This day reminds me of the song Lemon Tree ...by Fool's Garden
I'm sitting here in the boring room
It's just another rainy Sunday afternoon
I'm wasting my time
I got nothing to do
I'm hanging around
I'm waiting for you
But nothing ever happens and I wonder….
It’s the same now, its raining outside and all I can do is to watch TV, surf the Internet or cook food! I thought why not be a little productive and catch up with my blog writing.
It’s the Diwali season back in India, and I among a few other denigrate souls are away from their home, in a foreign land …a land so appealing yet sometimes very appalling.
Its been some time since I posted on this blog, as usual the cup of my mind brimming with ideas, my incapacity to write coherently combined with sheer indiscipline makes me write blogs in such spurts of enthusiasm. I guess I have a still a long way to go as far professional writing is concerned.
Yesterday was very exciting, I with a bunch of pals from my company packed our bags and decided to go out and actually celebrate Diwali in UK ! Diwali, after all was something which came once a year, is indeed the most special festival for most of us, we couldn’t have just let the day pass by, with us whiling our time on TV and the Internet. I took the initiative to gather the junta, pump-up the oddballs who were sill indecisive and in the end managed to muster 4 others besides me. This was quite a feat and was quite contrary to my behavior some years ago, when… I still remember.. during such occasions used to just stay at my home watching TV, I even avoided going to neighbors house for customary greetings. I am sure, when my parents see me like this, they will notice what a sea change I have been through especially in socializing.
Let me start by describing yesterday’s experience. My basic motivation to go out was of course to checkout the Diwali scene in UK and not waste the day. As such the place I live, 'Reading' is very dull on the weekends. Five of us left for Southall, a place I have heard a lot about, primarily for the Asian color it carries.
We took about half an hour to reach the south hall station from reading, but the time went by quickly amidst chatter with friends. The first thing I noticed about the place were the hoardings, they were marked in Punjabi and some even in Gujarati and Urdu ! I discovered even more
surprises as we moved ahead. Most of the people on the railway station were wearing Indian clothes, at least they looked so, and all of them had Asian if not an Indian look. I was surprised to se no ticket-check mechanism at the exit of station. That was something I haven’t seen at any of stations I’ve been to in UK.
There was a small single ticket counter, behind which stood again an Indian looking middle-aged man. I bent forward to ask for directions, and noticed his name plaque It read Mr. Ghosh. A Bengali, I was seeing Bengali here! Well that wasn't very surprising, after all Indians or should I say Asians form the basic fabric of society here in UK. Right from the Public Systems to Culture, fashion and food, Asians are a major influence!
As I stepped out of the station I noticed something very peculiar. The people all around me, e.g. the lady in the car on the road in fornt of me, the couple coming from my sideways, the kids playing around the corner, all I noticed were Asians. As I moved ahead I noticed a Gurdwara (a Sikh shrine). O my gosh, It was real Gurdwara! I was more excited for the reason that I haven’t been to a Gurdwara for so many years now, and here I find myself in front of a Gurdwara
, so away from my country all the way in UK!
We all went down the road till the Gurdwara, where I clicked a couple of pictures, there was quite rush at the place, must have been because of Diwali. As we moved ahead we saw grocery shops selling vegetables in the typical Indian style, on kind of sophisticated thelaas. Just out of sheer excitement we entered a store looking like a typical Indian-Grocery-Store and to our wonder found everything right from Spices to Maggi to Indian Biscuits and Vegetables right the same roof ! Hara-Dhaniya(Coriander leaves), which I have been so feverously searching for in the Local Sainsbury Shop for so long, lay there, in heaps. The shop had the typical smell, the smell of a Baniya Shop as it is in India. I felt so much at home, even the people around were looking like Indians. Of course they were not all Indians, I guess there were some Pakis, some Bangladeshis and maybe a few Ingrez as well.
The smell coupled with the people around me made me feel so intoxicated and happy at that moment ! Here I am standing in a Indian looking shop thousands of miles away from my country and it all feels so familiar, just like home ! Anyways a guy complained that we had not come to SouthHall to buy Coriander r for that matter experiencing the familiar scent. Of course, I realized we had come here for the Festival! After buying some stuff which I had to, we setout for exploring SouthHall.
It was about 5 PM so it was still quite a outside, despite the dark clouds there was a warmth in the atmosphere ! We moved ahead curiously peeping inside all the shops that came on the way. Almost everybody walking around us were wearing typical south Asian attires, so to say the Indian attires. There were a noticeable number of Surds, and If one noticed carefuly the people and shops most of them were speaking Punjabi, despite all of them not being Indians. There were a lot of Pakistani's as well, basically you could make out from the dress and the urdu they used with Punjabi. There were lot of kebab shops around the place, me and a friend hobknobbed ourselved into one of them and ordered for some Nan and Kebabs. It was a pakistani shop for sure and the guys behind the counter were speaking beautiful fluent punjabi, I chatted with one of them about the food and how do they prepare a specific kind of kebab. It was differrent kind of a feeling to be at a place where you were eating and talking to people feeling so faimiliar even when they belonged to altogether a differrent country !
We waited for our order for quite a while, and I clicked a couple of pictures there!
After the kebabs arrived we literally hogged over them finishing it in seconds. They were sumptous, but me as usual being so picky about food didn't felt that they were up to the mark. Not upto my expectation of a Paki Kebab shop ! Anyway I was having kebabs here in UK, this was quite unimaginable even when I was in Pune!
As we moved ahead, the dusk started to set in. There was music in the air and people were shopping, the scene was like a typical dilli bazaar on the ocassion of a festival. The streets were litterred with leaves & poleythenes, and you didn't had to wait for the signal to go red to cross the roads, it was all so much liked India ! I just loved it :-)
The next thing to check out was of course the sweets, bhai diwali ka mauka ho aur mithai na ho to woh Diwali kaisee, we entered a glitzy shop with displays of assortment of sweets, but obvious it was an Indian hsop, The shopkeepers were a Gujarati couple, the guy speaking fluent Gujarati and the lady speaking Punjabi ! Ha ha ..
There were customers speakign to each other in Gujarati, one persuading the other to buy the sweets and not worry about the money ! There were Punjabi's ladies carefully selecting the Sweets. I tried placing an order for like 15 minutes and then came out frustrated, as soon as I came out I felt so elated ... for feeling that frusration perhaps ! Still two of our guys finally managed to get the sweets, we wished each other Happy Diwali and ate sweets !
The whole place was now glitterring, it was lights and decorations everywhere!
Junta had started bursting crackers, there was fireworks in the sky wherever u looked. We moved around and explored the place a lot more, ate jalebis and later Dahi wadas ! We had a great time and I took a lot of snaps and couple of Videos!
Later we had dinner at a Indian restaurant, the food was relatively much cheaper
and the quality was ok ! Afterwards, we roamed around for some more time. We could have roamed more but then there was train at 10 after which the next one was at 11,
so we chose to leave by 10. We got the train and came back to Reading, later I along with two other guys watched a movie on the laptop and then went to sleep.
Today I got up pretty late, I think it was 11:45 or so, its been a long time since I had such a schedule...staying up late at night and then waking up aaram se ..
I did with the daily ablutions and made some breakfast for myself. The last night i had brought some veggies which I was determined to make today for lunch. I passed some time generally checking my mails and google-news. Afterwhich I started the preparations for making one of my all time favourite dishes. I was going to make Dry Stuffed Karela marignated in Curd. I am of course not going to bore you with the details of making it .. but I must say in the end the dishes were awesome! those who've eaten my salt know that !
Shall be posting the relevant albums, on internet soon .. bas after eating I was feeling a little heavy, but instead of sleeping i watched a movie .. a documentary type movie called "The Road to Ladakh" featuring Irfan Khan and Koel Purie .. Afterwards I thought I doing something constructive and wrote this big post !
This was obvioulsy not the outcome of one sitting, I am very restless to do anything
with so much attention and focus for so long. So I finally come to the end of this post. Hope to write the next soon ...
Sunday, October 22, 2006
~ I F ~
A wonderful poem I read recently ..
courtesy Divyesh
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
--Rudyard Kipling
courtesy Divyesh
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
--Rudyard Kipling
Friday, October 06, 2006
My Days in England - Part I
Sunday the 1st of October 2006
Number 18, Crown Street
Reading , Berkshire,
England
LONDON, what a beautiful city ! I am so much charged up to write about my experiences of the city. It’s been some time since I was waiting to write about the things happening around. I got the office laptop on Friday courtesy Vinicius the person whom I am replacing at the site. Of course I was excited because this would give me the opportunity to write at my free will about everything I thought, all the time I thought, and anywhere I thought ! But then something even more exciting came up which made me deprive the usage of the notebook for another 2 days, hell I never thought it would last 2 days! Neeways the last two days of my stay in UK have been very exciting so to say I have seen things and met people who have made me rethink about so many things in my life. I feel really privileged and indebted to my company for giving me the opportunity and cash to visit this wonderful place called London, to see how it feels to be in a city which lives 24X7, a city which is at the helm in the sectors of finance and technology.
Chintan, or as he was called ‘Chintu’, an old friend from my college days, someone whom I always admired as a person, someone towards whom I in my erstwhile days had an attitude of awe, someone so very simple yet so special, and definitely a friend to reckon with, called me up the other day. Thursday, I think it was Thursday or maybe Friday. We chatted for a while and decided to meet up over the weekend, the last I heard from him was that he was going to be busy over an office assignment on Sunday but would like to meet me on Saturday. I on my part had actually not made my mind abut that, and was instead anticipating joining my colleagues for a visit to some spot, over the weekend.
Chintu, as I often call Chintan, called me up on Friday, I later realized that he had left an Orkut Scrap and an email as well, I wondered what was the urgency? It was when I finally talked with him did I knew about it, he was planning to go to one of the Garba Nights. This was being held in Wembley, a sweet bustling Asian majority suburb in UK and I was extended an invitation for the same. Now although I was little hesistant in the beginning, but the desire to meet him and then go attend a Garba which I would do after almost 5 years was tempting enough to make my mind for it The office on the day was not so hectic, marked by the traditional cakes-meeting (Kabala Shabath) where I chanced to meet the Site Manager, a meeting with my other team member, Manish who had just came back from Israel, and a couple of other mundane tasks, which were taken care of. The day ended on a peaceful note and I left by the 6’O clock train for Reading.
As I reached back to my place, I had to rush for London. I decide to eat something as I did not knew when would I be having my next bite of food and then also thought of improving my disheveled look. After taking out the razor I realized that I did not have the shaving cream, which I had intentionally left back in India for the fear of Security Checks on the Airport. I thought about it and BOOM there went a Pound Bomb in my mind ! Now I had to obviously buy it in British Pounds. Anyways, since I was in hurry I used the soap lather to do the shaving, the next things I realized was that I even didn’t has an aftershave gel. The Pound Shock - Boom Again ! I think Iam adapting to the Pound Shocks, but still have a along way to go.
After getting ready I had a quick toast and tea and packed my bag not forgetting to keep my fantabalous sexy-brown leather jacket, which I had recently purchased for the UK visit. I then sprinted for Reading Central thinking that maybe I could get the 7:00 train for London. However after reaching I realized that since I had to travel to London and come back the day after or day-after-day after, the tickets would not be available from the automatic ticket machines. I then had to stand in the queue for 2 of the 8 counters open. I was feeling like, “these Europeans are so chilled, even the ticket counters are get closed by 7 PM”.
I managed to buy a return ticket valid two days after the day, however the price I had to pay for it was a bomb. Can u imagine one paying £20 for a return ticket from London? Another of the £ shocks, this amount was close to 2000 INR, I wondered if I had gone crazy?
The train without saying was on time, and since I didn’t had much clues about when I would be reaching I did not jumped a lot by asking around people and just submitted myself to get into the train, I knew the train would eventually be reaching London. I boarded the train and found a quite corner for myself. I was adjusting my bag to be comfortable when I noticed this person sitting right across me. The person sitting in the opposite corner was a funny looking girl, she would be roughly of my height, and had a strange hairstyle with striped white and red hair. She was actually looking more like a fancy doll than a real person. I tried to look outside the compartment window but my gaze kept on going back to her, partially because there wasn’t really much to look outside, and partially because I was really inquisitive, she appeared like a strange kind of a specimen to me. Anyways People-Watching as such is a very good pastime for me, it’s a great time-passer especially when I am traveling long distances and I don’t have an alternative like music or book. I noticed her taking out a mirror and then rearranging her hair in a manner that made her hair come out from all the directions unevenly. A kind of a hazelnut/porcupinet look. This was the COOL look as I had noticed amongst innumerably other gals in and around Reading.
After about 20 minutes or so, she got up and stood around the door of compartment, I wondered if it was me because of which she was perturbed, or was it a call she was attending. I wasn’t in a mood to start a conversation or something so I just moved back attention from her. Somehow the people around this place are so cold, and I often had the feeling of being an Alien amongst them. I just don’t feel like mingling with them, which is quite contrary to my regular pro-mingling nature.
Shall write more soon. As of now I have to sleep and then wake tomorrow morning for the office. More about my meeting with Chintu, his friends and our adventures over the last 2 days soon !
Amir
Number 18, Crown Street
Reading , Berkshire,
England
LONDON, what a beautiful city ! I am so much charged up to write about my experiences of the city. It’s been some time since I was waiting to write about the things happening around. I got the office laptop on Friday courtesy Vinicius the person whom I am replacing at the site. Of course I was excited because this would give me the opportunity to write at my free will about everything I thought, all the time I thought, and anywhere I thought ! But then something even more exciting came up which made me deprive the usage of the notebook for another 2 days, hell I never thought it would last 2 days! Neeways the last two days of my stay in UK have been very exciting so to say I have seen things and met people who have made me rethink about so many things in my life. I feel really privileged and indebted to my company for giving me the opportunity and cash to visit this wonderful place called London, to see how it feels to be in a city which lives 24X7, a city which is at the helm in the sectors of finance and technology.
Chintan, or as he was called ‘Chintu’, an old friend from my college days, someone whom I always admired as a person, someone towards whom I in my erstwhile days had an attitude of awe, someone so very simple yet so special, and definitely a friend to reckon with, called me up the other day. Thursday, I think it was Thursday or maybe Friday. We chatted for a while and decided to meet up over the weekend, the last I heard from him was that he was going to be busy over an office assignment on Sunday but would like to meet me on Saturday. I on my part had actually not made my mind abut that, and was instead anticipating joining my colleagues for a visit to some spot, over the weekend.
Chintu, as I often call Chintan, called me up on Friday, I later realized that he had left an Orkut Scrap and an email as well, I wondered what was the urgency? It was when I finally talked with him did I knew about it, he was planning to go to one of the Garba Nights. This was being held in Wembley, a sweet bustling Asian majority suburb in UK and I was extended an invitation for the same. Now although I was little hesistant in the beginning, but the desire to meet him and then go attend a Garba which I would do after almost 5 years was tempting enough to make my mind for it The office on the day was not so hectic, marked by the traditional cakes-meeting (Kabala Shabath) where I chanced to meet the Site Manager, a meeting with my other team member, Manish who had just came back from Israel, and a couple of other mundane tasks, which were taken care of. The day ended on a peaceful note and I left by the 6’O clock train for Reading.
As I reached back to my place, I had to rush for London. I decide to eat something as I did not knew when would I be having my next bite of food and then also thought of improving my disheveled look. After taking out the razor I realized that I did not have the shaving cream, which I had intentionally left back in India for the fear of Security Checks on the Airport. I thought about it and BOOM there went a Pound Bomb in my mind ! Now I had to obviously buy it in British Pounds. Anyways, since I was in hurry I used the soap lather to do the shaving, the next things I realized was that I even didn’t has an aftershave gel. The Pound Shock - Boom Again ! I think Iam adapting to the Pound Shocks, but still have a along way to go.
After getting ready I had a quick toast and tea and packed my bag not forgetting to keep my fantabalous sexy-brown leather jacket, which I had recently purchased for the UK visit. I then sprinted for Reading Central thinking that maybe I could get the 7:00 train for London. However after reaching I realized that since I had to travel to London and come back the day after or day-after-day after, the tickets would not be available from the automatic ticket machines. I then had to stand in the queue for 2 of the 8 counters open. I was feeling like, “these Europeans are so chilled, even the ticket counters are get closed by 7 PM”.
I managed to buy a return ticket valid two days after the day, however the price I had to pay for it was a bomb. Can u imagine one paying £20 for a return ticket from London? Another of the £ shocks, this amount was close to 2000 INR, I wondered if I had gone crazy?
The train without saying was on time, and since I didn’t had much clues about when I would be reaching I did not jumped a lot by asking around people and just submitted myself to get into the train, I knew the train would eventually be reaching London. I boarded the train and found a quite corner for myself. I was adjusting my bag to be comfortable when I noticed this person sitting right across me. The person sitting in the opposite corner was a funny looking girl, she would be roughly of my height, and had a strange hairstyle with striped white and red hair. She was actually looking more like a fancy doll than a real person. I tried to look outside the compartment window but my gaze kept on going back to her, partially because there wasn’t really much to look outside, and partially because I was really inquisitive, she appeared like a strange kind of a specimen to me. Anyways People-Watching as such is a very good pastime for me, it’s a great time-passer especially when I am traveling long distances and I don’t have an alternative like music or book. I noticed her taking out a mirror and then rearranging her hair in a manner that made her hair come out from all the directions unevenly. A kind of a hazelnut/porcupinet look. This was the COOL look as I had noticed amongst innumerably other gals in and around Reading.
After about 20 minutes or so, she got up and stood around the door of compartment, I wondered if it was me because of which she was perturbed, or was it a call she was attending. I wasn’t in a mood to start a conversation or something so I just moved back attention from her. Somehow the people around this place are so cold, and I often had the feeling of being an Alien amongst them. I just don’t feel like mingling with them, which is quite contrary to my regular pro-mingling nature.
Shall write more soon. As of now I have to sleep and then wake tomorrow morning for the office. More about my meeting with Chintu, his friends and our adventures over the last 2 days soon !
Amir
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