dreamland

Last weekend saw me and my husband attending something pretty interesting! Human Library – is a novel concept which has started its edition in Hyderabad 1 st and now in Bangalore. We both had registered out of curiosity. We got a mail confirming our registrations and a time slot was given for us to come. We went to the venue wondering how the event will play out. There were 7 books from which we could choose. We realized that time slot was just 1 way of confirming for 1 book but we could actually visit other books in other time slots if it were open. Each book topic had got us curious but with time constraint and slot constraint, we chose 2 books to attend on that day. I mention attend here, as the book(author) shares his/her story and we can have discussions/question-answer as needed. Since this was the 1 st session, there was 30 mins time slot fixed so that everyone will get a chance with the books. I am not going to share on what were the books and what was dis...

Neetu sat patiently waiting for him to come. She looked around but could not see him. She hoped he will come before his parents came home. This was her little secret that she cherished. She knew that her parents would never approve of this. She didn’t want to get caught when these moments gave her the happiness she has been yearning for. It was not that her parents were bad, it was just that they were strict and wanted her to study and be the “good girl”. She had always wanted them to approve of what she does but they were too busy to notice this. Being a single child, she felt bored at home doing everything herself. All her friends lived quite far and she was not allowed to go alone to meet them. The one time she had thrown tantrum to go to her friend’s place, her mother had made her sit in the dining table and tried to explain the “safety” reasons of not allowing her to go alone. But it didn’t help her mood and only made her angrier. She still remembered the day she met him...

As the princess  (she is called this by her friends but I have always seen her dress unlike-princess!)sat in front of laptop, I peeped from behind and saw her google for shrieking shower and found the answer as "faulty faucets". Bless these new technologies and the technical terms it keeps throwing! Soon the Biker(I have always seen him with camera and not bike!) came and they laughed over the shower incident and slept off. I wondered how long these 2 new folks will stick on here. This was my place and all the previous folks who stayed had left this house thinking it was some kind of bad omen but then they never realized that it was because of me! The next day again, princess got scared of the shower for a second and then reminding biker to get a plumber to fix it, both of them left. With the whole house to myself, I started snooping around. They had not unpacked everything but the 1st things I saw outside were some kind of strips of colorful papers and glues etc even ...

How life can change in a week! And that too in a total mixed bag. On one end we were celebrating the arrival of a new joy to our family and very soon on the other end, tearful farewell to another soul! Mind and heart needs the power to handle and deal with situations that we have to face suddenly. And such times are the ones when you see your parents and uncles/aunts at their emotional breakdown and you realize that you need to step up and take care of them and the roles have slowly reversed! There are times I wonder why life is cruel also. I got a chance to visit Vishranthi yesterday. It’s a place of destitute women. What started as a small Monday afternoon ladies club of meeting and sharing ideas and recipes and having “ladies time” soon turned to a charitable trust which led to this place called Vishranthi . Right now providing shelter for 170 women, this is one of the well known homes being run in Chennai. Ironically, the woman who started this amazing servic...

The Rains in Chennai which started this year during mid October had me worried a lot but it didn’t baffle me till 30 th Nov, Monday. 2 quick personal trips to Chennai during month of Nov, gave me a sample of what the city was witnessing and I came back to Bangalore on 29 th Nov. A narrow escape for me. 30 th Nov saw the worst rainfall the city is ever going to witness for some years(hopefully!) All the network connections went crazy. One quick call from my mother informing me that power is cut and network is also going down and not to worry about my family at Chennai made me realize the week wasn’t going to like previous ones! Different whatsapp groups were created by to quickly check on our Chennai colleagues of our department as no mails/calls were working. A few others from different locations were also added to check on their Chennai counterparts and then started a marathon tracking mission of 2200+ folks based out of Chennai. Similarly other department folks also g...

Present Day : She looked around her as women sat in groups working hard on getting the final touches of their entrepreneur journey ready! One of them looked up and spoke,” Ma, Am very confident we will do well. Thank you so much for teaching us, showing the path and helping us.” She smiled looking at the confident women around her, who once were meek and quiet and facing their own sets of challenges at their home. Each woman in this group of 20 were from different background and of different ages from 17 to 55 – newlywed, widow, abandoned wife, happy mother, grandmothers, single women – from all the walks of life but in one small village. The only common thing they had was dreams of doing something of their own! Another woman got up and said, “Yes Ma. Your family is so lucky to have you. Am so happy you came here to our lives. It feels like we are going to fly!” A tear came from eyes as she turned to hide it from them and looked out of the window, remembering her families...

The silence was deadening as she slowly opened her eyes. She looked up to see her attacker’s triumph face while the only sound came from the sword which slashed through her stomach . Undeterred she got up raising the nearest blood stained sword shouting – Jai Hind! And the curtain fell with loud applause from the audience!