Saturday, April 19, 2008
Goodbye, first year. It was great, but it's time to move on to bigger and better things. Good job people. Happy holidays and best of luck with internships!
Goodbye :D
Exams!
Monday, March 31, 2008
Yes, it's that time of the year again. Bah!
Here goes.
Examination Schedule -
Timings : 1:30 PM - 3:30 PM
Thursday, 10th of April - Communicative English - Introduction to Media Studies
Friday, 11th of April - General English
Saturday, 12th of April - Language
Tuesday, 15th of April - Optional English
Thursday, 17th of April - Psychology
Saturday, 19th of April - Communicative English - Creative Writing
- MGir
Chateau de (something) steak
Sunday, March 23, 2008
It is a palm sized chunk of well-cooked, juicy semi-crisp beef drowned in black pepper sauce and vinegar. It is surrounded by sliced semi-cooked onions, raw carrots and a yummy semi circular chunk of salted mashed potatoes. This is my favorite dish in the whole wide world. Once this dish is placed before, I forget everything. The mardi gras parade might go past me but I will not it if I am eating this delicious dish. You get it only in 'The only place'. Truely it is the only place where I find my stomach telling me "Sanjana good thinkin'!"
PS: I DID NOT copy this from the menu.
The mark of the years...
Thursday, March 20, 2008
...or not. There's an inexplicable, unavoidable attraction I have had to one idea, over the years, and that is the door. And what it signifies. You know, like walls. Things that hide, protect, etc. Rather a stereotypical concept, but I've been drawn to it.
[Careful readers of previous posts will note that this attraction is probably based in biographical happenings - thus making it a form of self-centredness, but all writing begins with being that, I think.]
So there was this one piece that I wrote - called "The Door", ooh, smart title, eh? ha, ha - when I was 13. I will clench the ole jaw, and put it up here:
--
I turned sharply and saw the door half-open. I stared. I always, always took care to close the door – I wasn’t allowed to lock it – as tightly as I could. Now there it stood, cutting across the emptiness of my room.
My room.
I own it and no one can trespass.
Except, now, the door was doing exactly that.
It stood there in a sneering, challenging way, in its green pallor, daring me to try and close it. I felt panicky. How dare it.
I knew, despite seven turbulent years of science education about non-living things, that the door had opened itself of its own accord. There was no one else in the two-room house. They were out, as they were most of the time. It couldn’t have been the wind – the day was cold, bright, and dry.
I decided that the door had to close. I closed my eyes for a moment, hoping I was just imagining it, and prayed hard, hoping it would close… hoping to hear its wooden creak… nothing. I opened my eyes. The door still stood open, exactly as it had stood before.
Revealing.
If that door was open I was open to the world – and I panicked at the thought that everyone could see me. I could hear them screaming in my ears- we’ve got you now! You thought you’d hide from us, did you? Well, we’ve seen you! Seen you! Seen you! The words rang in my head.
No. They can’t see me. Can never.
I tried to convince myself.
But the voices were getting louder now.
More insistent.
Like there were people somewhere in the house, rehearsing what they would say when they saw me…
I realized I was still staring at the door, with my mouth half-open. I had to do something, something… that door had to close. I was sitting on the bare floor of my empty room. I tried to get up, but found I couldn’t move my hands.
The door was open, I was rooted to the place, there was nothing I could do about any of it.
I was more vulnerable than I’d ever been in all my life.
Paranoia gripped me.
For how long I sat there I do not remember. I only remember that at last, with all the energy I’d ever had, I crawled to the door, slammed it shut, locked it, and in my last moment of life, shouted, “Safe!”
---
Ugh, ok, then. You managed to get that over with. Bless you! :P Pardon the irritating self-deprecation, but I don't like it much at the moment.
Anyway, the other day, when I wanted to write in a bit of flash fiction for the record, I actually thought of this piece. Before I reread it, I considered putting it in exactly as it was.
And then I read it.
Haha. At this point I should mention that when I HAD written it, which is, November 2003, I was rather satisfied with the piece. Evocative, and all that. And now, I read it, for the first time in five or so years...and was mortified. Yecch.
But I still clung to the idea. So I did another piece, which I will put you through, beginning now.
--
The door was seven feet away from me. Green and pallid. It would swing open anytime now, revealing me, crouching in a corner. Fear felt me, dimly at first, then firm.
Voices. Voices in my head, chaotic, unfamiliar voices. Amma, Appa. Laughing, sneering.
Now the room is growing dimmer. Louder and louder the voices become.
And now, suddenly, I am running. Smashing into the window.
And falling, free.
--
So thats the five-year-older version of the above. Needless to say, I think it's an improvement: tell me what you think, though!
I know I'm baring a bit of my soul by exposing pieces of writing - and pieces of me - that I know are silly and immature and worth being put away, once and for all - but I have this shrewd suspicion that I might be doing that several times over over the years to come. So what the hell, might as well begin.
The real reason I put both these pieces up is because I like how putting just a bit of space (and I don't mean five years, or anything - like say a week or two) between you and something you wrote gives you so much perspective. You look at your piece with a far less clouded eye, and you see what you can change, and you're surprised at unexpected flashes of brilliance, and so on.
Tell me about your writing, do you go back to things you wrote years ago and smirk at yourself, or wallow in your wisdom? Simply, what do you react like to writing that you've done a good few years in the past?
:D
This is a parody of the Hamlet soliloquy - that I had such fun doing. :D
I've only parodied select sections of the original:
"To be, or not to be--that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep--
No more--and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to.
...
...
- Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
- And thus the native hue of resolution
- Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
- And enterprise of great pitch and moment
- With this regard their currents turn awry
- And lose the name of action. -- Soft you now,
- The fair Ophelia! -- Nymph, in thy orisons
- Be all my sins remembered."
To preen, or not to preen - that is the question:
Whether it's nobler (to mankind) to offer
the stings and sorrows of grinless grooming,
Or to take the arms away from a sea of waxes
And by escaping become unsightly. To rest, to procrastinate -
and by the idleness I end the burning, the thousand unnatural shocks
my flesh is heir to.
Yet college does make cowards of us all!
And so the native thickness of the brow
is scraped over, by the insistent pressure of the palm -
My bolstered bravery turns meekly away
At the toothless throb of the thread - hush, now,
it is time to pay! - World, in these moments
be my fortitude forgotten.
-----
Note. It's not very elegant, nor exact, and I'm not very happy with the form, that is, how it looks, but hell, I had such fun doing it! :D I like the idea, if I do say so myself.
FLASH FICTION
This one is for children below the age of 10
All the toys were lined up in the nursery- the teddy bear, the engine train, the car, the galloping horse and the red kite with its long string.
Kim and Michael had to go on a picnic. “you may take only one toy with you to the picnic”, said mummy. All the toys heard mummy say this, so when thye were alone in the nursery the teddy bear said, “I am so warm and cuddly, I am sure they will take me along.” “I can go clippety clop. I’m sure Kim and Michael will take me with them”, said the galloping horse.
All the other toys kept on boasting but the red kite sat silently in a corner. After a while Kim and Michael came into the nursery to look around for a toy. “Look” ,said Kim, and she pointed out to the red kite in the corner, “Lets take the kite” ,he said. “Oh! That’s a great idea”, said Michael. “ We can play all day long with it”. They picked up the kite and ran out of the nursrey. The red kite went out for a wonderful picnic while all the other toys, who had boasted, sat gloomily in the nursery the whole day.
WE SHOULD NOT BOAST. THERE MAY ALWAYS BE SOMEONE WHO IS BETTER THAN US.
Anjali
DESCRIPTION
I was one among the thousands running toward the Chatrapathi Shivaji Terminal to board the 9:15 fast local to Bandra that would help me get home in less than an hour. The entire day’s fatigue was getting to me, all I wanted to do was go back home and soak my feet in a warm tub of water…
My thoughts were broken into with the familiar rhytmic beat of the “Chammach” against the many glass bottles filled with different coloured and flavoured syrups. I sighed witht relief and smiled. Luckily I still had fifteen minutes to spare before the train arrived, I walked up to the neatly dressed man behind the cart , looked at his multi coloured hands and couldn’t help but smile yet again as I rememberred how I would run to these Gola carts as a child, and here I was again- a fully grown 35 year old woman. I took the glass with the crushed ice, generously drowned in the “kala khatta and gulabi” syrup, witht a dash of chat powder and a squeeze of lime and took a nice long drag at it till I ran all out of breath and felt the coolness of the gola take over me and relax all my nerves. I walked away feeling Content Calm and Happy !
Anjali
New posts
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
OK, just to say I've read all your posts and am impressed, but am not commenting on them individually as I'm terribly tied up with the the third years' writing projects.But I will,eventually. OK?
Good work.
Un-horizon
Here we are in middle of life, nowhere to go nothing to do. No lines around us, living freely. This is everyone’s story, fortunately or unfortunately you decide. They say that everyday could be a bright day if you look at it the right way, that’s what it means to be selfish, you have to watch only one thing, its all about you-your views, your perspectives. Individualism suddenly stares you point-blank in the face. You didn’t ask for it, they call you the chosen one now. The fantasies the world makes, seems like there’s no limit to them, a fly becomes a dragon and a castle becomes a thatch-roof hut. Peaceful co-habitation is supposed to be the only option here, sounds like we’re in denial.
There seems to be no room in our own “La-de-da” world, but for whom? That’s why we need change, not drastic, those are never called changes. It’s always been slow rolling for this Bus; monotony never was a desired quality. People were always living and dying through the times why does it suddenly matter. Humpty-Dumpty’s are gaining power and Simple Smith’s are falling of cliffs. If there’s no limit then where do we stop? That’s the catch, we don’t. You have to keep going no matter how slow, you will get there, Newton already proved that. We don’t seem to realize that we decide the end, unconsciously guiding ourselves to our destiny, if you reach the end good for you, if not, then too, good for you. It’s all about perspectives at the end of the corridor, we all have it. It’s just who actually gets there.
Parody
I smoked the last piece of your very expensive T
you had probably been saving it to feel happy.
I'm sorry, it was tempting and i had no will power
i wanna feel happy too before i hit the bar.
Sonika Chauhan
1 PYEC
My Tahiti
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
My room to me is like a tiny island that belongs only to me. I have all rights over it, including cleaning duty. It's sometimes a mess sometimes spic and span, at the moment messy. It's a lavender room with a white ceiling with a huge, almost wall-to-wall window, which has bars across it (apparently apartment policy). The lovely view from my window is my neighbours wall, not that I'm complaining, I've got a 20 inch jungle running around my house so I can gaze at the hummingbird that chills out on the Guava tree if I need any scenery. On rainy days or sunny days the weather in my room is always cold, like a cool breeze took a pit stop and never left. This room is best enjoyed in winter, because I've heard that on winter mornings when you are tucked under that blanket you won't hear any alarms, your eyes may open but only for a second for the powers of this room's coziness are at their peak then. The warmth of the blanket and the coolness of the room combine to form the perfect remedy to be late for everything you have planned that day.
In my room I have the basics and a few extras. A table that has a stack of books and papers on it, I never actually use the table to write on so it stays that way forever. A bed that had four mattresses on it, because it was extremely low, but now has only two. One of which I have rolled up and wrapped up with a srilankan sarong (they're very vibrant) to look like a sweet wrapper and the other one is folded into a floor couch, ideal for bird watching. Along one wall is a shelf containing all the books I own that haven't been stolen or borrowed, never to be returned and along the other one is a gigantic twin cupboard with a mirror in between that has been broken for a year now, because the carpenter owes us some money and decided to abscond, but if you stoop really low you can see yourself. On another shelf above my table I have an assortment of things from the places I've been to consisting of a perfectly triangular pebble I found at a funeral to a rock I found in the rock garden in Darjeeling (my bag was pretty heavy when I returned from that trip), the recent additions being a boat-shaped seed capsule from an African tulip tree, that's not from Africa, and a pine acorn from Ooty. I never actually go anywhere thinking that I have to bring back a piece of the place but I somehow end up picking a stone here and a shell there and I'm pretty sure I'll have to live with this habit forever.
My room has a lot of other interesting things and not-so-interesting things but I enjoy my time within its walls because I know that it is a space that I can relax in away from the world's craziness and I am the sole ruler of said space.
Mischievous Endeavour
Diary entry- mischievous Endeavour: 17.03.08
I lie on my bed staring at the ceiling with a sheepish grin on my face and my pen keeps slipping out of my hand, why I did it I still can’t comprehend! Her bed is wet, not just wet but cleverly wet. The water has been poured just around the area below where her waist would’ve been. It looks like she had to go to the loo but couldn’t make it in time. What would my room mate think when she came back to her cozy bed! The thought make me burst out laughing, I tried to subside it but I couldn’t. Worse is what my other roomies are going to think of her, the poor bed wetter, I guess. Oh gosh! I can hear her coming; my face is burning as I’m trying to control the sadistic cackle I am letting out.
Anjali
