This Precious Life....

On Thursday night, A called his wife M from office, and told her he will be home late. Few hours later in the middle of the night a stranger called M and told her that he had admitted A, to the hospital with multiple injuries. Few hour later, in the morning, doctors declared to M that they could not save A and he was no more....
 Life is so unpredictable.... In the 3 years of their married life, A and M would have made so many plans for their future. A name for their child not yet conceived,  the dream car to buy from their funds saved, so that A can use a car to travel to work instead of his bike, the place where they want to build their retirement home. She had probably cooked his favorite dinner that night. But he never came home to relish it. Fate had some other plans for them.....


Life gives you cruel surprises. I guess, we must live each day like its probably the last day of life. Never leave home or go away from your loved ones with a frown or some harsh words...lest you never return to make amends.

Cool...

The temperatures in Mumbai are swinging between 18 and 28 degree Celsius...and Mumbaiites are freezing already! The hardly ever used winter ware is out to use!!


The coldest place I have been to is Chandigarh, in early December of 2007, when the temperatures were in single digits. And the open and green city has coldest breezes blowing at night....grrr. Compare that, and the Mumbai winter feels mild and soothing...


I yearn to sit curled up in a blanket, with a book in my lap and a mug of hot tea in my hands. Wow, thats heaven. Husband for company would even be better.

What DO Men want?

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Incidentally my 100th post, thank you!
Never imagined my 100th post will be anything more that "Yay my 100th post". But no, Blogadda has some plan for me! So I put on my thinking cap and though....


I believe that most men want
To be heard out...
....about the day they spent at work, job hiccups, boss bitching (yes you heard that right).


Gadgets...
....need I say more?


To be looked after and even pampered, like their moms did...
....clean home, warm food, hot tea and all they want at hand. With minimal effort. Or just a bit more than minimal effort (lets be fair to them)


A Strong Woman...
....who can fight her own battles. A silly scared girl may be cute (I said MAY be) to some, but most guys want a woman who is strong independent and not a sissy.


Peace of mind...
....no nagging and a mom and wife who can stay with each other with love. Each one has a special place in his life that cannot be replaced by anyone else


To be loved and accepted...
....unconditionally, with the the bald head, with the pot belly and with the sometimes small pay packet.


Freedom...
....to fart, burp, sneeze at any time of the day, in the confines of his home.


Happiness...
....in the eyes of his partner and children.


Appreciation...
....of all that he does for his loved ones. The efforts and the sacrifices.




I am sure there is lot more, all the men out there, tell us what you want. We want to hear you. Women out there, tell me what more men want!

Movie Day

Today was a movie day


First I watched The Lives of Others on UTV World Movies. German movie set in the the late 80s. Excellent movie about the life in East Germany and how it was controlled by the "Stasi". Great direction, casting and screenplay. Read reviews here and a full spoiler story here. Absolutely loved the movie.


Now watching Haapus, a Marathi movie on television. Another nice movie. Reviewed nicely here. Sorry I am bad at reviewing movies, so will pass.


But will highly recommend the movies....

Happy Diwali

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I love what Diwali does to the world around!!

Diwali is like a splash of colour on the otherwise sepia landscape of life. The otherwise crowded vegetable market suddenly has dozens of rangoli vendors and earthen lamp vendors. Colourful lanterns made of papers, thermocol, plastic, cloth adorn the bamboo stands. Young of boys run around selling small colourful sky lamps on wooden stands. Chinese rice lamps, electric lights flood the market from nowhere. Local grocery shops also double up as vendors of these special diwali items, diwali sweets and fy faraal, ubtan packets, chocolate and dry friut boxes
I love what Diwali does to the city....faraal shops and stalls, diwali sales. What I do not enjoy much is the noisy crackers. But this year somehow there seem to be less of these. The financial crunch? Possible. But I do love the pretty ones that fly high in the sky and burst into a shower of lights! Last year we had been to marine drive to watch the crackers, this year I watch from home....

This Diwali the cook in me who was comatose for the past two years stirred a little. So she made chivda a week before Diwali, tch tch, wrong timing. Did not last till Diwali. The cook then dreamt a lot and went back into the state of coma. The artist in me who was long dead stirred back to life and bought all possible rangoli colours. Then she also got small cheap plastic boxes to store the colours and methodically stored shades of reds in red boxes, yellows in yellow boxes and like that. Then she made a small not too artsy but neat rangoli outside her home. Then, after laxmi poojan, she went into the state of oblivion. This is what Diwali does to me!

Wish you all a very happy, peaceful, prosperous, fun filled and safe Diwali

This is How You Do NOT Bake a Cake

The Do's, everyone will tell you them, here are the don'ts that I have learn't the hard way, i.e personal experience

1) Don't bake till you have at least once seen someone bake either in real life or on TV or an authentic video. Small Things like how to fill, grease, flour and line the pans are very important.

2) Before you start out, have all your things together. The cookware, the spoons, whips, ingredients, measures....everything in place. My routine cooking is very intuitive. I start cooking, then walk around the kitchen, gather stuff and ingredients while I am cooking and that works fine for me for my roz ka khaana. NP claims I am a great cook, which I believe he says to convince himself and to gear himself to a lifetime of my radioactive cooking. (OK, I am not that bad, but not great either, a little better than average is quite where I am). But baking requires a little more effort than your routine cooking. At least in the beginning. So be well prepared.

3) Read the recipe carefully. Trust those from good books. Sites I am not sure. Cooking blogs are generally good, but do not go by the pics. Awful stuff can look awesome in a few fancy photographs. If a recipe seems complicated, please stay away. Use your intuition before you cook. This is presuming you are a newbie like me (since you have reached so far). Start with simple things first. Like a basic sponge cake.

4) Follow the sequence, yes. But do not take things THAT seriously. Like at the fag end of the recipe they will tell you to drop the mixture in greased and flour dusted tin and put it in an oven preheated for x minutes. No one will tell you that the tin must be greased and dusted before you begin. And by the time you are done the oven better be pre heated. Once the batter is made, it must be baked soon. Leaving it out for long will result in cakes that do not rise enough.

5) The tooth pic/knife/fork test, again do not take it SO seriously, the way I did. Kept poking my cake so often that it looked like a pock marked cake by the time it was fully done! BTW also beware, opening the oven too often during the innumerable fork tests is not good, the heat is lost out.

6) Prepare small portions at the oust. Expect some wastage and failed experiments before working out exactly how much heating your portions, your oven need. My first cake had a charred crust and rest was fine after I literally tore off the crust. Second was absolutely tasteless and charred mess. Third was too dense and sweet but overall not bad. Fourth attempt a year later with previous gyaan was much better but past "burns" made me poke it too often and my cake collapsed and got dense as the poking spoiled the top and let the air inside the baking cake escape.

7) Remember, Fahrenheit and Celsius were two different people with contributions to science similar yet different. So read carefully the temperature stated on the recipe and carry out appropriate conversions. Your oven may still need different temperatures so watch your cake get baked, this is not the time to watch that silly reality show on TV.

8) Finally, whatever you do, whether the outcome is a good cake or a damaged cake, your kitchen will end up smelling like heaven (that is how I imagine it smells), of course unless you char it way too far. And do not get discouraged, its really not rocket science, baking cakes, only practice makes one perfect. So happy trying.

The Irony of Life

When I am busy and neck deep in work, I look forward to being home and setting a lot of things in my life right (read cupboards, kitchen, papers) and giving time for shopping, parlour and my self!

Now I am home but unable to do any of that!! Thanks to conjunctivitis.... No going out in public places....contagious disease. No cleaning cupboards ....one more  reason to procrastinate, that I do not wish to contaminate my clean clothes with adenovirus stained hands. Only thing I did religiously was cook.....breakfasts maafed to oversleeping but dinners and lunches, yes I cooked. After real long time. 

I must save the recipes of all that I tried.....

Short Story......

Ek haat se do, aur ek haat se lo......likewise ek haat se I wrote the admission paper and doosre haat se wrote the discharge summary of that lady. Not just figuratively!

The lady came with an unbelievable heart rate of 16 beats per minute! And she was talking! Quickly I gathered her history, saw old charts, on duty intensivist came running and we were all set for temporary transvenous pacing. How excited I was, hoping I will be allowed to perform pacing. While the patient's relatives were trying to understand the implications of pacing, especially the financial ones, I sat down to write the admission paper. While I was doing that, the relatives had made their decision and wanted to move the patient to a charitable hospital. So after finishing the admission, my co started filling the discharge summary! Shortest ICU stay ever, with the lowest heart rate I had seen in a person, ever!

Hebra's Circle

Not related actually, Hebra's circle is something related to scabies (ouch, sorry) but then, cannot think of another terminology for these 'events' that happen in a circle. Like the other day, I was thinking about a 'character' I knew from one place about 2 years ago. The very next day, I actually see her at the most unlikely place. Then I was thinking of a blogger who shifted elsewhere and was wondering why she had still not mailed me her new url. Only to find later, four hours later to be precise, her mail in my inbox. Cool eh? So I think of something, and that thing happens, to complete this circle of sorts.

While I was waiting at the bus stop today early in the morning, saw a man alight from an auto. He was in his early thirties. His father (I presume from his age) dropped him, took a turn and went back in the auto. So I presumed (I love presuming things) he had dropped his son to the stop on his way somewhere. What struck me was the extreme thinness of this person. And the fact that his clothes hung about him like a sack. And the fact that earlier in the morning I was appreciating the uniforms of all staff nurses in the ICU and noticed one of them had visibly slimmed after she had her uniform made. Needless to say, she was the junior most on duty. Circle hmnn! Coming back to the slim man, either he was wearing 'handed over' clothes of someone healthier than him. Or had lost 20kgs in his clothes. Later possibility seemed unlikely, he did not look so sick. So, after his father left, he went away from the stop somewhere and a few minutes later, was back with a burning cigarette in his hand. Now nothing pisses me off more that people smoking at public places. Last time my friends and I had met someone like that at a coffee shop, one of my pals had politely told him that the smoke was bothering us and he very apologetically went to another table away from ours. He continued smoking, we cannot stop that, but at least he had the courtesy to keep away. I am not the kind who can tell people that they are bothering me. Not in so many words at least. So I silently tolerated his smoke. But not without giving him dirty looks. Passive aggression! I was also hoping his bus comes real soon, so that he has to drop his cigarette while he has just started smoking. His bus came, when he was almost through the whole cigarette, most of which I choose not to inhale. Prior to boarding the bus, the man dropped his cigarette on the road and did not bother to stamp it out. The bus left and the cigarette was left behind smoldering on the road, people carefully avoiding it. I was tempted to go and snuff the life out of it but refrained....not sure if it would be OK for the sole of my footwear! Plus did not want it to seem like I had thrown that stub! Eew.

Damn it, I hate people smoking on the road and public places.

Meter Jam

Auto, Taxi...you love them , you hate them, you swear at them yet cannot do without them.....

I hate it the most, to ask for an auto ride from Parle east to west. What makes it worse is that I get an auto after at least 10 have rejected (with 7 giving tchs, like I have asked them to try skinny dipping down the Mithi river) Late at night, I understand. But duing the day?! Whats the problem? Traffic? Its everywhere. Plus more traffic is more income, so why complain?!

Another pain is the airport. Try taking an auto from the Airport. To anywhere. Big pain  Once a fella fought with me because he had waited 3 hours in the queue and got a "minimum bhada". The other one, when I took him to Ghatkopar from the airport whined that this was way too far, he had waited 3 hours in the queue! Uh?!

I have reduced my auto rides the day the fares increased. Walking is good for me anyway!

But still, I do agree, we cannot do without them. Atleast I cannot. Since I do not have my own vehicle yet.

While we do blame them, there are nice guys too. One kaka near my home I particularly like. One day while on our way to Kurla terminus Nagesh forgot his bagpack with his laptop and SLR camera in the auto. When we realized, the auto had left already. But this kaka, returned back to give us our bag when he saw it in his rear view mirror.

For me, meter jam is almost always on. Bus or a walk. Auto for emergencies only.

But I am game for August 12th, yes!!

Finally Done.....

Got admission for secondary DNB in Anesthesiology at Nanavati Hospital, Mumbai. Yay. Work starts from August 2nd.


So now that means...

...no more "what nexts" for 2 years.
...small but steady income for next 2 years.
...Mumbai for next 2 years.
...busy for next 2 years.
...uncertainty postponed for the time being 

Its Not Me....

...because never have I been filled with any kind of hatred. Leave aside the amount I feel today. Someone tried to hurt my spirit.....suffocate it. The damage was slight, reparable but unforgettable. Unpardonable.

There are these moments.....

...when you are so tired, dying to hit the bed. And when you do, you realise you are too tired to even fall asleep!!

...when you wish you could change the direction in which your life is drifting....

...when things go so well you wonder whats wrong!

...when things go so so well that you need to pinch yourself to know its real.

...when things you are confident of doing well screw up royally and what you fear you won't manage goes fantastically well

...when you wished you looked in your photographs as nice as others look in theirs!!

...when you wished you could shed in a night the pounds you gathered over a year....aargh

Passed...

...my DA exam with 68.66%. First in my class :)


I know it doesn't sound nice but I must thank many people for my success 

Nagesh......for being OK with me staying far during my prep leave, for encouraging, for tolerating my tears and many months of tea and toast for breakfast especially when I overslept post calls or post late night studies.

Mom....for encouraging, being my stress buster and tolerating my moods.

Ma In Law....for good wishes, for hey prayers, her support when I was studying and busy neglecting home duties, for tolerating a student bahu

My teachers for guiding, mentoring even scolding and moulding...

My HOD Dr. Iyer and Prof Dr. Indrani for their encouraging feedback during the vivas. Facing the DNB interviews in front of a gang of 4 strangers I realize how important it is to have a familiar face during vivas and times of stress....

My buddies Aditi and Nitin, my partners in studying, my partners for dinners, lunches, teas and for chillaxing during times of stress....

My buddies Kshiteeja and Rashmi for dropping in for destressing, for encouragement, for help during exams in many ways that are beyond words....

Smt. Anagha Lele, Aditi's mom for sending tasty home cooked meals every day for 2 whole months to ease our hostel stay and make it tolerable!

Mumbai Dabbawalas for getting us on time our lunches :D


I may have missed some names now and will edit the post when needed!!

Dissppointment

Over the past 7-8 years I have developed this knack for handling vivas, its a challenge for me to have one better than the last one. Post ending exams, prelims, university exams......

Today was sort of antithesis, a viva, rather an interview which was not upto my "Varsha Standards". My DA exam viva was good, rocking good actually. This was rock bottom!!

Hope I do better next time.......and seize the next opportunity

Natarang

I know I am late, but what an amazing movie!! Awesome songs, music, direction, actors, story...everything. The movie has it all in a short span without too many unnecessary details. A landmark movie in the Marathi commercial cinema which has just recently managed to get out of raunchy senseless and repetitive humour..

Spellbound!!

YUMMY

yummy. Ate yummy Vada Pav and Pani Puri!!

Yay Yay


Sorry, this is not blog material, I may be sound like I am updating my facebook profile!!

Wish me good luck...

...for an upcoming interview!!

Now what

The uncertainty is here. All the while I was eagerly awaiting the day when I finish my DA and embark on a new journey...my future education. Now that my exam is through, suddenly I feel lost. Qualified yes, confident...well quite. Future, not dark but hazy.

While I was still in Nair, the future was still as hazy as it is now. But atleast I belonged somewhere. Now while my security blanket of belonging is gone, the vision ahead is not clear...atleast not yet.

If someone were to ask me what is one thing that I most want right now, covet the most right now is the knowledge and assurance that my chance to further education is secured. That I would get into a good institute for my DNB as soon as possible. That all will be fine and I won't be left groping about in the dark. Life has given me all that I have wanted, always after a small wait, as a surprise when things seemed not to be going too well. Is this one more of those times........iska jawab to samay hi dega!!

Big Plans

Now that a part of my exams, that is the theory is done, I'm just counting days when this phase of my life gets done and the next one begins.

I am already busy making plans how I want to spend my new found freedom post exam! As always, I have HUGE larger than life plans....those which would keep me busier than residency. And as always, I'm sure most of those will fizzle out! Over the years, you get to know yourself better, don't you?

But one plan I intend to stick to firmly is blogging with utmost regularity. So if you are reading this, keep tabs on my progress!!

Misc....

Well DA at fag end.....just a last few days of college and then I am relieved for my studies. Nervous, about impending exams, about the fact that soon, once again i will be licenced to "kill". Cannot believe its been 2 years already. Will miss my friends, the fun of college life......

Visited a "Tea Lounge" at Vile Parle. Long ago I had spoken of a place I love, Tea Centre at Churchgate. This place too is good. Tea accompaniments are pricey. I tried the mint tea......one pot is good for 2. The taste was just about fine. Couldn't match the mint tea at TC. But a refreshing change to have a tea lounge over a coffee shop I feel. For tea lovers like me more so.

Moms not too well. Need prayers for her.

There was so much I wanted to blog about, but the moment I log on my mind just blanks off!! Why???

Aiseich.......

Aiseich ek post....

The lazy girl, looks at the world and finds 10 things to blog about everyday. But the outcome?! Sigh.....

Just returned from a short but lovely trip to Mangalore. Met family and interesting people. Loved the place. Although riding on private buses in Karnataka is only for the brave ones.

Saw 3 Idiots (way back when it released but writing now) and LOVED it. Then read Five point someone. The novel is good, yes. But CB is not exactly an author who can create characters. Stories yes, characters, no. Like I could not have imagined how Alok in the novel was supposed to be had I not seen the movie. In fact I had even tried reading the book a year ago but had left midway since I found it tough to "visualize" the story. Unlike Agatha Christie, whose stories not only do I visualize, after having read the 30 odd of her books that I have, I think I know how British country side in the 1950s was. So the concept may be credited to him, but the movie has a charm of its own....

"Look at not what you have lost but at what you have left"..... Thought for the day at Afghan Church. Not too sure what that is supposed to mean.

June is the time for exams. So in a studying mode now. Last month of college left......