisher”. While we wait for the government to take initiative we have an individual blogger already doing all that we can.

Dr. Sreedhar’s presentation was followed by Sairee Chahal’s presentation on ‘New Media and Social Networking’. Sairee is a former journalist and a continuing academic with interest in leadership development, post soviet economies, media, social networking and knowledge Management. She has been nominated as the India representative for Central Eurasian Studies Review. Talking about social networking she runs and moderates a Network of 2000+ members on Ryze.com, namely NCR/Delhi Network.

Her presentation was quiet refreshing and informal. The participants were really interested to know more about social networking through internet. Sairee began by raising a very interesting question “how many of you here think social networking is bad?” There was a time when online networking and chatting was very tabooed and strictly prohibited for decent people. Today we have professionals who do their job earn a living through online social networking, we have professionals who don’t have a physical office and conduct their business entirely through communication on virtual world, their infrastructure, Laptop and GPRS/broadband.

The presentation mainly focused on how the way the various business network, social network sites work. There are about 200 of such networking sites, the most prominent being Ryze, LinkedIn, Orkut, Friendster, live journal, Yahoo Groups, etc. Interesting questions were raised like, a virtual community survives on the profile of its members or the content? How does the networking site owners make money, how can the moderator of the community make money, how do you control the spammers, why are the offline meets important when it’s an online community etc. The resource persons and Swagat Sen, Faculty member, AIMC who also was the coordinator of the program collectively answered all questions. “I owe my friendship with both Swagat and Sairee to one of the Ryze offline meets which we Ryzers call a ‘Mixer’, an important trivia on social networking which I immediately shared with everyone there.

When you talk about online social network how can blogging be far. Curious minds were already talking bout blogging in between Sairee’s speech making the perfect timing for me to begin my topic.

I too had a very refreshing and interactive presentation. The participants were as unaware as they were curious about blogging. The focus of my speech was individual’s power, role and freedom when it comes to publishing a little piece of his mind in the web. ‘Blogging’ an individual’s revolt against the fourth estate’s privilege, editor’s political monopoly, publisher’s economic convenience. Blogging a businessman’s platform to reach out to his customer, interact with them heart to heart, an artist’s platform to showcase his work, no more holding costly exhibitions, a non-techie’s answer to a software guy, “HTML isn’t the key dude, I have push button publishing”. Blogging an introvert’s paradise, an extrovert’s paradise too…coz he just can’t have enough of talking so is blogging, a loner’s ‘dear diary’, a community for net-workers….there is just no end to what you can do on a blog.

My speech was also followed by a live demonstration of my blogs, the Ryze network the Yahoo groups, blog service provider sites like http://www.blogger.com/, how to create a blog in 3 easy steps. Also featured were Tsunami blog by Peter griffin , personal blog of Encounter Specialist Pradster, Desipundit, Delhi Blogger’s community blog etc. Talking about individual’s stand in the web I started my demonstration by doing a google search of my name. My blog “This is my truth” was at # 1 in the search results. We have companies who work hard just to get that. And here I had my name at the # 1 position for almost no efforts of mine.

Some very interesting questions came up in the Q & A session. How much space is allowed to the blogger? Unlimited. What is the validity period for a blog? Infinity. Cost? Free. People were actually amazed by the answer, one of them just couldn’t believe it. “You mean once I open a blog its there till infinity unless I myself delete it? And you mean it could be as big as I want? Well yes unless your blog service provider goes bankrupt or their server crashes etc.

The Apple people were there to demonstrate the way pod-casting works, which was pretty cool. Its amazing what all you can do. Record an entire session of lecture and publish it. Record a presentation and publish the voice, the video and the power point file all at one go.

The finale was by Naveen Khilnani, the director of SPICMACAY talking about how SPICMACAY and other NGOs have been using the new media to promote their activities. Due to time constraint his speech was cut short a little and he mostly spoke about the Digital Heritage Laboratory (DHL) : Using Innovatvie Media Technology to Spread Cultural Awareness. DHL is a project undertaken by SPIC MACAY in association with IIT Delhi. It is meant to provide the first few steps in the cultural education system using the latest in technology. Under this project, an apple computer equipped media laboratory located in IIT Delhi has been made available to any and everybody willing to use it for any project related to the promotion of Indian culture and heritage.

With these wonderful thoughts of Naveen regarding our cultural music and art and heritage the weird jargons that we were listening since 9.30 in the morning were finally taking a backseat.

The day ended with distribution of certificate to the participants and souvenirs to the resource person. They gave me “The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari” I am a lawyer remember. This is the first time I gave away certificates. So far I have only received certificates. 'Twas something special for me.

My heartfelt thanks to Swagat for making me a part of it of this wonderful event.

When I started I didn’t know where I was going…now I know it was one of the best ‘chance’ things that happened to me…Blogging.

Its been so long that I got tagged...Finally responding

Was tagged by Beautiful and Insane by the same tag...and if I am not too wrong the most popular one recently... 8 points of a perfect Lover am making it 10 somehow just can't do in 8.

Target - Male
availability - haven't found him yet

1. He should be intelligent and cultured.
   
2. Should have a brain that thinks a mind that opines and speaks a heart that listens. He should have a thought process, should have a strong set of believes and should respect his believes... its immaterial whether I believe in what he believes in or not...
   
3. Should be sympathetic, kind, considerate and helpful.
4. Should be an extrovert and a crowd puller.
5. Should not be judgmental, should not be fussy, should not crib, fret or frown.
6. Should be strong mentally and physically. I like being taken care of...I like being scolded when I do something stupid
7. Should be adventurous and sporty. I have a fantasy of going on adventure trek with my lover...we trek throughout the day and make love in the night...we explore nature together... we leave behind the world and remember just each other.
8. He should be honest and open. I don't like people who keep a lot of secrets. And one single incident of lie is enough to blow up a life time of love and affection
   
9. This one might sound strange but he should be possessive about me coz I am gonna be possessive about him. I should mean the world to him (and should definately mean more than his mom to him)
   
10. And the award goes to..... he should be passionate...about anything...preferably me...but will do even if he is passionate bout his car, his books, his work, his hobbies, his believes.
    

So there goes....the perfect menu to jeopardise all chances of a marriage :D

Am not tagging anyone except my Sister coz this thing has become passe I believe.

Beautiful and Insane, I did it at last better late than never what say? Thanks for tagging :)

Some times you gotta give a little piece of your mind to people.........lest they start taking you too forgranted. I went to Nagpur for an interview in an NGO. They have sent me an offer letter yesterday and this is what I mailed them today...........Read on........

Dear Madam,

This is to let you know that I have received your offer letter for the post of Documentalist. I have to regretfully mention here that the amateurish way in which the interview process have been handled so far by your organization is not expected from an Esteemed organization like YUVA.

As you are aware I had applied for and was called for the interview for the post of Project Coordinator, Para Legal Studies. I applied for the said post given my particular interest, field level experience and expertise over the subject 'Para Legal Studies'. In the face to face interview dated 7th February 2006 with the Executive Director it was deduced that my inability to follow Marathi Language is the only hindrance as far as Documentation of the Project Activities were concerned. Given my Legal Background, my personal contacts with the socio-legal experts and my work experience I am confident I could have contributed exceptionally to the project 'Para Legal Studies' and taken it to a higher level.

However it seems there has been a misunderstanding between what I thought you were looking for in the candidate and what you were actually looking for. As per our telephonic conversation post interview I was told by you that I do not have enough experience of documentation, it is surprising that you are now offering me a post of Documentalist, a post for which I did not apply. I also do not understand why would the organization need an Advocate with almost 4 years of experience for the post of Documentalist.

Further, it seems there has been a communication gap regarding the remuneration. I had clearly mentioned my expectation, so as to avoid any confusion in the later stage, and decided to come down for the interview to Nagpur only after you agreed to offer a package of Rs. ******/-.

Everybody's time is precious. If we do not have clear perceptions and proper focus everybody's time shall be wasted. It seems YUVA's perceptions regarding the Post, the pre-requisite qualifications, the job profile and the remuneration was not very clear.

I hope we associate with each other for a more appropriate post and project in the future.

Please Forgive my Honesty.

Thanks and Regards

Going through a strange feeling today.

Going out to a weekend trip to Jim Corbett National Park with the Lets Go group. This is our first backpacking. Mostly new members are going the original members have long disassociated themselves from the group. I wasn't also bothering to initiate any activity...couldn't think of anyone to form a enjoyable team... Suddenly these new bunch of nice super-active enthusiastic guys have joined the group, Snigdha along with these new people arranged the trip...I am very exited...love these kinda trips...

But there is one thought in mind, one feeling...apprehension...of loss. Whenever I go out to such trips I find someone special, last it was Shashant, before that it was Munish...we start of great..become inseperable on the trip...as if we were friends for years...but then at the end of the trip I can never hold on to whatever I found...

Munish never spoke to me after we returned from Vizag, I never asked he never said anything. We continued being at the same organisation sitting next to each other for another month but we never spoke...He again joined my next organisation worked there of one whole month...we pretended to be strangers..still remember that day when I was missing the good old days, was feeling low, keeping quiet...Manoj figured out something was worng with me and kept insisting to know what was it...I told him "I am missing someone I lost", he offered all sort of help to find out my lost property, "who is he? you have his number? Give me, I will talk to him, your other friends must be having contacts with him... what happened, how can you people not even be in talking terms..." All the while Munish was standing right next to us and Manoj didn't have a clue...That's the bizzare truth of my life I keep referring to....wonder what would have been Manoj's reaction if I would have told him the person who we were talking about was standing right next to us...

With Shashant, I kept on thinking what can go wrong, what is going to screw this friendship up...couldn't figure out anything...but then he was based in Bombay when we met...and Now he is in Dubai, although we are as close as we can be and keep in touch through messenger but its never the same given the distance...

Today once again I am going through this feeling, what is it that is going to screw us up? Met this guy couple of days back...we are going on the trip together. He is just the kind of guy I get along well...Of what I know him, fits into the definition of my ideal man perfectly, is based in Delhi, we have become good friends, I know we gonna have a good time in the trip, but then what will that be which will ruin everything...i know there will be something...just wonder what

Writing this post just to reaffirm how short lived and predictable is the end of all my relationships...will come back and write how and what screwed up... Going for something knowing its never gonna last....such an act of bravery, which I do all the time.
------------------------------
Addendum (Post Corbett Trip)

Surprisingly, nothing went wrong, nothing got screwed...and nothing went overboard either.
Current Mood : Happy
Health : Not well
-------------------------------
Addendum II (3rd March 2006)

Writing this blog has become a risky affair. A lot of people who know me personally are also reading my blog. Its not a good idea to write just about any and everything cause people ask questions. The guy bout which I am talking in this post has raised quite a few eyebrows and some major curiosity amongst the Corbett trippers...who is this guy?? I promised the fellow trippers I would put up a clarification but now when I am actually adding this addendum, I am thinking why should I put up an explanation? For what purpose? Only that much is meant to be public as much as I write rest.......all the readers are free to assume whatever they want to......for the simple reason that it doesn't matter........doesn't matter who he is that guy? doesn't matter what I am feeling? Doesn't matter anything to anybody, not even to that guy... Its not the same person the one you met in real and the one you meet here on the blog....so don't try to relate the two...

So don't wonder and don't ask me anything either...

Autobiography...in bits and pieces

Having read this ...

A lot of music lovers here (where doesn't matter) have been entertained by one talented singer called Adnan Sami. I have liked his songs once in a while too...But there is some thing about him that bothers me. His music videos.

Quite a few number of his video features him and some of the most gorgeous bollywood actresses in an romantic atmostphere singing and dancing. Adnan is exceptionally overweight. And the actresses are obviously have figures. Now this fact, about our entertainment industry, that beauty of a woman is directly co related to her vital statistics and it just doesn't matter how good is the body of her male counterpart is, disturbs me. Just try to recall have you ever seen a fat female been paired with a worked out male. Why can't these video directors get real..if you gotta feature amisha patel why not put Hrithik against her...why Adnan...or better still feature me next to Adnan

Women is to beauty and men is to money. Why do we have this concept. I am a survey person. Research and survey is my hobby and I got it from my own tryst with this thing men say "Beauty is not the main thing". Oh c'mon, it so is. I used to believe it earlier and then I was disillusioned. Once, and then, and then again and again. Finally I got tired...

{Flash Back}

I have always known I am one of the ugliest people born. At least I, haven’t seen a face, uglier than mine. Am not doing self pity. Am just aware of the truth. A fact is a fact. And ya, there have been times when I have been a little upset about this fact but that’s not self pity. I am proud of myself in quite many ways and I know I am an wonderful person.

Right from that age when we start having petty crushes on the opposite sex I knew my life is not gonna be the same as every other girl. In those days when I was in my teens we didn’t have this parallel universe called internet. At that time, Co-ed Schools, Tuition classes, morning/evening walks in the neighborhood park, social gatherings, common parties, neighborhood activities, religious get-togethers these were the places where teen age kids used to meet and express their interest in each other. Exchange of sweet gestures, a glance or two or may be a flower. A pink letter written in innocent hand writing saying “I see you on your way to school everyday, can we be friends?” Come Valentine’s day, Rose day, Friendship day and I used to see these cute girls hiding flowers, stuff toys, greeting cards in their school bag. I used to see their joyful, victorious smile. “I am one rose up you” they used to smug. None of these ever happened to me. Presumably for the simple reason that from a distance just by looking at me no one was interested. Of course if one comes close to me gets to know me I am one of the most fascinating person. But then in teens who tries to get to know. I knew this and I had accepted the way things were. I was never too lonely to bother about it anyway.

I studied in a Girls school and a Girls college so all through the best days of my life I only had female friends. By the way, to all parents, it isn’t a very advisable thing for any kid. Anyway so we used to have a big group of friends. All cool n bindaas girls and I used to be the leader of the pack. Was everybody’s Sanju Boss. But before even Sanju Boss had her day I used to be a shy introvert kid hugely suffering from inferiority complex. Eventually I realized I wasn’t meant to catch attention easily, knew I had to be different to get that. And there started a never-ending eccentricity of being off track. I started breaking out of the usual patterns. 9^th Standard onwards was born Sanju Boss, hated by the good students (the winners), liked by the mediocre students (the runner ups) and worshiped by the back benchers (the loosers) I was and am the Leper Messiah.

To be more precise there happened an incident to trigger this change, some thing happened, something that changed my life, for good.

I had liked this guy for some couple of years. A neighborhood guy I used to always watch him play cricket in the colony ground. For couple of years I only liked him and then I felt this urge of being with him. I am comfortable doing this. I can go on liking someone without ever telling him. There is this man, the most good looking guy I have ever seen, I have been admiring him, his good looks, his mannerisms, his style his everything for almost 16 years now and he doesn’t have a clue. He is Nitai…would talk about him some other day.

So I liked this guy and have now decided to tell him that. I have always played an agony aunt to all my friends. Have helped them write love letters, doing the ground work by giving the guy a call and talk, you know we didn’t have sms and chat those days. Of course I didn’t get any kind of help from them when it was my turn, which is understandable, if they knew how to help they would have helped themselves. So what I did is write a letter to this guy, Jaspal, in the best of my handwriting, actually put it in a pink envelop and post it to his friend, Ashwini’s address. The letter carried my feelings for Jaspal, said, “I like you and would want to be with you. Can you please meet me on so and so date, outside my school, after my school is over?” But it didn’t reveal my identity. For that he had to meet me. I can still feel the mental unrest that I was going through while I was writing, affixing the stamp, dropping it in the letter box. That evening, standing in my balcony, I saw him reading the letter and his friends circling around him, every heartbeat was like the beating of drums…every moment was passed in a strange sensation.

Finally, the day came, 7^th of Jan. He and Ashwini was there in front of the main gate of my school. Since morning that day I had written another letter to him to be handed over when we meet in person. Can’t remember what all did this letter contain, the main point was “I am ready for a rejection and this is what I have to say to you while you reject…” and I remember it was something very emotional, had poured my heart out on paper.

Feets trembling, butterflies in stomach, throat drying up, voice weakening body still some how managed to walk up to him, extending my hands for a shake and with a wide smile on my face I spoke in a shivering voice “hi it was me who wrote that letter calling you here”. He didn’t shook hands. He gave me a look of disgust. My hands were still extended and the smile still there…I said, “can we be friends?” He didn’t say anything but shook his head in negation. I pulled my hands back tried to hold on to the smile, which was about to vanish. I held out the letter I had written, he wasn’t ready to take it. Ashwini took the letter and I just ran away from there and got into my school bus. I don’t know if rejection feels the same way to all…I was shattered. For almost a month my life was in ruins. I wanted to hide my face from him and everybody else who is related to him. It felt like I was raped. Humiliation. I never wanted to stay in that locality anymore. I started walking with my heads down. I used to cover my face as much as I could with my muffler when he was around. I lost appetite, couldn’t concentrate on my studies, all I could do was feel ashamed of myself, hate myself, curse myself for making a self mockery in front of him and his friends. Gradually I realize he has been decent enough to not make it public, and if at all he made it public may be his friends were decent enough to not give me that look, “oh she is the girl”.

A month later when I started getting back into normal routine, I wrote an entry in my diary. “I would never ever do it again. I would try to be a daughter my dad would be proud of. No more of this non-sense… I would never ever think of this stupid romance thing.” Incidentally dad read that entry and said, “I am glad you didn’t even give me an opportunity to scold ya”.

Everything changed after that. For years altogether I never had another crush. I killed the shy girl in me. Girls aren’t supposed to have crushes and fall for guys. It’s them who are supposed to fall for us… “Fall, keep falling, go deep down as deep as you can, never rise up again, I don’t give a damn, got no time for ya, you ain’t the only one falling for me and certainly you don’t deserve me.”

But I couldn’t keep my promise. Fell for another guy…

{Fash Back Ends}

I have now picked up this habit of surveying how many more men invariably say it and they invariably don't follow it. Like I said, research and survey is like my hobby

My Survey tool - Yahoo Messenger, Email, telephone, cell phone, sms, my Blogs, internet portals...etc.. Some of my Case Studies coming up. More tryst with the men kind also coming up.

29th Birthday

Morning

Hi, its my birth day tody. Cool. So whats the plan for the evening. No plans. I am going through the usual feel-low-on-birthday syndrome. Birthday is always a day which makes me feel low. It reminds me of all the things I wanted to achieve by this date but failed…of all those people who have forgot me, those who don’t keep in touch anymore, of all the friends who are there but don’t care to arrange a party for me, of people whose birthday I remember but who forgot to even wish me, of my singlehood…birthday is basically a day of bad remembrance.

Ideally friend's should be celebrating the fact that I was born, rather than I myself arrange a party call everybody and tell them hey guess what? I was born let's celebrate. And my friends, forget about celebration they won't even get a gift for me if I don't throw a party. And I am not throwing a party for such friends any more. Not all of them though, I'd say Snigdha and kreeti are exceptions.

Sis didn't wish. Asked Dino out yesterday and he turned me down. Haven't wished me yet. Me going out alone somewhere now...would come back and frown more about my syndrome
----------------------------------------
One memorable birthday

There was this time when I had a huge crush on this guy Sujit. I thought it was love back then, though now when I look back, I don’t think it was. Anyway, so he didn’t wish me all through the day. I was sad. Do I not deserve this much? I asked myself in the evening. Just when my eyes were about to be wet the landline rang and I picked up the phone. It was him on the line asking for the location of my house. He was there for me with a surprise visit and a nice gift. I was overwhelmed. “I love surprises” I had told him earlier. I wanted to run and hug him when I opened the door. Madhu and her then boyfriend (now husband) came over too. We had a small party.

Sujit got married lives at a distance of 15 min from my place. Haven’t seen him for more than 4 years now. I remember his birthday every year. Wonder if he remembers mine.
-----------------------
Midnight

Didn't move an inch from home all day. Was thinking of going out somewhere but felt unenthusiastic. Didn't meet anybody. All day spent in front of this stupid computer. No gift, no cards from nowhere, not even a cake. Was expecting a gift from sis. The least that she could do was say sorry that she didn't get any gift. Instead, what I got from her was her fundas (read shitty crap) on how gifts mean nothing, are actually for teenagers, am no longer in a age to expect gifts on birthday, "Just cause its your birthday doesn't mean I have to get a gift for you."

I recalled all those times gone by, each year I would think of a new surprise, would plan a month ahead and put all my energy time and resource to make her feel special. She was a kid then. Now she has grown up. Have her set of believes and understanding. Doesn't matter if I expect her to get me a gift, if she thinks its immature so it is. On her 16th birthday I made 16 colorful cards and hid them in 16 places in the house. Her and her friend's job was to find out all the cards each had a new message. The entire baccha party was so busy doing that and it was so much fun.

Another time most probably her 13th birthday, she was wanting to buy a music album of then popular band 'Aqua'. For months I kept telling her no they don't make good music, no point buying their album. She gave up hope of ever having that album. On the special day before she could even wake up I played the album at full blast. She went crazy with joy as she woke up to the tunes of 'Be Happy'. There was so much of love and emotion in the air. With time she has become mature and reserved. I can't see her emotions anymore and I am always wondering "are there any?"

One thing led to another and I had to cry. I only cry when I have a fight at home. The only people who can get tears to my eyes are my family for the simple reason that they are the only ones from whom I have some expectations. Let a 100 people forget my birthday I won't be as hurt as when 100s of them rembers but just one person from family forgets it.

That's how relationships are. Painful and complicated. You get hurt because you have expectations. But if you don't have expectations what good is that relationship.

Dino called at the end of the day. Knew he would. Sumit called from Bombay made me really really happy. Vipul and Gundeep called. Manoj smsd. Amit looking at my plight in the morning offered to take me out for a dinner. I, acting like a real jerk made him go around in stupid circle and then decided on a time and venue, only to cancell it at the nick of time. But whatever his sincere efforts to cheer me up made me really happy. Spoke to him for the first time. That guy talks so fast in so many languages. Shashant and Sri forgot. I smsd shashant and called sri. TF called in the evening to re confirm the venue for the xth DBM. She didn't know it was my birthday. Seema has been upset with me for a long time. She called too. Sid and Me sat online and told each other bout our special day. It was his birthday too. One sweet surprise call from Priya

Couldn't help thinking about MJ particularly towards the evening. Wish time had stopped back then on 23rd January 2004, few minuites past midnight, Durg.

That's how it was...my 29th birthday. Shit another year spent in vain.
------------------------------------------
Addendum

Ok this is real bad...Riddhi especially came online to wish me at sharp 12, she also sent me an e-card and yet her name is in not in the list of those who wished...even more bad.. she left a comment reminding me about that fact to which I said "I would put an addendum"...I didn't do that...Now what's worse is, she still loves me...Its exactly this kinda unconditional love that one should be careful of...you always end up hurting these people the most...While you were sulking about having no one to care for you...some one was there standing with a smile giving her/his every thing and you didn't even notice...

Thanks Riddhi...love you too girl...

We are celebrating the 2nd Anniversary of Delhi Blogger's Meet on Sunday 29th of January @ Cafe Coffe Day, CP from 4 pm onwards.

We would be discussing the following

1. Blogging viz. Creative Writin
2. Blogging viz. Mainstream Media
3. Blogging viz. Adverstising Tool

If you are a delhi wala who blogs and you want to contribute on any of the above topics we would love to hear from you. All are invited.

For any weird, stupid or silly question that might arise at your mind regarding this meet contact Me at the comments section or write to me personally at samyukta_basu[at]yahoo[dot]com. Am also available on Yahoo IM (samyukta_basu) and G Talk (samyukta.basu)

So see you there on sunday...

Tried my hand at absurd poetry as a writing exercise on Caferati...

Absurd?
Yeah absurd
Oh ok I thought absurd
you're so weird
weird isn’t absurd
Like I care
Care is absurd
Here, your paper
Yes that’s absurd
Pepper isn’t absurd
Paper is absurd
Knees hurt
Pain absurd
Getting cold
Axe is here
Hear something
Shrieks absurd
Power gone
You where?
At absurdicity my dear.

In life it is so very rare that you meet someone that you truely like and that someone also happens to like you...to find is difficult to keep is an effort...a lot of care and concern ...it is just that much and we fail to achieve...

That smile, that look, that thing...its very delicate, very fragile, if you find it carry it with caution, handle it with care...

I wanted to say those above lines to someone. Composed a mail 5 times with those lines but couldn't send...What's the point in saying. If he wants to loose me so let it be...It's not that I didn't make efforts to tell him. He knows I like him. He liked me too...wonder where in the line does the things get screwed. I have absolutely no idea what happened to us. Why did we just drift away. I don't know if he wants to see me again, is he ever gonna call me again? What will happen if I bump into him someday at some common event? Will we talk? May be we won't. I have already known how it feels to pretend like you were absolute strangers. Some of the 'YOU' dies inside and you are only half alive then. If that happens again I would be full dead.

I should have written this post long time back... the very next day I wrote the previous post to be more precise. That's cause me and dad were back being the best of friends the very next day. We have these fights always and then we forget next minuite that's how it has always been. Though the legal intricacies about that flat is still not understood and sorted out, but as encounter specialist commented I have left things to him only to be prepared to handle things later, God forbid, if they go wrong.

USAID suddenly (to my knowledge) pulled out all the funds and the project I just joined 3 months back is being shut down. I was really exited bout this project. I would have done a great job, too bad I didn't even get a chance to perform and now All my bags are packed I'm ready to go...

At times I think I have screwed up my whole career and am a looser big time. In this profession (or all profession i geuss) we have a very single route to follow, a single pattern...if you deviate a little from that set pattern you can assume you are never getting back on track. 1-2 years of work as a junior, when you don't get paid anything, you do all the running around the Courts, the drafting, copying, filing...follow your senior with those huge files in your hand. Then, you ditch your senior one day (you obviously would, coz he never paid you and now you have learned all that you could from him) and move on to either join a law firm or join some Company as a law officer.

If you wanna be rich and busy litigation lawyer you have to give 3-4 more years in that same position of an underpaid junior associate...so that not only do you pick up the art of litigation from your senior but you also build a rapport with all those client's who are not really happy with the way your senior has been handling the matters and you also have convinced them that you can settle the matter in much lesser money and time. Having done so you moved on to have your independent practice, the list of your senior's unhappy clients being your inventory...

I have been continuesly falling off from this usual track. I was in practice, then I joined a social research project then back to corporate and now again research...

I realise the lawyer/liar business is not really from me and am also not made for the corporate ladder at the end of the day I want to be extensivly involved in Socio Legal activism and right now I think I should concentrate on gaining more and more research experience. I am thinking I should start independent practice with the woman cell and juvenile cell cases, do some freelance research and also get started the NGO with Khurram da and RK.

Tough year ahead...so much to do...need some money as well, got car loan to pay and also wanna move out. Movings out means an extra budget. How are things going to work out...??

I have begin to have a bad temper. Sis says I become devilish when I am angry, I don't throw things though but I yell. I have these difference of opinion with mom every now and then and I yell at her, I say bad things to her. She was saying if there aint any way to stop the fights then it would be wise to leave. I think so too... I wanna be alone. More and more alone. It seems I can't make no body happy. Sis was asking where from all these anger coming....where from I ask?? I think I should blame it on all the men around me. I gotta keep away from all men who don't fall in the category of father, brothers, cousins, uncles, grand pas and bosses. They all bother me. They create too much of heart ache and tension... I need peace.

I am once again convinced I am not gonna get into marriage. I am a terrible person I won't make a good wife or a mother. With me there my family will never have a peace of mind...No point getting into a mess deliberately. Why ruin someone's life, why bring a life and then ruin it...

I feel like writing a lot today but am sleepy now...my next post has to be about why am I so angry at all men (except those above catagories)

This is one of my post on the creativegarh community mailing list...The topic was about a defining moment in someone's life. An uncanny coincidence that makes a change for life...come to think of it now, I do have some such defining moments though the mail isn't exactly about that...Read on.

Hi

Not sure if I have any defining moment or not...Most probably I don't, but talking about paranormal I have had many incidents which has made me believe there's something spooky about me, like I have the power of making things happen. well Not exactly make happen whatever i want. Its like when I am deeply jealous (I am a jealous person) or when i am very angry that negetive energy within me does have some impact somwhere around me...

For eg..this one time i had a crush on this coleague of mine...we had a touring job and we used to travel in teams...Now before one such trip that he was about to go i was extremly jealous of this girl who was gonna be his tour partner...and i wanted to be there in her place. The night before the day he was about to leave, he met with an accident and he couldn't go. He wasn't badly hurt or anything but of course he coudn't travel for two consecutive trips. As a compensation he got a much longer trip and this time I accompanied him (our coordinator knew bout the crush :D) and yeah we had the time of our lives.

And that wasn't the only time. There was another time when I didn't want him to go...and our team coordinator had a sudden last minute change of mind and changed his travel plans

I have had many such coincidences. In School standard 4th, my class teacher made me stand outside the class the whole day, wasn't even allowed to have lunch...just coz I had forgot to get my class work copy....its been such a long time and I still feel that pain and agony...i stood silently all day while the world kept burning inside of me. After couple of days she took a long break from school. we didn't know why she wasn't coming. Later we heard she had lost one of her ailing parents (cant remember who).

I never wanted my sister to study in this particular college and her admission got screwed up inspite of having undergone the entire process properly...thereafter she got into JNU and now she thinks language is what she ever wanted to do and nothing could have been better than this.

There are more such things which I cannot publicly mention...

But I never wish or pray for anything to happen....don't believe God has any such scheme of granting or not granting people's prayers...

Another time it was when I had lost my grandpa, about two months later my Dad's uncle also passed away and about 15 days later this Uncle's daughter-in-law (My Aunt) too passed away. two-three days before her expiry I saw this dream, An UFO type flying vehichle taking off from our house's main gate two men and one woman onboard, smiling and waving at me. I could clearly identify one of the men as my Grandpa though I couldn't recall the faces of the other two people.

Not many people would believe....fact is I had second and third and fourth thoughts before writing this mail...but then there are really so many things one can't explain...

wow that's a long mail...gotta stop now..
take care everyone
C u around...

I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...I wanna leave...

Take me away from here pleassssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssse.

Sanjay today told me "you are a lawyer, how come you people are buying a flat in Khirki Extention". I wanted to bury myself in shame at that statement.

Dad would buy a flat in Khirki Extention. He would make the full and final payment and not want to see a single papers of the flat. And I can't ask why? Every time I say something there is a big drama in the house. This is going on for the past 4-5 months now. Even if I want, I can't keep my fucking mouth, which talks of the legal implications all the time, shut and his ego can't stand his daughter asking questions.

I am told to keep the hell out of the whole issue its none of my damn business.

More than half of the payment has already been made relying upon the builder's word. The other day the builder called up, "Arre aap paise leke kab aayenge hum ne to tenent rakh liya hai...saturday to shif kar jaayenge tenent" The builder would decide upon who is the tenent, how much rent would we get, when would the tenent shift. I can't talk about having a proper verification of the tenent being done. "How much security money are we getting?" The damn me asked. "There is no security money. That's how it works in khirki extention. The builder told me." is what dad answered me. I had an argument on this day before yesterday. "How can you not talk about security money. Everybody takes it." Dad got irritated and went to see the builder to call off the tenancy idea. Apparently the builder was pissed off at Dad's change of mind and said things like, "aap ne to humein be ijjat kar diya, aap hi ne to bolatha kiraya pe chadana hai, aap ka to koi baat ka kuch value hi nahi hai." Dad came back home fuming at me, I am responsible for all the bad things the builder told him. Such nice couple they were who wanted to take the flat on rent. Such nice and honest is the builder and dad had to let them down all because of my fucking mind which looks at innocent people with suspicion.

When I came back from work today I heard that tomorrow the full and final payment would be done. This bloody mouth had to speak out "have you seen the title deeds?" what about the papers?" "Papers are only given once the payment is done" came the answer. "How many houses have you bought and sold dad?" I was calm. "Shut up. Like you know a hell lot of it." yelled dad.

Earlier, I had once said just as a passing thought, I can have a chamber in that flat. "You don't know anything, you are incapable of having a chamber."

I can't take the disrespect he shows to me. I wanna be out of this house. I wanna leave Delhi. I will go to bombay and do mazdoori, i would break patthar, I would beg. I am leaving delhi whether or not I get a job in Bombay.
______________

Damn I can't leave right away....My friend needs me desparately...

From the archives

This post is from the past..., feel it was a good para I worte so am just re posting it...

‘This is my truth’ was the theme of my blog. I started it coz there were, and still are, these times when I want to talk a lot about my life but no one to listen to...I thought I would share the bizarre truth of my life, which I think are stranger than fictions, but then where is the truth? What is my truth? What more is it than another sappy old story of love lost and heart break. Who doesn't have these stories and then what the hell do I know about other's story that I go about thinking my story is strange. Truth.

Truth is I don't have a story.
Just some scattered scribbled sheets.
‘Is the glass half empty or half full’ they ask.
Truth is there is no glass,
just a heap of crackled earthen pots,
scattered petals,
twisted pencil skins,
few old photographs,
few old wrapping papers,
few old crumpled movie tickets
with the name of the movie goers
written on the back of it by me,
some office vouchers,
certain visions when i close my eyes,
certain sounds I suddenly hear,
certain smell I suddenly find familiar,
some broken dreams, some sleepless nights,
some premeditated coincidences,
some long phone calls
and the subsequent phone bills…
all passing by.

The train is moving fast. But I wish it was moving faster and faster and faster. So that all the bits and pieces of my eventful life passes by in such lightening speed that I don’t even have the time to recollect them and frame in my blog.

Ryze Mixer

Glad I went ahead for the Ryze Mixer. It was fun meeting everybody. Am looking forward to more such meets. The drive back home was an amazing experience. The road all thorough had a terrible fog but was thickest on the new flyover connecting Dwarka and the Dhaula Kuan Crossing. The minuite I took this road I felt like I have come to a nowhere. I couldn't even see the bonnet of my car. You won't believe it untill you have seen it. It was blinding. Scary and exiting. I couldn't help taking a couple of pics while driving. Wanted to pull over but that was too risky at 10.30 in the night. The scene was amazing.

Happy days and Merry times are here again, bringing along that same feel of solititude and melancholy. I hate this. Last time it was Diwali and before that Dussherah. Everytime these festivals are here people around me would ask me questions I don't like to answer. "What's your christmas plan, what's New Year plan?" 'Nothing'. I have to answer. To make it sound like more of a choice and less of a pathetic helplessness, to avoid all sort of sympathy, I came out with my own theory onf why we need not celebrate a festival I told people with a desperate refusal to be vulnerable to pain, "I don't celebrate a festival, I celebrate a cause...My celebration is not restricted to the Calander."

Christmas is here, I have 3 days of holidays, I could have made a weekend trip to somewhere nearby, but I need atleast 1 company. But I never find a company for doing the things I want to do...Last I walked alone was in the John Primer show. Before that it was the Hutch Delhi Run. Heard from somewhere that there is an offline meet, a Christmas bash of Ryze members. Ya I am a member of Ryze, I am a member of all such networks for 'seeking someone, whether desperately or not, singles'. Ok I know Ryze is a business Network and not a dating club, So? Tell me which single is not seeking someone... So last night I decided to go for the meet. And ever since I have decided my own line is coming back to haunt my mind again and again..."I was less lonely when I was alone." Why am I going there? Just to reaffirm my emptyness? Why do I like doing this to myself? I can sit at home and read something. I can finish the unfinished posts. Is it going to make me feel any better to go there alone and come back alone.

Loneliness Actually sucks...if you are reading it, just agreet with it. Don't leave a comment saying it doesn't sucks...

And Kreeti if you reading this don't think I am being a loner here and trying to sulk, I am not. I am going there alright, and be rest assured I would be wearing the flashiest smile on my face and the brightest spark in my eyes...
__________________________
The two never spoke
The silence never broke
but they fell in love...

these lines just came to mind yesterday...
___________________________

When two people with great flair for writing have their way at romance, what you have is excellent 'reads'. The exchange of letters between Elizabeth Barret Browning and Robert Browning are one of the best piece of writing...The story of the Browning couple is so fascinating too, in yer youth she sufferred from some disease and was bed ridden. She reached out to the world only through her poems. Robert Browning, 6 years younger to her, fell in love with her reading her poems...For years together they didn't meet and the love affair happened only through exchange of love letters... Finally she eloped and married Robert.

I have already put an example of couple of exchange of mails that I have had, which made a good read . Here is more...

Me:-
The ever so wild and crazy, the ever so passionate and weird, wish I could I have an adventour with you, you could be my greatest challenge...

He:- (Original lines sent to me via sms)
What you call an adventour
is nothing more than a nightmare
Thats why I tell all the nightingales
not to fly towards the brigh glares

Its been long...have got a lot to write from my past, a lot of interesting stories couple of them are lying in the draft stage...would be out soon.

Meanwhile this is how the Delhi bloggers Meet go...read about it and please leave a comment.

http://delhiwecare.blogspot.com/2005/12/ixth-delhi-bloggers-meet-18th-december.html

I am happy these days...

Results of utter boredom...thank God I got a camera wala cell

random thoughts

How we keep hearing this term "True Love". I say, love is never true or false. The people involved might be, the circumstances might be but love in itself is like God. Not true not false, not black not white...colorless, shapeless, ageless, timeless...Love is just love. It gives you the same feeling even if it is offered by the person who is not true. Its like when you think the other person loves you, you might be wrong, may be the person lied to you, may be the person is two timing, but till that time you find the truth out, what you feel in your heart is LOVE. There's no truth or false about it.
____________________________________

If hearts were blogs and if you link your blog to a woman's blog, and if you keep visiting her blog everyday and keep leaving sweet comments there, eventually she would link her blog to your blog, she would no matter how dumb your blog is....Its automatic

The Delhi Blogger's December Meet - IX th DBM

The Perfect season for an outdoor activity. The perfect sun for a photo shoot and the perfect timing for a Cricket match. We decided to have a DBM with a difference this time. So here is the plan. Date 18th December, Sunday

Suggestions and improvements are always welcome and appreciated.

So we meet up at Humayuns tomb at 11am that gives us ample opportunity to bask in the winter sun. After the initial round of introductions (we have nothing against squares,triangles and other assorted geometric figures) we shall proccede to our photography show/tell/teach thingy ahich will be (hopefully) followed by a cricket/football match....this match can also act as a photo subject for some who are more inclined to photography and do not want to dirty thier clothes with cricket/shriket...football/shhotball.

ah...the games will be followd by lunch....which we can all go and eat at some joint or we can order takeaways and have a picnic in the sun......!!!

with time and consensus some gaana bajaana will be appreciated....loads of fun expected...but only if you are there.

oh and you need not be a blogger to be there (MSM spys are welcome too.....we are armed this time...lol) so you can bring along your freinds, brothers,sisters,aunties,uncles ....whatever....be there!!

Original invitation mail posted by Pradster on Delhi Blogger's Yahoo Group mailing list. However the invitation is open to all. So if you are you are some one who writes a blog, reads a blog, wishes to do so in future and has been doing so in the past...and if you are in Delhi on 18th Please Join us.

Don't worry about meeting a bunch of strangers...none of us bite... :P You'll have a good time PROMISE

RSVP

Twilight Fairy
Pradster
Me
Delhi Bloggers

We all have heard the song "I'd do anything for love" by Meatloaf. I found this hilarious letter to Mr. Meatloaf.

An open letter to Meatloaf:
Dear Mr Loaf,
In your hit single I Would Do Anything For Love, you claim, "I would do anything for love, but I won't do that". [My italics.] A willingness to do anything for love, sir, implies a readiness to pursue literally any course of action that might be of benefit to love, up to and including "that". If you persist in attaching limits and conditions to what you are prepared to do for love, you should amend your lyrics to reflect this, and make your position clear to a confused public.

"Whilst I am prepared to go to not inconsiderable lengths for love, I feel I must draw the line at that," would better describe your state of mind, given the current qualified nature of your commitment to love.

Yours sincerely,

Harry Hutton.

Read the Original here.

Finally my pic on the blog... some of the child hood pics. I have re taken the printed pics then with my webcam, just wanted to put them here, couldn't wait to get them scanned. Sorry bout the quality would scan them and update this space. The present day image is coming soon...

Don't they both look stunning

Passport size photo for school admission in delhi, was 8 plus

On my Tenth Birthday...

One of my few beutiful pics, with ma and masi, was 7/8

:) Sanju Boss in the making...

Not sure which year/month

I guess, was 3. Fancy Dress competition

haven't spoken to D for long and nor do I want to...

S2 and K may end up owing their marriage (ok I know I am acting crazy) to me...just like S3+P, M+S4, M2+M3 did... God Bless all of you couples.

Got my look changed, spent couple of hours and some freaking money in the parlour today...sometimes material things makes you happy.

Some girl said to this guy, and this guy came and told me that the girl told him that I am always looking for dates...as in am always chasing men. I don't know this girl at all except that she happens to be a friend of another of my friend and my friend keeps talking to her bout me...and my friend tells me she is very fond of me, but from what this guy tells me about what she told him about me, it seems she is NOT very fond of me, She also leaves nice comments on my blog and she also the other day added me on yahoo messenger [PERIOD] now which of these Fucking people to be believed [PERIOD] and from where do people get this Idea...I do all that I can to resist a man...

was looking at some of my child hood pics...I used to be cute

[PERIOD]

Wish S falls in love with me...Don't know him that well, except that he is this macho guy with a golden heart and great smile but I like him. Given the dreamer I am, might even say 'yes' if it happens hoping the rest would simply follow... There was this one time, he had called and I said "S I think you forgot your shoes there." he said, "No I haven't. I got my shoes with me but I have forgot my heart over there." I quickly responded, "aha tell me with who?" But he just laughed it away. I wanna write more about S here, but am afraid he might find out.

Can someone please tell me where can I find some hope? Yes I have looked within me...couldn't find it there..life is so stuck, professionally, personally, am trying to stay positive but its getting harder and harder... badly need some hope...

Its Sunday 10 pm and I am about to go to catch some sleep, an occassion so very rare that I actually have to blog about (i mean am wishing to blog about it but can't cause am too tired for creating a post) Mostly on any given day I am awake till 1 am. This weekend was so exeptionally tiring.

A minor heart ache
A small accident
a heated argument,
lots of police
FIR
Claims Tribunal...

All Coming up...

As soon as I gain some energy.

These day's I am reading the autobiography of Lord Denning. I too would be writing one na...so taking some tips from him... :D But of all the people why him. Well there's a reason. You know I feel a strange connection with him ever since I came to know that I shared my Birthday with him...I think I was Lord Denning in my past life (that can't be cause he was alive till 1999)

Me and Denning also happen to Share our birthdays with Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.

Soon after marriage Prithviraj's Sanjukta decided to study law and aspired to become Lord Denning. In Law college she became a rebel bole to ekdum politician. You know khali pili dharna naare baazi...Udhar Md.Ghori attacked Prithviraj and captured him. Sanjukta called a meet of all her college mates and asked for their blood...matlab she formed an army and declared war against Ghori to resucue prithviraj...prithiviraj to was rescued but panga yeh hua that he got very confused about Sanjukta. Soch ne laga is this the girl I married. She seems to be having multiple personalities. But prithiraj's love was true, so he didn't mind the new avtaar of hers. And they lived happily ever after (well not really more tales to come)

Jees...isn't it enough of crap. Who the hell want's more.

Stupid fairy and Dear Nitish

The modern day bollywood is finally making a movie on the eternal Love of Sanjukta and Prithviraj Chauhan. Finally people would pronounce my name properly... I remember having read their love story when I was 6 or 7, in an Amar Chitra Katha comic. Can't remember much now just this bit, that this guy prithviraj was a King and he was in love with this girl Sanjukta. At 6 it wasn't really my fault if I thought that girl was me. So this king wanted to marry her. Ofcourse marry, TP dating, flirting, living in and stuffs weren't known at that time of the historical clock. As always some panga happened and their marriage didn't appear to be a easy job. Then this guy decided to abduct Sanjukta on her wedding day of course she had already given her consent to the plan.

I still remember the scene, which my mind had visualised at that age.....Sanjukta was probably standing at a palace gate or something, prithvijraj was on his horse, sword in one hand, the mighty horse running at a speed faster than wind...heading right at her direction, he comes close by and lifts Sanjukta with the other hand puts her on the horse and they elope....they must have lived happily ever after. I don't know but they must have.

Mom why did you buy the comic for me. And why did you have to name me Sanjukta. Do you realize what have you done to your daughter. This stupid girl still cannot accept that its just her name that's similar.

Stupid fairy and her stupid tales.............
___________________________________________________

Dear Nitish
Say, are we gonna see a new day
Please Nitish
when there's a will there's a way

‘Shreshtha Purush’– Rama
Valmiki,
Prince Gautam and his enlightenment,
Mahavira and Nirvana
Kautilya and Arth Shastra
Moder art of State Craft
Ashoka and Eternal truth – Dharma
Amrapali and Sarvottam Nari – Sita
Civil Disobedience Movement

All born out of the same womb....Mother Bihar

They say History Repeats itself.

Will it, Nitish?
Has the day come
Can we get back the warmth of our mother's lap
We the sons and daughters of Bihar
Can we stop evacuating
Can we have civilization restored
Lots of hope on you
You the people’s representative
15 years is all it took
How long is it gonna take you?

No one ever got me flowers. Never.......... can you believe that??
There are more things about me which are unbelievable that you can possibly think of. And that's why I call it "This is my truth"...
Truth which is stranger than fiction,
Truth more scary and bewildering than fiction....
____________________________________________________
"Once I can understand it
Twice I can let it be
Three times it one too many now
You'll have to do without me"
____________________________________________________

Can Any body guess what is this???

I went ahead alone for the concert. My first ever Jazz concert, John Primer and The Real Deal Blues Band. It was good. Can't say if it was great or not coz I don't listen to a lot of Jazz.

Saw Harneet, and Mrs. and Mr. Deepan there. The world is small they say and if your areas of interest and subjects and places of hangouts is the same then the world becomes even smaller. I always knew this. Always knew I am gonna bump into Harneet at once such event. And like always I also knew he is never gonna even recognise me. Just the way Munish never did. The ideological differences were too much between me and Harneet so I guess we could never be friends...but I never wanted us to be strangers either. But you always don't have what you want. I would always be thankful to Harneet for introducing me to the blogger's community. Had it not been for him I wouldn't have attended any of the blog meets. Would always remember those long hours of chat...that one fun time when we had a non formal 'mini meet' (as Ravi puts it). Harneet, Ravi, Amit, Vivek and Me. Ironically, when I had joined the DBM the best welcome messages came from these people who now hate me. Deepan was so exited about my introductory mail. Amit and I had some intersting exchange of mails till the time we met in that informal meet. (after which for reasons unknown to me, we never called, or mailed or smsd) And then while the firefighting was going on between me and Harneet, the most malice ful mail was from Amit. He accused me of being responsible for the downfall of the group. He accused me of having creating nothing else but trouble for the group ever since I have joined.

Anyway I don't blame anyone...I know I am jinxed. I keep telling it to everyone but no body believes me. The closest you come the farthest you would be repelled.

"Sab log dhyan se suniye, abhi aapko Room No. *** mein jaana hai. Wahan aapko ek written test dena hoga. 20 questions hoga sab ke char answer honge, teen galat ek sahi. Aap wahan jaayenge hamara pen dikhayenge, Aapko question bilkul nahi padna hai, kisi bhi ek option pe tick maarna hai. I repeat, quetions padke time waste mat kariye aapke peeche aur bhi log honge isliye jaldi se pen dikhaiyee, 18 question pe tick maarke jaakar bus mein baith jayenge. Shaam ko hamare office se learner license collect kar lena."

Check out my latest post on the Community BLOG "Bribe Rates for Delhi"

Suggestions, Ideas, Criticism...all welcome.

Its so disgusting...of all the friends I have, all the men I have known all my families, aquaintances...not a single person to accompany me to a Jazz concert. I am so sick and tired of bhatkofying at places all by myself. I so wanna go to this music show today in Garden of 5 Senses but can't ask anyone to come with me. Do I have such weird likes and dislikes that I never find a like minded person. Or is somthing horribly wrong with the people in Delhi...I am sure I would have had some company for all the things I like to do if I was in Bombay or Bangalore. Alas...when will that day come? Delhi has no culture but shopping... All my female friends today would be engrossed in their house hold work...will do laundry, shop for grocery, fight with husbands, cook eat and that's all. Can you people be a little different, can you not do some thing new and exiting. And the male friends S is busy attending a marriage, S2 most probably would be busy he mentioned about an about an office tour this weekend, A doesn't likes Jazz, M is missing for days and even if he was available he wouldn't have gone I know, D, I did a stupid mistake of kissing him so now he thinks we are not friends and somthing else and I wouldn't call him cause then he would start assuming more things about me. Haven't yet called G and P they might be interested but then there's another f*%^#$% trouble... I have this guy who tentatively asked me out for the evening. Now it would be great if he confirms it. If he doesn't confirms I can call G and P and find out if they are available....trouble is I am not sure when is this guy gonna confirm or cancel the evening plan. Shit what am I gonna do...

"I suggest Samy take out the damn car..drive around do a couple of things and go to the concert...what did Tagore said....when no body is answering your call...walk alone"

Of course you needn't tell me that I already know... If this guy calls fair enough otherwise I'd see if somone can make it at the last minuite otherwise I'd go alone...

I am leaving now you keep sitting with the stupid machine

And the clock struck 12

Presenting "Cinderella and her two hours love story" The wonderful exchange of mails between cinderela and the prince before the clock struck 12 .

Dear Cinderella (Fake name)

To cut through the crap this mail's connection can be traced to the "Best (Fake name) poets" and your sudden sphinx like silence. considering that that the esteemed forum has banned any sort of personal interaction as also spelling mistakes I am making this overture.

My incidental identitly matches yours if you remember i.e. lawyer. What are u bout and where. Please do reply.

Prince Charming (Fake name, hence forth fakely referred to as PC)
--------------------------------------------------------
Dear PC

My silence on 'best' is kinda forced, i somhow don't identify with the way the list works...i mean its ok to say that personal communication is not allowed on the list but to object to a welcome message and ban it as too personal was a bit too much for me. I am talking about a mail RJ (fake) wrote to me and also cc marked you. I was kinda pissed off with that mail.

Besides that I find the poets on Best as a bunch of guys not so humble and kinda suedo...disagree with me as much as you can and want...the point is Best just didn't click with me. May be my level of poetry is not as high as the Bestians...

Me a lawyer as for now in corporate, still struggling to make a mark in my career, still suffering from identity crisis as to whether I am a social activist or a corporate bitch (u can read my blog on that) or just an ordinary girl…have worked for a while in a women’s rights organization then did some research activity in a strange place (will explain later) and now working with Fortis Securities Limited (wholly owned by Ranbaxy). No we don’t make medicines and don’t supply security guards. We are a stock broking company. Me a part of the Legal and Compliance Department.

Why am I on Bestpoets? I follow another mailing group that of the bloggers of which RJ too is a part. He had put this post about a "Best poet meet" last month which I attended for some reason still unknown to me. As a reward for attending the meet he added my name on the Best Poet's list. As far as poetry is concerned I do sometimes write some crappy lines which are found to be great piece of writing by people who are not part of Best or any other poetry circle (which explains), but have never dared to post any thing on the Best list except this one translation of a short para from Tagore’s Shyama…you must have read it in case you were a part of the mailing list then…

What about you? Research or Litigation? How long have you been a lawyer? Why are you on Bestpoets? You from delhi?

That’s it for today…

(I know you would) reply (just dunno how) soon

bye
--------------------------------------------------

'course I would reply. very very caught up today. cannot write much. but i agree with you. Best is not up my creek too. Too literary and all that kind of thing. I like my poetry hard nosed and my poets should be more in touch with the world. This dreamy soppiness is not my idea of fun.

I litigate in Delhi for the last about ten years. From Defence Colony. I am a litigating lawyer.

Write more about you.

Bye
PC
------------------------------------------
Dear PC

Hi, well you are so much senior to me. I have been a lawyer for the past 3 years. been in delhi for the past 21 years..here in R K Puram. So you have a law firm or something?

you had asked to write more about me, well i think I already wrote too much in reply to your couple of lines in the last mail...and your reply to my long mail is again quite concise...so I am not too sure what to write in this one.

And more particularly given your seniority I am not too sure in what direction should our conversation go, so would highly appreaciate if you write me in more details about yourself.

So do write in

bye
-----------------------------------------------

Hi Cinderella

Ha Ha Ha!! This is so funny.. So u think that u are being entrapped by some libidinous, pot-bellied, skirt chasing, pan chewing vakil whose favourite past time is neatly divided between arguing rent matters in cloistered sweaty court rooms and going to seedy pubs and drinking himself silly over cheap whisky and doubtful soda.

U know I had really thought u to be cool and bindaas. It was reflected in the way u wrote ur mails. was I wrong? I hope I was right.

What is this "much senior to me", "considering ur seniority"? God! am I corresponding in shaadi.com or something?!

My practice is in the High Court. I have my office in B4-20, Self Defence Colony (Fake) where I work with another two pals (we are not partners just share office space). I am a lawyer who does a lot of matters relating to contract, property and matrimony (or whatever remains of it by the time my clients reach me). I was schooled in DPS and did my law from CLC. I started practice in the year 1995.

I was concise earlier as I did not have the time. there is not much to say anyway.

My dad was in the Army. He is retired now. I live in NOIDA. I shall write more. provided u do not start calling me sir or something as horrible as that!

Don't mind my jest. Have fun;
Bye PC
-----------------------------------------------------

Well Well PC,

How could you underestimate my skills to comprehend a human mind so easily, that you assumed, that I am assuming you to be <some libidinous, pot-bellied, skirt chasing, pan chewing vakil whose favorite past time is neatly divided between arguing rent matters in cloistered sweaty court rooms and going to seedy pubs and drinking himself silly over cheap whisky and doubtful soda> On the very contrary, to begin with, for your not so bengali nomenclature I had assumed you to be a smart and street smart (u r a lawyer) intellectual (u r a bengali) well read (u are in Best). That was before when you first mailed in Best.

The second impression that's after reading your prev mail, I assumed you are this rich, successful workaholic Attorney somewhere in your mid 30s kinda like Richard Gere in Primal Fear and quite a few more movies of his. Since I respect my own profession too much and believe in maintaining the hierarchy I thought its not a good idea to be the kickass me which I generally am...and you know something particularly after that incident on Best with Mr. M I am so damn ashamed of my mindlessly rude behavior...I mean what if you are another person of stature as high as Mr. M (assuming you have read his bio)...so I was acting reserved.

Finally the third impression, which was formed just moments ago...I am too cool for you...:D kidding. You must be in your early 30s (31-32), single, cool fun loving, u like reading, traveling, music, don’t chew pan but smoke classic regular, drink Royal wine and whiskey at the hottest restro bars in Delhi etc.etc.

How do I assume all that Coz most men can be categorized...and i just put you into one of the few. Don't mind my rudeness you preferred me to be cool and bindaas right? Lemme know how good my categorization was (I wish I am wrong coz I don't like conventional, usual and predictable) and also ask me whatever you wanna ask

Till then Bye, Cinderella
-------------------------------------------------------

Marlboro lights my dear and not Classic Regular (those wretched foul smelling cigarettes). Always wanting to quit but can't. A cigarette or two a day can't harm u surely. The good life- wine (a nice Californian Chard) or single malt occasionally has not harmed humankind as much as idle gossip or research on fissile pyrotechnics. Wot say thou?

Yes men can be slotted/categorized. What about women then. This film crazy, 25, talkative, over articulate, pleasant looking woman (with trendy specs?). this non-litigation lawyer, provocative in her words but cautious in her conduct, misunderstood easily by the shallow and the wretched, who speaks too soon and then repents in leisure, outwardly very confident but slightly insecure otherwise. this femme of glorious contradictions this classy babe - this Sanjukta (with apologies to William Shakespeare -refer Richard-III).

I do not think u are rude. If people do not like a bit of provocation then I pity them :-).

Who wants to communicate on the basis of bio-datas. Can communication be turned into language of inter-departmental memos??? Forget this bio data of Mr. M - I frankly give a damn.

I have hated hierarchy all my life. Have u read the "the Peter Principle". It is a hilarious essay on something that is called hierarchiology (the study of hierarchies). The main principle is that all human beings in a hierarchy finally rise to their level of incompetence. I found it to be so funny.

Ur categorization was interesting. Was it right?? Well u forgot to add "substance abuse" (i love cocaine) and that embarrassing twitch on the right side of my face, which has made me, face contempt proceedings before the Hon'ble Court so many times. And what about my fetish for wearing silk bandannas on Thursdays and my craze for handcuff when making out on the back seat my snazzy black Jaguar. Hey - I am just fooling around. But what I want to say is that to be unpredictable or different is not that great in all situations. There is a comfort in being regular and sound. Any thoughts on this???

So u have long hair??? Tell me how precise was my above categorization of you.

PC

Btw I loved being compared to Richard Gere but on a more critical self-assessment I think I look more like Johnny Depp ;-)
---------------------------------------------------------
hi

Its been a long wait I know…c’mon don’t tell me you were not waiting eagerly for my reply.

Surprisingly the rest of the assessment which doesn’t form part of my physical appearance (talkative, over articulate, non-litigation lawyer, provocative in her words but cautious in her conduct, misunderstood easily by the shallow and the wretched, who speaks too soon and then repents in leisure, outwardly very confident but slighly insecure otherwise) is freaking correct…How did you know???

So the round of introduction, building, laying and imposing and impression and general prediction is over…what next? Hobbies and interest I guess…’Change’ that’s what I am interested in and that’s what my hobby is. I cant tell you my hobby is to sing coz I would soon change my hobby…but music have been quite persistent a pastime for me. The two personalities within me gives a wide range of choices from… [some names of music artist not forming part of this story edited...]

Bye

Till then

-------------------------------------------
One Mail from PC snipped here but Cinderella's parawise reply would make the context clear....

Hey hold it. Don't jump to conclusions please. An emotional Bong aren't u. Who in the dickens has said I won't reply. U forget I was the one who sent the first mail out of the blue. Do justice here mon chic

‘Emotional bong’ what exactly do u mean by this? Which part is not acceptable to you ‘emotional’ or ‘bong’. I am none and yet both…I don’t know under which sign I was born but I think it would be water…coz that’s what I am.

"Was away to Bangalore for a case the entire last week and have
just returned today. I was so god-damned busy with custody battles, guardianship
issues, wailing spouses, frowning judges, screaming lawyers, stubborn court
procedures that I do not think I even called my mother more than once. The
question of replying or even accessing my mail did not arise for
me."

Wow, you have some flair for writing…even a courtroom can be poetic it seems.

"Now I do not even know which of the two mails of ur mails should I reply to. Both, as u shall appreciate, are of decidedly different flavours."

And that was just tip of the iceberg. I have many more flavours and colors within and don’t make me start with when and how frequently shall I change them…like I said before…Change…aah such a beautiful word. To give u an example I just arranged an independence weekend trip to haridwar rishikesh along with my school time friend. When everything was all set I decided to change my mind and am now going to a leisure trip to Hotel Clark Shiraj in Agra at the company expense. My only defense “I am selfish, opportunist and a miser”.

"Btw I read ur blog just now. How I thought of ur non-physical attributes was matter of guess work. Just to keep u guessing. Perhaps I am somebody u already know. Working in ur office or something like that. Perhaps I have been stalking u for the last month or so. That shady lukin' guy who follows u over the distance every morning when u leave for work. ha ha ha But I did get the glasses right. U do wear glasses don't u? My taste in music is different. For me music is not a carefully acquired taste. I listen to whatever and wherever. A part of my very promiscuous personality ;-). What do I like. I shall tell u some day. "

Ok am waiting…

Bye

PS. I don’t like silence much
------------------------------------------------------
S, (or C)

In law we call it a para-wise reply in seriatum. So though u have certainly made out a strong case for ur unpredictable predilections (which is so very fascinating), ur method to express it remains very common law i.e. traversing each and every assertion in order to set out ur defence(offence??). There was a patent mistake in my mail though (which I am sure was ignored only because of ur graciousness ) - there is nothing like "mon chic". It ought to have been "mon cher".

As advised I shall not hazard guesses on ur persona. But I like selfishness or did someone call it enlightened self interest. Its nice to know that u have so many flavours and colours. U sound a bit like a fancy ice cream counter. Iridescent, cool, tempting and simply delicious ;-). I do adore rum and raisin. Do u have it in u??

I would have liked a holiday too. Agra shall be hot. But knowing u I guess u shall be either at the pool or at the bar or then perhaps attending a conference.. But frankly u sound slightly guilty about ditching ur school friend. Ur bravura, if I may say so, sounds a bit too brazen. I don't think that u are the one to walk over corpses. U overestimate urself there.

My kind of music is listening to myself sing when it is raining and I am driving and a cigarette smolders and the destination is far far away. Just kiddin'. I am neither that poetic nor self obsessed.

I shall certainly sms u. Even if u are selfish, opportunist and a miser. so what. I guess its high time that I had some friends with such decent virtues.
PC
---------------------------------------

Dear PC

GB Shaw said, “the perfect love affair is one which is conducted entirely by post”. I can never find more apt words to describe most of my love or whatever affairs and this is exactly what I would tell you if you had romance in your mind when you wrote the first mail to me (I would have serious doubts if you say you didn’t have). I like people who know what they want and can confidently ask for it without creating many verbal traps for the listener. So if you have romance in mind do confess…if you ask me I can smell romance every where and I could smell romance in all your mails and have tried my best to put that same essence in all my replies. Now, coming to the significance of the quote. Look, frankly speaking by the way you write, the words you use for me, in my mind you are someone no less than Shakespeare’s Romeo (assuming you have seen Baz Luhrman’s Romeo and Juliet) (I am a little more dreamy than I should be) and the way you describe the sanjukta that is there in your mind she is no less than Juliet either…well a more intelligent Juliet may be. But we both know that we could be dangerously wrong in our perceptions you could be Nana Patekar and I could be Mayawati (I could seriously be, mind you)

To cut the crappy story short whenever I have started something on net it has come to a bad end becoz either romeo or Juliet has been hazardously disappointed once they came out of the virtual world and met in person. Offlate I have completely deleted dating and romancing from my life for various reasons which I may tell you or may be you’ll read them in my Autobiography. Until Friday I thought you would be restricted to the virtual world only and that’s why I didn’t pick up your phone. I didn’t want to give a human voice to my fantasy. But then I thought over it. I should get real I gotta come out of my dream land.

So before I walk any further in my dreamland let’s both of us give each other an opportunity to get the real picture and avoid bigger disappointment. May be next Sunday provided I finish of the tasks I scheduled for yesterday on the next Saturday… :D. But if you think we need not meet and can continue to be some kind of email friend do lemme know it will be fine by me.

My Agra trip was good but not great, like I said I didn’t know any body besides my own dept. I still don’t know them. Either they were not very friendly or they found me unfriendly. I mostly spent time with myself, which wasn’t that bad I did miss a special someone’s company though. Particularly when I was burning the dance floor without a partner. More than 3 hrs…wonder how will it be with a partner…drinks weren’t a part of the luxury trip and there was no time to go to the bar or order room service…

Anyways, that’s it for today

----------------------------------------

12th August

Cinderella

I shall not enter into a parawise reply. It is boring. So I shall try to be spontaneous. My heart rebels against explanatory emails and I would rather flirt around or talk mischievously but something in ur mail has made me sit up and inspired me to talk straight ( a thing which I hate doing ).

When I wrote the first mail I was intending to include provocation in my life. In other words - cut through the boring claptrap of day to day existence. But I am not a romance hunter. That is not to say that I do not like the idea of romance. But I do not think that one can imagine a romance with a person one has not even seen. Disembodied communications do not make for romance. It takes a visual effect to give any credence to such a strong feeling.

Why I mailed u was simple. I was delighted by ur chutzpah and ur spontaneity in that cess pool of high culture -"Best poets". Remember the - "i sometimes say what I mean but sometimes I mean what I don't say" mail to the Best poets collective??? In other words I found u interesting. There was nothing less and nothing more. When I parodied Shakespeare's "King Richard the Second" I was not comparing u to Juliet. The take off was on John the Gaunt talking about England when he says - this pearl set among silver seas, this beautiful land, this England - or words to similar effect. So my take off was rather secular and had nothing to do with schmaltziness. It was a mail of a person impressed with the words of a woman and not her beauty; at least not yet :-). So this Johny Depp or Cleopatra conundrum was a mere tongue in cheek exercise and nothing more.

I could be Nana Patekar yes. and u could be Mayawati (no no - no one can combine crassness with superlative ugliness like that woman) but how does it matter. I may be a romantic but I am a lawyer too. A divorce lawyer who has seen the rather seamy side of the product of foolish romance - marriage, a bit too often to be having any rosy ideas..

Do I have romance in mind - NO! I have something better in mind. The joy of meeting an exciting person. I have no doubt that we have to meet. I cannot speak for u but I have no doubt that I shall be very happy to meet u. I feel it in my bones that we are people who are meant to meet up but have been separated due to the chance factor of an erratic destiny. Its time to undo the error.

when to meet up. As I keep on saying whenever. Sms me and I shall be there (unless I amy dying or some f**k**g client is wanting to kill me with his litany of sob stories).

Will it be a disappointment. Your best buddy could be right. Perhaps yes. Perhaps not. But I do not disappoint. And it is not because I look like Johny Depp, its because I am PC with all my flaws etc.

See u soon
PC

------------------------------------
The above chain of mails started on 24th of July. The last mail from PC was on 12th August....on 28th of August this is what was on Cinderella's mind....she finally found him.
But Cinderella knew its not gonna stay...she couldn't dream beyond a point....

I, Cinderlla in the above story, suddenly decided to meet him one fine day. I was with Manoj and was hanging around his office. I called up and asked if he'd like to meet up over a cup of coffee though Manoj would be there. He quicky said sure....we met....Nothing after that.

I have once smsd asking "hey whatever happened to our knowing each other more? are we even gonna be friends or not? Yes is my answer tell me yours." "yes, absolutely." He replied. Well then ask me out you silly I thought in my mind, but he didn't. Since then no call, no sms, no mails. I bumped into him couple of times in High Court and would see him again there someday...

This is what I had on my mind on 2nd of Sepetember The Sequel to "To be continued"

Some beautiful Moments to cherish forever...

That swift peck on my cheek when I was busy concentrating on safe driving amidst the mad city traffic...

That rolling of his eyes in sweet anger and insisting me to have the golguppas saying "kha lo, this is our last evening together here...

That attending of his third consecutive call in one hand while managing all my shopping bags in the other, to hear him say, "Samy I forgot to tell you something." "Now what, tell me quick." his reply - "forgot to say I love you".

That lying down with my head on his chest his arms wrapped around me, his fingres carassing my hair, in the silence of the night we lay motionless, speech less, eyes wide open looking into nowhere wishing the clock stops then and there....in that eternal moment...

Shit!! Why am I living in the past...

Pain...

How sweet are you O pain,
I fall in love with myself every time you touch me,
The way you hit my mind
The way you dry up all the fluid in my body
And form a solid rock in my throat.
Make me feel like a victorious soldier
When you slowly crawl down the throat, enter my heart
It’s no less than an orgasm what I fell then.
Come pain feel me in
Stay cause here’s someone who doesn’t wishes you leave
You make me feel worthy of so much
You make me feel beautiful
It’s only me and you who are real

Just can't stop admiring my ownself

Did this handwriting analysis online here and the following is the result

For a graphologist, the spacing on the page reflects the writer's attitude toward their own world and relationship to things in his or her own space. If the inputted data was correct Sanjukta has left lots of white space on the all four borders of the paper. Sanjukta fills up just the center area of the page. If this is true, then Sanjukta has a particular shyness toward people and a fear of moving too fast in any direction. In some cultures, respecting people, rules, and adhering to protocol are ways of life. The right side of the page represents the future and the left side represents the past. Sanjukta seems a bit stuck in the middle, afraid to take action. Sanjukta seems to have a fear of looking bad or of crossing boundries. It will be easy to work with Sanjukta on a team, because Sanjukta will usually follow the rules. However, this desire to respect the boundries can often be construed as a lack of confidence and people will walk over Sanjukta if she is not careful.

Sanjukta exaggerates about everything that has a physical nature. Although she may not intend to deceive or mislead, she blows things way out of proportion because that is the way she views them. She will be a good story teller. This exaggeration relates to all areas of her material world. Sanjukta allows many people into her life because she is accepting and trusting. She is sometimes called gullible by her friends. That only really means that she trusts too many people. Sanjukta has a vivid imagination.

Sanjukta has a healthy imagination and displays a fair amount of trust. She lets new people into her circle of friends. She uses her imagination to understand new ideas, things, and people.

Sanjukta is very self-sufficient. She is trying not to need anyone. She is capable of making it on her own. She probably wants and enjoys people, but she doesn't "need" them. She can be a loner.

Sanjukta has a temper. She uses this as a defense mechanism when she doesn't understand how to handle a situation. Temper is a hostile trait used to protect the ego. Temper can be a negative personality trait in the eyes of those around her.

Sanjukta is sarcastic. This is a defense mechanism designed to protect her ego when she feels hurt. She pokes people harder than she gets poked. These sarcastic remarks can be very funny. They can also be harsh, bitter, and caustic at the same time.

Sanjukta has very high goals. She has many big dreams that will be difficult to make happen. One way for Sanjukta to make these dreams become reality is to surround herself with people that do not have as much "vision", but have the ability to see these projects through. Sometimes she has a new and better dream every day, thus forgetting about yesterday's plans. Sanjukta's plans can be extremely successful only if she sees them through. She dreams of great things. Sanjukta will be more successful if she sets her goals more realistically. Her goals are so high that she will have a hard time reaching them. It only takes a small stroke adjustment to bring these dreams from the dream stage to reality. She is self confident. She believes these dreams can be achieved and she is the person to do it. This belief in herself leads her to over-sell her abilities. She is capable of great things, just not always as great as she makes them seem to be.

In reference to Sanjukta's mental abilities, she has a very investigating and creating mind. She investigates projects rapidly because she is curious about many things. She gets involved in many projects that seem good at the beginning, but she soon must slow down and look at all the angles. She probably gets too many things going at once. When Sanjukta slows down, then she becomes more creative than before. Since it takes time to be creative, she must slow down to do it. She then decides what projects she has time to finish. Thus she finishes at a slower pace than when she started the project. She has the best of two kinds of minds. One is the quick investigating mind. The other is the creative mind. Her mind thinks quick and rapidly in the investigative mode. She can learn quicker, investigate more, and think faster. Sanjukta can then switch into her low gear. When she is in the slower mode, she can be creative, remember longer and stack facts in a logical manner. She is more logical this way and can climb mental mountains with a much better grip.

Sanjukta will be candid and direct when expressing her opinion. She will tell them what she thinks if they ask for it, whether they like it or not. So, if they don't really want her opinion, don't ask for it!

Sanjukta is moderately outgoing. Her emotions are stirred by sympathy and heart rendering stories. In fact, she can be kind, friendly, affectionate and considerate of others. She has the ability to put herself into the other person's shoes. Sanjukta will be somewhat moody, with highs and lows. Sometimes she will be happy, the next day she might be sad. She has the unique ability to get along equally well with what psychology calls introverts and extroverts. This is because she is in between. Psychology calls Sanjukta an ambivert. She understands the needs of both types. Although they get along, she will not tolerate anyone that is too "far out." She doesn't sway too far one way or the other. When convincing her to buy a product or an idea, a heart rendering story could mean a great deal to her. She puts herself in the same situation as the person in the story, yet she will not buy anything that seems overly impractical or illogical. Sanjukta is an expressive person. She outwardly shows her emotions. She may even show traces of tears when hearing a sad story. Sanjukta is a "middle-of-the-roader," politically as well as logically. She weighs both sides of an issue, sits on the fence, and then will decide when she finally has to. She basically doesn't relate to any far out ideas and usually won't go to the extreme on any issue.

People that write their letters in an average height and average size are moderate in their ability to interact socially. According to the data input, Sanjukta doesn't write too large or too small, indicating a balanced ability to be social and interact with others.

Such is my curse

Last time I spoke to Manoj, he was supposed to leave for his home today, that is if his train ain’t cancelled. I couldn’t call him today so I don’t know if he has left or not. Called him a while ago his phone is switched off. Last I spoke to him we both knew we won’t be meeting before he leaves for kerela and the common understanding was “nevermind we’d meet once you come back”. Never occurred to me he is like a feather in the blowing wind, was like those rare dreams that comes true but only for a while.

Off late, he has not been taking care of his life. His career, his marriage, both up for a toss, had financial liabilities to fulfill, loans to pay. Had to leave his Gurgaon flat suddenly, gave away his car one fine day. When I met him he was a prince I saw him turning into a pauper. But, he seemed to never worry about any of these, an attitude which was surprising to me to begin with, but which soon became annoying. I started confronting him, “why don’t you take charge of things? Have you seen where to your life is heading? Don’t leave your job until you have one in hand. Take care of your life, it’s high time you pull up your socks and do something about it. Think. I don’t know if any of my words had any impact on him, he never gave a sign to show that they had any impact or even otherwise, he has only smiled and assured he IS taking charge that he has thought of a plan of action. I had asked him couple of times why can’t he go back home and resume his practice, he said he won’t do that. He came to Delhi with a dream, with a mission he won’t go back empty handed. He would have a lengthy justification for everything he does. Then he would have even lengthier justifications for not anymore doing those very things. This Monday when we spoke he told me he has booked tickets for Kerela, am not sure when did he make his mind to go, he said he would bring his wife and kid, give his marriage a second chance. Sounded like a sensible plan to me…and so…he is gone for good.

There was one morning last month when I was almost about to have a breakdown in that lifeless stock broking firm, where I never saw a human being in the span of 3 dead months that I spent there, I decided to visit that one place where I belong, the one place which gives me an identity, gives me space, gives me a sense of security, the High Court. I called him up, said, “I am going to High Court are you coming? His answers to me have never been a ‘No’. Also, it turned out that he had to meet one senior Advocate Sh. Aggarwal there for his work. He wanted me to accompany. I did. And I felt so good at the end of the day, having met a highly respectable senior, being able to sit across and talk to him on issues that interest me.

That day on my way to High Court, I had no idea why I was going there, what am I gonna do there, I was so clueless…the day turned out to be one of the most worth fully spent day, I owe it completely to him.

I went to High Court again today. Sh. Aggarwal wanted to invite me for a Lawyer’s Meet. He wanted me to collect the background paper and the invitation card today. He said he couldn’t reach through Manoj’s Cell. “He must have left for Kerela, Sir.” I said.

Now I am engulfed with an uncanny fear. He isn’t coming back. Why would he, why should he. Didn’t I tell him for his own good that he needs to go back and resume his practice. There isn’t anything for him here in Delhi. The more I think now the more certain I am. He isn’t coming back. I don’t have his Kerela contacts. His cell isn’t working. I don’t think he has taken it on roaming.

Such is my life. Such is my curse. I am fatal, everything in my vicinity comes to an end only I move on. I move on only to witness more beginnings and endings. Walking over the corpses like a zombie. The only I reason I resist those tears from dropping this time is because I can’t let him be responsible for a single tears of mine. He can only put smile on my face.

Never occurred to me then
that you might be going for good
Didn’t occur to me
That you might not be coming back
If it did, would have at least said goodbye…
Would have at least told you what you meant
now I hope you read these line and know
that I love you so my friend I love you so...

Run Delhi Run

Saturday, 30^th October 2005, 6.15 pm, I was on my PC writing a post for my blog and also doing some internet research for my work, when suddenly my sister came all panicky telling me do you something there is bomb blast going around, I looked at her and calmly asked, “you mean?” She got irritated by the cold attitude I had towards her panic. “what do you mean, ‘you mean’? I mean bomb blast, terrorist attacks.” She replied rather repulsively. “Ok.” I said and looked back at my PC and resumed my work where I left. She got furious now, almost started yelling, “how can you be so cold blooded, there are people dying, don’t you have any sympathy for them. How can you just go on blogging and surfing after you hear a news like that.

She has a point. I am ruthlessly cold to the latest bomb blast in Delhi. I don’t know why. I haven’t yet called up my friends to find out about them. I didn’t rush to the TV and start following everything that every biggies in town had to say about the incident.

When terror attacks we run for our lives. If a bomb happens to blast on my head I would run for my life no one else would run on my behalf. And so long as its not my life I don’t care. I know those who are running for their lives right now wouldn’t have cared either, had it not been their lives. Diwali, Eid…Tst Tst such a celebration time and such a tragedy. Well those who were about to celebrate didn’t bother for the ones who don’t even have blankets to protect them from the forthcoming cold when they live under the sky as their roof after they have lost their. Did they have a silent Dandiya in memory of the Qauke victims, a colorless Holi in memory of the Tsunami victims. The day Government of India Announces “ A day’s salary shall compulsorily go to the quake victims” one should see the long face I would make, you would make, these people who lost out all the fun of diwali due to the blast, would have made, had they been not busy running for their lives. Every year the Government appeals “Please have a pollution free diwali, who gives a damn. “Say no to crackers, child labour goes in it.” Not my child. Crores of money is senselessly burned on the occasion of Diwali. Some thousands of people die to do drunk driving. Women get raped on the occasion of Holi every year. Celebrations. What an Irony. What good is my concern gonna do to change the Irony? I stay in Dwarka. Do I or my sister who is being all-sympathetic, have the guts to rush to Sarojini Nagar and join hands with the rescue workers to pull out the bodies? We are not even gonna move out of the safety of our home as long as the terror knocks on our door.

Has anyone ever wondered what’s celebration anyway. Is it enough that a day of the calendar is being designed for celebration or do we need a good reason to celebrate.

I don’t celebrate any festival. When I am with my friends I eat, drink, sing and dance and have a time hell better than any celebrations. When I am alone any festival is just another day for me.

Run Delhi run.
Not for Hutch, but for your lives.
I too would run when it’s my turn.

I have run out of ideas to create further posts on my blog. But I am a wannabe writer. I cannot possibly run out of writing ideas in just about 10 month’s time. So lemme see what’s all there that I have written about and what’s all there I can write about.

Things I write about:-

My heart
My loneliness
My Frustration
Fights with Family
The absence of some one to love

My mind
What all I think
What's my take on latest issues.
On women’s empowerment.
On Legalizing Sex Trade
On Freedom
On the funny side of Life the good old days gone by
Exitement of Blogger's Meets

Things I don’t write about

My Heart
My petty crushes…which I keep having even at my age
My secret affairs
Those ups and downs in my secret affairs
Those secret desires
My Secret Admirer
People I curse with those cruel curses every time I am jealous
Sharp edged lines I write when I am infuriated with family

My mind
Which knows where have I failed
Incidents where I was on the wrong side
Politics cause I don’t understand it
Modern Art
Book reviews, both for the same reasons
Fellow bloggers

Not a very long list and there can be more to it… I haven’t been writing things I can write about from my heart because I am not feeling anything off late. Smile or frown, none whatsoever. About things I can write from my mind I am taking too much of time to compose them. But they would soon come up. If only I was a little less lazy.

Not many people are visiting my blog these days. Seems like my 15 minuites of fame has come to an end. Just when I was thinking about it...Suddenly a vision came to my mind…

A huge open space, thousands of people all around, they all had with them thousands of small frames having pictures of various colors displayed all around. Hundreds and millions of people moving about on their personal tracks, very thin tracks, criss crossing tracks, they are moving about and checking out the pictures on the frames. I too had a frame of mine and soon as I started following my track, million others crossed it, millions came visit the colors on my frame, thousands liked it and hundreds complimented it, and then they started moving about again and the space around me become desolate. My frame still on display and I wait alone with just one hand around my shoulder giving me hope support and assurance “It will be back…hang on”. That hand is yours. Do you know who you are

My second step

Second step in blogdom. A lot is being said and done about blogs these days. Blogs are now being considered as a stress buster, as a weapon of an opinionated and educated son of the democratic India (so what if he is working for an MNC somewhere in Noida or Gurgaon) blogs are being used as a forum for agitations against the corrupts, corporates use blogs to promote themselves, to instigate rival comments and debates, movies are being promoted, NGOs convey their message through blogs and what not. "A pen was mightier than sword and a key board is mightier than pen".
My blogging started in the beginning of this year when i read an article in Hindustan Times Brunch on Blogging. There was a lots in mind...a lot to talk about, to express, to convey all wanted to come out at a time the result was 'This is my Truth'. I am not a very well read person. I never knew I could write. And I think I actually could never write. Its just that as I started penning, rather typing, whatever I had in mind, words just kept flowing and I had my posts ready. I got inspired by my own writing to write more. I started admiring my own self.

I am not some one who follow the trend but I am also some one who doesn't likes to be left alone (I hate loneliness I still live in with him though) So when everyone around is optimising the various utility of Blogging I thought may be I should too lay downa a piece of my mind. My previous blogs still remains the same old blog about me, myself and I and this space is for what I feel about things and people, events and issues, gizmos and gadgets around me. Also this space would showcase the best from my previous blog.

The VIII th Delhi Bloggers Meet - This is how it went

I was walking alone on the path to nowhere
wanderers kept joining and a caravan was formed...

Rohit , Amit and Navnee t were the first ones who started walking. Two of them first timers weren't too sure of the DBM standard time. At that time somewhere near South-west delhi, a lady driven car was going a little haywire as she was busy attending calls on her cell phone, "are you coming?" Says Rohit. "Yes yes I am driving wud be there in some 30 min". Mam I am calling from Hutch...Listen I am driving call me later Hello samyukta this is Avikal call me when you reach there. So Avikal joins in. Ankur had reached by that time but was waiting in the main entrance for a more known person so as to curb the uneasiness of walking up to a stranger group and asking them if they were bloggers. Finally Sanjukta reaches. I don't wear a watch so my 30-35 min delay can please be excused...abhi to kaarwan banna baaki hai...Prasoon's joining in, 5 mins thereafter, triggered the hi and hello followed by one of the most significant question for the evening "who decided on the venue". In another 10 minuites Aseem joined. The meet has officially kicked off by now and the discussions went towards "The various Kinds of risk (real, financial...from insurance point of view. what did you guys think?) the latest browsers for netsurfing, the source of the term blog, the various tools available for blogging, the best blog hosts, what's RSS and XML". Avikal and Prasoon had to excuse themselves from the meet because of some other engagements they had. And so they did, but not before Prasoon, who breathes Lata regaled us with "Lag ja gale". He promised us we'd be hearing more of him singing in the future meets. (You did promise right prasoon?) The Meet then moved from Manipur stall to the open stage of Delhi Haat. All these while we were being assured by Harneet, Yogesh and Nikhil that they would join the caravan. Right when a very sensitive issue was about to be discussed, in which we might have required all those weapons kreeti (she wasn't there) was talking about, Harneet, joined in and saved us all. Followed by Yogesh and Nikhil (who came all huffing and puffing trying to find a parking) and was absolutely disappointed with the venue due to the reason of unavailibility of Alcohol. An issue the organisors must pay attention to next time onwards in public Interest. The final ones to join the group was Arun, Sushil and Shalini. A fresh round of discussion started focussing on topics like creative service industry, books publications, changing/emerging/newly acquired role of Blogs etcetera.

Nikhil's agitating mind and heart was calm for a while with the pseudo beer (Fruit Beer) but he again became restless trying to arrange for passess to the Rockoctober Fest. Looking at his plight Amit sacrificed his pass and Nikhil was seen walking out of the meet happilly. But Alas he was restless again in the parking area trying to locate his car...poor guy never got any peace...

Prasoon, hope you'd upload the pics and as you said do send us the links of some of those blog related techno sites.

Navneet, good job.

Avikal, thanks for joining. Hope the group would hear from you.

Thanks everybody for taking out time from your schedule to attend the Meet.

Log saath aate rahenge aur karwaan banta jaayega...This journey would continue, this show will go on, those who couldn't make it yesterday...watch out for the IX th Delhi Bloggers Meet.

VIII th DBM

Where am I these days? Amidst Exitement and Exasperation. Exited about my new role as a Socio-legal Researcher doing research for an USAID funded project. The social activist has taken over the corporate bitch...for some considerable length of time to come i guess...Am Exasperated about my Car's average, crazy drivers on the road, drivers who r in love with the (horns of cars i mean), those who would honk me even if I am driving at 55-60 when the speed limit is 40 (i have heard speed limit for cars on a delhi road is 50 isn't that funny) suddenly the number of a**h***s have increased on Delhi roads, driving 24 kms a day am running out foul words. Furthermore exasperated about the dysfunctional central lock, the broken light, a virus in my computer, an urgent requirement but total absence of a valid passport, running colors of my two Kurtas...the list can go on

Anyways at least there's one good news, the good news is that the Delhi Blogger's October Meet (the VIII th DBM) is happening.

Date: Saturday, 22nd October 2005

Time: 5 pm onwards

Venue: Dilli Haat, Manipur Stall

Agenda: Some meaningful conversation where people speak (not just talk) and listen (not just hear) followed by couple of silly jokes, some bursting into laughter with or without reason and lots of momos...

Participants: Anyone and everyone who stays in and around of delhi, or can make it to Delhi on that day, owns a blog, reads blogs or is interested in creating or reading blogs. Interestingly, you are welcome even if you hate blogs...

Please ensure participation at the largest possible number...spread the news amongst your friends, post message on your respective blogs...talk about it in ur workplace...etc.

Dating Etiquette Act, 2005

Dating Etiquette Act, 2005

An Act to codify the legislator’s ideas regarding the term called dating and to clear the stupid clichéd meaning given to the concept by the Indian middle class

Chapter – I – Preliminary

1. Short title and Extent - The law hereunder may collectively be known as the ‘dating Act’ and would be extended to any and every man irrespective of any caste, creed, race, age, region, religion or country, who wishes to, have at any point of time in the past 28 years had and does dates me with both retrospective and prospective effect.

2. Definitions – in this act unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context, the given terms shall have, so far as this Act is concerned, the meaning as ascribed herein.

(a) Legislator – that will be me the creator of the present law known by the name Sanjukta, Sanju, Sanj, San, Sans, Samyukta, Samy, Sam with Basu being the common surname for all the above names, having no relation whatsoever to Bipasha Basu and any resemblance to her, if found, would be purely coincidental, surgical, or as a part of the beholders hallucination or optical illusion.

(b) Flowers – shall not include any flower of the type belonging to gobi ka phool, geande ka phool and a certain red Jaba (Bengali nomenclature) phool which is exclusively used for the purpose of worshipping Goddess Kaali.

(c) “asking out on a date” - save as otherwise provided in this act, where a man, not being in any manner related to the legislator, whether single or married, shows his willingness to meet in person the present legislator for any purpose whatsoever and for whatever duration of time, be it a cup of coffee or a movie or simply to have a look at the legislator in flesh and blood, with an intention of getting to know the legislator better and get closer both physically and emotionally, whether immediately or over a period of time, this shall be known as asking the legislator out on a date.

(d) Date – the person who shows such willingness is known as a date and also the time and day when such a meeting takes place depending upon the context in which the term is used.

Explanation of (c) and (d) (I talk for myself and no one else but myself)

The term ‘dating’ doesn’t necessarily involve the element of ROMANCE. Dating is the very first step towards a relationship, which could be friendship, love, romance or can even turn out to be a professional relationship eventually. I meet a person in a café shop, in the railway reservation counter, in a yahoo chat room, on a networking portal like Orkut, Friendster, in a blogger’s meet, in an art gallery…etc. having exchanged a couple of words we then exchange phone nos. Thereafter, either I completely forget about this guy, never call and never bump into him again or may be we both kinda find each other interesting or may one of us find the other interesting, in which case there is further exchange of phone calls or sms(s). At this point when I and this guy decide to meet each other again, or for the first time (if the earlier meet was virtual) so that we get to know more about each other, I call such meeting as a ‘date’. If he says, “hey how about a cup of coffee tomorrow evening?” That will be like ‘asking me out’. That evening when I go out I will tell my other friends (when asked about my evening plans) that I am going to so and so place on a ‘date’.

In this entire scene there’s nowhere an element, essence or color of Romance or anything even remotely associated with romance. Its just a way to know a person. ‘An intention to spend quality time with an interesting person’ is the crux of the concept of dating. Of course one meeting isn’t enough to know a person. Two meetings is also not enough. So we meet quite often, we try to meet on weekends, what begin with a cup of coffee may now have been replaced by a movie or by art galleries (once again), further blogger’s meets or even outdoor adventure sports…this whole process over the period of time would be termed by me as “we are dating each other”. Which means, our interests match, our ideas of having fun match, our places of weekend hangouts match so we end up spending a lot of quality time together…we do stuffs together. Once again it has got nothing to do with romance. As a matter of fact dating shall end where romance begins. Once I know we are kinda romantically involved I shall call it a courtship and not dating.

Chapter – II – Rules of Dating

3. The longevity of a relationship (whatever kind) will be determined and the chances of giving a proper name and shape to the relationship shall depend upon the person’s dating etiquettes, which should definitely include the following: -

a) Get flowers.

b) Take the lead in most of the things, from which place to go and sit to what drinks to order etc.

c) Talk, about anything…just talk. Don’t let your mind go haywire, concentrate and pay attention to what the other person is saying, don’t let a chilling silence creep in.

d) Smile, just simply smile, don’t try to find a reason to smile.

e) Don’t have any other plans for that evening and if at all you do, don’t say it and don’t let it show up on your face. Don’t keep looking at your watch every now and then. Relax.

f) Say things that comes to your mind but with caution. Be yourself but don’t be rude.

g) DO NOT GO DUTCH on your FIRST date. Do not be entrapped. Yeah dating is costly.

h) Pay a compliment. Either in front of her or after you have departed.

i) Say ‘thanks’ for the time spent.

j) Handle her like a newborn baby…with love, care and affection.

k) Drop her back home.

l) Say “will meet again” just for the heck of it. Say it even if you don’t mean it.

Chapter – III - Effects of a Nice date

4. An evening with all the above etiquettes would certainly lead to a second date, and the second shall lead to third. So on and so forth.

a) The above said manners are most important in a first date. Eventually they can be logically done away with.

b) You need not get flowers on all the subsequent dates. But try to whenever its possible for you.

c) You can stop giving false compliments and be a critique after about 5-6 dates.

d) You can pick up a fight at the same time too.

e) When in fight, fight once its over don’t hold grudge.

Chapter – IV – Physical intimacy while dating

5. Having said that romance has got nothing to do with dating, this is to further clarify that presence of romance would not change the above definition of date, and that this chapter shall come into operation only when either of the party is having romance in his or her mind.

a) Physical intimacy while dating whether allowed or not is a complicated question.

b) On a first date it certainly would be a bit too forthcoming but is not totally prohibited.

c) A lot depends upon the way you carry yourself and the confidence with which you take a step.

d) A nice friendly hug is always welcome.

e) A slight brush of your palm on her cheeks is a nice gesture too.

f) A Kiss is dicey, but you never know…after all if the prince on the white horse kisses the princess would she mind. But make sure it is like the prince kissing Cinderella and not some…you know…

g) Thumb rule is that, never seek her permission, it would make you look like a weak man in her eyes be confident and decent in whatever you do and think before you do.

h) Most inhibitions are meant for the first and couple of subsequent dates, after which public display of affection should not be much of an issue.

The Legislator had never had a perfect date as described above.

pain knocked at my door

A sharp sword cut thru my heart, poor heart was bleeding...voice was choked. All of a sudden all the smiling stars in my eyes turned into scary ugly faces...and a loud sky piercing voice laughed out loud..."you fool, you innocent idiotic dreamer, shame, you expected...don't you know it's a crime, go to hell now."My poor heart is so tired now...of trying to resist the frequent push on the door, people walking in walking out leaving foot prints, rather mud marks, soul has been trying to wipe them off but before she can take care of it more people walking in and out...more dirt...I am closing the doors now...would try harder and harder to resist the next time...wish my heart was made of Iron...wish my eyes were as dry as zaire.

He - Tell me what do you want
She - I can't tell you what I want...you gotta find that out yourself. I never tell anybody what I want...
He - but with me you'll have to say...so tell me
She - I want to be with you, spend time with you, talk to you...
He - You are too demanding...

Just occured...

The more my network grows, the more I meet new people, more I find my self in solititude...I was less lonely when I was alone.

Almost all feminists are heart broken romantics...

A "live in" relationship is better than an "Open Marriage". Marriage is a beautiful term when coupled with Love, open marriage is disrespectful and shows weakness...living in is matter of guts.

The Sequel

Eyes met, hearts melt, flowers blossomed
To be continued…
Let there be no second part
Life is so much better if there is no tomorrow
If there is no after and no before
If only there was only the moment that she was living
Her heart pounding, pulse rating higher, thinking could this be him
Dreaming of her dream once again thinking this is him
Tomorrow there is no dream
Tomorrow she is suspicious, apprehensive
She can’t reach out
She dares not to expect
Tomorrow is truth, she knows bitter
Future was never faithful to her present

She finally found him. He lives in Mars and she in Venus...he has always seen her over the stars...she has always known him over the galaxies. One day she heard a knock on her doors. There was standing an angel, carrying a message from him to her, a message that was lightened up by the glitz of those million galaxies, which it crossed before reaching her. It carried the smell of the flowers that blossomed in his heart when he was writing it…it carried the smile that was there on his lips and the glow that he had in his eyes. She lost herself in that one splendid moment when she took the envelope in her hand…she wanted to sing a song, she wanted to write a poem, she wanted to take a rocket and fly to his planet…

To be continued

"Love, available only in Standard Sizes"
"Friendship, available in all shapes, sizes and colours"

On Freedom

What can I write on it? What can anybody write about it? The word obviously have different dimension for different people. Without trying to go into the wide spectrum of its meaning I would rather confine myself to what it means to me.

‘Freedom’ something I always have longed for, not that I don’t have it… but I just cant get enough. More and more freedom from more and more…everything.

To begin with I need the freedom to have my own definition of ‘freedom’. Off late this is one area that I am having a consistent fight with my dad. Coming home at 11 twice a week and 12.30 to 1 once a week…what was I doing, with who and where? Don’t ask me such questions I hate giving explanations. I need my freedom I tell him. “if u think that having a night life, staying overnight at a guy's place, smoking, drinking, chilling out with so called friends etc etc gives u a sense of independence, for me it is not” my pissed off friend yelled these words at me. I know that. I say Independence is when I am not being asked questions about what am I doing and why am I doing…when I am left alone to do my things in my own way to the best of my own judgment. ‘My own judgment’ are the key words. That’s what is my freedom.

We are not luggage or property, that we always need an owner or custodian. We were not born to be taken from the custody of our fathers and be handed safely (virginity intact) over to the custody of husbands. I am not against marriage. Not a feminist that way. But from being a father’s daughter to being a man’s wife, we must, at least I must for some time be ME. I need that transition period when I live only for myself. And I need freedom from people telling me my thinking is not the way it should be.