Monthly Archives: October 2011

Jeewan Kya hai Chalta Phirta Ek Khilona hai | RIP Maestro

12 Wednesday Oct 2011

Posted by in music

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Its a strange and weird time when your childhood icons start passing away. Ghazal Maestro Jagjit Singh passed away day before yeseterday. For me an era ended with him, many many evenings were spent listening to his soulful healing music. Soaking myself into the lyrics that he brought life too. His was one of the music that I grew up on, its a music thats in my soul. Music that will last me a lifetime and in my memories and his music will live the maestro forever. Rest in Peace the ghazal maestro

Today as a dedication to him let me present to you the top 10 ghazals (actually the first ten may be) which are my favorite… ten on tuesday on wednesday anyone?

So the sake of situation lets start with a song which makes most sense here Jeewan kya hai chalta phirta ek khilona hai

And a song we all grew up a song that symbolises him, yes woh kagaz ki kashti yeh baarish ka paani

Next up a ghazal that has lovely nuinaces in it, kal chaudavi ki raat this shab bhar raha charcha tera

Next is a a ghazal which I love for the sheer magic of its lyrics,

Gulshan ki faqt katoon se nahin phoolon se bhi zeenat hoti hai., jeene ke liye is duniya main gham ki bhi zararoot hoti hai

No list about Jagjit Singh can be complete without mentioning the magic he did to Mirza Ghalib poetry… dil hi to hai, Hazaron Khwahishen Aisi

Can anyone forget the magic he created with Insight, specially with Garaj baras pyaasi dharti ko phir paani de maula

He also sang many geet/ghazals in Punjabi…  here is one that I love to listen too Saun da mahina

He also sang a lot of devotional songs.. here are two – a shabd (punjabi bhajan sang in gurudwara)

and the ever famous hey ram hey ram hey ram

And here’s ending with my most favorite Jagjit Singh ghazal, the one that never ever fails to evoke emotions, make me teary eyed… touch my heart somewhere… babul mora naihar chhooto jaye

So tell me whats your favorite

When Happiness is in the air

11 Tuesday Oct 2011

Posted by in festivals, My India

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That’s what this time of the year is. Time for festivals. It starts right with rakhi, janmasthmi and eid in August moves on to Ganesh Chathurthi to navratri , dashara, karwachauth and ofcourse the mother of all festivals for India – Diwali

I love this season, season in which there are celebrations all around, happiness all around and not to mention the yummy food.

What surprises me in India though is the diversity of these festivals, how the small things differ from region to region. So while during Ganesh Chaturthi a little gauri is worshipped in Karnataka its usually only the Ganesh is rest of the country. For navratri too its different beliefs., different celebrations. Up north people fast for 7 days because the little durga was hiding in a cave in Vaishno Devi during those days without food and on the 8th/9th day when she emerged out of the cave after killing Bhairo she went to a farmer house for food. So this is what is celebrated on, 7th days of fasting followed by feeding little girls who are treated as devis.. halwa, poori and chole before breaking the fast. While the same is celebrated in West with the lovely dandiya every night with all the fun, while in east its all about celebrating Durga with Pujo Pandals and sindoor khela with the final day marking the visargan of durga. Down south it takes a different avatar and people keep golu (lots of cute dolls lined up in stairs), people are invited home and little gifts are exchanged. One time so many celebrations, amusing isn’t it? Even the final 10th day i.e dushehra is celebrated so differently, while in North its celebration of Ram’s victory over Ravana by burning huge effigies of Ravana, Meghnath and Kumbhkaran which is preceded by 9 days of Ram Lila that is enacting Ramayana in form of drama, whereas in some parts of South of Ravana is actually worshipped.

And here I have just pointed out the differences in the navratri, the pattern just continues in all festivals. The diversity and the reason I love India some more

Leaving you with a picture of my thali for the kanjaks at home this year, halwa,poori,chole, mars in a kung fu panda plate…

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Early morning and drives

09 Sunday Oct 2011

Posted by in Highway Travels - the mad couples travel tales

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Generally speaking I am not a morning person at all. Actually I am a night owl. Give me night over morning any day. I can be up till very late in the night infact I can be up till morning but as me to get up early morning and you will have a very cranky and itchy person on hand for the full day

But there is one exception to this and that is when I gotta hit the highway, gotta go for the drive. I absolutely love highways early in the morning. For the start we can avoid the dreaded traffic 😉 but also the fact that everything looks so beautiful and fresh at Dawn (yeah but only on the highway ok? ;p) witnessing the sun rise between the trees and the road

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the dhabha walli cutting chai – stronger than chai can ever be

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And who can we not talk about the breakfast, whether it’s the hot paranthas with extra butter in the north, kandha poha in the west or steaming idles in the south breakfast tastes better

Currently as I type this on my phone I am enjoying yet another lovely drive and for this one I demand a Nobel prize as I got ready at 5 am wearing a saree, things one does for being a good Bahu 😉

VAWM | How long is long enough?

08 Saturday Oct 2011

Posted by in Causes to Champion, Feminism

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Ranju was playing with her brothers and sisters, all 5 of them when her newly married uncle came visiting along with his new bride. She always used to look forward to the visits from uncle, he would bring along with him sweets from the city and a adult male presence in the house which was missing since her father left them all to deal with their luck and poverty one day to become a man of God, a man of God he wanted to become when he really couldn’t even become a man of life. In her uncle she tried to find her father, a father they had lost.

She was smitten by her aunt too. Pretty like any other new bride, gentle with her, she played with all of them while uncle and her mother tried to work out how will they survive the next month. When they were leaving the aunt asked Ranju if she wanted to go to city with them. The thought of a vacation excited her, she packed her bags quickly and was ready to go. A couple of days passed by like a fairy tale – good food, new clothes and many places to see. After couple of days the aunt suggested her that why doesn’t she stay in the city with them, study in a good school. She was enrolled in the near by school and the aunt brought her up like her own daughter. She had kids that treated her like their elder sister. Time passed by Ranju graduated and started doing a job, the aunt was more her mother than the one in the village. And like all girls one day it was declared that she is ready or marriage, some rishtas came her way and the one that sounded suitable to everyone was promptly fixed. A decent looking guy who runs his own shop and a nice family what else does one check. Ranju and Mohit were married with all the grandness the aunt could afford.

However reality dawned a couple of months later when she realised that the shop is owned by the father and he actually does nothing in it, a job was arranged by the uncle who came to her rescue. However Mohit didn’t last in the job long and when Ranju asked him why, began a new chapter in her life, Mohit slapped her the first time that day and the abuse never stopped after that. The mother in law and everyone else in the house would stand and watch when Ranju was being beaten and later verbal and emotional abuse would follow from all of them saying that if she didn’t even care for her mom, its only money that mattered to her. The thought that she has already troubled her aunt too much and her mother could hardly do anything. Bringing up 4 children with no source of income wasn’t easy made her tolerate the abuse and so did the fact that she was carrying her first child.

The abuse continued, eventually the aunt came to know about it but hardly could did anything she had her own kids to look after, she would sit at times and think how life came a full circle and her situation  became much like her mother, probably worst she atleast didn’t have anyone beating her, she would live on the money given to her by her aunt and Mohit’s brother. If she would talk about going back to work, she would get beaten again and slowly this started taking toll on her health but she held her fort. Today she has by her sheer will power managed to bring up a daughter and a son who are both educated and working, who stand by her and ask their father to stop if he tries to raise his hand. The emotional  abuse unfortunately still continues but she has made the focus of her life her kids and derives her pleasure from them.

Ranju’s story is unfortunately a story of many women in India. We as a society need to do something about it. Stand up raise a voice, do something about. If you observe domestic abuse around you, don’t be afraid to interfere. You could save a life


 

NaBloPoMo with a difference

04 Tuesday Oct 2011

Posted by in Random thoughts, Ten On Tuesday

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Yes a month of everyday blogging but not NaBloPoMo. Some days back both me and Sups were cribbing on twitter that how we need another month long challenge to start writing again and later she tweeted to me saying that a bunch of bloggers have come together to blog through the month of October, some days on topic of choice and on Mondays and Thursdays of every week on a selected topic. It seemed like an exciting challenge and I said yes, the word got around and 8 bloggers came together to form Bloggers united Smile

However this month the challenge I am taking is to write a post eveyday and I am going to spread it across my blogs depending on the topic I chose that day.

Today we do a ten on Tuesday, so here are ten random things I have been upto

  1. I am starting a little late on the challenge but damn I was traveling u see Winking smile and yes travel has been good to me to this year, just came back from a short break at Coonoor yesterday and had a blast of time at the small quaint town (more on this soon)
  2. I am missing Delhi again, come festival season and I start missing delhi so much. Its been 10 years but the feeling doesn’t go away at all
  3. I am missing my mom even more than I am missing Delhi, the last I met was in Feb and its been what, no please don’t calculate and tell me. Sad smile
  4. Ojas has vacations and is driving me up the wall. God how they need entertainment every waking second of their life is amazing. God grant me more patience for next ten days
  5. On the line of CSA, we have started Women against Violence month and the stories have began to come, heart breaking but yet the ones which require and need to be brought to the forefront
  6. I am missing most of MasterChef Australia this season because when it comes in the night mil wants to see serials and when it comes in the morning ojas wants to see cartoons and afternoon at 2pm we are having the damn power cut.. imagine? I think its high time I bought tata sky plus so that I can record it and watch.
  7. Life of a mother is never dull as I said on twitter/FB last week. Ojas on the first day of his holiday decided to jump from the staircase, had a bad fall and gave us the scare of life as we had to rush him to emergency for a CT scan. Thankfully all is well and he is fine now. These kids I tell *rolls eyes*
  8. I am also slowly realising that I am turning into my mother when it comes to ojas, oh the horror. God help me and God help ojas Smile with tongue out
  9. Tomorrow I am doing Kanjak at home, the joy… will be making halwa, poori, chole yumm yumm yummm
  10. I so want the iPhone5, iWANT iWANT iWANT

so tell me what have u guys been upto?