Characters you meet in Life

Characters that you encounter in your life sometimes inspire you to write. Needless to say that my life has been rather colourful in that aspect! At every phase of life, i met some interesting people giving that extra flavour to my journey. Some experiances were pleasant, some unpleasant and a limited few..quite a disaster!
I thought it would be an interesting read if i could pen down some real life inspired incidents as short-scenes with characters! Its a new effort...hope it turns out decent!!wish me luck!
( Disclaimer: The short-scenes are not completely real-life incidents.they may contain fiction and/or fictious characters. Offense to any person dead or alive is unintended.)

Trial 1:
" It is quite a sunny and beautiful day today", he said, trying to avoid an uneasy silence after she had come and sat in the chair next to him for a while.She was quite surprised by the sudden effort of her next seat companion to start a conversation. " Yes, it is quite beautiful. ThankGod it didnt rain today", she smiled back.
It was the outdoor Fun fest in the company grounds. A variety of things were organised on the day. Lots of games, international food and stage programs. The whole ground was decked up in the summer colours. She had taken care of her stall for a while, then gone around the different stalls to explore the options available and also cheered for the friends who performed on stage. Her legs were aching and she had slept only for a total of four hours in the past two days. She finally decided to retire on a seat and found two seats empty next to him. He had been sitting there and observing the stall for a long time. She left one in between and sat on the other.
" I really liked the classical music performance of Tinku, it was amazing!", he continued." Yea, it was. Although he missed a few notes in between. I have been in the practice sessions. But since the audience havent heard it before, i dont think they would have realised it", she said.
" Our stall is doing pretty good business.We sold a lot of food and drinks. The dart game we have put up is also pulling crowd", he brimmed." Yes, the dart game has become quite popular among the visitors. I was selling out food. But right now i am too tired to stand there.My legs are craving for some rest", she said.
They were both students in a University.They were in the same team in the funfest for putting up a stall.He was the person responsible for their stall. He and his team had toiled for the past 24 hours the put up the stall and prepared the food for sale.

" I have organized several events in my college before", he continued. "I was the chairperson of the cultural organization committee.Once i organised a concert of a famous rock band in the college ground. You know, the crowd loved it. They went berserk. The place was jam packed. I am used to organising events.", he said."Wow, thats cool. Its good to have such experiances", she smiled.
" In my previous job, i used to travel so much.The job demanded it you know.I was in one city one day. Never knew what the next day had in store for me.I was into consulting business" he said with pride all over his face." Thats cool.Consulting huh? I have heard that there is a lot of travel and also a lot of money. You must have had an interesting life". His face lit up when she mentioned the money." Yea, just two years into the company, when i quit the job i was earning about 60,000 rupees a month", he made a statement."  Cool! That is a real good salary for two years experiance.Quite impressive", she said.

That pumped him up a little more." You know i actually used a strategy to sell the items in our stall.People always like to try all the different items. Thats why i decided on the combo offers. They have something salty and something sweet. And when i noticed that the item 2 was not that popular, i reduced the price and it sold well after that. I think we will make a good profit.Let's see!",  he said. "Sure hope so!",  she smiled back.

It is always interesting to observe a conversation between a man and a women who are just aquainted and finally the guy gets to introduce himself to the women.The women did find him interesting and was slightly flattered by the fact that he was interested in making an impression on her.The guy felt that he made a first good impression and got a proper response from the girl.

" The courses i have this semester are really taking a toil on me",  he changed the subject." It takes a while to settle back to studying after working for two years. I miss the earning part though. But i am a very ambitious person. I need the degree. I want to make a good thesis and get a good internship during the study period. I have a good plan in mind",  he smiled. And continued to tell her more about his plans and his aspirations.
"Thats good to know that you have thought a plan through",  she told him. Suddenly she felt slightly amazed by how much the guy could speak. Eversince she sat next to him he had been talking. About what? she thought.She was constantly nodding her head at what he was saying, making some exclamatory remarks every now and then when he let her talk.

"Sanjuktha", two of her friends called out to her in chorus."Come here quickly". She finally cut him in between," I have to go now. My friends are calling me. See you later". She smiled and walked to her friends.
They were beaming back at her, giving her a dirty smile." What happened madam? You said that you wanted to sit for sometime. But seems like you were in no mood to come back to the stall. What was going on? You guys were talking for more than 30 minutes!", they laughed.
"Oh com on guys. We werent talking..he was talking!I didnt know someone could speak so much. Anyways good that you guys rescued me.I started getting a feeling that he would never stop! Anyways why did you call me??" she asked."We are closing the stall soon and we have saved some sweet for you. Eat it before someone else finishes it" her friend said. "Awww, thats so nice of you guys. Thanks a lot. Now hand that over to me. I never got a chance to taste it from morning", she brimmed.

The funfest finally ended. They wrapped up the stall and cleared the place.She finally went back home at night and fell on her bed. She was dead tired. Suddenly the conversation she had with the guy came to her mind.The guy really talks a lot, she thought. Self-centred for sure, very proud of himself and quite a brag, she made her first judgement.But she could not deny to herself that she was a bit impressed by the way he presented himself.
 Ya whatever, i need to make up for my lost sleep before i get back to me part-time job tomorrow, she thought and closed her eyes. Within a few seconds she fell into deep sleep.....

A smile from deep within

I still consider it as a wonderful part of my life....a wonderful experiance!
What am i talking about?... ........ The time i spent volunteering at CHES orphanage for AIDS affected children in Chennai.
It was a tough time in my life. Tough is a relative word. Rather i could say, it was the time in my life where things were not going smoothly for me. There were obstacles in my path and i had to fight it out at every step. I was game for it. But i used to spend several evenings, walking alone in the beach, taking my time to stare at the sea for as long as i could as if i was absorbing all the strength from it. I often used to seek out my destiny in life. I wanted to do something which would make me happy from deep inside. Thats when i found out about the NGO CHES (Community health education society).
The next day i rode down to Kodambakkam in Chennai and met Dr. P. Manorama, the founder of the NGO. She spoke to me about the NGO. It was basically an NGO which ran an ashram for orphan kids affected by HIV AIDS. Some children attended public schools, while rest of them were taught in the Ashram itself. She told me that monetary flow was really not an issue. What she wanted was some help of people who could spend time with the kids. Teach them some spoken english, arts and craft making and help them out with the school exams. She told me that she would be really grateful if i could spend some time with the kids instead of donating money. She also assured me that i would not be in danger of catching the virus because of physical contact with the kids. I just had to be careful not to come in contact with their body fluids. I thought about it and decided to oblige to her request.

I spend several weekends with the kids. I taught them spoken english. For the first time i had to think about how to make english learning an interesting experiance. I tried to make it interactive and made them speak it out confidently. It was a lovely experiance, eventhough patience testing at times, when i had to resolve their fights. They used to be so excited to see me and all the kids literally used to come and fall on me. Some of the kids used to come and hold my hands and tell me that i look very beautiful. I always used to look forward to that time of the week when i had to go and interact with them, especially because of the enthusiam they showed in learning. I taught them stainglass painting and made them do their individual works on small square pieces of glass which i prepared for the class. And they wanted to make painting on all the windows and and mirrors after that. Several weeks later when i met Dr.Manorama, she actually was so glad that i interacted with the kids. She narrated an incident when some foreigners came to the ashram and the kids greeted them in english and asked a few questions to them too. She was immensely proud of their effort! I was so happy to learn that my students actually implemented what i taught them. She also told me that they were planning to shift to a new place and there she wanted to have a huge glass partition where all the children could do their stainglass paintings and display it. She told me that they were so excited to do the paintings and showed the small square pieces to her when she came to visit them. Small things like this can give you an immense satisfaction which cannot be explained by words. Life is beautiful i thought!!

Some information about the NGO:

* Home Address : Anantha Illam, CHES(Community Health Education Society), 1,
Kumaran Colony(Near K.R.Vijaya Garden), Sridevi Kuppam Main Valasaravakkam, Chennai-600 087, TN.
Tel: 91-44-24726655 , 44-24840148
Email: ches_cheschennai@yahoo.co.in

* Started in 1994 by Dr.P.Manorama M.D.,DCH.,DM(Gastro) based on two HIV affected kids & now it is a home for 45 HIV+ kids(upto age of 15). This home provides complete shelter/education/medical support for kids.

* They receive orphan kids(HIV affected) from hospitals and government agencies from across Tamil Nadu. After completion of HIV test, based on the results the HIV+ve kids are retained in the ashram & -Ve kids are sent to the Government Child Welfare Society/GULID.

* They are running their own school within the Orphanage for upto 4th standard , for higher classes they send the students to Cauvery School, Saligramam and Kodambakkam Gov School (10 students) for education.

(Courtesy: http://indiasudar.wordpress.com)

Go Orange on Queen's day!

It was the spring of 2009, precisely on the 30th april, during my short stint in the Netherlands. I had gone to the pretty little city of Delft in Netherlands for a period of 6 months for my final master thesis work. I worked in one of the departments in the Delft University of technology.

Having arrived on the 15th of april, i was still very new to the place. I lived in one of the most happening student hostels in Delft called 'Marcushof', which mostly hosted all the exchange students to the University from all parts of the world. It was a different type of an intercultural experiance. Since the students were there mostly for a short period of time, their basic motto during the stay over there was, Party hard on weekdays, and Party harder on weekends!!!...Well, what can i say..they indeed lived upto it! I on the other hand was still pretty much closed. I was still getting used to using the common kitchen to which i had to rush even if i had to boil a glass of milk. The kitchen was filled with people almost always when i entered it. People sitting with their beer bottles or wine glasses and chatting or cooking together, or just chilling out on the sofa and smoking.

A day earlier, i entered the kitchen and smiled at the people who were sitting inside and told my usual 'hi'. Two Italian girls were making their usual pasta. They greeted me back. One of them called out to me, " Ciao Aash, so are you also coming to Amsterdam tomorrow with us?". I was puzzled, " Amsterdam? what is happening in Amsterdam tomorrow?". She replied,"Well it is the Queens birthday tomorrow, there is going to be a big party and lots of concerts in the city"..I could see the excitement on her face. I was embarassed of my ignorance about the country i had decided to come to. I was completely unaware of the monarchy in the Netherlands. I said, " The Queens birthday is it?, cool. I can come, i have never been to Amsterdam till now".

As we reached the Amsterdam station it was 11 AM. In total 20 of us from our hostel went together in the train. I hardly knew any of my companions. Just as we came out of the station there were people standing on the way and distributing bright orange foldable hats. We all took it in our hands and wore it. The italian girl walking beside me told me, " Oh ya, i heard that everyone should dress up in orange today because that is the national colour of Netherlands". Hmmm....wierd i thought. I didnt know what was in store for us. As we went to the main street, we were all really surprised..In front of us was a swamp of people, all dressed in bright fluorescent orange. Tees, skirts, bikinis, hats, garlands, giant cooling glasses, masks, armbands, earings, lipstick, Boobytubes...everything everything in orange. We all looked at ourselves, we were dressed normally, looking out of place. We bought ourselves an orange garland.

The streets were crowded like crazy. keeping to the group was very difficult.But i was always concious of the fact that this was my first time in Amsterdam and i had no idea of the routes. All local transport was non-functional on that day. It was a national holiday. The city was so crowded and so orange. People were carrying pom-poms and whistles and small drums with them. Each and every street was packed with people. Even the famous canals of amsterdam carried big boats filled with people dressed in orange shouting out in celebration and waving their hands to the onlookers on the streets. There were several concerts all over the city...and several people on the streets selling different things, right from cloths, souveneirs, handicrafts items and every other thing which one could think of. And last but not least loads and loads of alcohol was sold on the streets. My companions from the hostel had an amazing capacity for alcohol. I was awed by the amount of alcohol they consumed. They bought shots which were brewed and sold in test-tubes too. They smoked pot (oh ya isnt it Amsterdam, its legal there!!). On top of that they carried big bottles of vodka mixed with orange juice in their backpacks (well that was for when they felt thirsty!). What did i do?...i stood there and walked with my group, just amazed by the sight around me.

My group decided to go to one of the major concerts in the heart of the city. We pulled and pushed our way and found the place the concert took place. We had already walked for 4 hours without finding a place to sit down in the crowd. My feet hurt badly. But as i noticed, i didnt see a single sign of tiredness on the face of any of my companions. We pushed our way with a lot of difficulty into the crowd to get a decent location at the concert. I went on for another 2 more hours. I had not sat in 6 hours...and i was really thirsty. I finally decided to give up my apprehensions and moved away from my group in search of some coke. I lost them in the crowd and surprisingly i was so happy to be lost!! I found a empty place on a bench and immediately sat down. It was already 5:30 PM. I really didnt want to get back into the crowded concert or my alcoholic companions. I asked people around how to get back to the train station and headed back to Delft! Pheww, i fell dead on my bed like a dead person! But it was a day worth experiancing once in a lifetime.

Some facts about the day: On April 30, the Dutch celebrate Koninginnedag ("Queen's Day"), a national holiday to commemorate the birthday of the country's (former) Queen. It is by far the most widely celebrated holiday in the Netherlands. Amsterdam is packed to the gills on April 30, welcoming up to two million party-going visitors. The Dutch have been observing Queen's Day on April 30 since 1949, when the new Queen Juliana ascended the throne.

When Bobby came home

It was on 29. May 1994..It was summer vacations in school. The time of the year when all my cousins came down to Chennai. We lived in a two bedroom apartment on the third floor at that time. The colony i eventually spent 10 wonderful years of my childhood...Sneha Sadan.
Our house was always crowded during summer vacations. We were already three kids,mom, dad and grandmom. But summer vacation meant having fun with my cousins, aunts and uncles who used to come down to chennai from Trivandrum, Bangalore, Mumbai and Boston. The house used to be so crowded and noisy, when all the elders would catch up with the news of the year and for the kids it basically meant running up and down, playing games, fighting. We used to go for picnics to theme parks and to Marina beach. Food was always divided amongst all of us. Buying ice cream for one meant buying ice cream for all! That was the rule.

On that day, my dad was as usual sitting on his big sofa in corner of the hall, reading his newspaper in the morning. All the kids used to sleep in the hall in a row. It was late enough and my mom was shouting out for us kids of wake up and fold our bedsheets and roll our matresses so that the servant could sweep the hall. I didnt want to budge from my place...Well until my dad suddenly announced something from the paper. He read out that there were 4 German shepard pups for sale and asked, " Aashrita, shall we buy a pup for our home? ". I got up from my bed that instant and ran to him. I was so excited. I said," Yes, yes, we should buy a pup for our home..i always wanted a pup you know. Please pa, let us buy one". I saw a wicked smile on my dads face. My mom gave him the coldest stare. He told me, " I dont mind buying one you know. But your mom has to give the permission". I went begging to my mom. But she told "NO" in all the different ways she could. But i am a very very stubborn person. If i make up my mind for something, nothing can change it. My main goal at that moment was to convince my mom. I went about doing it. I remember all the promises i made that day..." Promise Ma, i will take the dog for walk everyday. i will take the responsibility of feeding it. I will bathe it regularly, take it to the doctor for injections, remove the ticks, also clean the house if it shits there. You dont have to do anything..I promise" ( Well as we all know, promises are meant to be broken :P ).

So finally we set out to Blue cross. After all the drama and rebellion from Mom, the consenses reached was that we will adopt an abandoned pup from Blue cross and i will have to take care of it for one year. If i do a good job at it, my dad will buy me a German shepard pup. A good deal, i thought. My uncle, aunt, little sister, dad and i dropped by Blue cross at Theosophical society to have a look at the pups there. I loved that place! They had many abandoned stray pups in cages with a cup of milk and a cup of water each. There were so many other animals also there. some injured birds, cats, squirrels etc. I was so excited to see them all. The doctor said that we could pick up a pup we liked from one of the cages. Oh my, they were all too cute..so small, cuddly and friendly..The pups were so excited to see us . They were jumping in the cages, trying to reach out to us. I went the one of the cages where there were 4 pups. One of it had light eyes. I didnt like it too much. There were two pups jumping up and down and trying to lick me. I picked up one of it and told my dad," Lets take this one..it likes me a lot :)" . It was a female. My dad said, " see i already have 5 females at home. I dont have a male company. Let us get a male pup". The 4th pup in the cage was a male. It was there, sitting in the cage, not even bothered by our presence. He was more keen on getting his sleep. The guy picked him up and gave him in my hands and said that he was one month old. He was too cute. Black eyes giving a sad look and a jet black nose, the rest of the body was light brown. He was shivering as i held him.

We decided to take him home. I was the first to hold him. My little sister ( 4 years old at that time) was too scared to touch him. We took him home in the car. He remained there cuddled on my lap..still shivering because we were strangers to him. I carried him up the three floors like he was a baby in my hands. My mom opened the door and gave him and me a cold stare, said nothing and went inside..My cousins and my elder sister were scared of him...They ran from the house to the terrace, two of them also climbed the water tank and shouted from there! I took him to the terrace to introduce him to them. I left him down on the terrace floor. He was timid and small. He was shaking in his new environment and didnt understand what was going on around him. I still remember his first steps on the floor. He was an angel. My first dog and my first love!

I was very innocent as a child. I believed all the stories that was told to me. My aunt told me that only if you whisper the name of dog in its ears three times, he will remember it and respond when called so. She asked me," so what shall we name him?"...After a long discussion round amongst all of us..we finally decided on one name....BOBBY!.. I took the pup on my lap and sincerely followed what my aunt told me...I whispered "Bobby" into his ears three time.....Thats when Bobby entered our lives and became a part of our family. Today, he is 15 years old and still alive and very much a part of our lives. And 29th May 1994 is a day that is still imprinted on my memory like it was just yesterday!!

The beginning of my blogging journey

I perhaps am a late starter of blogging...Having thought of starting it several times, i always postponed the process. I, like many others in this world suffer from the infamous "starting trouble". But like the old saying goes, Better late than never!!

Today sitting shut in my home due to the torrent rains in Chennai, i was bored to the core. I am back home for my vacations and soon will start my PhD in Austria...Well 'soon' is still 92 days away!!! Whether that is a lot or not, totally depends on the reader. As far as i am concerned, my days are crawling...and i feel i still have a looong time to go!!
Shortly about me....I am the second of the three daughters of my parents..the 'middle one', a biotechnologist who loves experimenting on things. I love mother nature in all her versatile forms. I believe in experiancing this world to the fullest...and am always in the pursuit of this goal, which i have realised is a neverending process. I am approaching my silver jubilee very soon and i feel the time is right to start blogging!
Writing was never one of my strengths. But i believe one has to start doing it to become better at it...So here it goes...My first experiment!! I dont know what i can promise the readers..... perhaps simple language, simple stories and simple thoughts........Wish me all the best!!!! :)))