Bhopal (Fresh Mormories of past)

Bhopal

Some things reminded me of good old days of Bhopal, been in Bombay for 13 years, but that city never left my mind. It has a charm of its own and the closeness to heart because I grew up there since I was 1. Had my first hill trek, just behind my house the first time, experienced the Bhopal gas tragedy, had the first nerve tingling visit to the sanctuary :Kanha Kisli, the first cultural endeavor Bharat Bhavan (thanks to my artist Ma), and the first ever running off the dentists chair eperience when he brought out the big injection. I still love the feel of growing up in that small but at times busy town. I have no photos of these memories, except in mind. Behind my house was a water tank and I used to rush there in the mornings and stand on it to catch the sunrise once a while from behind the hill, oh! how much I loved it....I reminded mom to wake me up early for that. I used to sit there for hours reading the fav Famous five, which filled my afternoons as if I wished I had a case to crack too :) I loved looking at that hammock our neighbor had and still wish to have one today. Our house veranda and vehicle parking area around it was always filled with flower and vegetable plants, as my mom loved gardening. "Mogra" was my fav flower, back then. I think I can reproduce a couple of pictures with those flowers. We had a parrot and our neighbours had a dog and the neighbors kids (vivek and nivedita) always jumped across the common wall with their dog to scare my parents wits and play with us :P..

The vivid memories are of school St. Joseph and favourite blue house. I used to rush with my best friends lily and mary and gurpreet to the the school ground to climb the best possible tree to sit and have lunch. It was certaily a beautiful view of school from the tree top and the railway track where a train passed by every few minutes. The thought of boarding one of the trains to visit Dadu in Nagpur was always their at the back of my mind though I did fear the scolding of my parents later.

ANother memory of school is, I was a really dumb student in language Hindi. I had to learn kabir ke dohe some of which still are fresh in my mind, but back then I was more so was more interested in mischiefs. So I failed my hindi paper on of the exams and the principal said he would not take us to the class picnic as a punishment. As scared I was to tell that to my mom. I got my mom pack my lunch for the school picnic and as everyone left on picnic, I managed to make 2 of my friends stay back with me in school and play in the huge school ground all day, OMG what a day. I realized that day school was so much fun. Cmon after all I was only in std 3.
The principal though very strict was one of my favorite persons while growing up. I adored that person in every way and wanted to be like him.

Winters had a fun of its own, the hill station feel, I remember experiences the first hail storm in Bhopal. We went out and kept a big vessel to collect hail :)The monkey caps, the sleet, the jittery teeth while waiting for school bus to arrive....

When I look back, I really feel greatful for having a chance to grow in that city.
Mumbai was nothing like it. The lying on grass atop a small hill, looking at the clear skies, Mumbai it all ended at a skyscrapper. But I got to be in that city at right time, career years.
You never get to see the natural beauty, the different seasons, peace of mind and people have no time to wait and watch, but you never have a boring moment in that city. And you get to meet a plethora of people from all over India. This blog is dedicated to Bhopal so I will not speak much of Bombay.

Bhopal, still fresh in my mind, with a lot more stories. I wonder if I will ever get a chance to go visit it once and see the school, the house, kanha kisli, 10 no. :).....but still I love that picture in my mind.

Sounds like a ruskin bond place....:D
Well and now that I write this blog I realize,....the b's never left me: From Bhopal to Bombay to Bangalore to Birmingham...wonder where I will go next :P

First Flight to "the unknown land" (reposted)

"Mati pukare tujhe des pukare"

Its just 2 months more to go to India and I was all excited @ it...Talking to my roommate @ what we would to once we got there..i remembered my first trip from India to US...Just thought off putting it down...Mon, dad, bro, granddad and grandma...came to the airport and we reported 2 hours early which meant watching similar students going to US...Seeing each ones anxiety made butterflies fill my stomach...Then the great moment "the security check" started and "lo and behold" my bag weighed 16 kgs extra...Had to remove a lot of eatables, bad for the "hungry me persona" rushing back to parents waiting area from students rush hour area. After lot of frantic efforts, managed to remove a lot from bag and now it weighed 4 kgs less. So I rushed back to get the usual but most important masalas and pickles...By the time I came out of the overweight, underweight dilemma, it was time to bade a final good-bye to parents….Well as first times in international flight, I flew with my friends awed at things around and the daily travelers around us were obviously oblivious of this state of affairs which intrigued us.
The plane took off, the altitude 40000ft..temperature -50degree, crossing of time zones and path the plane took were all depicted on a screen. Flying above clouds was wonderful. This all awe was followed by a light dinner which was indeed very light as is airplane food famous for. The "ingredients" were well written on the food item without any concern of it being tasty. The "usual bread" made me feel very light for other items were absent on my plate. This short meal and cool weather let me catch on some short winks...
This was the first day I saw the sunrise from my seat in the plane...I could see the dark orange ball of fire just across the window. The breakfast again came with sukha bread and some hot coffee which gave us an aftershock for the bitter taste it had..SO the morning coffee was a strict no-no and we lived the day on orange juice and pepsi "yeh dil mange more" company which saved the day...With all this bitter(coffee) an sweet experiences I reached Amsterdam……(continued)

Gatlinbarg (1,2 and 3) --older blog reposted

Gatlinburg ski trip Dec 2006
All set to ski...It just looks warm, the truth is exactly proportional to clothes everyone is wearing...damn cold :) This was the first ski experience. We girls never got off the baby slope, though we had a fun filled snow fight :D The difference between Christmas and halloween Gatlinburg was: Christmas had the magical decoration and feeling while the halloween decoration had a different charm. ALso getting up to both mornings was different experience. Christmas morning had the cabins completely covered in fog and u could not see anything outside the cabin, and with the glass windows you feel as if you are traveling in a cloud. It is a beautiful experience. You got to be there to experience it :)



Me, Richa, Meenakshi, Prashant, Mandar, Shalmalee






Telico Plains 2006
The second trip was with the friends below. We had booked a log house instead of a cabin this time, had a nice warm bonfire on this one :) The most memorable part of this trip was definetly the bonfire, the walk along the creek, the try to cross the cold creek part. I don't know how the guys crossed it on foot, my leg went numb the minute I entered the water. We girls decided to have a ride back in car instead :)



Preeti, Sumit, Me, Richa,
Nitin, Mandar, Shalmalee, Niroop





Smokies-Gatlinburg trip 2005



Radhika, Pushkar, Ritu, Richa, Parag, Anish Sonika, ROhan, Me

Just decided to pen down about our trip to Gatlinburg, till its still fresh in my memory...We (richa, parag, rohan, radhika, pushkar, anish, ritu, sonika and myself) started Friday evening aroung 4PM following the way to pegion forge where we had booked a beautiful cabin for 2 days.The journey was uneventful except for short breaks at the gas station and stop for dinner at an Indian restaurant(obviously amazing for students who have no thikana of eating)--- thanks to google maps (for their long but correct directions). We took exactly 3 hours to come to pegion forge after which we got lost and roamed in the city to find our cabin for @ half an hour. In between petrol tanks refill, wandering and city seeing :), we finally reached our destination : www.sugarmaplecabins.comReaching there at @11:30..we all decided to have tea (courtsey "TATA")... Ritu our tea lover went for it and we all proceeded to decide on "whos room is it anyway", and you guessed it right, for another half an hour between cousion fights we finally were able to get an all girls cozy room for ourselves :). By that time tea was totally forgotten about and we proceeded to play monopoly, when someone remembered about tea and lo and behold the picture of the disaster is posted below...After some effortful cleaning and remaking tea, we went back to playing monopoly...and finally slept at around 3.

Morning was beautiful...with the cabin in the smokie mountains, the patio directly opened to a view of mountains...windy cold morning...sitting on the swing on the patio..with hot tea..aha... Ya by now you must have guessed how much we like tea...sorry to pepsi and coke...After some rounds of pool, we were ready to go around the city by afternnon.
This city is a total party city with miniature golf and go carting everywhere and hotels and cabins,,all with halloween theme. I will put a picture of it soon..We then went for a sky ride, water ride etc. Was fun !! Then the best part of the trip was the "Old time photo house", all of us got dressed in this cowboy and maiden type dresses with guns in hand and clicked our way to the past...You will love the photo below..After this we went to the "Ripleys haunted house"...and it was so scary--I had to do without my voice for the next whole week...
Then we played miniature golf and went for go-carting...but missed on the wish of having icecream at baskin robins..as it closed by the time we reached...Then we reached home at around 3..after a long day...
Below is the beauty of nature we could capture in our camera on the way.

SURABHI - Taal bhi S~S~S

Music is my passion. One who can understand the words of music and only understand what that passion is. Very less friends of mine know this part of me, but then what are blogs for ;). and what are friends for...just kidding :D
So friends, this season for Diwali, we all from Birmingham, got a chance to get together and come up with a music program. It was a beautiful journey with a lot to learn and lot to enjoy.
Below is the slideshow of the whole team and more yet to come.
Surabhi team
It was nearly an effort of continuous practice and trials of new things and strings, instruments, voices and noises and juggle of which songs wins over the other over a time of more than a month.
First day started by choice of songs and the variety of themes being discussed from ideas pouring in of an era event or a multiligual event or an all instrumental section. Songs were being scrutinized in every possible direction the idea would give way. Strings pulled, combination of keys pressed and voices tested over and over again to generate the best melody.
During the first few days, I realized the beauty that each instrument carried and the distinct sounds which jelled with others. It felt like I had entered a new genre. I realized it was much easier to sing but more difficult to understand and play an instrument melodiously and play it in harmony with other instruments. I found myself listening to every sound as something unique and paid more attention to what instruments could have been used in a song while it was playing in my car, avoiding the car going off the road a couple of times. The songs obviously sounded all the more melodious.

Here is a link to the music videos. I hope the above was a good dose for you all to enjoy the links below though not in car:)

Aye Hairathe
Deewana huwa badal
Mein chali
Des Mere

Research.......

My roomate has recently joined PhD and the idea of getting into the research field and getting groomed for it through lectures and profs made her put her "research caps on". This is a term specially coined for her and people like her who read PhD comics for fun. I am not pulling their leg for 2 reasons 1) I am not inti enough for stuff like that and 2) Whoever read PhD comics does not need to know that research/no research its fun to read it....
So one day as she was crossing the traffic light, unknowingly she started calculation of how long it wud tk her to cross the road by walk and will it be faster on the bike or by the time she gets on the bike to cross the road and make way through the crowd it will tk the same time. She went away thinking on that. When she came home she narrated the incident and I decided to keep the memory of that first feeling.That was the day she realized her grooming for PhD had started taking shaping...I am sure since then things have kind of sinked in for her :)

Parents Trip here

Aai and Baba were here for a month. Just left for Mumbai today and as you would have all guessed, apparently I have nothing to do after all those days of pampering and merry making the reality strikes and thought of directing mua time to this long lost space...


This will be an ever increasing post with some photos and sweet stories:
Here is a picture of people I love the most and ofcourse missing are some who could not be in NY when this picture was taken at the rockerfeller centre ....:) When we come as students it does not take us long to adjust to things here, but as I saw my mom and dad trying to adjust and transition into the life here, i closely encountered the beauty of differences of both places.
On a lighter note my mom quickly adjusted to hot water running out of the taps whenever required and the dishwasher (no kamwali bai jhanjhat :) While my Dad could not take the sight of me driving on the wrong side of the road till the last day....Mom loved the fact of cut vegetables and the increased speed of cooking but missed the regular tu tu mein mein with sabjiwalas.....what boring life. More to come....

Shoppers Soul

(This is poem dedicated to my roomate Ms. Richa Tiwari...a shopoholic)

Sale at kohl's comes a buzz in the morning,
"Do you want to come along, shop in the evening?".

2 days a week, I wait for this chore,
Puzzled by the energy with which she roars.

"Shopping are we?", A smile, a twinkle,
a spring I see.
I have no heart to break that flow
For Macy's is worthless in front of that glow.

A discount, a deal we rush to the Aisle,
I notice a beaming face peeking out in a while.

Few hours in shopping, a day well spent,
A buy worth 5 dollars, is "A winner" in the end.

Office Picnic

(Two contradictory words- you think -you will soon know
I wote this after I read KG's poem and though something should be written for her. Here is my humble effort)

My cell phone rings "tring, tring"
I am still in bed,
Wondering if KG could give me
five minutes to spare

I rush to get ready and so does she
8:30 it is my school bus says
honking at her door
"Good morning" shes says
running to make a score...

The race to the door
to make it before nine
Hot fresh cup of green tea
keeps us online

Between bouts of work
we decide on our next trip,
Panera bread, silver coin or Mandar's Moes
today it is?

Between gtalks and yahoo
I often ask her
"Can I come to see you?"
and then we go gleefully to the breakroom
for a minute or two :)

4:58 it is
I am waiting for her to buzz
"give me 2 more min"
the statistician you can trust.

And if you ask her a reason or two,
she will prove how important the 2 min were to you

Thats my wonderful companion in office
Kayjee it is and office becomes picnic.....

(we do work in office sometime...:D)

A friend - my first try

(This is my first try at a poem, so please bear....)

You are as funny as a tickle
your smile send across ripples ;)
you are always so supportive,
and very attentive....

The secrets of your heart deeply hidden,
your mind always on your mouth ridden...

Little things you do that matter much,
Have I ever told you how much?? :)

Right there when friends need you
Left there where I know I would always find you:)

I will always be proud of you my friend,
looking from the corners of every bend,
from now to ever on my mind and heart you will reign. :D

Flavours of Surili

If you are wondering what Surili means, it could mean rythme as in music to ears. As music provides flavours to your ears, my attempt to blog will also provide a read of flavours of life. Also Surili is a name formed by putting together the names of all my family members if you are wondering why so?
This blog was an inspiration provided by 2 good friends of mine and I will post some stories/poems/instances as a dedication to them.