Lucknow- Delhi Trip

Last week I had been to Lucknow and Delhi. It was planned in a couple of hours and probably the quickest planning we've ever done for a trip. There's a certain thrill about sudden plans and I totally experienced that. Had the time of my life.

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Friday, January 9

We reached the Airport at around 12 pm. It was my first visit to Shamshabad Airport and my first reaction was “WOW!!”. I was totally spellbound by the ‘International’ appeal of the airport. It was SO gorgeous. I felt proud to be a Hyderabadi.
Our flight was scheduled for departure at 1:10 pm so it was almost an hour in the lounge. So I bought “The three mistakes of my life” by Chetan Bhagat and it was a great company apart from dad’s frequent one liners and mum’s never ending instructions. We boarded the flight at 1:00 and I took the window seat (call it the typical Indian mentality :D)
We reached Delhi by 3:00 pm. The weather wasn’t as cold as we expected it to be.If not for the absolute hotties, I would have given the airport a 2.5/5. Our connecting flight to Lucknow was at 6:30 pm so we were in some for some more waiting and me, for some more ogling :D

We took our flight for Lucknow a little later than the scheduled time and reached Lucknow at about 8 pm. I felt slightly weird because the previous day I spoke to my Aunt and Uncle on the phone and the next day I was there, seeing them. By the way, my aunt and uncle , apart from being my father’s elder sister and her husband, have also been the best friends of my parents and thus I have always loved them like my own parents.

We were served American chocolates, assorted nuts and cookies(One big advantage of having a cousin who lives abroad :D) almost immediately after we reached their place and I knew my food festival had begun. But my happiness lasted only till I found out there was mutton biryani for dinner. Very difficult to digest if you are a self declared chick-eggitarian like me. But I thought of only one solution – a little bit of deceit and so I passed most of the contents of my plate into mum’s without aunt watching it,ofcourse. :P

Saturday, January 10

Uncle treated us with his special Mexican omelette topped with sausages, onions, capsicum and tomatoes for breakfast. Yes ,my food festival had finally begun.
We decided to spend the evening in the Army club playing tambola and having chocobar . Yes, its great fun biting an icecream when the temperature is 10 degree Celsius and there’s no fear of the icecream melting to become only the cream.

There were some really weird prefixes given to numbers when we played tambola and I couldn’t figure out whether they were put for the sake of rhyming or something else. Here are some I thought I must share :


-Watch your son, If you have one – 21 (:D)

-Naughty eight – 38

-Sexy Punjabi- 65 (???)

-Fox in a fix – 46

And this one’s the best,
-Sexy danda – 61 (:P)

Sunday, January 11

Aunt was planning for a firangi style dinner and she chose me to assist her in the above mentioned mission. She woke me up really early (8:30 am :P) and we began to make the chocolate cake.
We soaked in the sun for an hour and that really gave me the i-m-on-a-holiday feeling. I must mention that their place has this very “farm-housy” feeling. The garden, the huge lobby, the hall, everything had a therapeutic effect on me. My best time pass was to rest on the ass-will-sink sofas and munch assorted nuts.
For dinner we had baked vegetables cooked in white sauce with toast and chicken tangdi kebabs for main course and Chocolate cake and milk pudding for dessert. The word elaborate would be an understatement for this meal. At that moment I really felt the need of having a space-extendable stomach :D.

Monday, January 12
We planned to spend the whole day outside. Watching Ghajini and eating Lucknowi chaat topped our agenda. We went to Hazratganj which I was told is famous for its chaat and I was not disappointed one bit. I pampered my taste buds with Dahi puri first and trust me , it was the BEST dahi puri I ever had in my life. The gooey tamarind and date chutney, the thick creamy curd, the filling of the puri. It was just perfect. I hogged on 3 plates of dahi puri and wanted to continue but I realized that that would break all the barricades of etiquette. I also tasted samosa ragda and aloo tikki which were well prepared but I couldn’t appreciate them as much as I had already lost my heart to dahi puri.
We proceeded to a mall where we planned to watch Ghajini. A great movie it was. Aamir has done it again and hats off to him. All of us liked the movie and kept discussing it till we finally hit the sack.

Monday, January 13
We left for Delhi at around midnight and reached the capital early next morning.

Monday, January 14

It was the highest degree of bearable cold and thankfully, it didn’t cross that mark. We reached my Uncle’s (mum’s elder brother) place in fifteen minutes and it was relatively colder inside the house.

I last visited Delhi when I was in 8th standard and so this visit was special. Another reason was my Mum’s birthday.
We stayed in Delhi only for a day so I was really looking forward to shopping in Sarojini Nagar market.
I personally feel Sarojini Nagar market is one of the best places to shop in delhi. I almost went crazy looking at the variety. Clothes, shades, shoes, accessories, bags ,you name it and they have it. I shopped like a maniac and promised myself to go there as often as possible. :D

It was the usual cake cutting and birthday song for mum in the evening and all of us enjoyed a quiet dinner. Mum was happy to spend her birthday with her brother and Grandma.


Finally, we landed in Hyderabad on 15th. All smiles.

The Harry Potter fever

I was always intrigued by the mass hysteria that surrounded Harry Potter books and thus, it always irritated me when some of my friends launched the 'Harry Potter discussions' whenever and wherever possible. It is however now when I have finished reading all the seven books(back to back ,within a month!) that I understand that the books were worth all the frenzy.I experienced the madness myself. I bunked classes to finish the books, read in the bus stops, read even when I didnt manage to get a seat in the bus and sometimes even suppressed my urge to attend the nature's call. :P

The plots, the characters, the writing style and most importantly the magical jargon left me with a feeling of awe. The way each plot is woven and the way it unfolds in the end is INCREDIBLE. There's not a single dull page and it gets SO addictive that after a point the books become a necessary evil :D. Infact the degree of my awe was so high that I had an hour long discussion with Pushyami (Another HP maniac!) about the various characters, lines in the book and parts I loved the most and thankfully, she shared my craze and excitement :)

The deaths of Sirius Black, Albus Dumbledore and Fred Weasley were extremely shattering. Infact the grief of Sirius's death was so much that I locked myself in the loo and cried and finally consoled myself by saying that "He is a fictional character after all." The saddest part was that I knew Dumbledore would die in the 6th part but I refused to believe it till I actually read it.I remember, I buried my face in my hands and wailed. I REALLY loved him and I think all HP fans will agree with me. He was a man of substance.The poise, dignity, grace and a magnetic persona with that childish elegance.He was an amazing person.

Parting Note :

Although I enjoyed reading all the books, I have chosen "Harry Potter and the goblet of fire" and "Harry Potter and the deathly hallows" as my favourites and If I go on to list my favourite characters I'll end up discussing each and everyone of them :P

One of my favourite lines by Dumbledore :

"By fearing death we do not fear death, but we fear the unknown."

Hail Harry Potter!

PS: Thankyou DA and Push for lending the books. It was one helluva journey! :)

Its all between the ears!

Few days back I read this article which emphasized that "sexiness lies in the mind".A wonderful article it was indeed and it forced me ponder upon a few things.
Personally, I feel its slightly difficult to think sexy when ;
a) your ass sticks out of your body like an overgrowth,
b)your thighs seem to look like they are bitten by a live size mosquito
c) and your paunch could be easily mistaken for -well, you know what I mean, right? :P
Well, It doesnt mean that I doubt the power of the mind and its strong influence on our aura and of those around us. I am staunch believer of the fact that mind has the power to make impossible possible and I have had practical experiences to reinforce that belief, but training the mind is indeed a huge mission.
But still I was simply bowled over by the idea of thinking sexy, and how it could change my life.
I have to admit that I always envy those women who are voluptuous and even a little more than voluptuous at times(cant think of a word) and still have this mesmerising appeal , a high MHT (making-heads-turn) quotient and a X-factor about them which clearly conceals their otherwise much evident "flaws"... I could even call them hot (No, I m absolutely straight!)
I myself have experienced that whenever I think and feel sexy it shows! My skin glows, I "look" slimmer (:P) and sometimes even get some compliments. I may also add that apart from just thinking and feeling sexy there are other requirements like: grooming, a distinct sense of style,a good self-image which make a person attractive(slim or not).
So now I have decided that if thinking sexy could be SO blissful then I will definitely incorporate this policy in my life, atleast till I lose weight :D

Royal challenge presents Shankar Mahadevan, Live in concert

Note: Please excuse me for the poor video quality and the shaking at places,which was caused because my dad was being pushed by some people (hypnotised by shankar's voice) and kindly ignore my senseless dance moves! I have no qualms admitting, I suck at dancing.

I wouldnt think twice before saying that Friday night was one of the BEST nights of my life.Without leaving much scope for you to start imagining things, here's why it was so special..
A)I watched Shankar Mahadevan perform,live in concert!
B)I shook hands with him( and was planning not to wash my hands for a couple of days, untill mom came into the picture :P)
C) I danced with him on the stage, got clicked and got printed(YAY!)

Celebrating 'joblessness'

How many times in your student life do you get to enjoy a month long paradise within the four walls of your house?!(no sarcasm intended!) I think all my francisian friends are enjoying that phase :)
When I gave my last paper to the invigilator, I was gripped by the i-have-conquered-an-empire feeling which died down soon after the I-havent-got-the-results-yet feeling sank in, but that never dampened my spirit to celebrate the end of exams and soon I found myself busy with something or other (refer the previous post).I occassionally hung out with my always-high-spirited DAV gang :), read an incredibly gripping and well written book called Kkrishnaa's Konfessions by Smita Jain, saw this terrible movie called Fashion and came out of the theatre feeling giddy!

.......and just when I thought joblessness was all set to attack me, the nearby VCD/DVD parlour came to the rescue :) I watched Kismet Konnection(whats with the KK c(k)onnection?) and Happy Days till the wee hours of morning. Both movies were the typical timepass movies but I had fun.My own small little theatrical setting- lays,limca, dim lights and me in the centre of the hall with my legs crossed on the glass table(thankgod mom dint see me, there were all chances of me getting murdered for putting my legs on her favourite glass table :D)and the chance to look at the Oh! so cute! Shahid Kapoor who was just a few steps away from the glass table (in the T.V , ofcourse) was just a wonderful feeling.

A life without any brainstorming organic chemistry conversions, "what if you fail?"and "she finished the whole portion, oh mi god! Is she is a magician or what?" thoughts, no "please go and study" nags from Ma, all of it felt like a paradise! and now, thanks to Manasa ,I have some amazing books to keep me occupied till 17th.

I love holidays, like never before :) (I can see that twinge of envy on my- future engineer/doctor/chef- friends' faces! mu ha ha ha)

Artsy movies, my flavour of the season

ABABABABABABABABABABABABABABAB

long time no C ...
well, lame jokes apart (:P), I have not been entirely jobless this time.I was busy attending post-bijoya(dusshera) parties , then there was Diwali,then some live shows which were struggling hard to be entertaining.... so there I give you some convincingly good excuses for not updating(as if you were desperate.A flying kiss, if you were! :-)) but amidst all those festive activities I managed to watch some great movies, in my sense of 'great'!
After wasting a few hundreds on some very average movies, I was dying to watch some "Oh,fuck!" movie and our very own idiot box satiated that hunger for good cinema (no i m not exaggerating!). I watched Raincoat and Corporate and was equally awed by both the movies.
I have to admit I have a thing for the slightly offbeat cinema and in that case even a hint of artsy will do. I genuinely believe they are 10000 times better than mindless flicks like Bachna Aey haseeno.. I mean whats with this guy (who is projected as a casanova) who dumps two girls before he falls for the third one and when she dumps him , he realises his mistake and gets back to his exes to ask for maafi. I wanted to pull all my hair in frustration! but I sat through the movie ONLY for Ranbir...Are we some kind of assholes or what?! such utter lack of concept! bah! leave it.. without digressing any further,

RAINCOAT:
Starring : Ajay Devgan, Aishwarya Rai, Anu kapoor
Director: Rituparno Ghosh
I watched this bengali movie directed by Rituparno ,which was a murder mystery and I clearly remember dad and me didnt move from our respective places till the movie was over.Not only because it was a murder mystery, but because of the unique style of narration paired with a mindblowing plot.I was impressed! and going by that first impression I dint think twice to stop at zee premier to watch Raincoat.
A wonderful adaptation of the very famous "The gift of the Magi" by O.Henry. Ritu beautifully told the tale of old lovers each caught in their own cobwebs of emotional turmoils yet faking about their 'lavish' lifestyles. The movie is slow paced but Ajay and Ash just blow your mind with their powerhouse performances. If you have a thing for arty stuff dont miss this one.

CORPORATE :
starring : Bipasha Basu, Rajat Kapoor, Kay kay menon , Raj Babbar
Director: Madhur Bhandarkar
Honestly, I m not a great lover of Madhur Bhandarkar's movies.I had watched bits of Page 3 and chandni bar (well,ahem only bits :P) and the only word i thought of was, sleazy! I dont exactly know what made me watch corporate though...May be sheer curiosity! :P
What a movie, i mean What a movie?!! The storyline, the performances, the characteristic 'reality' element which madhur is famous for, everything rocked. Bipasha was the surprise element. Her devastatingly powerful potrayal of a top honcho of a company, who struggles to find the real meaning of 'ethics' in the business world just makes you forget its the same Bipasha Basu. Not to forget KK menon and others(look above). Overall, a fabulous movie.

Men from Mars, Women from Venus!

When we were dealing with male and female psychology in our psychology class,this was the first thing shown to us and I found it quite amusing.
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Her diary :
He behaved weird today.I think the fact that I spent so much time shopping with my girlfriends didnt go down well with him.I kept him waiting for very long but he didnt say anything when I apologised for being late.He usually doesnt behave this way,he was awfully silent.I dont know what to make out of this,are things not working for us anymore? On the way back home I said,
"I love you" and he just smiled at me.After coming back home,he started watching T.V and didnt look interested in any conversation.I dont know what to do about this, I m really upset.


His Diary :

DAMN! India lost to Bangladesh by just 10 runs.
shit man.

This is called Complexity of women v/s simplicity of men

A rainy day

Was leafing through my diary last night and found this quite postable. It happened almost a month back.....So here it is.....

Note: I dont feel like this now at all (about the gym I mean)

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Was working out without any spirit today.I think I have reached a point of saturation with my much publicised(in the blog,obviously!) weight loss programme and while the you-can-do-it affirmation was doing rounds in my mind, I suddenly realised that it was raining cats and dogs outside... for a second I forgot about cursing my workout and just peeped through the door.... It was a heavy downpour and the next thing in my mind was to get wet in the rain. So, I threw my sneakers into the cover, wore my chappals and left the gym...

I was walking rather slowly just to enjoy the getting-wet process. It all seemed SO filmy *laughs* especially with the street light flickering above me. Totally felt like some Kjo movie but without any "Shahrukh" *smiles*... I didnt feel like going back home... The dark empty lane,the rains,a song on my lips and the I-me-myself feeling. Ah! just perfect!

24th sep, my birthday and much more

Origin of "Birthday" :

It is thought the large-scale celebration of birthdays in Europe began with the non-Christian cult of Mithras, which originated in Persia, and was spread by soldiers throughout the Roman Empire. Such celebrations were uncommon previously so practices from other contexts such as the Saturnalia were adapted for birthdays.
Because many Roman soldiers took to Mithraism, it was distributed widely and its influence was spead throughout the empire until it was supplanted by Christianity.

-courtesy wikipedia
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24th september is 268th day of the year. (yeah! the wait was too long !! :D)

Important events in History on 24th september :

* 24 september,1975

Dougal Haston and Doug Scott become the first Britons to reach the summit of the world's highest mountain.

*24 september,1988

Ben Johnson wins the 100m gold at the Seoul Olympics and reaffirms his position as the world's fastest man.

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I was born on a nice day isnt it? :-)

Some touching wishes and compliments I got :

-"You are getting prettier day by day"(Nikhat,my classmate) *blushes*

-"Many many happy returns of the day ...hope you have a great future." (sms from Sirisha Mam,comp applications lecturer )

-"You look perfect today... the eyes,the bangles, the outfit, everything."(Darshini and Nadiya, Bcom friends) *blushes again*

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The celebration :

Some things I must mention,

-Apurva wished me first ! (love you!!)

-I had a deadly German Black Forest pastry and a tasty chocolate cake facial... :D

-Soniya gifted me a funky bangle!

-Push forgot my present at home (hate her!) :(

-Dinesh sang, live! (after a really long session of pestering,persuasion and tantrums!) :)

PS: This one is for my lovely friends, I LOVE YOU ALL....ummuahhhhhh.. :)

After College:

At home:

AN ODE TO RTC buses.....

well, I always thought journey in RTC buses can make great stories(remember stamps and brakes?).There's drama, emotion,action,sex(read intimacy)... in short it has every element for a perfect masala story. So this post focusses on my experiences in RTC buses and some conclusions drawn out of them.

To begin with,there are different degrees of crowded buses,

primary : when you can stand(and only stand) comfortably and look out of the window and comfortably make out where you are.

secondary: the next stage, the crowd is relatively greater and you can touch your jeans pockets without hitting anybody's face.

tertiary: Oh yes, you will stand somewhere near the driver's seat and you wont get to hold any handles because there are atleast 6 people between you and a handle..

quaternary: first of all, god was feeling really generous and thats why you got into this bus and then leave the rest to him.

You are between atleast five XL asses and they churn you,mix you grind you so on and so forth and there are chances of many kinds of injuries like

* your ribs can get damaged while some fat asses are trying to get down at their stop.

* due to the continuous stamping, your feet may start looking like one of those flat chappals which have the worn out soles in the end .

* while some female is trying to relocate her dupatta, you might get a mighty blow and loose all your teeth.

these are just a FEW possibilities

Note: quaternary degree is worser than molestation.

Now i'll describe the different type of crowds in the buses:

the i-have-a-boyfriend crowd : It consists of girls who are glued to their cell phones whispering sweet nothings into their beau's ears and the volume .... well.... even if you stick their lips to your ears you cannot make out what they are speaking..

the conductor-is-my-jaani-dushman crowd : It consist of those who will definitely have a fight with the conductor.... high volume,high temperature, heated argument,blame game, exchange of.......ok i think you get the picture

the i-have-a-cellphone crowd : these people will play the cheapest songs in the bollywood history so that everyone in bus knows they HAVE a cellphone...and what kind of songs... some timeless classics of himesh reshammiya if they are feeling good and or else they can stoop down to Altaf Raja also..(of Tum Toh Tehre pardesi fame!!

the curious crowd : They want to know everything... "are you sure it will go there?""which route does this bus take?'"do you think the condition of buses will improve?""where are you going?""are you working or are you studying?""will conductor give my chiller?" ..........phew..

so thats about RTC buses...

Yes, It has been a roller coaster ride (literally) in RTC buses... I've had the WORST of experiences, but I know it will always make my college life unforgetable.*laughs*

Bhoomi ...

We had this Bengali Band called BHOOMI performing on 28th August in Kali Bari (A Kali Temple..) as a part of their Deity Installation Day celebrations..

Initially I was slightly apprehensive about going because I have this bengali-songs-have-to-be-boring thing in my head, but ultimately I did go and I must say I really enjoyed myself..

The lead singer (and also the drummer) had a beautiful voice and there was also this other guy with long hair who sang and played I dont know how many instruments. I loved the earthy elements in every song(as the name of the band says) some of the songs really gave me that eastern hill station feeling...,the chorus made it feel like I am listening to a record. The effect was magical....

The first five-six songs were average but in the last few songs the crowd went crazy dancing,clapping,howling(including me) they sang some very famous songs , very pacy and some songs really took out the Bong in me. I felt really close to my culture after a long time...

"Tomar dekha nai re","meneka pore che aaj ghoongta" and some others were SO SO good. Very enthralling performances and overall BHOOMI totally rocked !!!

have a look at the video (its not very clear i know , what more can you expect from a 2 mp phone cam ) and its ok if you dont understand the language :D

Chotu's birthday

Sirisha celebrated her birthday on 16th and 17th .... (i still don understand the logic)...

We gals starved (for a stupid reason..!!!) but it was soooo much fun. Nair, you missed it dude!! and the cake was from VACS( do I need to get more descriptive :D). and I m posting just for the pics.. here it goes..

bday gal and push....(her permed hair was so awesome..)

i look so eeeek....but just for dukhi aatma(manasa) its here!!!

thats almost 100000 calories (a very WIDE guess..) but I gave a damn!! :D

courtesy Anand... *laughs*

surprisingly anand's thumb is up... usually,he always has one favourite finger :D

I wish she could play that.... :D