Mirage

I float down life’s river to a destination without a name
Think I’ve lost the plot, don’t remember how to play the game
Drifting along the river, suddenly by my side
Another lonely traveler, he wants to share the ride

Where have you been, I have waited..
For the twisted hand of fate to usher you into my life

Lost and Found. Lost although I’ve found him
He’s a mirage and I’m the desert sun.
Shining on when he’s not there,
Shining on when he’s not there.

Found my Joie De Vivre

Do you think it’ll rain tomorrow and I’ll get the day off?” I asked her the same question two decades ago as a school girl as I do now. My grandmother shakes her weary head and responds, “You, will never grow up!!!”
I prayed for rain; the Gods almost never complied and I dragged my reluctant feet to school. Today I dragged them to work. The BMC announcement on SMS, the weather bureau, the 9pm news all promise heavy rain in the city coupled with high tide and water logging. The sun had other plans and out he popped forcing me to brace myself for another long journey to Malad.

Just another 5 days to go before my last day at work. I’ve decided to let go of a lucrative job to pursue a dream. My constant search for 'Work-Life Balance' is hopefully over. A friend commented, " You love life too much Lax to ever balance it with work.'

I have a dream and I plan to dedicate the rest of this year to make it a reality.

I've found my Joie De Vivre

Deesh happens whonly in India!!!!!

We read so often in the newspapers about shootouts in american schools and lately of similar instances in India as well. What happens minutes before the killer starts shooting innocent, unassuming victims? Is it just another day in their lives? And how do they react to gun wielding strangers? Panic? Or is it their 'Chalta hai' attitude that gets the better of them. I'm lucky I didn't find out....


The Monday blues spilled over to Tuesday. I resorted to my numbaar one stress buster...food ofcourse!!! A colleague had Jumbo Vada Pav cravings and off we went after work to my favourite tapri at Mindspace.

A Vada Pav in hand, exchanging pleasantries with ex-colleagues along the tapri, I missed watching my colleague bump into a really drunk or doped(maybe both) guy. As she glared at him our other colleague happened to notice that the guy wasn't just drunk or stoned, he also possessed a gun!!!! As he swayed and his two friends attempted to help him keep his balance. He held on to his gun and moved it around casually like it was a book or a cigarette he was holding. We panicked and moved away quickly into the car to watch what was happening from a safe distance.

Was this really happening? And why weren't all the people around reacting!!!! My heart skipped a beat...what if he just hit the trigger.....what if he shot somebody.... I looked around...everything seemed normal!!!

'Yaha sab kuch chalta hai!!!'

Somebody dialled the cops.Must be a toy gun, they said. And where is Mahim space?? After 5 minutes of explaining and after taking another 15 minutes to get there, the cops finally arrived. The gun wielding man managed to coax a rickshaw wala to drive him away just seconds before their arrival.

So filmi, I must say!!! The cops arrive when it's all over!!! Whereas for me...that was an interesting end to a blue tuesday :)

Pink is my new obsession!!!!!!!!

I'd driven to Sewri a million times to watch the flamingos in the distance.Pink specks covering the mudflats turned into bird shapes through my binoculars.

This Saturday was different!!! The afternoon sun scorched our skin as we assembled at Mahul village at 2pm. A little boat and some fisher folk awaited the 'Jungle lore' gang. We set off through the mangroves starling some paddy birds and gulls in the process. The high tide was coming in. The Flamingos who's had their fill were now walking along the mangroves before taking flight.
We were ushered into an even smaller boat, so we could row up to the flamingos without startling them. With my sun-kissed arms on either sides of the boat, squatting on the floor, shifting to maintain the boat's balance, I spotted them as we turned around the bend. Thousands of pink beauties as far as the eye could see!!!
I'd never been so up close and personal with the flamingos....the lesser and greater, the juveniles...just meters away from us....
They waded through the water, squabbled and called out to each other, some posed on one leg....and then....when the tide came in further and the skies beckoned they took off....synchronised feet treading the water's surface, wings flapping, and they were off...
As they flew above our heads towards Anushakti nagar, we watched them till they turned into little specks and then merged with the distant hills.

We rowed back to the village in awe, sharing photographs, our excitement and our new pink obsession!!!

Tiger, tiger, burning bright!!

TIGER, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
(William Blake)

The craters, brun maska, a cuppa tea

I opted for another hour of my beauty sleep.I didn't have to spend 2 hours travelling to fort for my meeting. My sister had already promised to get me there in 45 minutes if I agreed to drive faster than I usually do. The roads are clear and there's only a small bad patch(with a few potholes) she added.
The Bombay Port Trust road doesn't have a small bad patch. It has only bad patches of huge crater-like potholes, so my 45 minute drive was more like a trip to the moon's surface. We dodged potholes and bullock carts, and more potholes and trucks and lo and behold....it was a scene straight out of Die Hard 4. A trailer truck had almost overturned and then changed its mind before turning turtle by precariously balancing itself on all its right wheels while the left wheels were up in the air like a dog spraying a lamppost.

The eventful drive did however prove to be much shorter, with no traffic signals and lesser cars.
What does one do at 9:15 am when you're 45 minutes early for a meeting!! Yasdani bakery beckoned, and we sunk out teeth into a warm brun pav with oodles of maska spread on it. A piping hot cuppa followed. Life's little pleasures are sometimes experienced in the most unlikely places...the old, rustic parsi bakery is just one of them.

Satiated and happy with both, the crater laden BPT road(for saving my travel time) and the brun maska(food always makes me happy) I started yet another day on a happy note.

Rainy Days and Sundays..

The skies opened up and overwhelmed the earth and her parched occupants. Relentless and incessant, the downpour rendered many-human, mammalian, amphibian and other forms of life in various states of despair.
Safely tucked in bed with 'tuesdays with Morrie' my only displeasure was at having to cancel my weekend plans to paint the town red. The rain Gods summoned and I stepped out on a rainy Sunday to burn a few calories with an evening walk.
Gulmohur and copper-pod blossoms, the season's last mangoes, countless limbs of countless trees, a dozen egrets, a couple of dead kites...were all strewn over the colony garden. On the close inspection the pariah kites blinked their eyes, the only part of their drenched body that showed any sign of life.
They spent the week between two rainy weekends lying flat in our garage, letting me hand feed them and nurse them back to good health. As the strength returned to their almost dead bodies, they took to the sky, with one last circular flight around the house as if to say goodbye.

Traffic Police Encounter in Sion!!!

I grew up on large helpings of 'values' dished out by my grandmother. So, yesterday when a pot bellied, bribe-crazy traffic policeman stopped me at Sion for alleged lane cutting I arrogantly refused to slip a fifty rupee note in my licence. When I opened my wallet to hand over my licence he eyed the fifty rupee note right next to it, expecting me to subtly offer it to him in exchange for my 'freedom' and my time. We all know how painfully time consuming it is to follow-up with the traffic police to claim your confiscated licence.
Infact, along with my even fiery sibling I put up a fight. The cop had let a few BEST buses cut right across my little sunshine car, almost crushing me against the divider in the middle of the road. 'You don't argue with a Traffic Policeman' my Mom scolded me later. Common sense refused to prevail and 'Values' took over instead. 'You are your values. Stand for what you think is right.' Grandmom would be proud of me.

The next day, after having to give up on my beauty sleep, which is a weekend ritual I drove to the Police Chowki to get my licence.
The receipt the Mamu had given me mentioned something about appearing in court after 15 days for 'guidance'. Also something about the 'offence being compounded...'. Failing to understand what it meant I imagined myself standing in court defending my grave crime-lane cutting!!! "Mein yeh Gita pe haat rakh ke kehti hu ki saach ke sivah aur kuch nahi bolungi'. And maybe if they decided not to arrest me after all I would swear again." Mein yeh Gita pe haat rakh ke kehti hu ki kabhi, kabhi lane cut nahi karungi.'

At the police chowky it was a different story. Another pot-bellied mamu sat at a dusty, grilled window collecting money, tearing receipts and returning people's licences. It didn't get any eventful than that. His peon spent forever looking though dusty drawers for my licence which was no where to be found. A paan chewing cabbie yelled on his mobile phone while paan stained spit dribbled down his chin. He was just one of the many errant commuters who drove on Mumbai's roads and every now and then ended up breaking signals, lanes or sometimes just falling prey to a greedy hawaldar who hadn't made enough pocket money that day.

They finally retrieved my licence, charged me a hundred rupees, gave me another receipt and I was off....free to drive away hoping my next encounter(which is inevitable on the Mumbai streets) with a Traffic Police was decades away. And if by chance I encounter one soon I still know ' I am my values'

One Cuckoo flew over my nest

Here's the story of a female cuckoo bird that flew over my nest...
In distress, chased by the crows, voicing her fright and pain rather loudly she found her saviour a security guard who drove her tormentors away and brought the injured bird over to our place.
No amount of coaxing got her to eat the fruits offered to her.
Hurt and probably hungry after spending 2 days with us she set on another journey in a dark cardboard box to 'Karuna'. Karuna is a NGO which helps animals and birds in distress. She is hopefully in safe hands and on her way to recovery.

For information on Karuna - http://www.karunaforanimals.org/

The website has some useful info- phone numbers for Karuna volunteers, phone numbers for snake rescuers, etc

Baby Boom Time!!!

Slumber-kissed nights interspersed with the incessant chirp of baby budgerigars in my balcony has been my pride of the last couple of months. As the first brood of youngsters left the nest, the diligent mother set herelf to the task of raising another brood. Set to the endless task of cleaning her nest and feeding the ever-hungry fledgelings, her day seems busier than any regular birdie.

Budgerigars, natives of Australia, are very popular pets all over the world. Hardy, easy to care for and easily bred in captivity, the birds rarely survive if set free. I've known people who set their budgies free in an attempt to give them a better(free) life only to watch them being pecked to death my crows.

My neighbour recently rescued two budgies that someone had set free and had ended up on the crows' lunch menu.

Do educate people that though it's wrong to keep animals and birds caged, it's only fair to let the ones that were born and bred in captivity to live their life safely in the captive environment they're familiar with. That is the only world they know and setting them free only makes them easy prey for cats and crows.

Butterfly Effect!!!

I got home after a tiring day at work on 5th Feb and logged on to check my emails when a friend pinged me to tell me that my 'butterfly effect' photograph which I'd mailed to Hindustan times was selected for picture of the week and was published in their 5th Feb Edition of HT Cafe.

I'd photographed a male common eggfly butterfly that I'd found sitting on a leaf, basking in the sun.

The male and the female of the species are markedly different.

For more info on the species- http://www.geocities.com/brisbane_nymphs/CommonEggfly.htm

Sewri Fort

Build by the British as a checkpost, the Sewri fort which dates back to 1680 was then located on the eastern shore of the Parel Island, one of the original seven islands that formed Mumbai. In 1789 Yadi Sakat of the Janjira Islands conquered the Sewri fort along with the Masgaon fort. The fort had a garrison of 50 sepoys under a subedar and was equipped with around 10 cannons.The fort was subsequently used to house prisoners and later became a Bombay Port Trust godown. (Wikipedia)

A bumpy drive past the Imax theater through huge craters on the road brought me to the Sewri Mud flats and as I stood next to the Colgate Palmolive factory my jaw dropped at the site of icecream pink covered mangroves. The Sewri mud flats are home to the Flamingoes that migrate here every year from September to May.I took in the sight to my heart's content and then decided to make my way up the quarried hill to the dilapitated remains of the Sewri Fort. A foul smell emanated as I climbed up the stairs. The fort, unfortunately has been turned into a public toilet by the local residents. The walls bear wittness to where the cannons once stood. If you look seawards past the mudflats and the flamingoes you see the RCF factory in the backdrop.
Sad how little the government takes care of such heritage sites.