Just a quick post of the last henna i did before my vacation. A simple design just to keep my skills from rusting:
I had a yen to do some henna over the weekend but couldn’t get a hold of my supplies. Apparently they have been sacrificed at the altar of all my mother holds holy: cleanliness. The festival of Vesakhi (usually in the middle of April) which has both cultural (harvest festival for the farmers of Punjab) and religious (the day the Sikh religion was founded with the christening of the first 5 disciples) usually means a spring clean in my home. Unfortunately this time around I was several thousand kilometres away and the clean-up provided my mother with a chance to get rid of anything of mine she’s not fond of…sighs the joys of family!
I’ve just returned from my long over-due vacation and dived head-first into work. The post on my impressions and adventures will have to wait for the weekend when I hopefully get a moment to breathe in peace and just ‘be’.
This post came to mind while I was travelling. I had just finished Vikram Seth’s “A Suitable Boy” and the book had left a profound impression on me, so much so, that I picked up a copy for my own during my travels. The one point I kept returning to was that the boy she deemed most suitable was not the one who aroused great emotion in her but rather the one who made her laugh. I think that in most romantic relationships we over-estimate the fiery flames of amorous feelings and underestimate the warmth and steady glow of a good companion. The ideal you may think would be to have a balance of the two, and I think thats possible in a long-term commitment that sees the ups and downs of life, but not necessarily a possibility in the form of a perfectly packaged individual.
I pondered over this some and some personal interactions of my own have validated this for me. I’ve met people who have elicited great emotion from me and vice versa. Thats fine and dandy because noone on earth can possibly object to those wondrous highs of being in love and being loved in return and as such noone reads the fine print about the dastardly lows and highly irrational behavior. I’m guilty of some irrational behavior of my own and been subjected to some as well. All I can say is if the 2 people involved are not mature enough to communicate through the chaos to the real issues underneath and commit to resolving them it can get really ugly. I personally don’t like myself when I’m so choked up with emotion that I can barely string a coherent sentence and am just lashing out…so I figure I need to find my very own funny man. If he can fan the flames as well that will be the icing on the cake
With all this squared away I was resting easy until I picked up an issue of Marie Claire. The editor wrote a piece on the many single and seemingly eligible women in their late 20s who just can’t seem to find Mr Right. She raised some interesting points of how we may be so fixated on finding the ideal man, intelligent, successful, and handsome, that we pass up on people who don’t obviously fit the bill. What we may not realise, she said, was that the intelligent, successful and handsome Mr Right may not be looking for us. Most of us stabilise our personalities and our careers in our mid-to-late 20s and in the process may become quite boring! She also raised the point that the man we meet and reject at 28 will probably be the man we meet and accept at 38. Now I don’t know about you but that gives me major heebie-jeebies!! By that standard the guy i crushed on at 16 is probably the closest to the ideal man i’ve ever met and even he wasn’t the same ideal as his 16yr old self when i met him again years later!!
From the highs of funny man to the lows of 38yr old i’ve settled on a nice medium as aided by Shobha De. With all this men & marriage thoughts going on in my head I picked up her book “Spouse” in which she analyzes her own marriage and that of those around her. She doesn’t profess any magic cures but rather a few pointers from the rough roads she’s travelled. What I’ve liked most about her book is her approach…only marry if you really believe in marriage and in making that commitment to stick it out with your partner. That gives me hope because I truly believe in the institution of marriage and for keeps. Now I just need to find someone who thinks that and is tall, dark, handsome, highly successful, witty, intelligent, likes to be a little adventurous with food…………..and on and on. LOL!
Christmas is now behind us and the New Year looms threatening to arrive whether or not we may be ready for its arrival. The year in review post this year will require some more thought..I’m not sure what exactly this year has left me with other than lasting imprints…the kind you carry with you and fortunately for me an equal mix of life’s positives and negatives
Meanwhile I’ve had some house guests…meet the birdies!
The blue one is the boy bird and the yellow one is the female and trust me his humbled stoop is not an act. This is definitely one female who rules her roost!
An outing to Ikea (one of my favourite places to shop – must be the domestic side in me which gets so thrilled at the sight of Tupperware and linens!) produced stow-away’s. We caught them hiding away in my sister’s purse. She was compelled to bring them to work with her where they keep her rat company…
Last but not least I attempted to draw snowflakes on my toes as my interpretation for Christmas this year but fell short of the mark when they ended up looking like the Union Jack…sigh sigh!
AB forwarded me this quiz link and being the quiz-addict that i am i had to take it. Now i’ve got to read the darned book too!!
You’re Watership Down!
by Richard Adams
Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you’re
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You’d
be recognized as such if you weren’t always talking about talking rabbits.
Friday brought on a cough. It was annoying but not a major concern. By Saturday a fever burnt bright and the body aches travelled fast and furious on its heels. My nasal cavity evolved from serving its function as an odor-analyzing orifice to a pseudo-faucet. I was sure purgatory would begin quite that way.
Now you may be imagining all sorts of deadly infections, as was i, but all it turned out to be was a flu. It won’t kill you these days (or at least its really hard to die from a flu now) but it can still make life uncomfortable. Moral of this story was to drink lots of fluids and ride the tide of a drug-induced sleepy haze….yummy!
Now on to more exciting things. Many of you may be aware of CRMs (customer relationship management) tools and have come in contact with some of the softwares in the course of your workday.
In my office we use Salesforce and we really like it. Its simple, easy-to-use and best of all…it does what its supposed to….So imagine my surprise when i see this in a bookstore
I’ve never spent more than 10 minutes to show someone the workings of Salesforce and at the end of the 10 minutes “oh this is quite self-explanatory…I’m sure i can figure out the rest myself” inevitably follows. Go figure….
Its the start of a brand-new work-week, albeit a day late for me, and have a good week one and all…for all the ‘potty’ Potter fans out there was no line-up at Mustafa at 7:01am on Saturday!
The irony of Labour Day was probably that a good portion of the people for whom the public holiday first came into effect spent the day at work. The rest of us fat-cat office dwellers enjoyed the day off and indulged in our various pursuits. Mine started off with 60s art-deco on my toes and took a romantic bend with my pseudo-stained glass nails.
The weekend is here again and its time to do serious battle with the blanket i’m knitting. Hopefully the rains hold up otherwise the fight will have to wait for yet another day (never again will i attempt to knit a blanket while living on an island on the equator!)
The last of my 3 part visit to the fair city of Hanoi. My sister has since returned home and Hanoi is now off the destinations to visit list for some time. One interesting quirk is that the immigration stamps for all 3 visits sit on the same page on my passport and now i have officially christened it the Hanoi page.
Due to the lack of time and vanity taking importance in all our “must-do before we leave Hanoi” activities we didn’t make it out of the city. I was though exposed to parts of Hanoi outside the Old Quarter and i wish i could have spent more time there to do it proper justice.
The first night in Hanoi (it was 8pm by the time i got into the Old Quarter) was dedicated to food and relaxation. For my second evening there though we made it out to the Summit Lounge at Sofitel Plaza Hotel. The lounge is on the 20th floor and offers a breath-taking view of Hanoi’s skyline. We shared our space with some businessmen winding up their conference and everyone packed the terrace to take it what was a glorious sunset.
A few of the businessmen had perhaps enjoyed their drinks a little too much and provided us some entertainment when we left. The lounge is accessible via a lift that travels between the 19th and 20th floor or via a staircase. We had seen a gentleman enter the lift and make his way down. When the lift came back up and we proceeded to enter ourselves he’s still there. He was quite adamant that we all get off since the lift didn’t work and the doors did not open on the 19th floor. We decided to try our luck anyways and piled into the lift with him and a few other businessmen. The lift doors opened but on the other side. Our ‘merry’ friend had stared at the doors through which he had entered the lift and did not see the doors opening on, as he put it, “his back side”!
That night we sampled authentic Vietnamese cuisine in cute little claypots and ventured out to a club called “The Toilet” or T-pub. The music played was a bit of a mix by the standards of clubs in more cosmopolitan cities but ventured more to the R&B/Hip-Hop genres than anything else. The decor had to keep with the name and the showpiece bottles were housed in urinals mounted on the wall next to the bar. The tables all had a roll of toilet paper and it would have been nice if they had thought to keep some of the toilet paper for the actual toilet facilities which went without. It was interesting though to observe the young, urban Vietnamese. There were some who were clearly affluent from the way they were dressed, even going so far as to emulate the plaster Nelly always had on his face, and breaking out into elaborate breakdance routines. I was sadly left to dance mostly on my own since i was in my heels and standing at 5’10 and taller than most of the men there :-p
For the last day in Hanoi more good food was on the agenda and the ambiance in all the restaurants is truly something. Here’s the view from the cafe where we had breakfast:
The architecture of the Old quarter is truly wonderful and i personally love all the balconies you see in profusion. The Old Quarter also has to have some of the best and cheapest valet service anywhere in the world. The extreme motorbike traffic also results in creative parking of said bikes because many of the side streets in the Old Quarter are quite narrow.I also managed to capture this video from my cab window of a typical street scene in Hanoi. Unfortunately the cab was going very fast and my camera’s video functionality isn’t the best but you can get a vague sense of what it would be like to walk the streets for yourself.
For my last night i managed to get some Bun Cha for dinner and had a lovely evening with my sister, her friends in Hanoi and our new friend Saupath Kosal, a truly fun, entertaining, and warm person. We retired to a pub called “The Dragonfly” where we attempted to play cards but Jenga proved to be the far bigger entertainer. Note to self: Drinks while playing Jenga may seem like a bad idea logically but it makes for way more fun!
I’ve to confess to being really bad with my blog. Life is evolving and with it has come a re-shuffling of priorities and sacrifices to be made. Its all still a little up in the air and i’ll wait for the dust to settle some before we see which road i take.Have a good week everyone!
The cricket world as it is known has been turned on its ear in what is proving to be an exciting but also terribly frustrating world cup.
The Indian team was beaten quite badly by a very young team from Bangladesh. Ireland beat Pakistan sending them out of the world cup which resulted in their captain resigning and their coach, Bob Woolmer, added to the dramatic mix with his passing.
The thrashing from Bangladesh had some positive effect on India though as they went on to a record-breaking 257 run victory against Bermuda (no eye rolling allowed!). Luck hasn’t been with me with the friendly wagers i’ve made on the matches but there’s still time for the odds to swing in my favour.
On a personal front it is off to Hanoi again this weekend and indulge in my favorite north Vietnamese dish of Bun Cha. I’ll explore some new areas and bring everyone another glimpse of Hanoi.
Don’t forget to file your taxes and march madness reigns supreme!
I’ve been taking a mini hiatus from the blog and have loads of things to write about when i manage to eke out a few spare minutes but the excitement at having watched the Cricket ad by Nike, which is playing in India, shook me out of my malaise and demanded i immediately share it.
Those of you who enjoy cricket will get a real kick out of this one and for those who don’t just enjoy. Its incredibly interesting that sporting giants and ad agencies have pushed the boundaries on their advertising efforts as seen by the Adidas ad for the Soccer World Cup and now this in anticipation of the Cricket World Cup.I happily anticipate more of such madness!
