The Secret Of the Nagas by Amish

(I think this is the first book review that I am writing in my blog.)
This book, Secret of the Nagas is the sequel to the first- The Immortals of Meluha, which was pretty good, and ended with a suspense to make me grab my copy of the sequel on the day it released.
The second book lived up to the suspense although the actual secret can be known if you just read the last line in the last page. The pages till there are worth the read though.
The story is convincing, as to how one could justify God as a human or human as God. What I saw in the book was, to search the God within us. And what makes one strong and powerful enough to be worshiped or rather eternally remembered in glory.
To understand the approach of the author towards the characters, you should read the first book. 
The second book explains in human terms as is the style of the author in this series, the relation in the Shiva-Sati family.
Some secrets rather enlightening knowledge is seen in the conversations between the Lord and the Vasudev pandits, and overall the book doesn't disappoint the readers. I found these more interesting than the real secret itself.

I certainly felt that the language/writing style could have been a lot better.

Yet, I await the third one which Amish, I guess is going to start this October. 

Currently reading: The Good Earth by Pearl S Buck.
Next: want to grab the Millenium series, but The Money Changers by Arthur Hailey is on queue followed by Yes Minister which I am supposed to return to Suwarna.
Current track: Mona re- Bombay Vikings

Moi encore

If you have been a follower of my blog (which i am almost certain you are not), you would realize that my physique has been the major thing i ve ever had complaints about.
As days have been passing by, even my neighbours started having a problem with it and called my mom home one fine day to counsel her on this issue. she has heard a lot of advices from people who have no knowledge about ideal/under/over weight nor my health.
so she lost her cool on listening to that and came home bombarding me with a lesson asking me "HOW DO I ANSWER THEM???"
I was pretty annoyed too. so i decided i m going to work on it. If you remember that quote what nandhini told me "Amzu- you have a perseverance that knows no limits!"  so here is what i did- went on a hectic exercise regime, and a stupid liquid diet. It was all fine for 7 whole days. Started seeing results, but on the 8th day, i had to go somewhere far far away from home(there is as much of a fantasy as it sounds). a place it was that had no water nor milk, nor anything worth eating. Although, a friend of mine who was dropping me home shared her piece of bread with me- and that was the only solid i had over 8 days! (love u girl- else i would ve fainted and no one would have noticed it or bothered)
so what happened to me? i crashed in the hospital! i first went as an emergency outpatient. took a few injections everywhere possible, and then came home to suffer the pain and return as an inpatient to take a few more injections.
I was for sure a weird or rather an amusing patient to the doctor, and have had a lot of advices one of which is to give up aerated drinks- its like taking away alcohol from an addict! i have been so very used to it and HOW on earth could i give it up?
well its more like the price i m gonna have to pay for taking the comments of all those morons who felt i m too fat seriously.  And may be i really will because the doctor feels i shouldnt bother that much about it coz the other parameters are all fine.
Here is what i have to say: if you feel that my physique has anything to do with impressing you, you have my finger. I m neither gonna live a whole life with you, and neither are you gonna sponsor my food all life.
I had a perfectly working digestive system, excretory system, respiratory system which were all screwed up with 8 days of bothering about others.
And something i must say:
A humble thanks to the doctor who took good care of me, without trying to pose himself like philosopher, did his job well.
I never say it this humble, but i mean it this time, coz i know how much the pain killed me from the inside that makes me give all this respect. "Hail the doc" and a hearty thanks. I m never gonna bother about the jerks, and shall try my best not to touch any aerated drinks.
Current track: Dit by Carla Bruni

Thiniking: peut-etre

Life is as pathetic as it can be. Rather I have given it that chance. I was so freaked out, that I felt like a schizophrenic! I felt like throwing away my books and papers in the air and standing on top of the teacher’s table (or that office table) and sing some sleazy line or dance to some weird sound clips in my mind(save yourself… don’t ask me what that was )
But I had no guts to do it (good for me and the others), because there were so many things I am capable of doing to get applause and I gave not pursued it well. To be more honest, as I realized they did not grow with me. But I was such an amateur that I would have got terrified stares or stationery (or JUST anything one could grab hold of) thrown at me.

Following a series of videos, movies, music clips, speeches, articles and what not about following ones passion, here I am writing about the place I find happiness.
I have been following quite a few of them, and the one that made sure I make a blog entry about it was a movie “Julie and Julia”. When I don’t have mom at home, the best thing for me to do is to watch TV. Coz when she is around and finds me watching something English she takes it for granted its porn or something totally inappropriate to me. She will never grow up and come to realization that such things wont be aired on TV, and neither will she understand that I am an adult, nor that non Indian movies actually make sense. So here is what the movie reinforced into me. 
 It’s about talent, skill, hobby, like and love. I have never been consistent in pursuing anything that I took up in life. On estimation, if I had done well everything that I had started, or at least let me say 60% of the things I started, I would have been a prodigy, and found myself popular, successful, but most importantly happy!
It’s about trouver le Bonheur that I m talking about here. If at all there is something I could cling onto that would be there for me when I am in need of support, or just hang on and nothing more.
The answer was a 90% no. the only solace I have in life as of today is the French language. There are so many other things which I have left so far behind that they’ve not grown with me.
Hobbies become talent when they grow with you. You need to give it time and dedication for it to grow. And once it grows, it will be the wall of support.
Considering today is the best day, I ve decided to make a start with giving time and dedication to things that could possibly support me in my life. May be I m selfish, or may be not. But I just don’t want to grow alone. You might not always have your people with you forever. But certain assets would prove to be with you all life, and be with you when you need it whether you know it or not.
So here I begin doing everything I like, and love, the things that deserve to grow along with me.
End result: I m being as crazy I can/want to be in my room. Singing loud, dancing, strumming the guitar, playing the harmonica

Is the ado going away?

Here i am at an absolutely wrong time to be online.
As i could practically do nothing because of some stupid reasons, i sat reading some blogs of friends and my own old ones.
I realized how life changes every year, how morose and moronic we get day by day, and we see it prominent only at the end of each year.
As though i have had nothing useful to write, as though nothing good is happening around me, as though life was just of sorrows, i had abandoned this space.
Thanks to nandhini, i realized that i can bring about something good out of nothing.
And oh speaking about nothing.. its an annoying word that i come across, and use. Nothing to listen, nothing to talk, nothing to write. This was not how i was few years back.
So now on you shall have entertaining (atleast worth wasting time) posts here.
Good night for now, and lets begin tomorrow with inspirations!

The ado thinks again

Just like every adolescent (yeah.. no longer a teenager, yet an ado. concepts suck), i ve been wanting to get out, and find "freedom". yet, oh what a lazy bum i am (yet to upload the post i had written two days back!)
But anyways, life/world doesn't stop or take a break or chill coz i am doing either one or all of them.

Having lamented the fact that i had been jobless, or facing several problems, i was advised, and motivated to face it, and give it a try.
Well i did what i was asked to do. I faced it, gave it a try, and felt like a queen seeing the results(oh speaking of results, i have finished B1. felicitez- moi :P ). Giving it a try, i decided i could try making an attempt to move out of the city and start a whole new professional life.So i tried my luck in different cities. and realized something just yesterday.
so here is what happened: i went to the hi tech city . i ve always loved going there and i never miss a chance to get there. its a part of the city which is well developed and vivante (uh.. i think it is vivacious in English) of all the things for one to like the place. I m now not bothered about how cultural it is. Its a corporate world and it explains a lot. I had something to do there, and had to find my way to get a bus to reach home. in order to do that, i walked for a few kilometers (all this happened coz i had the mood, and the place is really good for a walk)
all my way back, i was wondering, what is not here that i have to run elsewhere in a search? As of now, i seem contended with what is available in Hyderabad and the need to run away is not as much as it was. Nevertheless, i would not mind experiencing new hi tech cities later in life :P

Here is a french saying which goes so well to what i m going through now: Liberté n'existe pas, independence quelque fois, solitude toujours! 

Inge Brahmanan

I have earlier written here "enge Brahmanan" (Where is the brahmin), and today i write "Inge Brahmanan" (Heres the brahmin).
I am elated to present Sri Vittaldas, an aspiring brahmin who wished to build a temple for the lord he worships.
Although i dont know much about him, there are some interesting and inspiring aspects of this person. This person is a brahmin, and collects funds to build the temple. To do this within the rules laid by brahminism, he collects funds by performing bhajans throught the country. He has never gone out of the country. He says that although he could potentially earn lots more than what he can within the country, he has decided not to step out in order to maintain the integrity of his ancestors. And adhering to so many such rules, he has collected funds to build a massive temple for his God. He had visited Hyderabad for a whole week to collect funds to finish the construction. The temple is at govindapuram, Kumbakonam district, and is bigger than the actual Vittal Temple in Pandarpur. He has been singing bhajans making us feel relaxed and energized throught the week, and doing some preaching in the most hilarious way possible.
Yesterday, (UNFORTUNATELY) the bhajans were amazing, and i missed it. the first day of the bhajan, i stopped clapping when my palms started aching, the next day, i stopped after my forearms started aching, the next day when my entire arm started aching, and then, i did not stop clapping even if it hurt me. As a matter of fact, i enjoyed it when i was clapping so hard. Yesterday it went so ecstatic that the musicians were also enthusiastic that the tabla tore.
And he has been doing all this in hyderabad inspite of ill health.
This man maintains the essence of brahminism and yet keeps himself updated of modern developments and employing them ideally in life.
I am proud to be a brahmin, and proud to say that the ideal brahmin lives even in the Kalyuga.

What does the dad of a 3 year old do?

I see many things a day that interest me. Some are just so beautiful / amazing that I d like to write in the blog. But about 90% of the times, I am distracted by some annoying forces. And only 1 % of the things make it to the blog.

Today is one such day. I’ve been horribly disturbed. In fact this disturbance has been there since last night which did not end very well today.

Now, I’ve decided, that I will be the one who d put the actual end, I also decided that I shall not let be impedance in not letting me put this interesting thing here.

I came across an article which says that children say “my father goes to office” not knowing what exactly the man does. Very small kids sure do that, but the older ones saying that is sad and rather alarming as to where the society is going!

But by the end of it, I was reminded as to what I knew about my dad and how I could tell about his work.

When I was a really young kid, my dad was a successful industrialist. So he would go to the office to handle the administration and to the factory to handle the manufacture. Every Thursday the laborers were given their weekly off in the factory (and Thursday was a day in my school where we did not have homework. This was till class 7 or 8. So I loved Thursdays all the more)

So I had another place to tell people. I d tell “my dad goes to office and factory, What about yours?” and people used to follow up with my parents on that for further clarification. Then at one time, my mom decided to enlighten me about what exactly my dad does. So in her story she told even about what the “often seen” staff did. [This all happened when I was somewhere around 3 or 4 years] The story ended with “so after doing all these things (of which I understood NOTHING), daddy gets money to buy you things from the shop.” [I must give her the due credits, that this story of hers helped me understand the circular flow of money in economics, macro and micro economics well even before it was a part of my syllabus when I started growing]

Then on, whenever anyone asked me as to what my father did, I started telling “he makes money”

If I heard any kid saying that today, I d appreciate that kid, as money is THE thing for which one works. But the sad thing was that, people reported this to my parents appreciating me, and it rang their bells. They thought that if this continued, people would think he was a manufacturer or fake notes or gets money by forming some mafia gang secretly. Apparently there were some scams of that sort happening, and they didn’t want to get in trouble for not doing it.

I can never forget that night. I was put between both my parents in the bed, and the whole night, I was not allowed to sleep, but was bombarded with lessons, that I shouldn’t tell things of that sort coz some nasty folks would think of it otherwise. This lecture followed with another teaching me how to actually respond to such questions. This continued till I got into the auto where I was again asked “what would you tell if someone asked you this?”

Asking a 3 or 4 year old sound odd to me, and I m not very happy about this habit of the elders. Asking family details to kids is really dangerous.  More than that I would say it is something of a criminal motive to encash the fact that a child is excited to talk out what it sees at home, and learns from places, and it hasn’t yet learnt how to lie.