Tea Break

I smiled at my hostess.She stopped on her way to kitchen and said ,"No.make it clear.What do you like to have .Tea or coffee ?". I decided to go for a Coffee and I said "MMnnn....Tea".This is where I become so helpless , my mind says one and my tounge utters another.She brought a cup of steaming tea and a couple of cookies in a plate.I sipped the thick sweetened liquid and tried hard not to smell the milk in that.At the rim of the cup, tea converged with its brown colour.I kept on smiling so that my dislike for the milk tea wouldn't be expressed.I swallowed each sip as I framed my answers to her queries in Tamil.I remembered my mom's words." Today onwards make your tea yourself".She 'd be taking back the cup of tea I rejected for it was stirred by a spoon that formerly served to stir my mom's milk tea.

As a kid I used to be a fan of the children's science magazine "Eureka" in Malayalam.It was an article in Eureka that made me aware of the presence of Caffeine in coffee and Thein in tea.I gave up coffee and tea completely afraid of a possible cancer.My mom congratulated me for being so deterministic ( She din't had any clue how she was going to be embarrassed because of my determination).

I was in 3rd std then.Once a couple of our relatives payed us a visit.After the usual chit chats , my mom served them tea. I warned my mom "Don't give them tea.They will die of cancer". She ignored me with a smile.No time to waste.I ran to the visitors and told them not to drink the tea ( Yeah...some directors are like this ...they 'll brutually copy things even from a kid's biography...I'm not talking about Fasil or Manichithrarhazhu...generally..).The visitors, afraid of a possible interchange of salt and sugar left the cup .My mom came and told them 'the naughty kid was kidding'.I couldn't understand why my mom want to put those lovely people's life at stake.I cried in front of them and explained about Caffeine and showed them Eureka for proof.They all laughed at me and continued with the tea.When the visitors left our home , mom advised me not to panic on others health.She said "just mind yours".

A couple of days latter we were visiting my dad's friends place.When they served tea , I became conscious of my health(Only my health).I declared " I don't take Tea"."Coffee?" , I said "No" as if she had asked me to be a suicide bomber.I ended up having grape juice (Now I can imagine my parents embarrassed faces).My dad waited till we got outta that house.I got enough firing.Mom tried to make me understand the difficulties of hosts.This time she advised me to ignore the tea if I don't want and not to ask for alternatives.

From then I used to leave the glasses untouched and latter when I myself was aware of the obligation to the host , pretended to take a sip and left it as such.Some one advised me not to waste tea ,once.

With time I started liking black coffee , then black tea.But I genuinely hated the smell of milk.Except at a friend's home I ne'er got my perfect tea.So Its me who make my favourite tea at home.If it is mom , it will go through a round of rejections as applications in Govt.offices. Lately I found out making best black tea in coffee machines(he he...machine serve hot water only).Some times I feel like our kitchen has become a small Brazil ,exporting that much of coffee.Now a days a cup of hot black tea is the perfect decor for my cubicle in office.But I cherish those times sipping from a cup of steaming black tea watching the rain , that too at home.

A sunday, well spent.

I asked the conductor twice and he assured the bus goes through Triplicane.I took the back seat with a girl who looked at me as if I was in the news for stealing some question papers.

I was on the way to attend an exam and the center of exam was at the other end of the city.Neethu, the culprit ,who forced me to attend the exam had got a nearby center and another friend to accompany her.Once again I felt my bag to make sure the pencil,pen,sharpener and eraser I bought few minutes ago are in place.I held the Rs.5 ticket in my hand and kept glancing at the conductors face every now and then.When most of the boards showed off 'triplicane' on them I started looking for the school name.Then the girl who was sitting next to me asked, "where do you want to go?".I told her the street name and school name.She nodded in helplessness.Bus drove past the Marina beach and entered a busy lane.At last the conductor turned his head and said Triplicane.I wondered that I travelled this long with Rs.5.It was easy to spot the old building of the school and find out my seat in the last row.

My previous experiences made me go through the instructions once again.Yes, I have a ball point pen and HB pencil , I relaxed.(Once during the CUSAT entrance exam I had darkened the bubbles in OMR sheets with a pen and when I realised it was to be done by a pencil, I tried my best to keep my lips curved in a smile.The invigilator exclaimed ," This careless, how are you going to be an engineer!!!").I kept the pencil and pen on the desk .A glance and I ,with a whirl in my stomach ,realised its not an HB pencil.I checked the pen, it was clearly written as Gel on it.I felt .....( I don't know a word to describe what I felt) .I turned my head .A girl whose face revealed her tensions was doing the final minute sharpening of her HB pencil.She said she don't have an additional pen.I asked the guy who sat in front of me.He threw a weired look and felt from his legs to feet and found a ball pen from one of the countless pockets of his cargoes.I decided to carry on with the non -HB ,extra dark pencil.I used the pencil in a very light manner so that it makes the effect of an HB pencil.I sat alone in my bench.Invigilator cross checked the hall tickets.I was not wearing spectacles in the photo.He stared for one more second and mapped the signature and confirmed my identity.

As the bells rang to open the question booklet seals , some one shouted an 'excuse me' from the door.A guy who definitely was a fan of Rajnikanth (his attire and shaving pattern...thats the only clue) came and sat beside me. Behind him entered a girl who was dressed as she was attending a party.All the candidates eyes including mine followed her even after she settled in her place.Invigilator asked the guy with a geometry box to leave his calculator away.He stood from his place and walked out , careful to avoid any wrinkles to his Peter England trousers.He came back and had a sip of water from the fruity bottle he was carrying.

After going through some pages of the booklet I was wondering , what are they going to do with all these circuit diagrams and mathematical equations. I was aware of the time distribution , so I started slowly . Once during the IIT JEE ( No,I din't over estimate me...another friend needed company ...thats why ...I got a result card after some months stating " Regret to inform you that you are not eligible...Your rank is One Lakh Twentyfive...") , I finished all the questions in half an hour and some how passed the three hours.The general knowledge section was the only relief.

None of the questions in the other sections made any sense to me.I could identify the zigzag figures as symbol for resistors, two parallel vertical lines as capacitors, a coil as inductor.But nothing more than that.

I glanced at Mr.Peter England.He adjusted his soda glasses and was busy doing some thing in the space for rough work.He had kept his geometry box open and the fruity bottle close to him.There were two fans in the room.A dusty Usha and another old Crompton Greeves.They worked hard to keep the Chennai heat away.

I began to brain storm on the terms ....where did I hear all these? Transducer, Self induction,Gap,dielectrics,impedance,characteristic plots,planes,omegas,waves, angles,diodes...........When diodes appeared in the paper , I thought there was some diode starting with Z.Ohh..yeah next question is about Zenor diode.Mnn...not that a week memory( there are some occasions, I get impressed by myself).Then came the coefficients with all the scientists names as prefix. I replaced all those names with Bhavya in my mind.Bhavya coefficient of dielectric, Bhavya constant, Bhavya wave length, Bhavya's Theorem,Bhavya temperature of boiling......not a rhyming set of words.Good , that there is no constants or coeff named after me.

Miss.Party had already closed her questionnaire.She tried to adjust her loose hair locks and started admiring her own nail polish.I looked at my nails and wondered , what colour will look good on them! Mr.Rajnikanth rested his head on the desk.The orange colour of the old building reflected on his face( Once one of my cousin had told me , if you take photos facing a bright orange wall ,the pics will be warm).

When it was past half the time , a press photographer entered the room .The invigilator adjusted his shirt collar and wiped his face with a kerchief.Photographer suggested some posses and the invigilator was so keen in following his instructions.He clicked some ten snaps. In all the photos invigilator stood exactly in front of me and my hope of appearing in a Tamil news paper faded then itself.

I started a game of rolling pen and pencil on the desk.The one which reaches the farthest on the desk wins.Always pencil won, pen was not a perfect figure to roll.Once the pencil fell off the desk and invigilator noticed and Miss.Tension smiled at me with a yawn.I gave up the game.

When it was half an hour left I had 5 questions to finish.I formulated another game.Do one question and take a break of 3 minutes.But I finished marking it in next two minutes.I dint even looked at the answers.Just darkened the circles in OMR sheet.When Invigilator started collecting the answer sheets , Mr.Peter England hasn't finished.His rough work space might had got over. I have to return the pen to Mr.Cargos.The pen had 'Infosys' embossed on it.I returned the pen with an unintonated 'thank you'.

Just after the exam I got Neethu's SMS saying she enjoyed the 3 hours.Travelling back was easy . Back at home while having my lunch ,I got a call from my friends ,"Hurry up,we are planning to go to Besant Nagar Beach".Some how I answered "Now? I can't join you." and within five minutes I was sleeping like a pig( I don't know what I look like when I sleep, may not be a pig , I hope).

Reading day

As I skimmed through the pages of Mathrubhumi daily one news came to my notice.Kerala Govt.observes June 19th as Vayana Dinam (Reading Day) and the week from 19th to 25th as Vayana Varam (Reading Week).This will be celebrated with different programs and competitions in schools and colleges.

I remember how we used to observe the day in our school days.There would be an assembly in the morning before the commencement of the class.The head mistress would announce ,"Its my pleasure to inform you all that today is 'the great reading day' ( I don't know why she used to decorate everything with a 'great' , 'happy','successful'....kinda adjectives.).Our 'uschool' too is taking part in this event(She pretended to be an epitome of discipline in conduct and academics , but she could ne'er ever pronounce the word school properly.She said 'uschool ' in every assembly and gave us a chance to exchange smiles which resembled some emoticons in my office communicator.Ooh !! yeah, you are right .I had many more issues with the head mistress.Used to criticise her for every this and that , as I was Miss.Perfect.).Then another teacher , probably a Malayalam teacher, will talk about the importance of reading habit and books for another half an hour.He 'd highlight the impacts of Television on children since TV is said to be the enemy of books.And by the end of this assembly ,ends our 'reading day'. School library was some thing we had to 'discover' ourselves.Really , that was the case.One of my friend happened to see some book shelves in the distant corner of the staff room and we kept asking about it and a teacher revealed us its the so called school library.And we started borrowing books from there.
In college there was a small shelf in which books of fiction stood embarrassed in the huge library which gave space to technical stuff only.

Most of the reading day programs start with a mourn on the death of reading habit among today's youth.Yes , TV, the Internet and such electronic medias are alternate means of entertainment.But it doesn't mean the community that reads give up their interest .Just a look at the best seller statistics shows still there are people who love reading ( And do count the pirated book lovers like me too)and they find time for that.I too have half read books waiting for my return to the book mark , but that doesn't mean I gave up reading.More over , The Internet opens windows to the wide world of letters and words. Blogosphere stands as the best example of that.

There will be people who adore the paths through which books (printed or e-books) leads them and luxuriate in the magic of words till the end of this world . Even though the scenario is like this , it is good to have a special day or week which reminds us about the existence of such a habit as part of us .Long live reading.

My Chi

"You are wrong ,do the other way",
"You should pronounce that word like this.........",
"This dress doesn't suit you",
"Oh..you don't know what is it!!!",
"Use your commonsense..."

If you think these abuses/criticism/correction come from my parents or a friend of mine , you are wrong. These all are the occasional knocks I get from my sister who is five years younger than me.Lets call her Chi.After going through my blog she noticed , I haven't ever made a mention about her anywhere. Since I'm afraid of a "So mean you are ..." ,I promised her "Eey ,I have some thing in mind.'ll pen it down soon" .So this is more of a 'post on request'.

It was in a hospital bed, I met Chi for the first time, laying beside my mom , after a few hours of her entrance to this world.Standing on a stool by the side of the bed and leaning over my mom I saw her sleeping silently.My grand mom introduced her to me and I found a lot of scope in that toy like thing.I fancied of carrying her instaed of a doll , in my mind.But more than the baby what caught my attention was a green mosquito net and a feeding bottle.I started playing with those things and left the baby.I can't recollect me shouting at my mom to throw that baby away and let me stay with her.But my grand mother kept on describing that scene every now and then when I grew up.But I I din't...........
When the baby was brought to home I badly wanted to carry her in my hands but no one allowed me to.I waited for one day when I grow up to a lady and hold her in my hands .But a cousin asked, "Do you think she 'll remain a baby once you become a lady ?".



Untill Chi was six she din't had any friends except me.Those were the days I got respected the most in my life.She watched whatever I do as heroism.She always wanted my company but school was a big obstacle.By the time I get ready to school Chi'd start asking me secretly "Baa...only today , I wont ask you anymore.Please don't go to school today ,let's play".I 'd agree her a hundred times to bunk school but dad ,mom......When I leave home she 'd start crying with all her might and most of the days I too wet my eyes and curse school.Once when I was in 3rd STD she asked me to take her to school .But how? My aunt made a master plan.I'll take her to school and by the time the class starts aunt will come and bring her back to home.Aunt was damn sure about she being afraid of the teacher and begging to take her back.But when teacher came to class , she said she 'll stay there with me other wise I too have to accompany her home.But my teacher was so sweet and permitted this 3yr old to sit in her class beside me.But when teacher told us to write some thing Chi told me it 'll be good if we draw a picture instead of following the teacher.I was in a dilemma.We were a team and I started writing and gave her a rough book to draw in.But she wanted to draw in my book itself.At last I had to give her space in the book margin.After hardly one hour a boy in the class did some thing mischievous and the teacher beat him with her cane stick , followed by a shower of scolding.By that time my sister buried her face in my lap and started crying "I want to go home".Teacher gave me leave and send my friend with me.At home she was fully contented, "I saved you before your turn came ,na?".

I was not permitted to stay over night at any of my relatives houses since she'd be left company less.Once she somehow agreed on me staying in a cousins house and the very next day early in the morning we woke up to see my dad with the crying Chi in hand.From then I couldn't leave her except for school till she was some 5 or 6 yrs old.

She attended hardly a ten days in nursery that too in my company.She used to hold my hand tight and ensured my presence.When she started attending school I used to take her till her friends house and they 'd go together from there.Till we reach that house she used to nag me like 'take me back home'.And I had handed over my exclusive possession of our dad to her when she was born.Instead of me dad told stories to her and made her sleep to comfort.

As time went on , she got many good friends and she explored a world beyond me.And she started taking her teachers words for value.Once when she was asked to bring Rs.10 to school she asked dad to give '10 roopa*' and he asked her back '10 urpika *?' .she demanded 'roopa' and not 'urpika'.He gave a 10 rupee note and assured her its '10 roopa'.On the way to school some one asked her why are you holding '10 urpika' and she came back home and asked dad whether it is '10 roopa' or '10 urpika'.
And to mention our fights ,it will take a whole series of posts.Will consider it that way.

Now that she is grown up and I don't ever felt insulted when she corrects me.And miss her calling me 'Baa...' when she is not around.As a wall paper she once created in photoshop says 'Baa & Chi rocks'

Phoolon ka tharon ka sabka kehna hai
Ek hazaron mein meri behna hai
Sari umar hame sang rehna hai

* Roopa & Urpika = Rupees

A voice from Chile ,that echos .....

Our college too had anti ragging means.We were under the watch full eyes of lectures all the time through out the first two or three months. Seniors kept themselves away at least in their presence .But this bunch of guys were successful in distributing a notice among the first year students at the entrance itself.I don't remember what that notice (union inauguration?) was all about.But it had a picture of a flag with a star and some words or letters( may be "Independence,democracy & socialism" ) and the back cover of that booklet had the name 'SFI MESCE Unit' printed on it.

The first page read like this :

And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry

speak of dreams and leaves

and the great volcanoes of his native
land?

Come and see the blood in the streets.

Come and see

The blood in the streets.

Come and see the blood

In the streets!

That was the first time I met Pablo Neruda in my life.I felt those words have such a commanding power that you can't escape from the questions of your own conscience.From then Neruda was a power that was enough to pump adrenaline in to my blood.I'm thank full to that notice.

You can read Neruda here:

http://www.poemhunter.com/pablo-neruda/poems/

A fire alarm

A fire alarm was a plaything for me in my childhood.He ,he...not a joke.One of my neighbour had an emergency lantern with an emergency siren .She showed it to me the very next day her dad brought it from abroad.She dint believe when i said its the same sound a fire engine makes and every one give way when it comes.We turned it ON and peeped from inside her house to see if some one is coming running.Only her grand father who was sitting just a few feet away from us turned his head and smiled .I felt ashamed of being unable to prove my point.From that day onwards we used to play with that and the emergency alarm became the back ground music of our playtime.

But today when i was enjoying a coffee in my office space when the alarm rang and loud speakers announced over my head "due to some emergency all are requested to evacuate the building" , i was startled. After some seconds of confusion i could find myself running down stairs clutching my bag .Nobody was using the lift.I could hear others talking about 'bomb threat'.At that moment some pictures came into my mind.Today at our office entrance a group of people with 'Emergency Response Team' cap on their head were busy doing something.An ambulance which used to be at a corner was in the drive way.There may be a threat and they might have confirmed the presence of a bomb now only.What if it explodes now , before i come out of the building? I even pictured my funeral...and people who disperse after the mourning indulging in their daily routine.Ohh...even if i disappear from this earth nothing is gonna change , not even to my close relatives.They will live again with all the fortunes of the life.They may drop some tears in my memory once in a year...after some years ....they won't even think of me. An urge (out of sheer jealousy) came into my mind .I want to live.I started skipping two or three steps and the people with me were not in a hurry.I pitied them.Why are they not serious in this moment when there existence is being questioned?

As i reached the ground floor i could see water pumping in the height of the building.It was not the right time to wonder how many hp is that pump.Some one from the ERT was announcing through a megaphone to get into a safe assembly area. Then he said you should be faster in getting here when there is an emergency. I realised it was a fire drill . A fire drill without any prior information or i missed it. Is that why others were relaxed even while running? I felt like I'm cheated.But i did clap for the filmy entrance of ambulance and all those exercises. There was a funny SMS circulating about fire drills. Once all employees got out of the building they will make another announcement."As part of cost cutting we are laying off a lion portion of our employees.Only whose name will be called out need to enter the office.We regret.........". Any such initiatives.... No , no.......I don't know how my imagination weave out such weird things in the exact moment.Have to tame my mind ...........

Rain........................

It rained in Chennai last Friday , for the first time after my arrival. Thunder being the first outside noise to penetrate the walls of office , i realised its gonna rain . I was happy like a peacock.I don't know why rain makes me cheerful.Keeping an umbrella was the last thing to expect.I walked in the rain to my cab.I could see a biker sliding from the tiled path and felling off his bike. Then another ....But i felt it only as an action sequence in the newly released rain . I opened the window and drenched in rain till the driver became concerned about the seat cover. The roads were submerged in water. Power went off. The city seemed to be a scene from some horror movie when it lightened.

By the time i reached my room , rain was in its full swing. sparks came out of the electric sockets.I some how unplugged my friend's laptop. Darkness wrapped me around like a cloak of fear after every crack of lightening. I looked around to see the shadows of all the ghosts and demons i have ever heard of.Rain poured over my loneliness. I thought of the rain at home. Rain drops hitting green leaves , warning to sit on a wooden chair , cuddling sister , a hot black tea......even paper boats from a long back archive.I badly wanted to be at home at that moment. Next moment my phone blinked 'home calling' , I picked it up and told my father "I will be there next week".