My Thoughts Keyboarded

Someone told me that writer’s block is basically the imaginary friend not willing to talk to the writer. If this is the case I think I lost mine, or perhaps he wandered off to a land where writing is as effortless as a waterfall or a sunrise.  And this post is my call, my ode and my plea for his mercy to come back to me. Every morning I take a 30-minute bus drive to work, through a freeway which is mostly surrounded by trees with little or no buildings of any sort. It is very calming journey. Except the humming sound of the bus, there is no other noise. In fact, it is kind of soothing to travel with that sound, it makes no sense and forms a background music to my thoughts. Morning sun plays with shadows on the floor and people are usually quiet, either scrolling through their phone or sleeping.  On these journeys, I either meditate, read or simply gaze through the window on the passing by sight with contemplation. I also make mental notes on the chang...

His voice pierced through the humming of the bus and snatum kaur singing from my earphone.  Few heads looked up with mine, to see who is making the noise. We were sitting on the top of double-decker bus, which was making a steady pace on the highway to work.  Sitting in the front seat was the loud toddler in uniform, who clearly seemed different and special . He was repeating some gibberish in a familiar nursery rhyme tune. Sitting next to him was his father, who neither responded to his loud singing, or to the murmurs of fellow passengers. He caught me looking at him and smiled at me and I responded with smile. He turned around kneeling in his seat to face me. He stretched his hands to reach and I extended mine. He got excited now, and started singing louder, holding my hand in swaying movement.  His hands and eyes did not coordinate, and he kept looking at the passing trees. Listening closely I realized he isn't singing gibberish but the actual r...

Dear You, I bet the cemeteries heard more honest confessions than any court, Airports have seen more love than any wedding and Hospitals have heard most sincere prayers than any place of worship. Because regret is stronger than gratefulness, so loss is felt stronger than gains.  Be it a friend who left us for an absurd reason, Love that is faded over time or a loved one who departed too soon. We hold on to them like a tight rope that’s going to stop us from falling free. “ Ok now you move forward and slide down whenever ready ” my instructor told me for the third time. I was sitting on edge of a platform of (what I suppose) 200 meter tall tower. I had my safety jacket on, and it’s attached to the pulley of an overhead cable that was connected from the tower to a lower point. This is what I signed up for, in my recent trip to Bintan in Indonesia.  The idea is to freefall from the platform and slide to the lower point which is popularly known as “Flying fox”. The instr...

In the city where meals are happier than people who have it, no one has time to live in the moment. We even press ‘close’ button in the lift several times hoping it would close faster. We hold our breath in weekdays and breathe out during weekends. We constantly long for long weekends. While we like living in this city, we love escaping it during long weekends.  Perhaps we believe our work is our purpose, and holiday is a form of reward. But if you were to take two week holiday with no new city to visit or agenda to attend to, you would go crazy. That was exactly my mindset when I had a surgery recently. My gallbladder was removed and I had to rest for couple of weeks. My activity for the day were eat, sleep, pee and a short walk around the block.  First few days flew as I concentrated on finding the best position to sleep, and enjoying the attention from others.  And then there was my mom. After the operation I couldn't take the pain and I wept on her sho...

In the world of, LAP full of technical TOPS and HAND full of PHONES, it is no wonder some of us feel so far away from ourselves.  Well we live together with machines, it's only true as the saying goes "couple who lives together long starts to look the same". Have you seen Jellyfish swimming ? They glow in dark and it's the most magical and mesmerizing scene to witness. Like a luminous aqua blue Christmas lamp dancing in rhythm. For all we know they are here for more than 600 million years,  outdating even dinosaurs!  Remember we use to consult our grandparents for all the biggest decisions in the family? well it's time we consult our great great grandmother of all, the Jellyfish! This is one of my submission for a design contest for a food restaurant called "Jumbo Crab" for their 25th anniversary. Can you spot the jellyfishes in the surrealistic background? 95% of Jellyfish is made up of water! We are essentially made up of five elements, more of o...

Leaf succulent are plants that grow in extreme conditions of the dessert. To be precise, they stay dormant for most of their life, waiting for a random cloud to get lost and pour down some love. Within few hours of rain, they grow, bloom and store as much as water they can in their fleshy inside. A bed of colorful flowers in the middle of the dessert! Then again the dormant cycle begins, it could be weeks, months or even years until it can rain, yet they wait patiently. I came across this, in kid's encyclopedia that I was reading out to 6 year old Sam, my landlord's kid. "Is the plant sick?" he asked me , tad worried. It took me couple of seconds to realise why he is asking me that. Sam's mom is a nurse and patient can only mean one thing. It's been just couple of weeks since I moved in here, but all it took for Sam and Angeline to befriend me was just a smile. Angeline is turning 3 tomorrow, and had little idea about the discussion, yet she enjoyed sitti...

In a city where people couldn't wait few seconds before the signal turns green, Its only understandable that the body hanging from the tree, on the side of the road hardly got any attention. In the silent hours of today, an Indian worker in his twenties hanged himself  for unknown reason(s), I was told by my friend. Feelings are intangible but I could touch the sadness of death.For all we know this could be anyone related to us. Money? love? health? or sheer helplessness? Should I say, why the hell ?  or rest in heaven ? Unspoken nightmares? or failed dreams ? I would be lying if I said I hadn't thought about jumping from high floor or slashing my own wrist at times. Believe me the luck I had in last several months can turn a good man bad. I was literally few events away  from turning bitter. But one good thing is that I always vocalised my problems.  I let them out, sometimes here, sometimes to my friends and mostly to my dear di...

"How long is one second chichu mama?" my nephew asked me, without lifting his head from the jigsaw puzzle we were playing. I looked up wondering what to say.  "hmmm.. I dont know kutti, why dont you tell me how long it is?". He smiled at me, with his iam-gonna-make-something-up-look. He held his two tiny hands apart as if he is holding an invisible ball and said "this much". The next ten seconds were long enough to pick him up and swirl him around. He put his arms out and pretended to be a jet plane. We crash landed on the bed and giggled for long. "NEXT.." the voice was loud enough to jolt me back to where I was. I was standing in the queue to student service at my college. It took one soft drink, 28 pages of Mitch albom's book and a day dream - in total a good two and half hours before I reached the counter.While the short Filipino lady waited impatiently, I fumbled through my valet and handed her my student ID.   " hi , I just finis...

U smile !  that's what you do when someone takes a photograph of you, unless there is a good reason behind it, perhaps a death ( although I wonder who would take a picture of in that moment) or if you have made a eternal pact, not to smile at the person behind the camera. On the other side, why to smile while being photographed ? cant we own the weirdest-custom-made expression that we carry on our face ? I pondered on it, while my photo was taken last night in the Christmas mass at a church here. The photographer is a warden in her early 40 , dressed elegantly in black gown , lush red lipstick and a hair clip and shoes that had feathers in it .she must be from the high class. She seem to be interested to capture the patrons who turned up for the special mass. As she made her way back to her seat her heals drummed the floor, It was loud enough to be heard in the packed church.  Before I could reach a conclusion about...

Remember the time someone said something to you and you couldn't get it out of your head. Probably you will end up all night thinking about why he/she said that in the first place. Like a old gramophone record it goes on and on, and every time you would try to come up with better answers or insults you could have possibly given to the other party. Yeah thats exactly I am talking about! Understanding : I remember this story from a teacher who taught me meditation. A old man accompanied by two children was sitting in the railway station. The kids were making noises, jumping around, and fighting with each other. A disturbed commuter asked the old man to keep the kids silent. To which he replied, I dont know how to control them , they lost their mother this morning.  What seemed like a pure angry and irritation turned into sympathy and love for the kids. Thats the power of understanding. As much as we want to put ourselves first and declare what a pri...

Its almost the 10th time I have opened this window to type a new post. The first line of the post is like the opening sentence to the girl in the bar. It might either go way better than you think or fall flat on your face. And then comes the second line, now that you got the attention, its important to say something smart. Have you played angry birds ?  ( ok not so smart but questions do help). If you are not familiar with this iPhone game you might as well ask my mother ( she is yet to return my iPod touch, thanks to gaming addiction).  I always found the direct hit on the pigs or the castle wont help to finish the game. The trick lies in finding the exact point, when hit would start a domino type demolition effect. A catalyst shot for the ripple effect. Many ideologies say your current state of life depends on your current state of mind , which is sum of your positive and negative thoughts. By tipping the scale of positive th...

Last night, I remembered the time I did the reverse bungee in Singapore. I was sitting in this open capsule, all strapped up to be shot to 700 meters up in the air. I looked at the crowed gathered around and many of them cheered me while the count down began. I asked myself why they would cheer me. It’s not like I am helping humanity or giving them a free beer. Then I realized for many it’s something they wish, but never do. They are applauding me for facing the fear, the one they too poses. They can empathise the fight within and cheering me for victory over it. At the last minute, I heard my heart beating faster and saw a blurred image (partly owing to the fancy smoke beneath the capsule). Then I told myself “I let go”, for there is nothing I can control about it. Within seconds I was in the air, fear reached its maximum threshold and adrenaline rush took over. While the excitement can be explained in many ways, I believe it was because of the internal shift. I crossed the boundary...

There is a time in life we would be faced with making a choice between doing what is suppose to be done or  what we always wanted to do. Today I chose the latter; I have packed up my 10 years of IT career to chase my dream in advertising. All my IT experience has been shredded out; even from resume to avoid “IT related job interview” calls. I had a light chest pain as I typed the resignation mail, then I realised it came from right so nothing can be serious about it. Heart is in the left, right? Anyway I dreaded how it would feel to be on the other side of the door. Now that I am out, it does not feel scary, in fact I feel free and I bet I can sleep peaceful tonight. I don’t have any leads in creative industry and don’t know how long it would take to make a decent earning. But I have two best things to get me through this period - FRIENDS and BELIEF. If I expect something extraordinary to happen in my life, I had to be extra – ordinary. Srivats

Trying to cut down on food while staying with mother is like the nose itch you get while you are washing  clothes. Sooner or later (actually soonest) the itch takes over and you won’t even regret for it. Even now I have eaten more and feel like pregnant women or python, actually more like a tom (from Tom and Jerry) that gobbled a melon and looks just like that. It’s been a month since I exercised, and I found the best way to stop worrying - I stopped checking my weight. Have you ever communicated with your pet without a word? (duh!) . The dog we pet was kept by workers while constructing our home. After we moved in, mom started feeding her and she became very loyal guardian of our gate. Its name is Julie and as strange as it sounds, everyone addresses her as he. My mom started it before she read its bar code and we stuck to it. We feed him rice twice a day and crackers/rusk whenever I or dad gets home. I feed him every time I come back home. It’s hard not to - when he gree...

I happen to see this video of elephant giving birth and it blew me off. The mother elephant (after delivery) checked the calf which neither breathed nor moved. After several kicks and a quick blow the calf took its first breath to everyone’s relief. In next few minutes the calf stood up and looked perfectly fine. The mother seemed so happy and proud and I almost heard her say “see I have made my child and I know how to take care of it”. Nearly million elephants are killed in africa during last two decades, that left so many orphans, think before buying Ivory stuff , photo courtesy National Geographic This morning found me in an unusual place, a baby shower function (locally known as “Seemandham”) of my cousin’s wife. Unlike abroad it’s a family function here and I was obliged to attend. Needless to say I was surrounded by truck load of aunties and soon to be, worrying about my future love life and stuff. On occasions like this, men get busy taking part in the rituals/ doing t...

It started raining in Singapore, quite regularly. Its awesome sight to watch the greenary around drenched in rain( the above picture is taken several months back). I now understand how beautiful a writer's life is. I stick numerous post-it notes on my mind (while bathing, eating, even while peeing or sleeping) to write like 5 paragraph post twice a week. I even type and save them, if I were in front of the computer, knowing fully that I may not use them in any post. Most of these notes are discarded on the second read. Sometimes they give birth to new ones and sometimes when I finally finish writing the post; it would be about something else :) Yet writing is fun, it makes us look around for an inspiration to write. Once we start writing our life would never be the same. I can bet a million dollar on this. Be it chat with a friend over the coffee or a normal day at work, we would start seeing them in new light. It gets only better and interesting as the days pass by. We write our l...

TGIF! Today is one of the “nothing interests me” days. I feel like doing nothing, although on second thoughts that sound funny, how can I be doing nothing when I am doing nothing: P. Everything seems very boring, even calling my friends/loved ones! May be this is a best day to sit on a bean bag and watch soap operas and don’t even bother to change channel during commercials. That’s Lethargic! Yesterday I donated blood. Although I have donated a bunch of times before, it’s my first time in Singapore. So they put a sticker on me which said “Treat me nice, this is my first time". Unlike in India, the registration and screening itself is a 20 plus minutes process. After filling a 3 page form, medical history consultation, and the finger-pricking-Haemoglobin test (they have a better pain less instrument though), I was given a local anaesthesia! That's comfort! They asked me if I am feeling okay (which they did umpteen times) after the donation, and I replied “I am little tired but ...

Last weekend was perfect! It still lingers on my mind, like the sand in the shoes that walked the beach. My friend and I went to “Fountain of Wealth” - The largest fountain in the world, on Saturday evening. Every night, after the laser show, visitors can dedicate songs and laser messages for free! If you are visiting Singapore make sure to see this. It’s my 5th visit here and like Emma I too feel a deep connection and profound happiness watching flowing water (Have a look at her neat travelogues ). As we sat there watching the huge fountain in awe, I noticed most of the messages are either wishes for birthday/anniversaries or love messages. I looked around. I saw couples sitting hand in hand, some kids sitting on their parent’s lap, some playing in the puddle, friends laughing and tourists taking pictures. No difference of any sort, no hate and no debate. Just a group of people appreciating beauty of life, breathing the air filled with the drizzles of fountain and love. We had tastie...