Early morning, late evening!!

Dedicated to all those who travel by bus to work day in day out! :D

My normal work day begins early in the morning. Office being so far away from home, I need to start at 7.30 in the morning in order to catch my bus and be there before the traffic hustle bustle begins! I've never spent this much time on travelling everyday ever in my life. So well, I guess this is quite the reason why I'm dedicating a post to it. :D

The bus journey everyday is a very interesting experience for me. I was very very apprehensive about travelling so far away everyday but now I can say I am kinda used to it and it's really not so bad. To be honest, I almost enjoy it( although I crib and complain about it all the while!), except the waking up real early part!

The bus stop is just about 3 minutes from my home. I reach there by 7.27 on most of the days. I meet a couple of people who I call my bus friends. We just have some little silly small talk about the match yesterday or why these guys have such a big problem with their ties or how marriages and holidays are so much fun! Just random topics for exactly about 3 or 4 minutes till the bus arrives.
From the first day, I used to go and occupy the last seat. The only reason behind this was I wanted the window seat and that was the only seat where window seat was empty. Slowly, it's become my habit to sit just there even though the seat is highly uncomfortable and throws me out of the seat on a slightly bad road.  But well, it doesn't matter to me, I still prefer going and sitting there. :) I just like to sit there by myself, gazing out of the window or listening to music or reading a book or just dozing off.
In the morning, it's pretty much easy to travel. I reach work in at most an hour. And I doze off for half the journey. Listening and discovering nice music is my favorite activity during that time. Everyday it's a new band and a new song. Gives me the inspiration to keep myself going for the rest of the day! Ah the wonders good music and good sleep can do!! :D
If I am not doing either of these two, I just sit and look out of the window, admiring the scenery(?) outside ;) Well, all I get to see are mostly people waiting for their office/ college buses somewhere near the bus stops. There are people all fresh and determined to face the new day's challenges. It reminds me of the saying-"Early bird catches the prey", all the people all set to hunt down their preys. :D There are no traffic jams anywhere, just the umpteen signals(I'll talk about signals in some time). So well this is the view I get when I peer outside the window. Oh one day I saw one man going on his scooter on the other side of the road. My bus had stopped at a signal. This chap stooped his bike and folded his hands and prayed for a couple of minutes, as one would do when they see a temple across the road and went by. I go on this road daily and I wondered how this temple went unnoticed by me! So I turned to look and guess what, there was no temple there! I still search for a temple everyday when I go on that road and I've not found it yet. :|
People keep boarding the bus at various different stops and sometimes the bus gets full and some of them come standing as well. I think I am glad I get to sit in the bus, I am "better placed" than them, thanks to my faraway house ;) Then the best part of my morning journey is the freeway. It spans a distance of around 10km and soon as the bus enters it, I somehow manage to doze off. It just takes him 7-10 minutes to cross this stretch and I'm woken up when the bus takes a turn near the tollgate indicating the end of my journey and start of another day at office! Everyday, invariably my thought is "Oh! So soon, did we reach so soon!? Why??!!"
That was my morning story. Evening story is not really so interesting because it's pretty boring to have to go back all the way so far away everyday and the traffic and pollution don't help lift my mood up. So, I'm quite a sad grumpy girl when I'm travelling in the evening. I just go and sit in the bus, now not the last seat, I just occupy any seat that's got an empty window seat. Once the bus leaves, I wonder what to do. I am too tired to read that book. Music! Yes I need music to keep me away from the noise of the outside world and to soothe my tired soul! :) So listening to music, I manage to doze off till we reach the end of the freeway. The freeway is mostly(emphasize mostly) traffic free even in the evenings. So I kinda get my power nap. Then comes the stranded traffic, noisy, polluting, irritating. I still shut my eyes and sit for however long possible. I sleep, and wake up to find the traffic's hardly moved up 1km.
Somehow I catch glimpses of sleep, again get up, change the music and try to sleep again. This happens for the initial half hour of the journey. Then mostly I just give up on the idea of sleeping and just begin to think. Think of what to write next, think of what to ask mom to make tonight for dinner et al. This is my time to just sit and close my eyes and let the thoughts flow.
Even after an hour, sometimes I'm still stuck up far away from home. It just gets to me. Looking out of the window just makes it worse. So I close my eyes and meditate(?) if you can call it that. Oh I almost forgot about the traffic signals! These are like adding salt to my wounds! I get stuck in every possible big signal for 120 seconds! It's like that, on an average, increases about 15 minutes of my travel time! I just sit in the bus, helplessly feeling suffocated, adding the numbers on the number plates of vehicles to kill time just waiting to get home. The one good thing about this is that the journey is non stop till almost two stops before my home so that's a relief. :)
Anyways, after about one and a half hours( sometimes two hours) of this journey, I finally am back home for a good night's rest to wake up again early in the morning for my next journey!
My cousin rightly wished me-"Happy journey to your office" the other day :D It truly is!!

I Love You...

This one's dedicated to all my loved ones. :) :) My first attempt of writing poetry.. Wrote this sitting in the bus on the way back from work. Here goes:

I love you
because you make me happy,
you make me sad,
you make me angry,
and you make a bad day good or good day bad.

I love you
because you make me smile,
you make me cry,
you make me go for you that extra mile,
and you give me the faith that if i really want to I can fly!

I love you
because you scold me when I'm wrong,
you make me go crazy mad,
but when i cry, you hold me or sing a song,
and with a smile, you tell me-"Hey it's really not so bad!"

I love you
because when i crib my Life's such a mess,
you tell me life's tough, I should be tougher,
you give me hope, say I should worry less,
Oh! you are the best, the very best teacher!

Yes, I love you.
I love you
because you love me.
You are the one who makes me Me!! :) :) :)

What's in a name... What's not in it!! :|

This one dedicated to all my friends and non friends named Divya. :D

My name is Divya. In school and college, thankfully there was never another Divya in the same class as me. I knew many of them but I never noticed it and it never was a big deal. I was like, OK so what? But my view changed completely after joining work. Let me explain. On the first or second day, we got our official mail IDs. So all of us wanted to look for our names in the Global directory. My friends and I started looking for our names. Everyone found their name. Except me. :| I typed Divya and the list of Divyas was like never ending. It feels like almost one fourth of the women in Infy are called Divya.
That's when I started noticing it. Yes so many Divyas there were around me. My friends have friends called Divya. Not just one but many Divyas. It's just so unfair!! :(
But well what can I do.. I can only crib and complain. I can't change my name now. My parents have named me Divya. It rhymes with my sisters' names. When we say all our names together it sounds so cool! So what? :|
I keep hearing it everywhere. When I go out somewhere, any busy place- restaurants, food courts or any large gatherings, I assure you there are a minimum of my named girls out there! I remember one incident vividly when I think of my name. One day, my friend walks up to me and tells me-"My cousin's name is Divya." I said-"ok fine, many girls have the same name as me. What's the big deal?" And then she tells me he is a guy!! This was sometime in school. That was the first time I heard even a guy can have my name and I was super upset for a couple of hours after the incident. Lol.
The other day both my friend and I met two friends on the way to lunch. The friend I met is called Divya  and guess what my friend's friend's name was? Yes, another Divya. That's just a small example. So many same named people all around you!! And yes that's your name. :|
But, but the very fact that I am writing an entire post dedicated to my name says it all. I actually love my name. Even though it is so common, even though almost every other girl on the street is called by the same name, I still love my name. You know, when I think of me, what is it that I think of? My name. Yes. It is my identity. My name defines me. Even though I complain so much about it, I feel my parents have given me a very good name. It means beautiful, according to my Dad. I heard different meanings as I grew up. That it's something to do with spark. Something bright. I like all the meanings. It makes me feel beautiful and alive. My name is what identifies me. So what if I share it with a million others? It's still my name.
So finally, what's in a name? Everything!

Sleepless night(s)!!!

Dedicated to everyone who has suffered from sleepless nights because of the cough! :D
Oh this cough and cold!! The worst ailment one can suffer from! It causes noise pollution, sleepless nights and disturbs us and everyone around. :( :(
I have a problem of sleeping less generally. I wake up even if there's a small disturbance, as in my if my phone sends out a small beep I just get up. It's crazy. I wake up a million times in between my sleep and it's very annoying especially when everyone else gets their share of sound beauty sleep every night. I can't say i suffer from Insomnia but I suffer from some distant cousin of it!! :D
Well, so coming back to last night. It was a bad bad evening and the bad carried over to my night as well. I left my office in the 7.15 bus. This is I guess the worst time because there is so much traffic, thus increasing the pollution and noise levels. The travel time is almost 1 hour 45 minutes!! Usually, I just doze off or listen to music or read a book. But yesterday, unfortunately, I was sick plus I had no music to listen to and I wasn't carrying a book to read. I was sick all coughing coughing in the bus. Trust me, I sound like a patient suffering from TB when i cough! :| The same thing happened in the morning and a kind girl sitting next to me offered water to me. So in the evening, to save myself the embarrassment of having to borrow water, I carried my water bottle along without forgetting. :)
So, somehow I was just sitting thinking of random things, humming songs in my head, chewing gum, coughing occasionally, my journey was kinda ok still. But all of a sudden, I felt very nauseated. I was still half hour away from home. I opened the window thinking some fresh air will do me good. But no, all I could breathe in was the dirty hot carbon monoxide. :( Made me feel even worse!! That's when I realized how dirty my favorite Bangalore has become. I love Bangalore but this pollution, this dirt and the environment that we have here now is terrible. There is absolutely no fresh air!! :( What has this city come to?? How am I going to live here?
So with these thoughts in my head, I finally reached home. Had some nice hot soup and decided I was too tired I need to sleep. I needed sleep very badly. I was tired, I was sick so there was no reason to not be able to sleep right? But well, whoever it is who makes plans from up above had something else planned for me. The moment my head hit the pillow, the stupid cough started!! I didn't lose heart, I woke up, rubbed vicks on my throat, drank hot water, inhaled vicks, went back to sleep. It was a hot night so the fan was on in the room. I again started coughing. So I again thought- "Ok, alright, fan is not helping me. I'll just get up one last time put off the fan. open the window and sleep nicely." I did exactly that and went back to sleep.
Little did I know my neighbors ( or whoever it was) would decide to burn something in the middle of the night on this very night when my room window was open :( So well, they did and the smoke was inside my room! I was sick in the first place and to top that the smoke, I guess cough didn't need any more reason to start all over again! So again I got up closed the window, drank some hot water from the flask. I decided no fan, no open window for me. It's ok I can sleep now.
I slept, I guess, for half an hour. And then, the next round of cough started. This was more strong and so bad. The worst cough! I just couldn't sleep. I sat up on my bed giving up all my attempts to sleep!! I just sat up staring into the dark night. I felt empty, all energy drained off! I sat there for I don't know how long and then I guess somehow I dozed off while sitting. This cough is such a cunning thing. It doesn't come that much when I am awake, but the moment I sleep, it just starts. So I just dozed off for I guess two minutes and it started off one more time! :( I gave up all my attempts to sleep after that. Left it to fate. Drank up all the water in the flask. I don't remember the time of the night. I just sat. But guess what? I slept afterwards I don't remember how. Or when and how the cough stopped. I found myself on bed sleeping peacefully till the alarm rang!! :) And thankfully it's a holiday today, so more good news, I didn't have to wake up early in the morning when it rang :P I put it off and went back to get another couple of hours of nice, peaceful sleep.

Lizards!! Aaahhh...

Dedicated to my wonderful friend, best best roomie ever and a fellow lizard hater!! :D

Lizards are, according to me, a shrunken version of the dinosaurs. All the lizard non haters say they are pretty harmless. But i beg to differ. They are extremely harmful, ugly looking, dangerous and despicable creatures. I am saying all this out of my own experience.
I've always been scared of them and have hated them but the intensity of my hatred has increased now after I know that they conspire and rage a war and scare us poor souls who are already so afraid of them!! :( I lived in Mysore for a couple of years. Both my roomie and I are scared, super scared of them. I think they could smell ( or sense in some weird way) our fear for they would roam around on the floors and crawl so low on the walls of our home like they are ready to pounce on my head any moment. Living in constant fear of being attacked by these evil creatures, I decided it's high time I did something against these creations of God. My post is just my way of saying-"No matter what happens I'll always hate you, Lizard!"
I've fought three big wars so far I guess with the lizards and still I don't know who has emerged victorious in them :( I'll tell you about them and maybe you can decide for me.
One day, we came back from work- it had become a habit by then to scan our rooms for the presence of our beloved guets at home, by habit, we were scanning our rooms. And no prizes for guessing, that day there it was, sitting in the corner of one wall in my friend's room staring at us mockingly. I don't know whether the walls had less grip, or whether the creature had no fear, I knew that it would be on the floor at any moment. Sleeping with the lizard in the same room, was completely out of question. Thus began our first war against the lizards. We brought out our weapons- Hit spray and a broom. As expected, it came on the floor and somehow after a lot of screaming and shouting, I sprayed Hit on it. That didn't deter the creature. It was running all around after that. We hit it with the broom and still no use. This process went on for quite sometime. We were tired and suffocated due to excessive inhalation of Hit, the enemy finally got exhausted and wiggly so we thought it was accepting defeat. So I got out a piece of paper so I could throw it out of our house. But it again moved. One final blow and it became immobile. I picked it up and threw it out of our house. We used to sleep on the floor till that time. After this incident, the next day we had cots :D
Several months passed after this. We had our encounters with them on a regular basis. It would show itself in the living room or kitchen quite often. On a Friday, I was to leave for Bangalore. I was in a hurry to leave, and I saw it's head peep out near an open shelf in my room on the floor. But I was in a hurry and moreover it was weekend so I decided to let it party in my room for the weekend. I told it the same thing and moved out of my house. When I came back, I didn't look around for the lizard for two reasons:
(a) I just assumed it would be out of my room because two days had passed
(b) In case it was still there, I didn't want to go looking for it and wage another war
So I continued living in peace and I almost forgot about it when one day it showed itself again in the same place. And it seemed filled with a lot of energy. Our second war had started. Again the Hit spray and broom came out. The enemy was more prepared to scare us this time around. Every time I went near it to shoo it off, it seemed to run right into me and attack me. From one corner of the room to the other, on the floor, the lizard kept running as we attacked it. This time both my roomie and I were even more scared. No matter what we did, the lizard was not ready to slow down. I already had a very huge guilt of murdering one lizard, didn't want to do it again. But this cunning creature didn't leave me with an option. It shed it's wiggly tail and started running. But we didn't give up. Finally, it had to sacrifice it's life. But I should say this was a bigger martyr than it's previous friend. Gave a very tough fight. Left us exhausted and tired and so sad that we had to kill one more lizard. :(
After this, they changed their way of attack. they chose our kitchen now. There was one day when there were three of them having a gala time in our kitchen. We gave in by skipping dinner that night because we didn't have the guts to stand in the midst of them and cook :D
The scariest incident, the final war,happened when I was alone. T his is the reason why I call these creatures evil and schemy and cunning. I was alone at home when one lizard decided to enter my room and crawl up behind my bed to the same exact height as my bed. It stranded itself on the wall behind my bed. I was standing outside my room and watching it. I didn't know what to do. It was challenging me giving me those looks. I was all alone talking to my mom on the phone. Telling her about it, I got yelled at by my parents for being so scared. I hung up. Told them I'll do something about it. With great guts I was going towards my room and it started of doing acrobatics. Stretching it's head and all that and as I was looking, it LEAPT!! Leapt towards my bed, as though aiming to go sleep straight on it. But thankfully, it missed it. Came straight on the floor. It ran and hid under my blanket which was lying on the floor! This was it. I mean I had never ever seen a lizard leap before! I decided it's gone out of my hands now. There is nothing I can do about it. I just gave up. But I had to sleep! Sleep in my room. I decided to take help. Went to my neighbor's house and told the Aunty my problem. Poor her, she's also a lizard hater. She said she'll tell her husband once he comes home. So I waited for him to come. Finally, around ten in the night he came over. He went to my room. I told him the last i saw it, it was under the blanket and it was still there when he went. Sleeping cozily under my blanket :( He just so easily, like it was an ant, went ahead and swept it and drove it out of the house without any difficulty! I just stood there and stared speechless. The lizard was out. I was glad. :)
Finally, after two years of living in that lizard filled place we moved out. I came back to my house. It so happened that I had to stay here with my same roomie for a week when my parents had gone out of town. No prizes for guessing, yes, the lizards were back here to haunt me. I've never seen so many of them together when my parents are around. There were around five of them roaming around near the kitchen. And one fine day, there was one lizard that had fallen into the kitchen sink!!
I feel jinxed. As I already said, any new place I go to, I just spot them and find them staring at me giving me the bad looks. But I hope I'll be able to create my own world which doesn't have any of these unwanted, sad creatures where I can live peacefully without the fear of attack by Descendants of the Dinosaur!!

Movies, Music and Me :)

This post is dedicated to a very important and special person in my life who has taught me many many things. Re-introducing me to the world of movies and music is just one of them.
Music is, I guess, something which everyone is associated with in their lives. To me, music is like food for the soul. I grew up playing Antakshari. This one game is so cool it just increases your knowledge bank of songs. Thanks to this, I know almost all the famous 80's, 90's Hindi songs with correct lyrics :D and the funny thing about this game is the song database doesn't get updated as new songs get released. We keep singing the same old songs no matter when we play this game!!
I never was good at singing but somehow managed to be part of the singing group in school and would take part in all the music competitions back then. But i never thought of myself as a good singer. But music always soothed me.
Around high school time, I started listening to old hindi songs. Till then, my notion was old songs are old and boring. Boo. But i started off with Kishore Kumar. Fell in love with the lyrics and melody of these songs. All of them were so simple, beautiful and yet so touching. Songs to suit all moods, all occasions. I still like to listen to all these songs whenever I get bored of the new stupid Hindi songs. Next I listened to Rafi. And finally Mukesh. My favorite song of Mukesh is "Jis Gali mein tera ghar na ho saajna"- a very very beautiful song. There is another beautiful Mukesh song which I felt was very boring and just fast forwarded. It's called "Koi jab tumhara hriday tod de". Well, I had this friend in class 11 who was a huge Mukesh fan. She hummed this song once. And then I came home and actually listend to this song and fell in love with the lyrics! It is a super slow song but a very beautiful song indeed.
After this came the normal, then new Hindi songs. I listened and loved Hum Aapke Hain Kaun songs. Listened to the cassette a million times, so much so that the tape got ruined! Next came DDLJ, DTPH etc. etc.. There would be days when I would do nothing other than listening to these songs, dancing to them and learning the lyrics. Ah! The simple joys :)
Then came the days of Hindi music albums. There were songs of Shaan, Sagarika, Lucky Ali, remix songs. I grew up listening to these songs. They were all fun. I know so many of those songs till this day by heart. Lol. :D
Music has been a part of my life forever but I never did go beyond Bollywood music. I still like listening to the Hindi songs, I enjoy them too just to dance around and hum. For me, English songs were totally out of question. Metal, rock-oh no too loud for me! This was the perception I had about it. But recently, this very important person of my life(whom I have dedicated the post to) showed me where the real music is!! Rock music need not necessarily mean noise. Rock is not noise. Yes, it is not. All you folks out there who have ruled out rock music as noise, please think again! I've been listening to a little bit of this for sometime now. And I am so in love with it. It is healing, soothing and so beautiful. Everything that you want and need, these songs give you. I am still exploring the world of this music. But it is something I certainly want to keep with me for the rest of my life.:) I'll write more about this in my upcoming posts. How it keeps me going, about my favorite songs and all that. :)
Next, let's talk about movies. Am I really passionate about movies? Ardent movie watcher? I just watch a movie for the fun of it. Watch it and enjoy it. That's it. I've not watched many famous movies such as Sholay(yes i haven't watched it!!!), Amar Akbar Anthony.
During school days, I've just watched very few movies in the theatre and almost all those theatre visits have been memorable.
As a kid, I went to watch this kannada movie, i think it was Akasmika. My dad had this super cool calculator watch with lights on it. I loved that watch. I was sitting on my dad's lap in the movie and playing with the watch. The light in the watch amazed me as a kid. And i played with it so much the watch got spoilt :D My dad still misses that calculator watch of his! I'll get you a calculator watch someday Dad. :)
Another movie I remember well is Kaho Na Pyar Hain. I was in high school( don't remember which class) The hero and heroine were new. I went with my sisters to Sagar theatre in Majestic to watch it. I knew nothing about the movie but just knew it had just released that week. I was so super happy after it got over! As it happened with thousand other people, I too fell in love with Hritik Roshan :D and Amisha Patel became my then favorite actress. :D
The next movie is Taal. This is the first movie I watched more than once on the big screen, and I think the only movie I've watched 3 times properly. The first time I went for this movie with my Mom and her best friend and her daughter. I just loved Aishwarya Rai in the movie. And the songs, I love all the songs. The beautiful scenery, the stupid predictable story. I liked all of it. I don't remember when i watched it the second time. It was on small screen, maybe my cousin had borrowed the CD or something. So i watched it a second time then. I used to live in I.I.Sc. back then. In the campus, they have a small hall to screen movies. Usually, movies that were screened here were the ones that were superhits but screened long after their release. Incidentally, Taal was screened here too. My friends were all going for it, and I tagged along. :) Not a super great movie, but I will always talk about it because it's the only movie I've seen three times. :D
The next movie on the list is Spiderman. I think I was in class 10 or 11 when it released. I was watching it in the theatre. I was sitting in the theatre, the lights were off I guess. This noisy group made an entry and sat behind me. I was looking at them and I knew one of the girls in that group. She was this girl from my class in a different section. She sat behind me. We spoke formally and guess what this girl is my best friend now. Back then, I never for once imagine she'd be my best friend and so close to me. This incident really makes me smile and wonder how certain incidents become special and memorable even without you knowing they would be special!
I watched a million movies during college. Almost one movie a week. They were all just for the fun of it. But the only movie which I'd like to mention here from the long list of movies I watched would be Don. Why? Because this is the one and only movie I've watched "First Day First Show". I liked the movie, of course. More so, because I was watching it on the first day. :D
Finally, I think I should talk about this one movie before I conclude. The movie I am going to talk about now is Kites. I don't know the story of this movie even now. This was the first movie I watched with the person I've dedicated this post to. This person, is a movie lover, but not at all interested in Hindi movies anymore. So it was this movie which we went for together for the first time. The movie was so so stupid but it didn't matter to us. We were together, we were so happy. That's what mattered. And that's the reason why this movie will remain special to me and very very close to my heart.
I can see how all the movies that I've watched have been associated with the experience around watching the movie and not the movie itself. :D I have written about the incidents that cross my mind when I speak of movies.
I hear a lot about how wonderful an experience it is to just watch a movie and appreciate the beauty of it. I would love to do that. The list of movies that I want to watch is in the making. It is going to be a very very long list I am sure. And yes, it will be a nice journey-watching movies for the sake of the movie and enjoying that. :)

My first blog :)

Finally!! My first blog. I've been planning on this for years now. But never could- so many excuses. But I am glad I am writing now. :)

I have always thought of so many things but to take out time to actually implement it requires a lot of motivation, inspiration and an inner voice which says-"OK go ahead, enough of procrastination!". I got all of it in ample amount which has finally got me to writing :)
My posts are dedicated to myself, all my loved ones and people who continue to inspire, support and motivate me during all phases of my life and keep me going.
I think this is sufficient for my first blog, my introductory blog as I am itching to go ahead and start my next post!!
Hope I keep this going :):)