For a change let me start with few comments on author before saying my review about this book
Chetan Bhagat - Budding Indian writer who has given 4 best sellers in a very short span and now entering into Bollywood screenplays/scripts. Being an IIT/IIMA alumini the country would expect more from him than being a writer. He safely escapes saying 'Pen is mightier than sword'...India is in need of more Tatas,Premji's and NarayanaMurthy's than a bollywood screenplay writer. I am not commenting this being so jealous on a person who is lucky to persue his passion, that too being in India. My only point is not to have wasted a costly seat in India's leading institutions. By the way why dont these institutions come up with a rule that their students should serve their country and show a profit of XYZ $ before moving out to any part of the world. All alumini's of IITs/IIMs come out with a notion that they are born and brought up to be slaves of leading MNCs, except for few exceptions. Our Government should also race with other MNCs and be ready to pay more and grab these (so called tagged)smart people.
Ok...coming to the book...its a super cool personal blog published as a book. The author needs special appreciation for his witty and simple style of writing. I feel all his books so far are based on his real life experiences. waiting to see something different from him...
Seen more as a youth icon than just an author, this IIT D/ IIMA graduate is making India read like never before.
This sounds so funny to me- not sure who took the statistics to see how good were Indians in reading before and after Chetan's book releases. Probably being an IIMA alumini he is putting his marketing skills at its best.
Chetan's official website - http://www.chetanbhagat.com/
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Kovalam Trip-Oct'09
After almost two and a half years we made a trip to Kerala. Good it was with friends or else we would have ended up eating Puliyogre and Curd rice in kovalam beach with our family. In India the added fun to each tourist spot is the dominance of the state cultures and values(???) they force on them.
We started off from our friends place by 11am (surely not a time to start for sight-seeing but that's how our gang trip works out...the guys take a long time to come out of their hangover and make a plan for the day...Unlike US/UK I cant plan the trip as we dont have maps or any clue to decide on the optimal route. so my job ends in listing out the places I want to see and obviously a long shopping list). after an hours travel we reached "Padmanabhapuram palace" just to get disappointed seeing the board 'GOVERNMENT HOLIDAY' - Gandhi Jayanti...!!!! We are so grateful to Bapuji that we close all major tourist spots too, on his birthdays. it sounded so ridiculous to me as anyone's common sense would say, that was the day(weekend) when most of the people would plan such trips...anyway we just sighed off and started our travel to "Thirparappu Falls". Thirparappu Means A Pavilion Of Beauty And Sacredness - It holds good for the falls but not its surroundings. As all other tourist spots of India this was also less maintained with more crowd. The water pressure was so high in the falls as we had heavy downpour that day couple of hours back. I was so worried to even step out of the room as it was still drizzling and if I go out I am gonna make my son get wet in rain for the first time. Luckily after 20min. the drizzling also stopped and my husband(at times reading my mind right) volunteered to baby sit for next half an hour. I rushed out to the falls and had great time playing in water for half an hour. I could see my husband struggling to hold my son from coming to the falls. My son was pointing to me and saying he wanted to go there...:) I quickly changed and took my turn to babysit. As our friend was in a high profile Government job we got a decent room to change our clothes. If that was called 'decent', I was wondering what kind of rooms others were using!!!!
We started off from that place by 6pm and reached a hotel in Trivandrum at 8pm. In "God's own country"-Kerala unless you pay everywhere as if it is "God's own money" you wont get a good reception...:) The next day morning, we started off to "Padmanabhaswamy temple". All guys were against it and all girls instead to visit the temple and traveled with a pride of winning the argument till we reached temple. Already my husband was irritated for deviating a fun trip to pilgrimage trip, he was totally pissed off on seeing the board "Men in dhotis and women in saris"...even I wondered who the hell would have made such rules...but luckily all girls were in saree. My husband was given the most dirtiest dhotis they had and he trying to act smart wore it on top of his pants...One of the pandit saw that and started giving him a long gyan starting "Thambi, intha tem(p)ble-a...." losing his patience and temper my husband stopped him and changed back to only dhoti. my frustration was also increasing as all this drama took 20min and we had only next 15 min for darshan. From 11.30am - 12noon it was nap time for God(/Pandits...) I insisted on making an "archanai" (special prayer to God with all possible special demands). My husband furiously answered me "God is within you, don't try to fool yourself"...Having made the greatest sin for that day I thought I will at least please God by offering Ghee lamp. For 20 bucks the priest gave me a ghee bowl which I have to pour in a big lamp. He said think of all your family members and their nakshatras and pour the ghee. I started with my Dad, Mom (i wondered her memory power of remembering everyone's nakshatra),sister&family,brother&Family,siter-in-law...by the time I reached to my son I heard my husband calling/searching for me. I think I have got this habit from my mom who always has a list of 10+ people with their nakshatras to test the patience of the priest...by the time she would say the 5th person's name, the priest would say "I will do it on God's name.." but she wont leave him until he pronounced all tongue-twisting names and nakshatras rightly and completes the pooja. My son enjoyed running around the temple and we started off to Kovalam at 12.30pm.
Everyone jumped off the car and rushed to the beach. My son seeing the beach for the first time was observing it so closely. For the first half an hour he was bit scared off getting his legs wet in water and facing the waves. once he got used to it, he was so excited and we all had good fun time for next 2 hours. As hunger struck us we were forced to leave for lunch and had good fun in sea side restaurant. We again played for another hour and reached hotel by 10pm. I wondered how my priorities have changed in my life. during college days I used to play in beach for more than 4 hours without having any food. now all that I was worried about in this romantic place was about my son - if the water would suit him or not, how long he has played in water, what food can I give him etc..etc...
The next day we went to "Neyyar Dam". Kids enjoyed the crocodile park. The lion safari got canceled and we got a chance to have a long walk along a beautiful greenery patch. Everyone of us had so many sweet memories to share and this was the most memorable time of our trip. we left the dam by 4pm and waved bye to Trivandrum by 6pm.
We started off from our friends place by 11am (surely not a time to start for sight-seeing but that's how our gang trip works out...the guys take a long time to come out of their hangover and make a plan for the day...Unlike US/UK I cant plan the trip as we dont have maps or any clue to decide on the optimal route. so my job ends in listing out the places I want to see and obviously a long shopping list). after an hours travel we reached "Padmanabhapuram palace" just to get disappointed seeing the board 'GOVERNMENT HOLIDAY' - Gandhi Jayanti...!!!! We are so grateful to Bapuji that we close all major tourist spots too, on his birthdays. it sounded so ridiculous to me as anyone's common sense would say, that was the day(weekend) when most of the people would plan such trips...anyway we just sighed off and started our travel to "Thirparappu Falls". Thirparappu Means A Pavilion Of Beauty And Sacredness - It holds good for the falls but not its surroundings. As all other tourist spots of India this was also less maintained with more crowd. The water pressure was so high in the falls as we had heavy downpour that day couple of hours back. I was so worried to even step out of the room as it was still drizzling and if I go out I am gonna make my son get wet in rain for the first time. Luckily after 20min. the drizzling also stopped and my husband(at times reading my mind right) volunteered to baby sit for next half an hour. I rushed out to the falls and had great time playing in water for half an hour. I could see my husband struggling to hold my son from coming to the falls. My son was pointing to me and saying he wanted to go there...:) I quickly changed and took my turn to babysit. As our friend was in a high profile Government job we got a decent room to change our clothes. If that was called 'decent', I was wondering what kind of rooms others were using!!!!
We started off from that place by 6pm and reached a hotel in Trivandrum at 8pm. In "God's own country"-Kerala unless you pay everywhere as if it is "God's own money" you wont get a good reception...:) The next day morning, we started off to "Padmanabhaswamy temple". All guys were against it and all girls instead to visit the temple and traveled with a pride of winning the argument till we reached temple. Already my husband was irritated for deviating a fun trip to pilgrimage trip, he was totally pissed off on seeing the board "Men in dhotis and women in saris"...even I wondered who the hell would have made such rules...but luckily all girls were in saree. My husband was given the most dirtiest dhotis they had and he trying to act smart wore it on top of his pants...One of the pandit saw that and started giving him a long gyan starting "Thambi, intha tem(p)ble-a...." losing his patience and temper my husband stopped him and changed back to only dhoti. my frustration was also increasing as all this drama took 20min and we had only next 15 min for darshan. From 11.30am - 12noon it was nap time for God(/Pandits...) I insisted on making an "archanai" (special prayer to God with all possible special demands). My husband furiously answered me "God is within you, don't try to fool yourself"...Having made the greatest sin for that day I thought I will at least please God by offering Ghee lamp. For 20 bucks the priest gave me a ghee bowl which I have to pour in a big lamp. He said think of all your family members and their nakshatras and pour the ghee. I started with my Dad, Mom (i wondered her memory power of remembering everyone's nakshatra),sister&family,brother&Family,siter-in-law...by the time I reached to my son I heard my husband calling/searching for me. I think I have got this habit from my mom who always has a list of 10+ people with their nakshatras to test the patience of the priest...by the time she would say the 5th person's name, the priest would say "I will do it on God's name.." but she wont leave him until he pronounced all tongue-twisting names and nakshatras rightly and completes the pooja. My son enjoyed running around the temple and we started off to Kovalam at 12.30pm.
Everyone jumped off the car and rushed to the beach. My son seeing the beach for the first time was observing it so closely. For the first half an hour he was bit scared off getting his legs wet in water and facing the waves. once he got used to it, he was so excited and we all had good fun time for next 2 hours. As hunger struck us we were forced to leave for lunch and had good fun in sea side restaurant. We again played for another hour and reached hotel by 10pm. I wondered how my priorities have changed in my life. during college days I used to play in beach for more than 4 hours without having any food. now all that I was worried about in this romantic place was about my son - if the water would suit him or not, how long he has played in water, what food can I give him etc..etc...
The next day we went to "Neyyar Dam". Kids enjoyed the crocodile park. The lion safari got canceled and we got a chance to have a long walk along a beautiful greenery patch. Everyone of us had so many sweet memories to share and this was the most memorable time of our trip. we left the dam by 4pm and waved bye to Trivandrum by 6pm.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Breaking the Break....
I am blogging after one year and seven months…Had so many interesting importing things to blog but couldn’t spare time for it.
No regrets as I have spent that time with my dear son. The journey of motherhood was good. Before I could recognize and appreciate the changes within me because of my little one, I was 7 months pregnant J Too much of information is too bad…that holds good for all Indian moms as we have so many functions during the 9 months of pregnancy. It might have been a good knowledge sharing occasions during 19th century but doesn’t hold good anymore as you have so many good sites and books where info is more reliable.
8.40PM IST July 4th, 2008 – a great moment in my life. My first glance at my baby…
Heard my beloved was so tensed. It’s obvious after listening to the doctor whom you rely 100% at that moment says “We can say anything only after the baby comes out. He should give a good loud cry for everything to go fine”. So I guess my atheist husband would have thought of some God for the first time to rescue us. Fortunately Arya(after days of discussion and thought we decided to have this name. will blog later on this) gave a loud cry…
My son was supposed to see the world on Aug 15th 2008(Indian Independence Day). Having returned from US 6 months before my pregnancy, I cribbed a lot about
I have chosen Aug 15th 2009 as a good day to start blogging to give a message to my son that having born in
The next three months was the most hectic time of our life shuttling between hospital and home and getting panic on any small unacceptable reaction Arya would give. My world shrunk to my home and my baby. It was impossible to even spend half an hour with my husband. J
The best part of Indian mom is the Food and Ayurvedic medicine they give you after pregnancy.(Wait to see my blog on this soon) The allopathic practitioners would say they can prove it is good for your baby and you to have any food from day 1 of your delivery. But with my experience I would strongly say IT IS NOT.
19th Oct 2008 – great milestone achieved in our life. We moved to our new own home with our baby.
We had drastic change in our life after that. A good living environment plays a major role in your life. Had all fun during Arya’s first Diwali, New year, Pongal etc. To add to all fun his uncle travelled down from US to see him… Arya had his first outing to Bannerghatta Jungle Resort on 7th Feb 2009. He enjoyed his time with his uncle a lot as all of us in family did.
I joined back office on 1st March 2009. It was such a pain for the first two weeks to get adjusted to work environment leaving my 8 months baby at home. It took me almost a month to maintain a work-life balance. By then Arya started crawling, babbling, screaming, talking etc etc…
We had good fun on his 1st birthday. ooohhhh couldn’t believe 1 year has passed by…
That’s the long story said short and sweet….:)
Now Arya would wave bye to me by sharp 8.45am implying Mom- time for office for you and play for me....see u in evening...:)
Going fwd I have decided to use my one hour of travel time in the morning to blog something interesting…
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