So, my little baby brother seems to have grown up – officially.

He’s left home to join a very prestigious course at a very prestigious institute – and it’s just what he’d wanted – and he’s happy – and so am I.

He’s lived at home way longer than I have. He was born in Meerut, and then lived there through school, and then way lucky enough to have an option to join the Institute of Hotel Management in Meerut. He’s done with college too now, and has gotten through what he’d wanted, and has moved into the new hostel just a couple of days ago.

He started classes yesterday, and he’s loving it!

Mom, Papa and I are just happy that our Brat finally has some discipline in his life! The poor boy has to wake up at 5:30 and go do P.T.!! The idiotic, lazy boy who didn’t bathe till you pushed him into the bathroom and locked him inside, is now bathing that early in the morning, and getting dressed in formals and going to class! Oooh, how I love it! *evil laughter*

Here’s wishing him all the happiness and love, and all the fun and hard work, and all of what he loves the most!

Candy’s 20th birthday is on the 10th of April. In human years, that means a hundred-and-forty years. She died yesterday, on the 30th of March.

She was the loveliest dog in the world. So human that she’d understand facial expressions. The slightest raising of one eyebrow would make her cock her head to the right side and look at you, as if to ask what’s up?

She’d go thirsty for hours, but wouldn’t drink water from a bowl. You just needed to pass by, for her to get up and start prancing around the sink, looking all happy and hopeful that you’d stop and put on the tap for her. And then she’d happily drink fresh running water.

We’d take her for picnics and she’d run around in crazy circles till she was completely exhausted. And then she’d sit quietly in the car on the ride back home.

At this same picnic spot, there was this little lake with pedal boats. Candy saw Mom standing at the opposite end of this lake, and wagged her tail and jumped into the water – and swam across to reach Mom. Of course, then she got stuck since she couldn’t climb out from the water on to the cemented edges, and looked at Mom with panic on her face – till she was pulled out of the lake.

Even though we had a male dog in the house also, she didn’t ever get pregnant till she was 6 or 7 years old. And the first time that she did, none of her pups survived. I remember taking 4 days off from school because she’d trust me to look after her pups. Also becuaes she was never a very good mother – would just get up and walk away while her pups were still feeding. All of these pups from the first litter would start shivering one by one, and all the other pups would leave that one alone – and then this horrid coldness that I’ll never forget, would start creeping upwards from their paws, and slowly each of them would just die. I held most of them when they were dying, and cry with Candy. One night, exhausted with the crying, I went to bed and left Candy on her bed with the pups, in one corner of my room. Another of the pups started shivering, and Candy gently picked up the little thing in her mouth, came up to my bed and put her front paws up and whined and cried till it woke me up. And I woke up to see her standing with her dying puppy in her mouth, and her eyes asking me to help her babies. I’ll never forget that feeling of complete and utter helplessness.

Candy would always know if you were upset. I remember crying with her sitting next to me, licking me gently.

Her favourite food was fruits. All fruits, but especially mangoes and papayas. Also, roasted sweet potato. Though I always wondered how they were her favourites, since she never chewed anything. Would just open her mouth, grab the fruit you offering greedily, and gulp it down. All the dogs in our house got two meals a day. But one of us would always feed Candy at lunch as well. After finishing our food, we’d take an extra roti and feed her whatever it was that we were having. And she loved it. She loved paneer a lot too.

Through the last 20 years, we’ve had other dogs too. But that’s all they were – pet dogs. Candy was like everyone’s baby. And she knew that too. When we got our Dachshund pup home, she spent the first 3 days being scared of this almost-hairless little black thing with long ears and a straight long tail. And soon she was dragging him around the house with one of those long floppy ears in her mouth.

She’s been steadily growing old, but the last couple of years saw her getting thick cataract in both her eyes. Her hearing went. She could always smell as well though. She had trouble standing up. And would sleep a whole lot. But she never lost her puppy-like happiness and jumpi-ness ever. Except the last week.

My brother spent two nights sitting up with her, trying to put water with Electral in her mouth, through an empty syringe. He tried papaya too. It looked like she was getting better. Yesterday morning, Mom gave her her medicine and she went back to sleep. Her breathing was raspy. And then around 10:30 in the morning, Mom was told that Candy wasn’t breathing any more.

Mom and Papa went to the community park opposite our house, dug a hole near the back wall of the ground, and buried her.

We all miss her. I can’t imagine a lovelier dog than her. And I’ll always wish I could’ve gone home to Meerut and sat with her sometime in the last week.

This post is due to Threedrinksahead’s subtle, sly efforts at somehow initiating me, if not to start a blog, then at least to do a guest post here. Not that I have anything against blogging, or bloggers, in fact I think most bloggers are interesting people to know, and love reading their stuff, but then it’s an altogether different ball game to start one for yourself – anyway, ‘nuf said.

…

1. If your lover betrayed you, what will your reaction be?
Truthfully I don’t know, a part of me would want to ask - why couldn’t you have cheated on me with a pretty woman!?  Seriously, I would just walk away and not look at another woman for a really long time… I think basically steer clear of everyone and everything until I can think clearly.

2. If you can have a dream to come true, what would it be?
Right now, it would be to make everyone around me who I care the most for -  Healthy, Happy and at peace with the world particularly in that order (I know how much this is needed right now).

3. Whose butt would you like to kick?
Right now, its a raffle between the person on top of threedrinksahead’s list, and some dastardly relatives… ohh yes, and the people who call themselves the Indian / Deccan Mujahideen (IM/DM) in the news. Some of these are dead now but the remaining can have their share too.

4. What would you do with a billion dollars?
Buy a House, a BMW 5 series, a Harley and then Travel across India on a shoe string budget cuz I don’t think I’ll have much else left after all this.

5. Will you fall in love with your best friend?
Ditto. I did.

6. Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone?
I think it works best when you have loved someone, and then have someone else fall in love with you, cuz then you really figure out what it’s like.

7. How long do you intend to wait for someone you really love?
I didn’t, which actually turned out to be a good thing for me…3rd time lucky.

8. If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do?
Find out if she’s into clandestine affairs!

9. If you’d like to act with someone, who will it be? Your GF/BF or an actress/actor?
Depends on the scene we are acting out!

10. What takes you down the fastest?
People I love being sad or unwell. And not feeling satisfied and happy at work. People expecting me to be unlike how I really am.

11. How would you see yourself in ten years time?
Happy – with two kids, a faithful dog, our two cats, Aanchal, and a nice home with a big garden. And my sisters and dad with me. And a nice boutique Cafe with a book shop on the side!

12. What’s your fear?
Losing the people I love. Nothing that scares me more than that.

13. What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is?
Aanchal – The love of my life.  

14. Would you rather be single and rich or married but poor?
Single and rich.

15. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up?
Look at the time and go ohhh shit! I have  only 5 mins to get ready for work.

16. Would you give all in a relationship?
Yes. Always have given it all for anything I do.

17. If you fall in love with two people simultaneously, who would you pick?
Never happened. It’s one person at a time for me. 

18. Would you forgive and forget no matter how horrible a thing the someone has done?
Forgive maybe. Forgetting, though, would depend on how it affected me.

19.Do you prefer being single or having a relationship?
Having  a relationship.

The number of people who left comments on my Dad’s article finally made him do what I’ve been wanting him to do for years now.

He started his blog! Finally.

Thank you, people!

His next article shall be coming up here.

Please note: The article at the bottom of this post was not written originally by my Dad. It was edited by him and modified to fit the context of the Indian soldiers. This is already mentioned at the bottom of this post. And he’s even linked to the original on his blog. Most people who commented here understood that. Strangely enough, there are other people who cannot scroll to the bottom and read, and instead leave rude comments at other blogs.

If Obelix was here, you know what he’d have done, right? Tapped his head (toc toc toc), and said – “These trolls are crazy!”

…

Long, long time since I wrote. And the number of unpublished posts I have is unbelievable. I’ve tried to start writing and then lost the inclination, or had my mind blanking out, or just not had the time to finish.

The Mumbai Attacks, meanwhile, have left me feeling …or actually, have left me wondering what to feel. Angry? Confused? Outraged? All of the above?

I watched the news for four days straight, with only breaks for sleeping at night – horrified at what was happening, and the implications of all of it. Feeling guilty to even be sleeping. No reason for the guilt, I know. But staying awake and watching the news, and feeling the pain, was the only way to take part in what was happening in a city over 1400 Kms away. Over the next few days, I’ve even found myself putting on radio in the car, on the way back from work, and feeling instantly guilty to be listening to music.

Yes, I realise that this makes very little sense.

I have only been speaking about this with my parents, brother and husband – because I just don’t have it in me to engage in a conversation about this with anyone else who doesn’t feel the outrage that we all have been feeling. It is difficult to put this feeling in words, spoken or written. All of us have sat and watched TV with tears flowing down our faces. My brother’s had a fight with a friend, and my husband’s had an argument with a colleague.

Saahil’s friend is doing Hotel Management (so is Saahil), and all he had to say was that he was glad he hadn’t started training in either of these hotels. My brother was incapable of explaining to this boy that it was so not about your own self here. There was so much more.

G’s colleague said that he wished “all these Muslims” would just be sent back to Pakistan.

I’ve felt physical rage at just hearing these two stories from S and G, and do not wish to enter into any conversations myself with people.

I’ve been reading a few blogs off and on. There were people who just reported what had happened, but mostly they were outraged too. Some wondered why the Officers who died had to head these operations themselves, and couldn’t just strategise from the background since they were heads of various teams. Well, maybe because they were “Officers”, and one of the vows they take is to protect their country, their men, and then if they have any life left, themselves – in that order.

I’ve read in many blogs now that it’s sad how the young don’t care. And while I agree that it’s extremely sad that a lot of them don’t, I disagree, mainly because of my 21 year old brother, who does.

I heard people wondering what the big deal was with the Kerala CM not going to Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan’s home. And, while I agree that it isn’t wrong for the Kerala CM to choose to fly to Karnataka a little late, it is still inexcusable what he said.

But, anyway, while on the topic – this is something that might answer some questions that a lot of people have about why the media is suddenly so full of how important our Army, Navy and Air Force are. Yes, people have been wondering why this incident has led to so much being written about them all over the place, even though these same people do the same job every day in J&K. Why is so much being made of it this time around? No, it isn’t because the “elite” got attacked, and the “aam aadmi” didn’t.

We’re talking about them because this incident was not the same thing as what happens every day in J&K. If there is firing at our borders, it is between the Armies of two countries. It isn’t an illogical, all-out attack on civilians of a country by terrorists.

My family has had many people who’ve served in one of the three Armed Forces. Mom’s father (my Nana) was in the Army, both of my Naani’s brothers were in the Navy, and my Dad’s an ex-fighter pilot from the IAF. This is an artcle that Papa wrote while we were all in the midst of watching the news. Do read.

—

Half Man  Half Boy

The average age of the army man is 23 years. 

He is a short haired, tight-muscled kid who, under normal circumstances is considered by society as half man, half boy. Not yet dry behind the ears, not old enough to buy a beer in the capital of his country, but old enough to die for his country.

He’s a recent school or college graduate; he was probably an average student from one of the Kendriya Vidyalayas, pursued some form of sport activities, drives a rickety bicycle, and had a girlfriend that either broke up with him when he left, or swears to be waiting when he returns from half a world away. He listens to rock and roll or hip -hop or bhangra or gazals and a 155mm howitzer.

He is 5 or 7 kilos lighter now than when he was at home because he is working or fighting the insurgents or standing guard on the icy Himalayas from before dawn to well after dusk or he is at Mumbai engaging the terrorists. He has trouble spelling, thus letter writing is a pain for him, but he can field strip a rifle in 30 seconds and reassemble it in less time in the dark. He can recite to you the nomenclature of a machine gun or grenade launcher and use either one effectively if he must.

He digs foxholes and latrines and can apply first aid like a professional. 

He can march until he is told to stop, or stop until he is told to march. 

He obeys orders instantly and without hesitation, but he is not without spirit or individual dignity. His pride and self-respect, he does not lack.

He is self-sufficient. 

He has two sets of combat dress: he washes one and wears the other. 

He keeps his water bottle full and his feet dry. 

He sometimes forgets to brush his teeth, but never to clean his rifle. He can cook his own meals, mend his own clothes, and fix his own wounds. 

If you’re thirsty, he’ll share his water with you; if you are hungry, his food. He’ll even split his ammunition with you in the midst of battle when you run low.

He has learned to use his hands like weapons and weapons like they were his hands. 

He can save your life – or take it, because he’s been trained for both.

He will often do twice the work of a civilian, draw half the pay, and still find ironic humor in it all. 

He has seen more suffering and death than he should have in his short lifetime. 

He has wept in public and in private, for friends who have fallen in combat and is unashamed to do so.

He feels every note of the Jana Gana Mana vibrate through his body while at rigid attention, while tempering the burning desire to ’square-away’ those around him who haven’t bothered to stand, remove their hands from their pockets, or even stop talking. In an odd twist, day in and day out, far from home, he defends their right to be disrespectful. Just as did his Father, Grandfather, and Great-grandfather, he is paying the price for our freedom.

Beardless or not, he is not a boy. 

He is your nation’s Fighting Man that has kept this country free and defended your right to Freedom. He has experienced deprivation and adversity, and has seen his buddies falling to bullets and maimed and blown.

And he smiles at the irony of the IAS babu and politician reducing his status year after year and the unkindest cut of all, even reducing his salary and asking why he should get 24 eggs a week free! And when he silently whispers in protest, the same politician and babu aghast, suggest he’s mutinying!

Wake up citizens of India! Let’s begin discriminating between the saviours of India and the traitors!

- Flt. Lt. Rajiv Tyagi

Edited to add: This article isn’t written entirely by my Dad. It’s just been modified to fit the Indian context. He actually wrote another piece for a newspaper, which I shall post when he sends it to me. (Hurry up, Papa!)

So, the last weekend was spent at home.

Home, being Meerut.

G and I drove down Friday night, after work, for Papa’s birthday.

Had a fantastically restful and fun weekend after a long-ish time. Also, managed to go swimming with little brother after years! We used to be like little fish, spending our entire summer in the pool.

A couple of pictures from the birthday party:

Am sitting at home, all packed and ready to leave for home(!!!! ) – just waiting for G to get home, pick me up, put the luggage and the cats in the back seat, and drive off – to Meerut.

Papa’s birthday today. Party tomorrow.

More details later.

—

And, Happy Birthday, Papa! Love you!

…to the man with whom I compare every other man in the world.

I would’ve been a totally different person if it wasn’t for you, Papa. And no – I don’t just mean the bat ears and the eye bags that your genes are responsible for!. *hmph*

I also mean the love of books, of knowledge, the sense of integrity, compassion, the ability to love someone unconditionally, independence, a sense of adventure – for all of this, and for being my best friend: Thanks!

I love you!

Mom says I always take your side. Yes, I do. And I always will.

…who is not a baby any more.

Of course, this is a picture from when we both were.

Please notice the missing teeth – I was losing milk teeth, he was sprouting milk teeth. We were both giggling in bed in our favourite “cloud razaai” after Mom had been telling us to get into our respective beds and go to sleep.

Today happens to be my baby brother’s 21st birthday.

Last night, the Brat called me 40 minutes before his birthday started to tell me that in another 40 minutes he’s going to be presenting ‘the cheque‘ in the bank. I said, the rules of this bank say that he can’t present it till the legal age of 25. And then he groaned.

The story goes like this…

When I was 8 years old, and he was 3, we were both given some money – it was probably a festival or something. I quickly spent mine, and was soon eyeing his. And since I was the child prodigy that I was, I quickly tore a few pages out of my notebook, tore the pages into little horizontal rectangles, stapled these from one side, and wrote Cheque Book on the first page. I then tore some more pages into vertical rectangles, stapled them and wrote Pass Book on the first page. I wrote his name on both, and then explained to him the importance of Banking, thus giving this my little brother his first lesson in Economics.

So anyway…

Not only did he understand the concept of banking at that young age (some of his sister’s brilliance would sometimes rub off on him), he was quite impressed with it too. The first drawer of my study table was the Bank, and so into it went his money. A note was made on the Pass Book, and he was given the Cheque Book to keep and use when he needed te money.

Being as excited as he was at the thought of having a bank account he could use, the next time that he wanted to buy a sweet or some such thing, the Brat came up to me, his Banker, and in his grubby hand he held out, very proudly, his first cheque. He wanted 10 rupees. There was also an illegible signature on the cheque.

Of course though, the cheque wasn’t honoured since he wasn’t an adult, and was told by his banker that he obviously couldn’t expect the bank to honour cheques written by a minor. Of course, the day he turned 18, he could withdraw the money if he wanted.

Makes sense. No?

Well, it sort of did to the Brat. (err…not like he had a choice anyway.)

So, he waited – patiently – for another 15 years. On his 18th birthday, he was told that the legal age had been moved up to 21. Well – what could the Banker do – it was government that decided these things…!

Fast forward to another 3 years from then, and you will reach the 7th of March 2008.

He is now worried that he will have to wait another 4 years now.

His Banker is (extremely!) worried at the Interest he will expect to have accumulated in 22 years from when he made the Deposit.

…

Happy Birthday, Brat!

I love you.

And, err … GOT YOU AGAIN! HA!!

…

This post here about why I love my baby brother so much.

…at the hospital the last three days.

G had to have emergency surgery – for a kidney stone that was blocking the exit from the right kidney. Have had three exhausting (physically and emotionally) days – and now he’s back home (and feeling fine), and I’m back at work. *whew*

I wish for you all the happiness and love in the world this year. And, I’d like to say – Thanks.

Had written this, and since I wrote it, had wanted to write about you too. Was storing it up. Had thought – either your birthday, or our first anniversary. Couldn’t wait another month.

Sweetheart, I’ve now known you for close to six and a half years – and have loved every moment of it. I don’t remember when it was that I fell in love with you, and I don’t even recollect when it was that I realised that I was in love with you. You just grew from being my best, closest friend to my “boyfriend”, to my husband. Marriage to you was more a natural progression of our friendship, than anything else. Even now, 11 months since we’ve been married – I still haven’t gotten used to having you around all the time. As 11 p.m. approaches, I find often find myself getting impatient of everything else, and wanting to just only spend time with you. 11 p.m. because that’s the time you’d say bye and go back home, before we were married. And then, it suddenly hits me – you ain’t goin’ away now…!! And then I get this nice warm feeling inside.

Sometimes I feel that I missed that “cathartic” feeling that a lot of people get after getting married – the complete euphoria and “letting go”. But then, I wouldn’t change what we had/have for anything.

The friendship, the craziness, the late night drink on the terrace, the fights, the trying-to-understand-each-other conversations, the love, the togetherness, the feeling of being a “team”, the mad laughter, the cards, the e-mails, the late night phone calls, the serious discussions about books and films, sharing work stories, sharing the most useless information, sharing our lives.

Here’s to all of that, and all that there is to come.

Happy Birthday.

I love you.

Been away for many days, and not ‘coz I was busy at work. Instead, I have the following new addictions:

1. Jeffrey Archer – Have re-discovered all his books. In the last month or so, have finished Kane and Abel, A Twist in the Tale, Cat O’Nine Tales, Honour Among Thieves, Sons of Fortune, First Among Equals, Shall We Tell the President, Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less, False Impressions, and A Quiver full of Arrows. Currently reading As the Crow Flies.
2. Facebook – Though this is now quite an old addiction. I’m currently trying to not have to keep updating my Status(!) on Facebook.
3. The Sims – Extremely addictive it is!!

After a long-ish time, G and I have been spending more time together. Mostly, this is limited to a late-night drink out on the terrace together after a long day at office for both of us. At least a couple of times a week, we try and watch a movie with that drink. Night before last, we watched The Pursuit of Happyness. We’d missed it when it came out last year. Absolutely beautiful movie

I also watched Madhuri’s comeback film. I cannot fathom why the woman came back to THIS!! Bad script, bad actors, bad costumes, weak story, bad direction – and Madhuri’s accent!! One of my many quirks is that I can never watch a film while eating. This has nothing to do with not liking food. It’s only that I can’t bear to miss even a single shot in the film, a single expression, a single cut, a single…whatever. I have to either watch a film in a theatre, or else draw the curtains, eat, drink, go to the loo, and do everything else that might interrupt the film. And this is something that bugs my entire family. I’ve been known to even shout at people for coughing and sneezing. In fact, this quirk extends to not just myself, I even nudge (poke??) the person I’m watching the film with if she/he even looks down at their food for (as long as!) 10 seconds. [Note to G: I do this for your good!]

Things I did while watching Aaja Nachle:

1. Heat dinner
2. Eat dinner
3. Give the cats’ food
4. Make soup for G, and fry bread crumbs for the soup
5. Go to the loo
6. Bring a blanket from the other room
7. Talk on the phone

If that doesn’t say how bad the film is, nothing else will!

I wasn’t online on Christmas, and I hope you all had a very merry one!

This was our first Christmas together for G and me after we got married.

Mom had got me a very big, very pretty Christmas tree last year, as a Christmas plus house-warming present. (That’s when I’d moved into this house.) Now, this year, for some inexplicable reason, the tree shed all its leaves (spikes??), and there were some fresh new green branches coming out, but Christmas arrived before they did. So, G and I went and bought a new one for this Christmas. A much smaller one though.

Had fun decorating it though. This was the first time we did it together.

Gabriel had a lot of fun too. He’s spent the last few days jumping up at the tree, the shiny ornaments hanging from the branches being too huge a temptation to avoid.

Here’s a picture of the tree, with Gabriel contemplating whether it’s safe to jump up at it with me in such close proximity…

And, here’s a picture of how Xena and Gabriel spent Christmas – sleeping in front of the heater. (I can’t get over how a cat can sleep like that!)

There were four of them!

One, G got on his way back from office on the 20th. He was supposed to pick me up from office too. Called me when he was leaving, and then called an hour later and said he was stuck in a horrid jam. Actually, he’d bought the cake, brought it home, hidden it, locked up the house again, thrown the keys back up to the house, and then come to pick me up. And then, there was the surprise at 12 a.m.

The second cake came from Mom the next afternoon. She came from Meerut with a friend, and they got me an awesome Truffle cake from Wenger’s.
On 21st evening then, while I was home and stuck in bed with the horrid, horrid cold, two friends from work dropped in, bearing with them a cake from my “Secret Santa” in office. [Thanks again, SS. ]

And, then, at 11:30 p.m. on the 21st, there came Brat, also known as my younger brother, who came with an out-of-the-world Bitter Chocolate-Lemon cake with him! This came from the pastry shop of the Imperial Hotel (the one on Janpath), and if you ever happen to stop by, please do try this cake. AWESOME!

The diyaas that Mom sent.

This photo was taken after G was done soaking them
in water and was putting them in the sun to dry.My rangoli.
G insisted, while I was making it, that it looked
like a 10 year old had made it. After I was done with it, though,
he did admit it actually looked nice.
Oh, and he helped too.
Oh, and this was made with the rangoli colours that Mom sent.

Sparks!

Yours truly. And, you can see the pretty
diyaas in the background.

Really like this photo.
Looks like both of us have our wands out, and
are casting spells on each other. Quite Potter-ish.
Oh, and that’s my hand in the foreground.