For it sweeps you off like pile of hay
Altering the course of your life
Tomorrow will be yet another day
Ever not imagined than you've today
September 29, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Friday, September 26, 2008
Prem is back!!!
No, it's not Salman Khan or Shahid Kapoor this time, but the hottest new dude in town - Sonu Sood. And does he look handsome or what! *swoon*The film Ek Vivaah... Aisa Bhi is coming out in November this year. yipiieeeee!!!
Check out Prem's signature dialog in the film: "saat janam... kaafi hai na?" on here.
Can't wait to listen to the new songs of Ravindra Jain. Here are some of them:
Song 1:
aaj ke imtehaan ki fikr nahin
jeet kar hum yahaan se guzarenge
asliyat to pataa chalegi jab
ishq ke imtehaan se guzrenge
Song 2:
mujh mein zinda hai woh
us mein zinda hoon main
Song 3:
mandir hai (3) ghar yeh hamara
mandir hai ghar yeh hamara
utna hi paavan utna hi sundar
utna hi pyaara pyaara
mandir hai ghar yeh hamara (2)
Click on the link above for trailers and other info. Long live Rajshri!
Image rights: Rajshri
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Gujarati Couplet
gujaare je shire taare jagat no naath te sehje
gaNyu je pyaaru pyaaraa e ati pyaaru gaNi leje
By Shri Balashankar Kantharia
ગુજારે જે શિરે તારે જગતનો નાથ તે સહેજે
ગણ્યું જે પ્યારું પ્યારાએ અતી પ્યારું ગણી લેજે.
Translation:
Bear the sufferings that are given to you by the master of universe.
Consider that it (the above) is liked by the one who is liked by everyone (God almighty) and accept it happily/gladly.
gaNyu je pyaaru pyaaraa e ati pyaaru gaNi leje
By Shri Balashankar Kantharia
ગુજારે જે શિરે તારે જગતનો નાથ તે સહેજે
ગણ્યું જે પ્યારું પ્યારાએ અતી પ્યારું ગણી લેજે.
Translation:
Bear the sufferings that are given to you by the master of universe.
Consider that it (the above) is liked by the one who is liked by everyone (God almighty) and accept it happily/gladly.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Road Adventures in India
January 25, 2008
As I look forward to my next India trip, I couldn't help remember my last one of early 2006 and the roadside adventures that I got to experience back then. And on top of that, after I read Aspi's The great Indian license trick, I just had to write this up!
Plane close up
Originally uploaded by kananj
It started from the airport. Fortunately, the custom folks didn't even look at me or my baggage more than a glimpse so I was very pleasantly surprised and still thank God for none of those hassles that I have heard horrid stories about.
Now since we had to switch the airports at Mumbai from international to domestic, we had to take the shuttle bus. So this driver or the shuttle bus helper guy shows up, and even before I say anything and without asking me, he starts picking up my baggage from carts and starts loading it on the bus baggage storage area, so I just thought he was being nice (yeah right!). After he loads up all the baggage, he gives me a begging face look and asks me for some money. I said I don't have anything and that since I didn't ask him for any help in the first place, I didn't owe him anything. He kept going on about it... and to be honest, I didn't keep anything but a twenty dollar bill with me, which I didn't want to give for some guy who volunteers to act like a coolie. So I told him looking into his eyes that I did not have anything for him and that he stop asking for the money. Finally, I ended up giving him some chocolates and candies that I had in my purse, as that was the only thing I could give but that experience taught me one thing - as soon as these guys see it is female passengers from the US, they try to act smart and make money off of us. I don't like people who cheat like that to make money off of innocent travelers. Beware of these *nice* guys.
Traffic at Tran darwaja
Originally uploaded by kananj
Another one was driving around with my uncle in Ahmedabad. So his car is an early 90s make; some of them don't have the seat belts and the drivers are supposed to carry around this proof of what year the model is in car so they can prove that their car is excused from having no belts. That evening we were getting late to reach for a dinner and this cop pulls us over. My uncle doesn't have the little piece of paper that this police officer needs, so he starts talking about a Rs. 100 ticket for him, but my uncle who is a professor in a reputed school in the city, starts apologizing and telling him where he teaches and what, etc. And then the officer sees rest of us in the car and thinks over and finally lets uncle go with a warning. I was pleasantly surprised we didn't even bribe him and he let us go. Key to not get a ticket, have a whole bunch of innocent looking passengers in car, tell them how big your workplace is and finally... apologize. Tada! no ticket for you.
Yet another incident happened in Ahmedabad, it was a friend of mine who was driving me around and we almost ran a red light at a big intersection at rush hour. And how can a cop miss that who's standing like right in our faces? He came right up to us and pulled us over. My friend admitted she hadn't seen the red light and apologized and promised it won't happen again. He warned and let us go without the ticket. :) yoo hoo! more money for shopping. ;)
Btw, did you know, the seat-belt requirement is only for the driver, not the front seat passenger! :D I still wonder why... if you know the answer, do let me know.
This one takes the cake. It happened in Rajkot. So my cousin, who also happens to be a professor in a reputed college in the city, was driving us to a book store which is quite far from home. And since mom and I had to go shopping afterwards, he said he will give us both a ride on his scooter. In hurry, he forgot to remove his hat and wear a helmet instead. So right in middle of an extremely crowded intersection, a cop comes running in the middle where we are trying to balance the two-wheeler with three of us adults' weight and such slow speed, or rather no speed at all. The cop removes the scooter keys and runs back to the curbside in corner. So we have come to a complete stop in middle of jam packed intersection. Imagine the scene... traffic is already bad and there is a scooter with three adults on and not moving at all. Hahahaha! For a moment, I didn't even realize what had happened as I was too busy watching the traffic. I mean come on, it's so much fun to watch that kind of traffic - that too from being in middle of it - when the only kind of traffic you get to see on daily basis is bumper to bumper cars on a five-lane freeway. In any case, eventually I realized we had come to complete stop because my cousin started getting very upset at what had just happened. It's humiliating to have been stopped by a cop in middle of cross roads, that too if you're a professor! I was feeling bad and funny at the same time. Finally, another cop, who wasn't blowing his top, came back with the keys realizing that there was no way we could pull over on the side without the key. And we moved on the side. My cousin was too busy getting upset with the polite officer about what the other officer just did (that is to remove the keys like that). He said they do this because a lot of people don't even stop and run away from such crowded intersections so they started this new tradition of removing the keys to keep crazy drivers from running away! LOL I like that idea... wish they tried it some time here in the US. I think the cop will get a ticket for doing that. ;) The most fun part now - so the nicer cop says he must write a ticket as we were riding three adults, which for some reasons is illegal? (not sure whether that's true at all as I saw four adults on a motorbike in Ahmedabad just a couple of days back before this happened) and that the driver isn't wearing a helmet. So we had to pay the fine for a ticket. Then he asks us whether we were going to be driving around like that for more time and when we said yes, he told us he will write us a paper ticket so that next time around when a cop stops us, we can just show that to them and they won't give us another ticket. Hahahaha! Apparently, the paper ticket costs Rs. 100 and non-paper ticket is Rs. 50. We took the paper ticket paid off the fine and went about our shopping trip. When I told this story to a friend of mine in US, she told me about how another friend of hers got two tickets within less than a few minutes for not stopping at two consecutive stop signs in a residential area.
And a couple of more photos to add to the series!
In India, pedestrians are not the only ones who have a right of way.
Cows crossing the road
Originally uploaded by kananj
Traffic goes which way again?
Driving from Paravadi to Damnagar
Originally uploaded by kananj
Were these adventures enjoyable? You bet!
As I look forward to my next India trip, I couldn't help remember my last one of early 2006 and the roadside adventures that I got to experience back then. And on top of that, after I read Aspi's The great Indian license trick, I just had to write this up!
Plane close up
Originally uploaded by kananj
It started from the airport. Fortunately, the custom folks didn't even look at me or my baggage more than a glimpse so I was very pleasantly surprised and still thank God for none of those hassles that I have heard horrid stories about.
Now since we had to switch the airports at Mumbai from international to domestic, we had to take the shuttle bus. So this driver or the shuttle bus helper guy shows up, and even before I say anything and without asking me, he starts picking up my baggage from carts and starts loading it on the bus baggage storage area, so I just thought he was being nice (yeah right!). After he loads up all the baggage, he gives me a begging face look and asks me for some money. I said I don't have anything and that since I didn't ask him for any help in the first place, I didn't owe him anything. He kept going on about it... and to be honest, I didn't keep anything but a twenty dollar bill with me, which I didn't want to give for some guy who volunteers to act like a coolie. So I told him looking into his eyes that I did not have anything for him and that he stop asking for the money. Finally, I ended up giving him some chocolates and candies that I had in my purse, as that was the only thing I could give but that experience taught me one thing - as soon as these guys see it is female passengers from the US, they try to act smart and make money off of us. I don't like people who cheat like that to make money off of innocent travelers. Beware of these *nice* guys.
Traffic at Tran darwaja
Originally uploaded by kananj
Another one was driving around with my uncle in Ahmedabad. So his car is an early 90s make; some of them don't have the seat belts and the drivers are supposed to carry around this proof of what year the model is in car so they can prove that their car is excused from having no belts. That evening we were getting late to reach for a dinner and this cop pulls us over. My uncle doesn't have the little piece of paper that this police officer needs, so he starts talking about a Rs. 100 ticket for him, but my uncle who is a professor in a reputed school in the city, starts apologizing and telling him where he teaches and what, etc. And then the officer sees rest of us in the car and thinks over and finally lets uncle go with a warning. I was pleasantly surprised we didn't even bribe him and he let us go. Key to not get a ticket, have a whole bunch of innocent looking passengers in car, tell them how big your workplace is and finally... apologize. Tada! no ticket for you.
Yet another incident happened in Ahmedabad, it was a friend of mine who was driving me around and we almost ran a red light at a big intersection at rush hour. And how can a cop miss that who's standing like right in our faces? He came right up to us and pulled us over. My friend admitted she hadn't seen the red light and apologized and promised it won't happen again. He warned and let us go without the ticket. :) yoo hoo! more money for shopping. ;)
Btw, did you know, the seat-belt requirement is only for the driver, not the front seat passenger! :D I still wonder why... if you know the answer, do let me know.
This one takes the cake. It happened in Rajkot. So my cousin, who also happens to be a professor in a reputed college in the city, was driving us to a book store which is quite far from home. And since mom and I had to go shopping afterwards, he said he will give us both a ride on his scooter. In hurry, he forgot to remove his hat and wear a helmet instead. So right in middle of an extremely crowded intersection, a cop comes running in the middle where we are trying to balance the two-wheeler with three of us adults' weight and such slow speed, or rather no speed at all. The cop removes the scooter keys and runs back to the curbside in corner. So we have come to a complete stop in middle of jam packed intersection. Imagine the scene... traffic is already bad and there is a scooter with three adults on and not moving at all. Hahahaha! For a moment, I didn't even realize what had happened as I was too busy watching the traffic. I mean come on, it's so much fun to watch that kind of traffic - that too from being in middle of it - when the only kind of traffic you get to see on daily basis is bumper to bumper cars on a five-lane freeway. In any case, eventually I realized we had come to complete stop because my cousin started getting very upset at what had just happened. It's humiliating to have been stopped by a cop in middle of cross roads, that too if you're a professor! I was feeling bad and funny at the same time. Finally, another cop, who wasn't blowing his top, came back with the keys realizing that there was no way we could pull over on the side without the key. And we moved on the side. My cousin was too busy getting upset with the polite officer about what the other officer just did (that is to remove the keys like that). He said they do this because a lot of people don't even stop and run away from such crowded intersections so they started this new tradition of removing the keys to keep crazy drivers from running away! LOL I like that idea... wish they tried it some time here in the US. I think the cop will get a ticket for doing that. ;) The most fun part now - so the nicer cop says he must write a ticket as we were riding three adults, which for some reasons is illegal? (not sure whether that's true at all as I saw four adults on a motorbike in Ahmedabad just a couple of days back before this happened) and that the driver isn't wearing a helmet. So we had to pay the fine for a ticket. Then he asks us whether we were going to be driving around like that for more time and when we said yes, he told us he will write us a paper ticket so that next time around when a cop stops us, we can just show that to them and they won't give us another ticket. Hahahaha! Apparently, the paper ticket costs Rs. 100 and non-paper ticket is Rs. 50. We took the paper ticket paid off the fine and went about our shopping trip. When I told this story to a friend of mine in US, she told me about how another friend of hers got two tickets within less than a few minutes for not stopping at two consecutive stop signs in a residential area.
And a couple of more photos to add to the series!
In India, pedestrians are not the only ones who have a right of way.
Cows crossing the road
Originally uploaded by kananj
Traffic goes which way again?
Driving from Paravadi to Damnagar
Originally uploaded by kananj
Were these adventures enjoyable? You bet!
Sunday, September 21, 2008
They call themselves Drum Girls
Out of the world choreography, excellent reflexes, strong legs and cute smiles, not to forget A LOT OF practice and the result is:
Saturday, September 20, 2008
And the award goes to...
my songs blog 'Lyriks I like'.
*applause*
That's right. :)
My HFM blog has been awarded that aakha blogistan mein famous Brilliante Weblog Premio 2008 award by none other then Neha! And I'm delighted to accept the award, Neha. ;) :D THANK YOU SO MUCH!
As the tradition must continue now it is time for me to choose 8 of my favorite blogs to confer upon this same award to!
It is very difficult to pick and choose from so many fabulous blogs that I have come across; so I'll try to pick the ones who haven't received this award before.
In an alphabetical order:
And last but not least, a big thanks to everyone else who writes their blogs, and reads this blog. Though I have to admit, I didn't start blogging for the social value it carries but it was only for myself and now that I get to read my fellow bloggers views, I have been feeling more enthusiastic to write my thoughts and write about my favorite things including those songs. Thank you all!
*applause*
That's right. :)
My HFM blog has been awarded that aakha blogistan mein famous Brilliante Weblog Premio 2008 award by none other then Neha! And I'm delighted to accept the award, Neha. ;) :D THANK YOU SO MUCH!
As the tradition must continue now it is time for me to choose 8 of my favorite blogs to confer upon this same award to!
It is very difficult to pick and choose from so many fabulous blogs that I have come across; so I'll try to pick the ones who haven't received this award before.
In an alphabetical order:
- Aspi's Drift - for all kinds of Entertainments with capital E. Thank you, Aspi.
- Beth Loves Bollywood - for the best looking header photos ever! and of course for the sincere love of Bollywood. Thank you, Beth.
- Idle Moments - for the beautiful photographs and beautiful writing from the heart. Thank you, Ami.
- lifeiscool - for those thought provoking posts and questions. Thank you, Chinmai.
- Sayesha on the rocks - for the way she shares her moments of life in the most extraordinary way. Thank you, Sayesha.
- The Little Ranting Reptile and Other Stories.... - first of all, for not going extinct! :P and for the silliest and record breaking number of posts per month and teaching some valuable lessons in them; and that anda-z with how you play with words... ;) Thank you, Stupidosaur.
- This I am grateful for today... - for the positive energy that is being spread all around from each little post. Thank you, Kashmira.
- Wanderingmindz's Weblog - for bringing back the Sanskrit literature to my life with extremely helpful translations. Thank you, Medha.
And last but not least, a big thanks to everyone else who writes their blogs, and reads this blog. Though I have to admit, I didn't start blogging for the social value it carries but it was only for myself and now that I get to read my fellow bloggers views, I have been feeling more enthusiastic to write my thoughts and write about my favorite things including those songs. Thank you all!
Friday, September 19, 2008
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Disaster's in the air
Nope, I didn't say that. Timon did. :P
I was just humming that Can You Feel the Love Tonight song. Have you heard it?
Timon: I can see what's happening
Pumba: What?
Timon: And they don't have a clue!
Pumba: Who?
Timon: They'll fall in love and here's the bottom line
Our trio's down to two
Pumba: Oh
Timon: The sweet caress of twilight
There's magic everywhere
And with all this romantic atmosphere
Disaster's in the air
Chorus: Can you feel the love tonight?
The peace the evening brings
The world, for once, in perfect harmony
With all its living things
Simba: So many things to tell her
But how to make her see
The truth about my past? Impossible!
She'd turn away from me
Nala: He's holding back, he's hiding
But what, I can't decide
Why won't he be the king I know he is
The king I see inside?
Chorus: Can you feel the love tonight?
The peace the evening brings
The world, for once, in perfect harmony
With all its living things
Can you feel the love tonight?
You needn't look too far
Stealing through the night's uncertainties
Love is where they are
Timon: And if he falls in love tonight
It can be assumed
Pumba: His carefree days with us are history
Both: In short, our pal is doomed! (cry)
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Romance in the air at Sakhi’s and as she turned the fan on, I too felt the fresh breeze of that air.
Disclaimer: I am not sure what kind of love we're talking about here and also, I don't know the actual definition of love so please note that while you read the answers.
Here I go:
Now here are the rules:
RULE #1: People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blogs and replace any question that they dislike with a new question formulated by themselves.
RULE #2: Tag 6 people to do this quiz and they cannot refuse. These people must state who they were tagged by, cannot tag the person whom they were tagged by, and must continue this game by sending it to other people.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
While we're still talking about love, here is a cutsie love song I adore from the I love Lucy show. It is picturized on Lucy and Ricky.
The Loveliest Night of the Year
when you are in love, it’s the loveliest night of the year,
stars twinkle above, and you almost can touch them from here.
words fall into rhyme, everytime you are holding me near.
when you are in love, it’s the loveliest night of the year.
waltzing along in the blue, like a breeze drifting over the sand,
thrilled by the wonder of you, and the wonderful touch of your hand and
my heart starts to beat, like a child when a birthday is near.
so kiss me, my sweet. it’s the loveliest night of the year.
(Lyrics by Mario Lanza)
"loveliest night of the year" starts at 2:40 mins.
I was just humming that Can You Feel the Love Tonight song. Have you heard it?
Timon: I can see what's happening
Pumba: What?
Timon: And they don't have a clue!
Pumba: Who?
Timon: They'll fall in love and here's the bottom line
Our trio's down to two
Pumba: Oh
Timon: The sweet caress of twilight
There's magic everywhere
And with all this romantic atmosphere
Disaster's in the air
Chorus: Can you feel the love tonight?
The peace the evening brings
The world, for once, in perfect harmony
With all its living things
Simba: So many things to tell her
But how to make her see
The truth about my past? Impossible!
She'd turn away from me
Nala: He's holding back, he's hiding
But what, I can't decide
Why won't he be the king I know he is
The king I see inside?
Chorus: Can you feel the love tonight?
The peace the evening brings
The world, for once, in perfect harmony
With all its living things
Can you feel the love tonight?
You needn't look too far
Stealing through the night's uncertainties
Love is where they are
Timon: And if he falls in love tonight
It can be assumed
Pumba: His carefree days with us are history
Both: In short, our pal is doomed! (cry)
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Romance in the air at Sakhi’s and as she turned the fan on, I too felt the fresh breeze of that air.
Disclaimer: I am not sure what kind of love we're talking about here and also, I don't know the actual definition of love so please note that while you read the answers.
Here I go:
- If your lover betrayed you, what will your reaction be? Then it was never meant to be; and if that was the case, better now than later.
- If you can have a dream to come true, what would it be? Detachment from life at all times. Hmm.. now there' something to dream about.
- What do you love the most in your lover? Kindness
- What would you do with a billion dollars? Can't tell right now but would rather share it with others than just spend it all myself. :D
- Will you fall in love with your best friend? Ummm.. it's difficult to gamble so much.
- Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone? How about both? If I had to pick one I'd pick the first one. It is an emotion to be experienced at least once in a lifetime.
- How long do you intend to wait for someone you really love? So long the patience doesn't run out. :)
- If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do? Pray to God for good and better things in their life.
- If you like to act with someone, who will it be? Your gf/bf or an actress/actor? Acting? Are you kidding me? But if I were forced to, I'd rather pick an actor/actress.
- What takes you down the fastest? Nosy people who ask personal questions. Just one will do, but it better not be you! ;)
- How would you see yourself in ten years’ time? No idea. Hopefully closer to achieving that dream I talked about above.
- What’s your fear? To not being able to let go.
- What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is? A mysterious gal who is a fabulous writer. :)
- Would you rather be single and rich or married but poor? How about happily married but poor? :P
- What’s the first thing you do when you wake up? Open the window blinds to let the daylight come in.
- Would you give all in a relationship? Meaning? If it means give it my best, then yes I would. :)
- If you fall in love with two people simultaneously, who would you pick? Pick for what? I already love more than two people right now. LOL!
- Would you forgive and forget, no matter how horrible a thing that special someone has done? Forgive? Yes. Forget? I don't know. I could become indifferent towards them.
- If you get to go back in time and fall in love all over again, would it still be with the same person? This question makes me feel like Basanti.
- List 6 people to tag:
Haan to kahan thi main? Haan... Ramgadh ka ek rupaiya aur Belapur ka dedh...
Phir maine socha, chalo back in time jaana hi hai to hum chale jaate hai lekin agar love all over again karna pade to hum kar bhi sakte hai aur nahin bhi. Aur agar kar liya to phir to wohi baat ho gayi jo pehle thi aur agar nahin kiya to kisi aur se kar lete hai. Lekin us ke liye mujhe Shiv mandir mein jaa kar thode aur somvaar ke vrat karne padenge. :P
Kashmira
Pitu
Sayesha
Soham
Solitaire
Stupidosaur
Now here are the rules:
RULE #1: People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blogs and replace any question that they dislike with a new question formulated by themselves.
RULE #2: Tag 6 people to do this quiz and they cannot refuse. These people must state who they were tagged by, cannot tag the person whom they were tagged by, and must continue this game by sending it to other people.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
While we're still talking about love, here is a cutsie love song I adore from the I love Lucy show. It is picturized on Lucy and Ricky.
The Loveliest Night of the Year
when you are in love, it’s the loveliest night of the year,
stars twinkle above, and you almost can touch them from here.
words fall into rhyme, everytime you are holding me near.
when you are in love, it’s the loveliest night of the year.
waltzing along in the blue, like a breeze drifting over the sand,
thrilled by the wonder of you, and the wonderful touch of your hand and
my heart starts to beat, like a child when a birthday is near.
so kiss me, my sweet. it’s the loveliest night of the year.
(Lyrics by Mario Lanza)
"loveliest night of the year" starts at 2:40 mins.
Moving in today...
Yup, some of the old posts and comments are moving to this blog today.
Sorry folks, for your feeds are going to be bombarded with some restaurant reviews and photo posts and a whole bunch of old comments. Please bear with me while I'm in process of combining two of my ignored blogs to this main one.
Thanks for your patience & love.
Kanan
Sorry folks, for your feeds are going to be bombarded with some restaurant reviews and photo posts and a whole bunch of old comments. Please bear with me while I'm in process of combining two of my ignored blogs to this main one.
Thanks for your patience & love.
Kanan
Friday, September 12, 2008
Do you want to go out and play?
I so want to...
You know what I just realized? In India, a kid almost never gets bored. Why? Because we have games/sports that need almost no expenditure. And while I was reading some of the comments on my previous posts, I was reminded of them - the amateur sports that I grew up playing with the neighborhood kids/friends/cousins. My memory of me playing them is good but the rules I've forgotten for some. Here's my best try to recall them.
My lovely readers, I present to you the amateur sports I grew up playing. As you'll notice, a lot of these have Gujarati names and that's because that's what we'd call them.
Note: All Gujarati words are in italics.
dablaa ice-pice: Or is it I-spies? Or I-spice? I don't know. That's what we called it, without actually knowing the reason behind it. In any case, this one requires any old dabloo (tin-can) and a whole bunch of players. I think this one isn't that famous in charotar area because I usually played this with my cousins when I went to Bhavnagar for holidays. So speaking of the rules, they're similar to hide-n-seek and some more; once we had the players and equipment ready, we would gather up in the large front yard or the little smaller backyard. A circle was drawn in the middle of the field that had radius of a person's foot. One person (we'll call him person A) was appointed as the finder, whose daav (turn) it was to find everyone who's hidden - that is all other players. One of the other players would throw the dabloo far away and person A was supposed to go collect it and place it back in the circle. Until then all other players went in hiding. Then it was person A's turn to go look for all these people. If person A saw anyone (say person B), he/she would run back to the dabloo and kick it away from the circle screaming "dablaa ice-pice". Now it would be person B's daav (turn). If any of the other players can sneak up to the dabloo while player A is away from the dabloo, then they come and kick it screaming "dablaa ice-pice". Person A would take the turn again in that case. This exhausting fun game continues for hours.
kho-kho: This one has two versions - beThi (sitting) kho & ubhi (standing) kho.
langDi or langaDi: This actually means "one legged". More famous during the rainy seasons mostly as the ground would be cool and wet; in summers we avoided it mostly as the dirt would be burning hot as we played this one barefoot. For this one we draw rectangles on ground with a stick or piece of stone about 2x4 ft stacked so that the 4ft side of rectangles touched one another. There would be about 8 to 10 of these rectangles depending upon how much space we had available where we were playing and then at one end of it was a huge round circle. The other end, we will call it the "begin" area. While traveling in the rectangles, each player can only step in it once and with just one foot so they hop from one end of the rectangles to the big circle hopping on one foot. Players can use both feet in the big circle. There was a dice like piece that each of us made with a broken tile or a flat piece of rock. We used to call them kukari or kuki. All the players come up with a sequence of how they will play. e.g. Players A B and C would decide that they will play in order C, A, and B so then person C takes first turn. (There are ways to determine this as well, but we will talk about it later). So now it is the turn of person C. He/she stands at the "begin" area and throws his/her kukari in the nearest first rectangle. After they do this, they skip stepping into that first rectangle and travel all the way up to the circle. While coming back, they stop in rectangle 2 and pick up their kukari and step out with two feet. As long as they completed this successfully, without losing balance and without throwing the kukari outside the circle, they get to go to next rectangle. Thus, they try to complete all of the rectangles and eventually the big circle as well. Once they finish them all, they turn their back towards the drawn area and throw their kukari with eyes closed on it. Wherever it lands, if within any rectangle then that becomes their home. Meaning next time around they are allowed to step two feet in that rectangle. If it lands in the big circle, they have a choice of what rectangle to pick, you can not pick the circle as your home as it is universal home. Once they have picked the home, they get to decide whether they will allow guests to step single foot, both feet or none in their home. The others have to follow these rules, if they don't then they lose turn. If the kukari goes out of the boundaries or the player loses balance, they lose their turn. There are a lot of variations of this game. One of them being how it is drawn on the ground and the other being how the players bring the kukari back to the "begin" area.
nadi ke parvat: The exact translation is "river or mountain". This was again one of those games that I played a lot more with my cousins as our grandparents home had a huge yard and lot of steps/oTalaa around. I don't know what oTalaa are in English but it's a raised platform like area touching a house, about one or two feet high. So for this one, one player would take a turn (player A) and then everyone would stand around player A (not within their reach, of course) and ask "nadi ke parvat?" Once player A declares whether they want nadi (river) or parvat (mountain) they would get to stand on either the ground (being the river) if they asked for nadi or on the platform areas (being the mountains) if they asked for parvat. The goal of other players (player B) is to try to step in the area where player A is standing and if player A tags them while they're in that designated area, that player B loses. Player B takes their turn next.
pakaD daav: This is the typical game of tag. The more players the better and the bigger the field the more fun the game!
sangeet khurshi: This is our traditional musical chairs. Let me know if anyone wants to know more about this one. I think almost everyone knows how this is played.
satoDi: This is the game they show Aishwarya Rai playing in song "man mohini" of Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and all of them playing in milan abhi aadha adhoora hai of Vivah (@ 1:45 mins). There are two teams with equal number of members. Seven round flat pieces of wood or rock are needed. These could be bought out in the stores as well as made at home from old broken tiles or stone pieces. Also, a ball is needed; an old tennis ball, a cricket ball or any other ball that can bounce and dismount the seven flat pieces would do. Be sure to choose the right kind of ball as it's also thrown at the team members. :P So to begin the game, the seven flat pieces are orderly stacked (smallest on top) in the center of the grounds and a circle is drawn around it (about the size of one foot diameter). Then there is a line drawn about 8 to 10 ft away from it. Say team A takes turn to throw the ball at satoDi. One team A member will stand behind the line and throw the ball towards the satoDi to make the stacked pieces fall apart. As soon as at least one of them gets thrown away from the stack, the game has begun. Team A runs away from the ball to try and re-stack the seven pieces back in the exact same order they were placed before. The goal of Team B members is to throw the ball at eachother while hitting one of the team A members with the ball before the satoDi is stacked back to normal position. Whoever finishes first, wins the game. Once all the pieces of satoDi are placed back in a nice pile, one of the team A member screams "SATODI" to let everyone know they've managed to meet their goal. If team B member manages to tag any team A member, they scream "OUT". That's when the game ends. The winner gets to throw the ball at satoDi in next round.
thappo: This is one silly old hide & seek game. The only difference was, we would draw a big circle on some wall with a chalk or a piece of orange brick or a piece of black coal at about 5 ft height from the ground where the person whose turn it was (person A) to shut their eyes would rest their head and hide their eyes behind their palms. This made sure they weren't peeking out to watch where everyone's hiding. They were usually forced to count up to 50 or 100 before they could open their eyes. Once they found someone, they'd rush back to the circle on wall and slap their hand on it screaming "thappo". If some other player sneaked out before person A could see them, they'd run to the circle to do the same before person A got there. In the latter case, it person A would yet again take turn to shut their eyes and recount until everyone hid again, otherwise whoever they found would take the turn.
zoo: The silliest game we ever played and the most fun! We used to play this one in our extra wide living room that was somewhere around 20x20 ft size. But you can play this one practically roomy place with clear ground. A wide belt is drawn on the ground about the size of 5 ft wide to 20 ft long. The player taking their turn (player A) stands within this belt. All the other players stand on one side of the belt and their job is to cross the belt without getting tagged by player A. Every other player must make at least one round trip on the other side of the belt (side B) and back (side A). While other players are on side B, player A can even tag them if they're within their hands' reach or while they're crossing the belt. So then what's the "zoo"? Well, that's the sound other players make while crossing the belt. I think that has been in place to draw attention of player A that there's a player crossing. This gets most fun when only one player is left on side A who still needs to cross over and come back and player A won't let go but face them at all times. The game can go on for hours.
gilli DanDaa: I didn't really play this much as it wasn't too famous around the neighborhood, but do know how to make the gilli and DanDaa and how to play.
gulel: This is our typical game of slingshot. While playing this one, better make sure the neighborhood uncles and aunties are not watching when the flying objects go into their glass windows or car windshields. ;)
I think for the indoor/sitting down games of paanchika, chopaaT, patta, and other similar games there would have to be a separate post some day.
So which one of these you're most likely to play? Or played? Do share.
You know what I just realized? In India, a kid almost never gets bored. Why? Because we have games/sports that need almost no expenditure. And while I was reading some of the comments on my previous posts, I was reminded of them - the amateur sports that I grew up playing with the neighborhood kids/friends/cousins. My memory of me playing them is good but the rules I've forgotten for some. Here's my best try to recall them.
My lovely readers, I present to you the amateur sports I grew up playing. As you'll notice, a lot of these have Gujarati names and that's because that's what we'd call them.
Note: All Gujarati words are in italics.
dablaa ice-pice: Or is it I-spies? Or I-spice? I don't know. That's what we called it, without actually knowing the reason behind it. In any case, this one requires any old dabloo (tin-can) and a whole bunch of players. I think this one isn't that famous in charotar area because I usually played this with my cousins when I went to Bhavnagar for holidays. So speaking of the rules, they're similar to hide-n-seek and some more; once we had the players and equipment ready, we would gather up in the large front yard or the little smaller backyard. A circle was drawn in the middle of the field that had radius of a person's foot. One person (we'll call him person A) was appointed as the finder, whose daav (turn) it was to find everyone who's hidden - that is all other players. One of the other players would throw the dabloo far away and person A was supposed to go collect it and place it back in the circle. Until then all other players went in hiding. Then it was person A's turn to go look for all these people. If person A saw anyone (say person B), he/she would run back to the dabloo and kick it away from the circle screaming "dablaa ice-pice". Now it would be person B's daav (turn). If any of the other players can sneak up to the dabloo while player A is away from the dabloo, then they come and kick it screaming "dablaa ice-pice". Person A would take the turn again in that case. This exhausting fun game continues for hours.
kho-kho: This one has two versions - beThi (sitting) kho & ubhi (standing) kho.
- beThi kho: This one needs about ten or so players. The official rules say there must be 12 players but I think a few less are fine too. Two of these players stand at the end of an invisible line and rest of them sit down facing alternate direction in between. The ones sitting down sit in the ready-to-get-up-and-run pose. One of the standing players (player A) begins chasing towards other standing player (player B) to tag him/her. Player A can only travel clock-wise and can not pass from in between the sitting players, whereas player B can travel in any direction but of course it must be around the sitting players, and not like 10 ft away from where everyone is sitting down. The trick is, player A can not cross in between the sitting players but can give a "kho" to a person facing the same direction as player A. Since "kho" is given to a person from their back so now the player who received kho (player C) gets up (player A sits in their spot facing the same direction) and chases player B to tag him/her. There is no rules on how soon person C can give a kho to next player so it's up to them to decide. So the game actually tests the players ability of how soon can they can get away without being tagged for the longest time. We used to play the modified version of the game so we didn't have two teams but just one. When a player gets tagged, he/she will take up the chaser role and the tagger will become the future taggie.
- ubhi kho: This one has almost similar concept as the beThi kho, except for the players stand in a big circle facing alternate sides and the chaser is either trapped inside or outside this circle during their turn until they give kho to a player from their back. The taggie can run around almost everywhere within the circle and near the perimeter of the circle without being caught.
langDi or langaDi: This actually means "one legged". More famous during the rainy seasons mostly as the ground would be cool and wet; in summers we avoided it mostly as the dirt would be burning hot as we played this one barefoot. For this one we draw rectangles on ground with a stick or piece of stone about 2x4 ft stacked so that the 4ft side of rectangles touched one another. There would be about 8 to 10 of these rectangles depending upon how much space we had available where we were playing and then at one end of it was a huge round circle. The other end, we will call it the "begin" area. While traveling in the rectangles, each player can only step in it once and with just one foot so they hop from one end of the rectangles to the big circle hopping on one foot. Players can use both feet in the big circle. There was a dice like piece that each of us made with a broken tile or a flat piece of rock. We used to call them kukari or kuki. All the players come up with a sequence of how they will play. e.g. Players A B and C would decide that they will play in order C, A, and B so then person C takes first turn. (There are ways to determine this as well, but we will talk about it later). So now it is the turn of person C. He/she stands at the "begin" area and throws his/her kukari in the nearest first rectangle. After they do this, they skip stepping into that first rectangle and travel all the way up to the circle. While coming back, they stop in rectangle 2 and pick up their kukari and step out with two feet. As long as they completed this successfully, without losing balance and without throwing the kukari outside the circle, they get to go to next rectangle. Thus, they try to complete all of the rectangles and eventually the big circle as well. Once they finish them all, they turn their back towards the drawn area and throw their kukari with eyes closed on it. Wherever it lands, if within any rectangle then that becomes their home. Meaning next time around they are allowed to step two feet in that rectangle. If it lands in the big circle, they have a choice of what rectangle to pick, you can not pick the circle as your home as it is universal home. Once they have picked the home, they get to decide whether they will allow guests to step single foot, both feet or none in their home. The others have to follow these rules, if they don't then they lose turn. If the kukari goes out of the boundaries or the player loses balance, they lose their turn. There are a lot of variations of this game. One of them being how it is drawn on the ground and the other being how the players bring the kukari back to the "begin" area.
nadi ke parvat: The exact translation is "river or mountain". This was again one of those games that I played a lot more with my cousins as our grandparents home had a huge yard and lot of steps/oTalaa around. I don't know what oTalaa are in English but it's a raised platform like area touching a house, about one or two feet high. So for this one, one player would take a turn (player A) and then everyone would stand around player A (not within their reach, of course) and ask "nadi ke parvat?" Once player A declares whether they want nadi (river) or parvat (mountain) they would get to stand on either the ground (being the river) if they asked for nadi or on the platform areas (being the mountains) if they asked for parvat. The goal of other players (player B) is to try to step in the area where player A is standing and if player A tags them while they're in that designated area, that player B loses. Player B takes their turn next.
pakaD daav: This is the typical game of tag. The more players the better and the bigger the field the more fun the game!
sangeet khurshi: This is our traditional musical chairs. Let me know if anyone wants to know more about this one. I think almost everyone knows how this is played.
satoDi: This is the game they show Aishwarya Rai playing in song "man mohini" of Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and all of them playing in milan abhi aadha adhoora hai of Vivah (@ 1:45 mins). There are two teams with equal number of members. Seven round flat pieces of wood or rock are needed. These could be bought out in the stores as well as made at home from old broken tiles or stone pieces. Also, a ball is needed; an old tennis ball, a cricket ball or any other ball that can bounce and dismount the seven flat pieces would do. Be sure to choose the right kind of ball as it's also thrown at the team members. :P So to begin the game, the seven flat pieces are orderly stacked (smallest on top) in the center of the grounds and a circle is drawn around it (about the size of one foot diameter). Then there is a line drawn about 8 to 10 ft away from it. Say team A takes turn to throw the ball at satoDi. One team A member will stand behind the line and throw the ball towards the satoDi to make the stacked pieces fall apart. As soon as at least one of them gets thrown away from the stack, the game has begun. Team A runs away from the ball to try and re-stack the seven pieces back in the exact same order they were placed before. The goal of Team B members is to throw the ball at eachother while hitting one of the team A members with the ball before the satoDi is stacked back to normal position. Whoever finishes first, wins the game. Once all the pieces of satoDi are placed back in a nice pile, one of the team A member screams "SATODI" to let everyone know they've managed to meet their goal. If team B member manages to tag any team A member, they scream "OUT". That's when the game ends. The winner gets to throw the ball at satoDi in next round.
thappo: This is one silly old hide & seek game. The only difference was, we would draw a big circle on some wall with a chalk or a piece of orange brick or a piece of black coal at about 5 ft height from the ground where the person whose turn it was (person A) to shut their eyes would rest their head and hide their eyes behind their palms. This made sure they weren't peeking out to watch where everyone's hiding. They were usually forced to count up to 50 or 100 before they could open their eyes. Once they found someone, they'd rush back to the circle on wall and slap their hand on it screaming "thappo". If some other player sneaked out before person A could see them, they'd run to the circle to do the same before person A got there. In the latter case, it person A would yet again take turn to shut their eyes and recount until everyone hid again, otherwise whoever they found would take the turn.
zoo: The silliest game we ever played and the most fun! We used to play this one in our extra wide living room that was somewhere around 20x20 ft size. But you can play this one practically roomy place with clear ground. A wide belt is drawn on the ground about the size of 5 ft wide to 20 ft long. The player taking their turn (player A) stands within this belt. All the other players stand on one side of the belt and their job is to cross the belt without getting tagged by player A. Every other player must make at least one round trip on the other side of the belt (side B) and back (side A). While other players are on side B, player A can even tag them if they're within their hands' reach or while they're crossing the belt. So then what's the "zoo"? Well, that's the sound other players make while crossing the belt. I think that has been in place to draw attention of player A that there's a player crossing. This gets most fun when only one player is left on side A who still needs to cross over and come back and player A won't let go but face them at all times. The game can go on for hours.
gilli DanDaa: I didn't really play this much as it wasn't too famous around the neighborhood, but do know how to make the gilli and DanDaa and how to play.
gulel: This is our typical game of slingshot. While playing this one, better make sure the neighborhood uncles and aunties are not watching when the flying objects go into their glass windows or car windshields. ;)
I think for the indoor/sitting down games of paanchika, chopaaT, patta, and other similar games there would have to be a separate post some day.
So which one of these you're most likely to play? Or played? Do share.
Go Home Ike, Tina's Not Here!
This photo made me chuckle for a moment and then worried.
I've been reading the news and looking at the photos and just freaked out. It looks horrible. I'm glad my loved ones have left Galveston.
Mother Nature is taking her course and we just got to hold on, hold on to anything that we can.
God bless everyone.
I've been reading the news and looking at the photos and just freaked out. It looks horrible. I'm glad my loved ones have left Galveston.
Mother Nature is taking her course and we just got to hold on, hold on to anything that we can.
God bless everyone.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Elders Edwise
ધરમ ના કામમાં ઢીલ ન કરવી.
Gujarati: dharam naa kaam maa Dheel na karavi.
Translation: when it comes to do duty/charity, don't delay.
My notes: the meaning of dharam can be interpreted in more than one way.
Dictionary meanings:
Gujarati: dharam naa kaam maa Dheel na karavi.
Translation: when it comes to do duty/charity, don't delay.
My notes: the meaning of dharam can be interpreted in more than one way.
Dictionary meanings:
- ઢીલ - f. - delay, dilatoriness; looseness, slackness, laxity; indifference, carelessness
- ધરમ - m. - knowledge, faith or belief in the matter of morality, good behavior, death, life after death, God, etc.; religion; religious practices; merit or virtue; charity; duty, obligation; first of the four objects of life, property, quality, nature; name of Yudhisthira; Yama, God of death.
Friday, September 05, 2008
What is common in these 3 films?
- Jab We Met
- Lage Raho Munna Bhai
- Vivah
At first, it seems difficult to see this similarity but if you notice it, it's quite funny.
Aditya Kashyap's company office in JWM, the reception area of Jhanvi's radio station - World Space Satellite Radio in LRMB and Harishchandra group of companies reception area are all the same! Check it out. ;)
Jab We Met - Aditya Kashyap has just launched new calling card "Geet" and it was on TV, he climbs down the stairs
Jab We Met - Geet's family barges in after watching Aditya on TV launching the calling card
Lage Raho Munna Bhai - Bhai comes for radio interview
Vivah - Prem has just arrived to office after a game of squash
Vivah - The receptionist or Maria aunty as Prem calls her gets all excited because big boss (Prem's dad) has found a girl for him to marry!I still have a feeling that I've seen this office/reception area in more films, just can't recall now.
Another similar location is actually the white colored swing used in Hrishikesh Mukherjee's movies. (I'll have to look up for the photo of it) I think it's seen in Chupke Chupke, Khubsoorat, and a few others. Anyone remember that?
For frustration... there's Microsoft!
So all of a sudden it was gone!
When I press Ctrl + A in MS Word or Outlook compose email, all of the text did not get highlighted. I opened a few other applications to find out whether the "Select All" and "Ctrl + A" had been broken in other places too? Like Wordpad, Notepad, Excel, IE, Firefox and what not. All the places were fine. It was just this one stupid place - Word docs and the Compose more of Outlook. I knew before that they’re both related. So 2+ hours of frustration and frantic search on google and what do I find? Nothing, practically nothing. There’s some dude out there who has spent like weeks finding out that the installation of Rich Text Controls do this. I didn’t have any of that installed. Just an application that used MS Word components. Later on, I asked like a dozen other people whether their "Select All" option had a shortcut changed to something strange like "Ctrl + CLEAR (Num 5)" and they all said no. Btw, if you're wondering that Num 5 means the key 5 on the right hand side of the keyboard where you have the Numbers pad and Num Lock key.
I googled once again only to find nothing about it, even on Microsoft website, nothing turned up for MS Office 2003. They did have something about shortcut changes in Word 2007, but it wasn't 2003. I had 2003. Also found that as usual, they admitted having broken functionality for Select All in Word and Outlook but that too didn't resolve my issue. Where was my Control A, man!? I was super pissed at Microsoft and Bill Gates as usual for hours. Only if I could strangle them. *grrr*
I come back to my Word document after a couple of hours, still very annoyed. I start playing around the Options and Customize menu only to find out that the other application I was using had somehow modified my Normal.dot file so the Ctrl + A shortcut got deleted from it. How? I don't know.
Solution: Under the Tools menu -> Customize -> Commands tab -> Keyboard button -> went to Edit - EditSelectAll and clicked on "Reset All" button to restore the Ctrl + A shortcut under the Current Keys list.
As you can imagine, I felt utterly stupid and silly when I found the solution. But what can I say, that's Microsoft for you.
We can hate it but we can't live without it. *sigh*
When I press Ctrl + A in MS Word or Outlook compose email, all of the text did not get highlighted. I opened a few other applications to find out whether the "Select All" and "Ctrl + A" had been broken in other places too? Like Wordpad, Notepad, Excel, IE, Firefox and what not. All the places were fine. It was just this one stupid place - Word docs and the Compose more of Outlook. I knew before that they’re both related. So 2+ hours of frustration and frantic search on google and what do I find? Nothing, practically nothing. There’s some dude out there who has spent like weeks finding out that the installation of Rich Text Controls do this. I didn’t have any of that installed. Just an application that used MS Word components. Later on, I asked like a dozen other people whether their "Select All" option had a shortcut changed to something strange like "Ctrl + CLEAR (Num 5)" and they all said no. Btw, if you're wondering that Num 5 means the key 5 on the right hand side of the keyboard where you have the Numbers pad and Num Lock key.
I googled once again only to find nothing about it, even on Microsoft website, nothing turned up for MS Office 2003. They did have something about shortcut changes in Word 2007, but it wasn't 2003. I had 2003. Also found that as usual, they admitted having broken functionality for Select All in Word and Outlook but that too didn't resolve my issue. Where was my Control A, man!? I was super pissed at Microsoft and Bill Gates as usual for hours. Only if I could strangle them. *grrr*
I come back to my Word document after a couple of hours, still very annoyed. I start playing around the Options and Customize menu only to find out that the other application I was using had somehow modified my Normal.dot file so the Ctrl + A shortcut got deleted from it. How? I don't know.
Solution: Under the Tools menu -> Customize -> Commands tab -> Keyboard button -> went to Edit - EditSelectAll and clicked on "Reset All" button to restore the Ctrl + A shortcut under the Current Keys list.
As you can imagine, I felt utterly stupid and silly when I found the solution. But what can I say, that's Microsoft for you.
We can hate it but we can't live without it. *sigh*
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
|| ॐ गणेशाय नमः ||
vighneshwaraaya varadaaya surapriyaaya lambodaraaya sakalaaya jagdwitaaya |
naagaananaaya shrutiyagnavibhushitaaya gaurisutaaya gaNanaath namo namaste ||
Meaning:
vighneshwaraaya = the one who takes away obstacles
varadaaya = the one who blesses us
surapriyaaya = the one who is favorite of Gods
lambodaraaya = the one who has big belly
sakalaaya = whole
jagdwitaaya = the one who does good of the world
naagaananaaya = the one with an elephant head
shrutiyagnavibhushitaaya = the one who beautifies Shrutis of Ved and Yagna
gaurisutaaya = the one who is Son of Goddess Parvati
gaNanaath = the one who is Leader (naath) of all the gaNas
namo namaste = I respectfully bow to you
What do we learn from Lord Shri Ganesh? A lot and one of them is to respect our parents.
We all know of how when Shivji wanted to test the intelligence of His two Sons - Ganesh & Kartikey - he asked them to do parikrama (circumambulation) of the earth. When Kartikey went on to complete His parikrama on His peacock, Ganesh went around his parents Shivji & Gaurima praying them and did seven prarikramas. He completed the circumambulations before Kartikey did thus achieving blessings of His parents before Kartikey. They blessed Him.
He also has gotten His signature elephant head because of following orders of His Mother - Ma Parvati. When Shivji had returned from being away for years, He couldn't reconize His son and tried to enter the home and ended up fighting with Ganesh and beheading Him. Eventually when Ma Parvati came and saw Her son's condition, She requested Shivji to give Her son life. Shivji said whoever comes their way very first will be beheaded to give his head to Ganesh. An elephant came and Lord Ganesh became Gajaanan.
He lost his one tusk fighting to protect asleep Shivji against Parshuram who had come to visit His Guru (Shivji). Ganesh did not want a stranger waking His father up. They dueled and His right tusk was broken with Parshuram's axe. This is how He got the name of Ekdanta.
Here's to the God who inspires everyone! More modak/laddoos to all of us. :)
Happy Ganesh Chaturthi to all!
naagaananaaya shrutiyagnavibhushitaaya gaurisutaaya gaNanaath namo namaste ||
Meaning:
vighneshwaraaya = the one who takes away obstacles
varadaaya = the one who blesses us
surapriyaaya = the one who is favorite of Gods
lambodaraaya = the one who has big belly
sakalaaya = whole
jagdwitaaya = the one who does good of the world
naagaananaaya = the one with an elephant head
shrutiyagnavibhushitaaya = the one who beautifies Shrutis of Ved and Yagna
gaurisutaaya = the one who is Son of Goddess Parvati
gaNanaath = the one who is Leader (naath) of all the gaNas
namo namaste = I respectfully bow to you
What do we learn from Lord Shri Ganesh? A lot and one of them is to respect our parents.
We all know of how when Shivji wanted to test the intelligence of His two Sons - Ganesh & Kartikey - he asked them to do parikrama (circumambulation) of the earth. When Kartikey went on to complete His parikrama on His peacock, Ganesh went around his parents Shivji & Gaurima praying them and did seven prarikramas. He completed the circumambulations before Kartikey did thus achieving blessings of His parents before Kartikey. They blessed Him.
He also has gotten His signature elephant head because of following orders of His Mother - Ma Parvati. When Shivji had returned from being away for years, He couldn't reconize His son and tried to enter the home and ended up fighting with Ganesh and beheading Him. Eventually when Ma Parvati came and saw Her son's condition, She requested Shivji to give Her son life. Shivji said whoever comes their way very first will be beheaded to give his head to Ganesh. An elephant came and Lord Ganesh became Gajaanan.
He lost his one tusk fighting to protect asleep Shivji against Parshuram who had come to visit His Guru (Shivji). Ganesh did not want a stranger waking His father up. They dueled and His right tusk was broken with Parshuram's axe. This is how He got the name of Ekdanta.
Here's to the God who inspires everyone! More modak/laddoos to all of us. :)
Happy Ganesh Chaturthi to all!
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Strawberries in the backyard
Since Urv mentioned that he loves strawberries too along with cherries, I thought I'd share some of my latest photos. These are the ones growing in the backyard on two little plants (or are they called shrubs? I dunno), which are less than six inches tall because the leaves are heavier than the stems and they are growing sideways more than vertical. The whole plant actually fits within one square foot.
I will take photos of the plant and share as well. Until then here are some shots of the tiny fruits. :)
The fruit is born from tiny white flowers.
Which eventually grows into tiny yellowish green fruit like this.
That grows into bigger fruit turning a shade of light pink when fully grown.
And before you know it, the pink turns into bright red! (Btw, those tiny blank ants love to eat the leaves of strawberry plants)
This is what it'd look like when you've just picked it off the plant. :D
Here's what the plant looks like (top view).
A typical strawberry farm looks like this. This one is located in Brentwood, CA.
More strawberry photos taken by me.
I will take photos of the plant and share as well. Until then here are some shots of the tiny fruits. :)
The fruit is born from tiny white flowers.
Which eventually grows into tiny yellowish green fruit like this.
That grows into bigger fruit turning a shade of light pink when fully grown.
And before you know it, the pink turns into bright red! (Btw, those tiny blank ants love to eat the leaves of strawberry plants)
This is what it'd look like when you've just picked it off the plant. :D
Here's what the plant looks like (top view).
A typical strawberry farm looks like this. This one is located in Brentwood, CA.
More strawberry photos taken by me.
Offensive or Effective?
Photo: In Vogue India magazine, an old woman missing her upper front teeth holds a child in rumpled clothes — who is wearing a Fendi bib, which costs about $100. Images Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company
This one along with more such photos have created a havoc among certain Indians. And I can see why. It is because people get offended when the attention is brought to something that they don't have. Forget what ALL they have, as soon as the topic turns to something a person doesn't have, they are going to feel hurt and won't be pleased regardless of how much explanation you give or excuses you make. That's exactly what Vogue has done here. They went to sell of more-affordable-fashion but in turn displayed it in a very poor manner. They ended up pointing finger at the poverty of India.
Is this the way to market new fashion? I don't think so. I only have one question for Priya Tanna who has a lot of justification for these distasteful photos: "Just what were you thinking?"
Here's what Ms. Tanna has to say in the article:
Vogue India editor Priya Tanna’s message to critics of the August shoot: “Lighten up,” she said in a telephone interview. Vogue is about realizing the “power of fashion” she said, and the shoot was saying that “fashion is no longer a rich man’s privilege. Anyone can carry it off and make it look beautiful,” she said.
“You have to remember with fashion, you can’t take it that seriously,” Ms. Tanna said. “We weren’t trying to make a political statement or save the world,” she said.
Nearly half of India’s population — about 456 million people — live on less than $1.25 a day, according to World Bank figures released last week.
Source - The New York Times
Well, Ms. Tanna, I'm sorry to say the "power of fashion" just went out, and the quality of your magazine along with your reputation has just downgraded to rock bottom with this edition.
Years ago, I used to dislike these brand names for the same reason that they are abusive towards the poor and needy, but eventually I became more forgiving towards them. Now after reading this article I find them just plain disgusting. I have no respect for them.
Monday, September 01, 2008
Why Dumbledore wants thick, woolen socks?
Book # 1
This is after Harry has seen the Mirror of Erised for the third time, and he finds Professor Dumbledore sitting in the same room.
My comment --> []
So Dumbledore desperately desires thick, woolen socks.
My question is: Was Dumbledore not truthful when he answered this question like Harry thought or this clue has been answered in the later books? I couldn't put together the pieces of this puzzle.
This is after Harry has seen the Mirror of Erised for the third time, and he finds Professor Dumbledore sitting in the same room.
My comment --> []
Harry stood up.
"Sir -- Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something?" [Hahahaha! I love it when someone asks this question. ;)]
"Obviously, you've just done so," Dumbledore smiled. "You may ask me one more thing, however."
"What do you see when you look in the mirror?"
"I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks."
Harry stared.
"One can never have enough socks, " said Dumbledore. "Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books."
So Dumbledore desperately desires thick, woolen socks.
My question is: Was Dumbledore not truthful when he answered this question like Harry thought or this clue has been answered in the later books? I couldn't put together the pieces of this puzzle.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)