I took a lane to nostalgia and was browsing through my old blog posts and landed upon this post on Mahabharata and Perspectives. It’s quite amusing to find that the perspective as mentioned earlier has changed, indeed (developed, rather!) into another form. Given the path that I had to travel over the years after the post, it’s no wonder that perspectives change.
Reblogging! And new post in draft. To be posted at the earliest!
Mahabharata is one of my all time favourite ‘experience’. I term it an experience because, quite often when I get to read/hear/watch retellings of the great epic, a thought process occurs, which gives rise to new perspectives, new vistas, new ideas, which are experiences that need to be savoured deeply! I had grown up listening to Mahabharata […]
I had taken a break from blogging due to personal and professional reasons, for the past few months, and presumably now, I have the got the much-needed time to spend on my blog occasionally.
Now that, I’m supposed to post the break-blog-fast, I’m stuck up with what you know – Writer’s Block (Well, I’d prefer the term Blogger’s Block). So, I’m stuck with the Blogger’s Block and searching over my good old friend, Google, to overcome this Block. And it is giving ideas, well, good ideas, yet which seem bad to me! So for now, let me just ramble!
I had started blogging as a way to express my thoughts and also as a pastime. There were moments, where I had taken blogging seriously and had been blogging regularly, making it a part of my regular schedule. As professional commitments demanded higher priority, blogging had to move down over the list of priorities, and my blog getting stagnant.
Now that, I’ve settled down a bit, and have also sorted out the time, I’m blessed with, blogging regularly must be a part of my regular activity. And I hope it goes that way!
Spring season is loved by everyone. And more by those, for whom, the springs blows away the harsh and cold winds of winter, literally and metaphorically!
It could be the truth, or psychological effect, or a beautiful imagination, the onset of this period of time (last final weeks and February, and the beginning weeks of March) brings a sudden gush of energy and happiness into me, every year, right from childhood.
Probably it could be, because of the anticipation of completing the annual exams (I’ve never feared exams 😉 ) and enjoying the long summer holidays, the happiness of playing on streets without fear of rains disrupting (actually I loved rain, but the fact that I’d be pulled into home, by grandma, made me detest it slightly) the excitement of family tours, the joy of watching TV without any restrictions, the happiness of relishing pulpy, sweet-tangy mangoes, and the reasons could go on and on, in the days of childhood.
Meanwhile, semester holidays which arrived during spring/summer gave me uninterrupted time to read books, start blogging 🙂 , occasionally go out and play (I stopped playing out, once getting into college, unlike my friends. Not sure if a good or bad thing 😀 ) and few to name, to happen in the later days of my life.
Now spring/summer doesn’t make a difference in the routine or ‘timetable’ of the day. Yet the spirit of spring remains intact and brings in a fresh wave of energy, from nowhere.
Well, on a second thought, if we make and take the best of any situation, and derive happiness from it, everyday of life is spring, with flowers blooming around and butterflies abounding everywhere!
Sharing an all time favourite song of mine..that matches the situation here!
P.S..the title for this post was inspired by one of the chapters in my 6th standard English Literary textbook – Songbird in Spring Time – a short biography on M.S.Subbulakshmi. One of the few chapters from my school textbooks that I can never forget!
The previous Shiva Trilogy series by Amish Tripathi caught the interest of many into reading alternate mythology. I’m not a big fan of alternate mythology, yet the beginning of the Shiva Trilogy was very interesting, though I felt the ending was mediocre. Now the author has come up with the Ram Chandra Series and first book of the series, Scion Of Ikshvaku was released on 22nd June. I had preordered my copy and received it right yesterday. Received with a metallic bookmark. Happy!
‘Kaushik’ is an important character in the series 😉
Coming to the book, the story is an alternate mythology (or can be said a fictional story too), based on the Ramayana. This book elaborates on the beginning part of the Ramayana. It can be loosely said that this book covers Bala Kanda, Ayodhya Kanda and Aranya Kanda. As it is an alternate mythology, there are twists, characters, drama, sub-plots added by the author. Some of these are very interesting and some not-so.
There are some philosophical conversations that are present in this book, which are highly thought provoking and interesting. One for example…
‘Exactly!’, said Ram. ‘If He is my God, if He picks my side over someone else’s, He is not the One God. The only true One God is the one who picks no sides, who belongs to everything, who doesn’t demand loyalty or fear; in fact, who doesn’t demand anything at all. Because the Ekam just exists; and His existence allows for the existence of all else.’
Those who have interest in philosophy, mythology would find this book interesting, though those who follow orthodox way may not. Taking apart the ‘religious’ angle, the book can also be a good fictional read. Waiting for the next book in the series.
This post is completely dedicated to a beautiful, clean, serene, divine, calm, picturesque, peaceful, little town in Karnataka, named Melkote. It is at a distance of about 50 kms from Mysore and has good, accessible road from there. And still, i’m still out of adjectives to sing the praise of this place!
Raya Gopura
Melkote, also known as ThiruNarayanaPuram is more of a pilgrimage center, than a tourist spot, and that’s the main reason we were there (remember I had mentioned family vacation/pilgrimage in the earlier post?) The CheluvaNarayana Temple and the YogaNarasimha Swamy Temple atop a small hill are the important temples, apart from a few other ancient, antique temples here.
CheluvaNarayana Temple
Melkote is quiet, little town with few ancient temples, many clean and pristine ponds surrounded by lush greenery, simple and traditional homes, clean roads, little shops, a Sanskrit college and academy, scenic vistas, humble and helpful people, which makes a person fall in love with this place again and again!
The YogaNarasimha Swamy temple is situated atop a small hill. Visiting this temple requires a climb of around 200 rock cut steps, which are covered by lush greenery, and occasional stone mantapa. There were many monkeys and goats along this way too, giving us a good company.
And not to forget the yummy Puliogare and Chakare Pongal that we got to taste here. Simply divine! And for the uninitiated, Puliogare and Chakare Pongal are a delicacy present in many South Indian Temples. They are supposed to be second most important aspect of the temple, the first being the Lord 😉
That’s me, on the way to YogaNarasimhaSwamy Temple, atop the hill.
From the various experiences that I had here, the one I loved the most are the divinity and the cleanliness of this place. Divinity is beyond the scope of any explanation and our understanding! So moving on to the cleanliness aspect, the temples, roads, ponds, public washrooms are maintained so well in this little town!
Overall, the pilgrimage to Melkote was nourishing to the soul, pumping up more faith into the mind and lifting up our spirits.
Check out the following links, which provide more information on Melkote. Please do pay a visit to this place and get an experience of a lifetime!
This was a post pending for long, and finally I’ve got time to post. An office colleague who is also a good friend got married few days back, at her hometown Kumbakonam. Few guys of us not just attended the wedding, but also had a good time roaming about at Kumbakonam.
A town known for temples and festivals, it also had some of the warmest people i’ve ever met. The town, its streets, temple, people, their hospitality, wedding, food, ponds, fun, etc, etc could be elaborated over a series of lengthy posts! So rich was our experience in a short stay of two days. And here goes my short picture chronicle on our Kumbakonam trip…
Sarangapani Temple undergoing renovation. We had a pleasant time praying to the handsome Sarangapani, with the temple not much crowded while we visited on the Saturday morning.
The famed Mahamaham pond, right at the heart of Kumbakonam, getting decked up for the Mahamaham festival to be held next year.
Porthamarai pond behind the Sarangapani Temple. The temple seen here behind this pond is AdhiKumbeshwarar Temple. Kumbakonam is a town with so many temples, that when you exit from a temple, you enter into another!
Another enchanting view of the Porthamarai pond.
Nageshwarar Temple. Another hub of peace and serenity.
The elephant of AdhiKumbeshwarar Temple, who was dancing with joy and was only happy to bless us too!
A bright and colourful view of the Kumbakonam skyline at twilight. Can you spot a lone star twinkling?
The A/C bus stop here. Chennai needs some of these very badly!
Hey, that’s me at the friend’s wedding!
As stated earlier, it’d take a series of lengthy posts to talk about the rich and awesome experiences we had at Kumbakonam. And these pictures talk about few of them!
As I was typing my previous post on women, a sudden thought led to the creation of this post too. I wanted to publish on three of my favourite fictional women from movies. (Please don’t ponder or question on ‘why three’? For some odd reason I love the number three, and making a short list in three’s 😀 ) And here I go…
Shanichari – Rudaali
This movie depicts the life of a Rudaali – profession mourner, played by Dimple Kapadia. I watched this movie on a women’s day, telecast on Doordarshan, few years back. (I still remember, my annual exams were a week apart, and I was going to watch an ‘old and boring’ movie) The movie is a slow moving one, but deeply touching. Shanichari (character portrayed by Dimple) faces a lot of trouble in her life – she loses her husband, falls in debt, her son deserts her, but nothing can dampen her spirit. She wonders throughout the movie, how can someone(referring to the profession mourners) mourn for some unknown and unrelated person, until an incident changes her life. Shanichari from the movie Rudaali is still one of my favourite fictional character.
Madhura – Sringaram
This movie portrays the life of devadasis, set in the pre-independence era. The character Madhura (played by Aditi Rao Hydari) is a bold, young, beautiful, talented devadasi. She loves and craves for a life of freedom, which is denied to her, given her profession and status in the society. All the riches that she possess doesn’t bring any meaning to her life. When she couldn’t take it anymore, she moves away from the clutches of the society, to lead a life that she wishes. The story unfolds as a flashback story heard by Madhura’s daughter, Varshini (also played by Aditi Rao Hydari) Madhura is one character gracefully portrayed, that i’d love watching her again and again.
Elsa – Frozen
Queen Elsa is a bit more popular, that she needs not much of an introduction. She is my favourite Disney character after Mickey Mouse. Elsa didn’t need a charming dude to make her life beautiful, she had to fight evil and demons within herself, there were things she had to Let it Go, she had powers that were amazing but fearsome too, and these make her a queen, and not a princess! And ‘Let it Go’ could be listened to a thousand times, yet bring out the emotions, powerful every time ~ (The song of judgement)
A common thread that connects the story of these women is that, they wanted a life where they could be themselves, not hiding anything of theirs, just because the society didn’t accept or approve of the facts! They never let fate take over, and fought back to lead a life of their own.
It’s long since I posted here. Past few days were hectic, with some work to be done. With severe writing block now, really had no idea of what to post about, and then came a flash! Why don’t I make a post on few of my latest tweets, and what made me post tweet them. Maybe an expansion of the short tweets. And I logged into Twitter immediately!
I really don’t understand why some people consider ignorance a cool thing! Probably they take ‘ignorance is bliss’ too seriously..
I’ve known many people with this kind of attitude, who consider ignorance a very cool thing to possess, and good to flaunt it around. It could be a different perspective from mine, or something which I don’t know to value, or some good thing which I don’t know at all (okay i’m ‘flaunting’ my ignorance now 😉 )
It’s good to follow any religion, many religions or not to follow any. But keeping it to yourself is awesome! (1) — Kaushik (@KauGov) February 18, 2015
I’m religious, spiritual and as you know, awesome too 😉 (2)
I think I don’t need to elaborate much on this. Many are more bothered about spreading their religion, picking issues/criticizing religions that they don’t follow, and so on than actually practising the religion that they identify themselves with. And there are the ‘cool’ guys who proclaim that they’re spiritual but not religious. Being religious is not such a bad thing at all. But not keeping the religion to oneself, is such a big one!
Everyone sees the world with their own eyes. Let’s accept all of them atleast, if we can’t agree to them! (1) — Kaushik (@KauGov) February 16, 2015
Variations can create many a collage, and many a conflict too. It’s upto us to choose between them. (2)
I’ve always dreaded the idea of a homogeneous society. How boring it would be, if everyone looked same, had same behaviour, same thought process, everything same-to-same?! A society is like a collage, the more colours and textures, the more beautiful. Just as the sections of a collage, everyone in a society must be unique, yet complement each other.
The mountains are pimples, and the valleys are dimples…a silly-sounding rhyme, which was a great achievement for me and my sister when we ‘invented’ it!
There was an old Tamil ad where a girl would shout, ‘Miss Pimpley varaaaaa’. Maybe when I was 5-6 yrs old, this was one of my favourite ads. Sadly I’m able to neither recollect what endorsement was it nor find the ad anywhere.
Those were some of the funny experiences I’ve had with pimples and if you’d have guessed, the not-so-funny experiences surely were when I got some. When I was young (very young actually), I had a thought that only girls would get pimples on their when they grow up. And boys would get hair on face as they grow. Of course I realized the dumbness later.
Honestly saying, I was luckier than most of my friends, for I never had more than a pimple or two, if not many on my face, at any given time. And I should thank my mother for it. As in any home, oil and spices were not included in high dosage in ours’. The junk food I sneaked at times also didn’t create much damage in form of pimples.
How can I forget my friends and well-wishers who came up with innovative ideas to avoid, or cure pimples! Rub face with banana peel, apply toothpaste, apply some-some cream, don’t apply any cream, use soap, don’t use soap, apply my own saliva (gross! but believe me, I’ve got his suggestion too) Again coming to my rescue, it was my mother who gave the best idea – leave the pimple as it is. It’s natural to get a few pimples and it’ll go away on its own. As I said earlier, I had just one or two pimple on my face and occasionally that too. So it wasn’t a big deal to worry about quite often.
And I grew older and bolder, so did the pimples that started appearing. So my way of just ignoring them was not too good an idea. The pimples did disappear but not without leaving their mark. These marks stayed for a period longer than their previous tenant and were too adamant to vacate on their own, at the earliest. Use any inappropriate force on them, and they will grow stronger.
It is in such situations that Garnier products comes to your rescue. Garnier Pure Active with the goodness of neem is an excellent way of treating pimples, vacating their successors, keeping yourself fresh and clean!
P.S..If you were wondering about what the title (this term comes in an old Tamil movie) means, it is literally ‘nothing’ or something useless like the pimples. A better desi explanation would be Pimplekyi Pilapi = Babaji ka Thullu!
One can have cool head, not reacting much to the happenings around. But mind is one thing which is ever inquisitive to travel deep into the forbidden areas. One fine afternoon I was travelling in bus, listening to Let it Go and then this poem happened. There are things that aren’t perfect, In and around me. The cause of which, Doesn’t trace its roots to me. I’m told to accept them And embrace too. As nothing can be And should be perfect. I understand and agree. But where were and are These voices, When I did things That weren’t perfect, That didn’t meet the standards Which I didn’t set. When I was judged, And accepted not For meeting not Their standards. Well, the past is in the past. The stones that stand The test of time, Will live, to sing The song and the story Of the past. The wounds have healed But the scars remain. And these may disappear too, Along with a serene sunset. Here I stand, Accepting the judgement Of none, but One. Raised by the hands, That wanted to make a gentleman. Will live so forever, Not succumb to the pressure. Let the world respect a unworthy. But I will stay true to those Whom I consider worthy.
With a lazy weekend coming to a glorious end, I was browsing through the pictures in my phone, when I got a spark. I wanted to publish a quick post on some things which I captured on a weekend, over a period of time. And here are they…
This is at the Chennai Trade Center, where many fairs, exhibitions, events take place regularly. A very lively, and productive place too!
This is from the seashore of Mahabalipuram. A place to amaze or laze.
That’s Schmidt Memorial at Elliot’s Beach. A place for a wonderful weekend evening.
The ceiling of Connemara Library. Established over a century ago, this is one of the oldest library here.
Balcony of my home, on a rainy day. What better place than home!
Palavakkam Beach, a lesser known quiet and clean suburb.
Amdavadi – one of my favourite restaurant near home.
At Parthasarathy Temple. I and words would fail to describe the peace I get here.
That’s the sunset at the heart of a metro city. If only the place was real clean – adversities of urbanization
I just wanted to write a short analysis of how my 2014 had been, this pleasant Monday morning, and here I go.
2014 had been a calm, beautiful and peaceful year for me. There weren’t many adventures, twists and scary moments. It was just a calm boat ride. At the end of 2013, I expected 2014 to give me a rollercoaster ride, but it was one of the smoothest years i’ve had. And the time seemed to run fast too.
But one amazing thing to happen in 2014 is realization of myself. I learnt a lot more about myself. I accepted several things about me that I would be scared to even think about. I need not lie on the range of any imaginary spectrum. I can be anything, anywhere and yet be an awesome creation of God. Self acceptance is one great thing to happen to me in the past year. I accepted several things without an ounce of regret and with full of happiness.
Still there are miles to go. There are things which are not clear. There are questions which don’t have a satisfactory answer. I may or may not get an answer for them. But I will not stop searching for the answers. Yes there could be and must be issues in everyone’s life. Life is all about searching answers and finding solutions for these issues. That is the essence of an interesting life.
Another great thing to happen in the past year is blogging. I definitely grew as a blogger. I could come up with better and bolder posts. I came across many great blogs and befriended many people through blogging.
During a casual conversation, say the word sex and things will get uncomfortable (no pun, I mean the conversation going uncomfortable) . Prefix the word ‘premarital’ to it, and things can only get worse, unless the conversation is with extremely close friends (same gender!) Try prefixing other words like ‘same’, ‘casual’, <I leave the rest to your imagination> and you’d have already started guessing what mess could happen.
Of course times are changing, but in a conservative society like that of India, these topics are still taboo-kind-of and not discussed widely, in general. Yes, we need to respect this thought of others, yet make a point that there’s nothing wrong talking about sex or sex itself! Because we all weren’t dropped into our cradles by a stork actually.
Coming to the topic of premarital sex, I opine that sex is more about two souls getting to know each other, and marriage is more about letting the world know about their relation. That’s the reason the former act is done is private and the latter in public. Both of them are a journey. One travelled by the imperishable souls and the other by the perishable body.
The act of (true) sex is beyond that of anything physical. It is more like a fusion of two bodies of energy. The journey to find oneself by traversing into the other. Something very divine. And it has nothing to do with the walls that humans have created, in the form of marriage, in the form of society. But if one feels so, we ought to respect it.
So saying sex and marriage can be considered independent of each other. In that case the term premarital sex gets meaningless. Sex is more than lust, before or after marriage, with or without marriage. But again perspectives vary and none of can be validated or invalidated.
So, do you believe in love? Someone asked me once, and I replied, I feel, I am here, on this earth, just to teach the world, ‘Love’, the essence of True Love and how to create sensational union with your Split half, Twin soul, True Love and discover the ultimate, passionate, esoteric ‘Ancient Art of True Love’says author Poonaam Uppal, as taken from the introduction to her book, in Flipkart.
P.S 1..The significance of sex is lost without the elements of trust, responsibility and love between the two.
P.S 2..I’ve said sex is about two souls. They don’t have a gender and I haven’t mentioned anything about gender or orientation here (in case you haven’t noticed)
P.S 3..I’ve posted only about premarital sex. The other moral issues such as cohabitation, adultery, prostitution, etc do not find a place here.
It has been three years since I registered in my blog here, and thanks to WordPress for reminding me of it!
Though I had registered three years back (used Blogspot previously), I’ve been active in WordPress only for the past two years (+ few months) and it has been an amazing journey!
I have met new people, made new friends, read amazing blogs, won great prizes, had great experiences, influenced some through blogging. I never thought I’d come this long when I start to blog initially.
Blogging is one form of letting the world know, of one’s emotions, opinions, thoughts, or anything our mind wants to yet and our hand wants to type. Some are successful in it and now I think I’ve got a taste of it too, all thanks to God, my good teachers and dearest blogging friends.
With a month more to complete 2014, new journeys to make, new vistas to visit, new people to come, life move ahead with lots and lots of hope!
Words & Lines 