The Shambles of Zuili

There it stands. Each brick precariously balanced one over the other; a thin, wobbly stack leading upto half-broken arches. The moss has long since covered the once rustic, brown walls. Now fresh, lush and green they appear- overridden with weeds and fungi. In shambles lies the once proud structure. It lies humble and weak on it's creaking knees. The warm morning sun leaves behind eerie shadows, long and irregularly shaped; like spirits lurking in the dark. The place is cursed with charm. It holds its darkest secrets behind the guise of beauty; but then again, maybe not...

In he ventured. His time-worn, tattered clothes seemed appropriate. Slowly, yet purposefully he strode; unaware of what fate awaited him beyond those ram-shackled walls. But he didn't care enough to worry. As he walked under the unstable archways, the ground shifted under his feet. Weeds were disturbed and fell before him from great heights. Occasionally a snake whizzed past between his legs, striking at his oversized, river-wet pants. His clothes smelled of adventure and his face spoke of wisdom. He had set out on a journey long before he could remember. He was still searching for his final destination; one he wasn't so certain of anymore. Would he find what he was looking for among the shambles of Zuili? Only time will tell.

Who wants to go out?!

Those words set a dog's heart racing with such immeasurable joy that their body twitches with excitement. Did I say twitches? Pardon me, that's an understatement. Make that swings wildly from side to side. When I pick up the leash to take Chaplin out for a walk, I can hear the sound of his claws against the floor scrambling towards me. He wags his tail so hard, his whole backside sways two and fro while he circles me expectantly. At this point he's walking round fast, moving his hips continuously with his head bobbing up and down as he tries hard to suppress his squeals of joy. It takes a few moments to get the chain around his anything-but-stationary head. Leash in place, he begins to jump on me, clawing me for delaying any further and steadily begins to bark his head off. After trying desperately to calm down this hyper-active dog; and succeeding momentarily, I open the door. This sets him off again and sends tremors of happiness through his body and he resumes his dance. And then I brace myself. Fwoosh! He leads me bounding down the stairs, nearly tripping me at every second step. If you don't run down with him, he'd be flying you like a kite. This going down the stairs part of the walk is full of loud, incessant, maniacal barking that puts mortal fear into any passerby's heart. Once down the stairs, he makes a frantic dash for the gate, as though fearing I'll change my mind and yank him back upstairs. I use the word yank since that's the only way to make him go anywhere he doesn't wish to be. Only and only once he's outside the gate is he at peace.

There's a peanuts comic strip that I identified with 100%. Charlie Brown, I couldn't have said it any better.

Which direction do I turn?

Why does the future need to be planned right now? What's the great urgency? The world sure isn't ending that soon. How can I know, at 17, when there are so many exciting and interesting options all around, which of them I want to do and continue doing for the rest of my life? But the sore reality is that I need to know just that. And what scares me is that I'll make the wrong choice.

Wherever I go, I meet people who ask me, "So what are you going to do after 12th?" And as they patiently wait for a confident answer like medicine or engineering, I search for ways to put into words my indecision without making myself sound lost. Most of the time I just reply saying "pure sciences" which is a fancy way of saying BSc. This generally raises some eyebrows since most of those who ask me these questions are acquaintances of my grandparents, who connect the science stream to wanting to become a doctor or an engineer only. I find relatives and others telling my sister to study hard and become a doctor. I went through that "It would be nice to have a doctor in the family" phase myself. But that line definitely isn't for me. 

I'm not sure what I want to do, but I'm pretty clear about what I don't want to. You'd think that narrows things down for me but it really doesn't. What I find so intimidating about the whole post-12th stage is the uncertainty linked with it. Even if I knew for sure what I wanted to study and where I wanted to study it, there would be no way of ensuring it would happen. There are after all, thousands of other students at the same crossroads as I am. 

So for now, it's just study hard and see where life takes me.   

spooky arachnid

This was pretty cool to say the least. He was about two and a half inches and a greenish-blue colour, perched slightly high up between the two branches (first picture) of a silk cotton tree. The web he's sitting on was beautiful and perfect- just as he intended it to be, I'm sure. You can faintly see the web lines in the second picture. I'm not quite sure what the zig-zag lines on the web are...maybe another layer or some markings or even some sticky spots. I was quite happy I managed to get this picture since I had a bit of trouble getting the camera to focus on him. At a height, with all the paraphernalia in the background, the little fella wasn't center of attraction for my lens. 

I realize that I've taken for granted that this spider's a 'he'. Feminine just isn't the first thing I think of when I see a spider. 

oooo and some more!

suessian socks

Crow summit 2011

the insects visit

hornet wasp

bug of the order Hemiptera and family pentatomidae

(insect names kindly given by Sachin Chorge of BNHS)

Best medicine, or magic potion?

It amazes me how laughing can suddenly rid you of all anxieties, inhibitions and sorrows.
When there are reasons to laugh, why cry?
Sure, sorrow has its place. Sometimes it's important to keep your silence.
But every opportunity to smile, laugh, sing and enjoy should be made the most of.

When I laugh, I am perfectly oblivious to those around me. Why must I be conscious of what the twenty other strangers in the restaurant think of me? I'm not going to see them ever again. And what's the point of laughing if you don't do it with all your heart? Do I embarrass my family? My friends? Yes! But they've found that that's just who I am, and nothing they do can shut me up once I've let go. The laughing beast once unleashed, is not easily tamed! And I hope it never is; for there's nothing that puts me in a better mood than a good fit of laughter.

Hit the high decibels!
Think back and try to figure the last time you kept a straight face in the presence of a laughing friend.
Spread the joy; through laughter, a warm smile, a tight hug or a good joke.
When you see a dog, pet it till its tail is too tired to wag anymore.
Scratch a cat behind its ears till the vibrations from its purring feel like currents through your hand.
Tickle someone till their sides ache with laughter.
And just laugh.
Your body needs it, believe me.

anticipation

Anticipation is an evil. You plan something, you see it beginning to happen or take shape, maybe just in your mind. You begin to hype the possibilities of what could and would happen. You dream on to the point where you not only wish it all would happen, but want it to. You sit in eager anticipation for that time to come. But if you've been building these dreams (or daydreams) over little or no foundation, there's a pretty good chance that they'll come shattering down- leaving you listless. And just as reality dawns upon you and you stop thinking "If only...", you realize how stupid it was to anticipate. Of course, by 'you' I mean 'me'. I'm a silly girl who'll never learn. (sigh...) 

a bunch of random photos

 i took this picture in Jaipur last year while i was on a 'Jaipur Darshan' with my best friend. one thing i absolutely love about cows is their eyes. they have such big, beautiful, shapely, dreamy eyes that you get lost in. i feel the same way about elephants.

 this is Mili. she has big marble-like eyes that open up wide every time she hears a sudden noise.  

 this is one of a collection of black and white bathroom pictures that i took once when i was thoroughly bored. this was my favourite. the pictures turned out to be quite interesting actually. 

 yet again, this is from a series of silly poses- this is the silliest.

 some fun with a bunch of roses and a flashlight.

 this was an incredibly friendly, fun dog. and, she loved the camera. this was her brief moment of shyness.

 taken from the car at a signal. the bottom half of this cement mixer was so horribly dirty, i thought it better left un-photographed.

a rocket fired off during a small Diwali celebration we had in Lonavala.

out and about

oh please....

I spent Sunday studying with this guy staring back at me. 

I tend to agree with him.

Trapped in time

Today, black and white is an effect you can chose to use while taking photographs. An effect, (which I personally love) that adds character to the photo with it's shadows and shades. It enhances the overall mood and feel of the moment captured by concentrating on what's being photographed rather than paying attention to colour detail. It's interesting to think that the option of using colour didn't exist some years ago. Maybe it's for the same reason that a black and white photo, even one taken today, will take you back in time. It adds years to a photo, almost making it seem wise. A photo of a lady sitting down and thinking amidst a bustling road could make a spectacular, dynamic picture if taken in colour. Taken in black and white, it will seem contemplative, artistic and more in the moment than in colour. It's amazing how this 'effect' can so vastly change the personality of a photo. A black and grey photo is one suspended in time.

bada-bing, bada-bong.

Gosh I love to walk. A brisk, long walk everyday is called for. Throwing in the occasional jog. Got my hair up in a high pony and my headphones on my head, good music coming in through my ears- I walk. I walk and walk and walk. Sometimes I find it hard to stop even after my one hour. Especially if another song with the right beat starts playing. It feels go-od. I feel energized, enthused. And there's no better feeling than stretching out your tired muscles after a long walk. As I sit sweaty faced, sweaty haired, sweaty clothed overlooking the sea after my walk, the cool breeze and the waving water puts me in what I call a 'la la mood'. I feel so happy! It's the moment of the day when I say to myself, "Ah, this is the life." It may sound strange, but it's true. I hate having to come back home after my walk. But then I'll be back the next day- so it's not so hard to peel myself away.
Back home, out of my sweat-soaked clothes, with a glass full of cool orange juice-  that's contentment.

groovy toast

i was not expecting that.

second appearance

Greyscale

there's something about the mood of this photo that i love. is he trying to peek at me through the leaves? or is he bowing his head shyly, hoping i'll leave him alone?

"put that camera down, lady!!" he seemed to be crowing ever so impressively at me. i did, but only after getting this shot. 

Yes, quite.

Being in a sober place doesn't necessarily mean being sad.
Being happy isn't just about laughing or being in a chirpy mood.
Being content and quiet once in a while just means you're calmly, peacefully, implicitly happy. 
This I realized, however, after a bit of brain-searching.
Saturday was such a day for me. I felt rather low, or to be more accurate- not in the highest spirits. I wondered why- since I had nothing to be sad about or to brood over. But then, I wasn't sad. I couldn't call myself happy either. What was I? And this inability to understand what was wrong with me soured my mood further. It was only later I found that I needed to give myself a break from the hyper-happiness and enjoy the silent-happiness once in a while too. Nothing wrong with it, provided I don't lead myself into too monotonous a mood wherein I do end up feeling low. No, I don't want to be an ever solemn Dalai Lama. But I'll know better than to curse the lack of high spirits next time I'm in that mood.
Being mad is, and always will be my favourite state of mind. When I say mad, I mean the kind of mood that would make you say things like:
"You can see the moonlight dancing off my watchman's bald head like car headlights in the sea."
"I've been peeing so often, I'm going to set up camp in the bathroom!"
"Breeze blows because there's air in the air."
"While making maggi noodles I realized that adding a solute to water increases the boiling point of water."
"There are so many cats in this house, I could pick up 'meow' faster than German."
"Do you see those floating while bubbles in the blue, blue sky?"
and so on and so forth....
Yep, it is definitely the best mood to be in. But I can't spend all my days rambling on like that, can I? So I'll just accept the fact that I need to mix it up a bit with the occasional Dalai Lama. Peace be unto all. Ho Hum. 

Zzz?

Daydreams are intriguing. It's a curious, half-awake, semi-subconscious state of mind. Quite often, daydreams are far more exciting than our night time dreams. Partly because you get to monitor what you dream about. But there I contradict myself. I think the best part about dreaming at night is the "gee, I did not expect that" factor. Waking up in the morning and trying to piece together from memory all the little bits of my dream, I'm often lead to what made me have that dream. And that something is generally one that would go unnoticed in a non-dream scenario.

When it comes to daydreaming, there's a fine line between 'I was thinking....' and 'I had a dream...'
The stuff your mind can come up with when left idle is insane! Sometimes I feel I should carry a little book around with me and write about any funny daydreams I have. It'll be fun to go through them some time later. I remember one peculiar reverie wherein I was chasing some large sized monkey-like creature. There was some slow music score to this number and I vaguely remember some dancing.

Daydreaming is an art. It's the art of emptying your mind of all the cacophony and setting it free. I've noticed that I tend to daydream most when I look out a window and fix my eyes on something relatively uninteresting. It's almost as though that moment was all my mind was waiting for and it takes that opportunity and plunges itself into a world of imagination. What can I say? My mind has a mind of its own. I just sit around waiting for it to surprise me.

Letters

I’ve always wanted to have a pen pal. I love to write letters to people and I absolutely love receiving them. The idea of having someone, somewhere writing to you, whom you’ve never met or seen before is just so deliciously tempting. My parents grew up having pen pals and their stories make me jealous. Today, when everyone has an email id, no one wants to sit down and put a pen to paper. It’s just sad, really. It’s so exciting to get something in the post! And I’d think it would be just as exciting for someone else receiving one I wrote them. (Or at least surprising) But then again, it’s almost impossible to get anyone to write you a handwritten letter. In fact, very few take the trouble to email, let alone write a real one down. 

There’s something special about a handwritten letter. It has a lot more heart to it.  It makes you feel like you matter enough to that person for them to write to you.  Also, it’s fun! When you send someone an email, you know that it’s been sent immediately and that that someone may read it just 10 mins after you’ve sent it. So you take it for granted that they’d reply right away and there’s no waiting involved. There’s no real novelty to it. But when you post a letter to someone, you know it will take a few days to get there, another day or so for that person to reply and then another few for you to receive your reply. All in all, around a week. The anticipation of that reply just makes you appreciate it that much more. It becomes the highlight of your day. 

 

A book I like to read off and on is one called 84 Charing Crossroads. It’s a collection of letters sent back and forth between Helene Hanff, an American scriptwriter and the people of a bookstore, Marks and Co. in London. They corresponded for many years before even seeing a photograph of each other. The writing is so witty and it’s fascinating to see the contrast in characters of those writing. Helene Hanff- an informal, satirical, eccentric writer. Frank Doel (one of Marks and Co. who wrote extensively to her)- a more formal, courteous and pleasantly humourous writer. The correspondence between Helene and the bookshop was primarily business, as she asked them for books and they’d send them to her(with an invoice, of course.) But the lovely friendships that came of it and the joy they brought into each others’ lives with their letters makes me wish I had someone to write to all the more. 

I’ve often wondered how and where to find a pen pal. Is there someone out there who longs for the same, old-school correspondence with another unknown someone? If so, I’d like to find that someone. Yes, I would.

So true.

Soft kitty
Warm kitty
Little ball of fur.
Happy kitty
Sleepy kitty
purr purr purr.

Squirrel!

Ever had that feeling, when you've been studying chemistry for what seems to be eternity, that you'd rather look at dog poo than your text book? I had that feeling yesterday. But then! The clouds parted and the sun shone  through! There, on the tree outside my window were two happy squirrels prancing about on a jolly tree. A much better sight than dog poo.(not to mention my text book) "What's so exciting about a squirrel?", you may ask. Well, nothing in particular, apart from the fact that they're terribly adorable and not so common in Mumbai. But then again, it's exciting to see any animal apart from stray dogs and cows. (although I love to see them around too...sightings of them lack that element of surprise.) I would appear somewhat mental if I were to suddenly stop in my tracks while walking on the road and point in astonishment, "(gasp!) A cow!!".

A new life- in the making

I spent last weekend at my grandparents' house where we were forced to play host to a couple. They made themselves cozy in an empty pot and there they laid an egg. Although the subsequent hatching of that egg will stink up the window and mess up the pot completely,  this miracle of nature called out to our warmer sides and so we let it be. So keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that no crow will see that dependent egg before it hatches and be tempted to pinch it, I should have pictures of a baby pigeon soon! Till then, here's the mum and her darling egg.

Golden Oriole

A quick, lucky sighting of this spectacular fellow at close quarters was a perfect start to the day! He was so close, I'm surprised he didn't fly off before the shutter went off. Look at its eyes! Aren't they just gorgeous?? (well, eye...) Almost as big as a pigeon, this guy was stunningly bright among the yellow and green leaves of that tree. It was a sudden movement on his part and lucky timing on mine that allowed me to spot him. He was, otherwise, rather well hidden. 

Wodehouse Madhouse

Dear, dear, P. G. Wodehouse,
You are ingenious.You are marvelous. You are brilliant. You crack me up like none other. Perhaps the best compliment I could give you, is that you are mad. Your madness is what makes you so incredibly fantastic. What wonderfully funny characters you've brought to life: Bertram Wilberforce Wooster, Augustus Fink-nottle, Aunt Agatha, Monty Bodkins,The one and only Jeeves, The potty ol' Duke of Dunstable, The Earl of Emsworth and his upright sister Constance, The Empress of Blandings in all her slop-mouthed glory, Psmith and Uncle Fred to name a few. You're a nut. And What ho! You're the best nut there is! Your writing and humour seems as effortless as falling down into a pool of mossy muck. Your metaphors are as delightful as the sound of popcorn popping in a deep pan. Your stories are the spring of springs in a land of winters. You are, like Jeeves, only even more so- Inimitable.
If I had a top hat on, I'd take it off to you.

Just one of the many who love you,
Ishika

Lonavala- Day 3

My heart- wrenched.

Bakri Id is a festival I've attempted to understand. However, it's one I have failed to. Every year, thousands of goats are brutally slaughtered. A ritual practiced by the Muslims, wherein they 'sacrifice' a goat or sheep in the name of God. The goats are bred, brought up, fed, fattened and in fact, loved by these people all year round only to face their inevitable fate. I definitely think it's high time they came up with a better alternative to these ridiculously barbaric practices. This mass slaughter is simply not done. It's inhumane and bloody. It's foul and morbid. It breaks my heart every year to see a bunch of goats tied together a few days before this blasted day, being escorted to their respective murder houses. If only they knew... Today I happened to see some terribly dreadful sights. Carcasses of goats lying on the ground. The details are too painful to describe. I was left nauseated with a sickening knot in my stomach.

To all those innocent goats who were made to sacrifice their lives in the name of God, I mourn for you. May your souls rest in peace. 

Egrets in the field

You must not know too much, or be too precise or scientific about birds and trees and flowers and water-craft; a certain free margin, and even vagueness - perhaps ignorance, credulity - helps your enjoyment of these things... ~Walt Whitman

Day 2 Pictures