Of Nightmares and SweetDreams

These are some of my night time memories, often repeated. I know there are people out there who can conjure up some meaning out of this, but I don’t want to know… what if it says something bad. Ok I am paranoid about knowing the future. I like to take life as it comes. Anyway read on… as the tradition goes bad things first.

Nightmares:

1. I am in a public place and suddenly my legs fail me... I am no longer able to walk, people don’t come for help. I start crawling on the floor, and my clothes start tearing. I am afraid I will go nude before I reach home… but the dream “always” stops at this point.
2. I get up and see myself sleeping (which means I am dead?)
3. 2 or 3 of my dead relatives are mix-and-matched, like body of one with head of other etc and they come and sit and talk with me …brrrrrrrr
4. I come inside the house and see shadows moving all around the house, and suddenly the whole house becomes completely dark; again I always get up at this point drenched in sweat and feeling terribly scared!

Sweet/Funny Dreams:

1. Sri Satya Sai Baba of Shirdi comes out of the picture (which I have in the pooja room) and gives me a dAswALa flower.
2. I am running in a yellow flower field (remember DDLJ?) and I am extremely happy about something.
3. I am on a stage speaking something, and 1000s of people are cheering me.
4. I go to buy milk, the milkman is milking the cow there and as soon as I reach there pista flavored milk starts coming from the cow ;-)
5. My aunt comes to our house wearing a noodle strap top and a mini skirt (FYI, she is very fat and not exactly the good looking types). No offense meant but she does look real funny... I can’t help it ;-)
6. I am some 10 years old and I hide my father’s glasses. He can’t see a thing so me and my sis sit and watch TV on “mute”… lol! (My father wears specks, but he can definitely manage without them. And oh ya! TV was absolutely forbidden during our school days except for the 9pm DD News :-)) – It’s been a million years since I was 10, but still this dream doesn’t seem to leave me.
7. My mom is being chased by a robber, and instead of running on the road, she is into hurdle race, jumping over our neighbors’ compound walls!
8. My cousin gets up one morning only to find all her hair eaten by a bunch of rats (She is a sweet cousin of mine, but keeps boasting of her long thick black curly hair… dreaming this might be my revenge ;-) )

The news that pain me

1. I had dreams of one day becoming a “Dr”. Initially it was the MBBS doctor, but since that has not worked out, I thought I will do a PhD at least someday. But now I have dropped that idea! If a person like Shilpa Shetty gets a doctorate, I just don’t want to be in that circle anymore!!!!!
2. Are you a female? You are useless… If I know your gender before birth I will kill you; else I will utilize you only for physical pleasures (household work and sex) and all I finally want is “male” kids from you!
3. He is going away… The “Intellectual” man, the children’s man, the intelligent face of our nation, the scientist, the rational thinker... Mr. President, Dr. Abdul Kalam. Goodbye with a heavy heart...
4. Mafia’s associates are “free” and are out in the open. She walks out free even though she had “fake-passports”! And all Monica Bedi had to give was Rs25, 000 as bail amount. What is that amount to her... peanuts?
5. Women have to walk naked on the street to get “attention”, for what? For people to wake up and “listen” to their dowry harassment stories.

I can go on and on… my mood is anyway spoilt, don’t want to do the same for you guys, so THE END.

Pleasure thy name is Music

Was listening to this song today after a very long time.. and I am simply bowled all over again by the simple yet deep meaning lyrics. I am sure it sends anyone who reads this; or better who listens to this song into a deep trance.

Song Name: Mokshamu Galada
Composer: Saint Tyagaraja
Raaga: Saramathi
Thala: Adi

mokshamu galadA bhuvilo
jeevana mukthulu gAni vAralaku

sAkshAthkAra nee sadbhakthi
sangitajnAna vihinulaku

prANAnala samyOgamu valla
praNava nAdamu sapthasvaramulai baraga
vINA vAdana loludau Sivamano
vidha merugaru, thyAgarAja vinutha

And the translation (to the best of my knowledge) goes something like this…

Is salvation (moksha) conferred on anyone in this world?
or is it attainable only to realized souls ?

Is salvation (sAkshAthkAra) attainable without true devotion in you?
can a music-illiterate realize you?

Without life (prANA) and fire (Anala)
there is no Omkara (praNava)
From Omkara, the seven notes (sapthasvara) of divine music emerge
Lord Shiva derives indescribable pleasure from playing viNa
Is salvation obtainable to those who are not able to perceive this?

Basically Sri Tyagaraja is trying to tell us that we can attain salvation through Music. Isn’t it amazing to see the powers of Music? Be it any form, any kind. It’s left to the person to “vibrate” with any kind of music that matches his frequency.
I have myself experienced this amazing power...

I feel energized to start a new task when I hear something in nAta rAga.

When I am sad, I listen to varALi rAga, and each and every time tears flow down my eyes and makes my heart light.

Nothing puts me in an upbeat mood more than the rAga kadanakuthUhala.

kalyaNi and bhairavi are evergreen and can be listened to any time.. anywhere

I can go on and on…..

For me it is Carnatic Music, but some may feel the same with movie songs or even hard rock. Music is music... be it classical or pop or jazz or whatever. As long as you have felt it... you are blessed. Salvation is very near.

If any of you have not experienced this power of music.. then you are missing something really beautiful… just go and immerse yourself in this ocean of divine pleasure

Can I have 36 hours in a day please?

As boring as it may sound, here's my itinerary of an average day

6:00am : Wake up - with great difficulty and sheer willpower of course!

6:20am to 7:30am : Daily activities, Make coffee, Read Newspaper, Get ready, Do Pooja, Leave to office (The initial 20 mins is for actually getting up ;-))

8:45am : Reach office, have breakfast at the desk itself and get to work...

12:00pm to 1:00pm : Lunch

1:00pm to 1:30pm : Time pass, like blogging or checking forwards etc...

1:30pm to 5:15pm : Work again in full swing, with an in between coffee at the desk. Leave for home

6:45pm to 7:30pm : Reach home, have coffee, freshen up and relax for sometime.

7:30pm to 8:30pm : Study time. I have some certifications/entrance exams lined up :(

8:30pm to 9:30pm : Prepare (basically heat sambar;already prepared by my mil, and make chapathis) and have dinner

9:30pm to 10:30pm : Serial time :) and some chit chats with in-laws during breaks ;-)

10:30pm to 11:00pm : Prepare for the next day (wash my tiffin, iron clothes etc)

11:00pm to 12:30pm : Study some more... the last 20 minutes is just falling asleep, but trying to be awake and read something else will feel guilty the next day.

Now that you have seen the schedule, I still have LOT many things which I would want to do, but just don't have the time for it. Some of them being,

• Social Work (Involve myself in the activities of an orphanage or an old age home)
• Practice music/ play veena (I feel ashamed sometimes that I have almost lost my touch!)
• Go to dance (Bharathanatyam) class
• Do some painting (I was very interested in this in my school days.. but after that have hardly had time for it)
• Call up old friends (Except for very few with whom I interact regularly, I hardly keep in touch with old friends...che..che..)
• Visit my cousins (Some of them are very young, and I would love to spend some time with them.. but where, pray tell me where is the time?)
• Go for some concerts (Ah! It's almost ages since I drowned myself in some good carnatic music concert)
• Read some good books, religious and philosophical (Somehow I do read novels during my bus journey to office :).. long live traffic jams!)
• Experiment some good recipes (ya.. I am very fond of cooking... as long as there are people to eat them ;-))
• Play some games (me and my sis used to play badminton/Chess/Carom etc in the good old days.. now?)

*sigh* I know! I know! you will tell me.. what are weekends for?... Here's what it is for

• Shopping - The necessities like groceries and other house hold articles... and sometimes if there is a necessity to shop for personal stuff like dress or shoes... some function on the way. Gone are the days when I used to shop just for fun... ah! the bliss of bachelor life :)
• Cleaning the house - This takes away most of the time! But I love it :)
• Urgent or mandatory visits - Have to give something to somebody, someday had a baby, somebody is ill, some function, kind of visits.
• Studying and oil bath activities :)

So there you go.. weekends go faster than the weekdays, even before you realise it's over :(

In the midst of all this, questions have subtly started coming in about my plans of starting a family... hello! *knock* *knock* Where is the time? "IF" I can feed my children "while" I am studying, if I can play with them while I am cooking, If I can make them to do homework while I am cleaning and closing the kitchen for the day, if I can help them with their school project work while I am in office... they can come and be a part of my life anytime ;-) But, till I get this great multitasking ability... kids.. you have to wait...

As much as I LOVE kids... I also want to give 100% of myself to them... so till I can do that, they can't make an entry.

OR oh ya.. if I can have 36 hours in a day....

P.S: If only some of my relatives could read this blog ;-)

Our Rashtrapatni ji?

Pratibha Patil became a celebrity overnight when the UPA alliance proposed her as a presidential candidate. Before this nobody even knew that she existed!

Anyway all said and done she was proposed for the first citizen post. One thing which did irritate me was the “woman” tag that she had. The newspapers started boasting of first woman president and all that. It set me thinking, is it important to have a woman as our president or is it more important to have a capable person out there irrespective of their gender?

To some extent I have to agree that the President of India does not have as much power in his hands as compared to that of the Prime Minister. But still, it is THE most respectable post. Is it not then the responsibility of the parliamentarians to choose a capable candidate?

I have nothing against Prathibha Patil, but can she ever be compared with the intellectual Mr.Kalam? This looks more like yet another move from Ms.Gandhi, so that she can remote control this post also! If we remember the Office-of-Profit bill faced much resistance from Mr.Kalam and irked Ms.Gandhi to an extent. All this looks like Ms.Patil is expected to be another pawn in the hands of that Italian woman, to make things come more “her-way”.

Lets have a look at Ms.Patil’s resume

• The bank which she had set up for the so called welfare of women “Pratibha Mahila Sahakari Bank”, had it’s license revoked in 2003 for misappropriation of funds.
• It is believed that she falsely testified as a witness to protect her brother in a murder case.
• The factory “Sant Muktabai Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana” of which she is the founder directory failed to repay a bank loan and was sealed in Jan 2007.
• She claims to have had a communion with a dead guru.
  

These are only some of her achievements which I am aware of, who knows how many more are there.
The point I want to make is, is she a good successor to Kalam? He who was so respected for his intellectual thoughts… and she who is already full of controversies!
Alas! We do have to agree that if we look at our parliament today, we will not even find one clean (as in without allegations) man/woman, but this woman just didn’t strike the cord for a presidential candidate.

Wish “we” could elect our president!