I sink.......in chinese

Statuory Warning: Contains Anglo - Chinese text"

And so...One more of those School memoirs...And before I forget, Now tht the storm over FFBW is over..Letz start one more with Vi ...:)
by dedicating this blog to her..


This is not one of those High school memoirs...Ther r too many to write..
I wud be flooded with thoughts, jus like Bombay is marooned now..
.


This one was in my Masters...


And so, we had this Chinese proff, who like most other proffs frm there, has trouble communicating in English.


Itz a big wonder as to how they interview and get selected as well..
maybe they accept lower salaries..but thts a diff story..


She made us get to school on a sat, as she had something to discuss abt..


A 3 hr class on a sat morning....yikes....somehow we made it.
I was having trouble focussing and was jus prancin around..and the fact that she is difficult to understand made my choice easier..




10 mins..


15


she was getting fed up with me...and finally..summoned the courage..
"uroan..".(thts how she spells my name)" how many fishes in the
cube.."

"huh..excuse me" I was totally taken aback...

and she repeated that again...this time a bit more slowly...But I heard it the same way still..

Now everyone around were as bewildered, but since they werent in the firing line..they started laughing as well...

She was loosing her cool by now

"Oh cmon..Den u no...how many fishes..iz viry izzey. Cmon sink"
translated as " Dont u know. Its very easy... Cmon think" :-)

It was an manuacturing Engg class and I dint know what fishes and sink got to do with it..

"fishes..fishes...sink sink.." she continued.......

..and so..to cut a long story short..

She finally answered it herself..

"6" said the proff..

We were like...eh..how...do u have a particular size and shape for the fishes..Did u mention how big the cube is..

or iz it like a fish displaces this much amount of water..and u calculated accordingly........

And then, she showed it with her hand, and took a book and showed us

"Think this is a cube..U have six fishes"
and showed the top, bottom and the sides of the book..

"Ohhhhhhhhh....Faces..."
and our own 'fishes' brightened...I mean Faces :D


"wat dij u sink..." asked she...

translated as " what did u think"

"oh nothing..I just dint get it...6 faces u r right" and I sat down..

and so the story goes..:)

Grandmas and Vegas

Yes..u read that right..
U must have heard of vegas and show girls

of vegas and beauty queens
s

even of vegas honey mooners'

But this one is something new...

Grand-mas and vegas..

The last 2 times I was in vegas I had to take grandmas along..including one as latest as last week.

Pics of me hand in hand with grandmas are all over my computer folders..

and my mom is pestering me for fotos taken on the trip....sigh

Word has it that she wants recent fotos for fixing alliances..

wonder what will happen, if I send her fotos of mine with the other 'woman'...

ya ya...grand mas of course..:)

But this vegas trip was a defining one -very diff from my prev ones..

I have always lost an obscene amount of money on all those trips..

But this time..GULP..hold your breath, I lost not even a penny..

Kewl eh...

To round it up, itz one hell of an experience to go with grandmas..

forget all those bikini clad and handerkerchief clad babes, U always get a chance to get going with them.

trust me, grandmas are fun too...:-)

The most exciting part of the trip, was when

Remember all those mexicans standing by the roadside, and handing out credit card size pics of nude girls
with their 1-800 no.s on the streets of vegas..

Grandmas, got hold of one..rofl ...that stupid mexican gave her one...

he was just handing it out to all and sundry, and lo she extened her hand to get one..

She looked at it, and silently put it down..

Her facial expression at that time..said a 1000 words..

Nay..I'm lying make in 1 Million.. :))

The last time I lied

Always dedicate ur work to the one that inspired you..said mr.somebody
So letz dedicate this one to Flower bestial...and ...to her chaotic post..:)
and that had me thinking..

this is something I can Identify with..An incurable curse..at one point of time..
.

Trust me...I can lie thro my teeth..and I have no problems lying about something..even when there is absolutely no need for it.

so if I say, Your post touched me to the heart..or well written..:)

well well...Not so fast, re read the prev line..I said " at one point of time.' :)

It pretty much seems to be a part of me..

No wonder my fav song is frm the movie Run..the tamil version of it that is..

The first 2 lines go like this..


Poi solla koodathu kaadhali
Poi sonnalum neeye en kaadhali/...

For the Non Tamil Junta..that translates as..

Dont lie.. my sweet heart..
Even if you do, you ARE my sweet heart..

Any ways, getting to the point..
When was the last time I lied...
..

..
..
..
..
..
..
..
..
..
..

hmm...wat am I doing right now :-)

Air India - Do U really wanna fly that:-)

Guess it was my first trip to India from here..
Had a overnight stay in Sing - I had flown there in a Korean Air flight
and from there to Madras by Indian Airlines...
.

That 3 hr journey, I realised never will I fly Air India again..

I had stayed overnight in my cousins place and she had come to drop me at the Changi airport (or watever that is called).

One look at the queue outside, you could have mistaken it for a fish market..

was sooooooo crowded with confusion all around that ticketing area..
It looked more like a vegetable chawl in India.

I looked at it in disbelief..and my cousin gave me a wry smile and she said, this is the reason why I was asking you yesterday, about not taking a sing airlines flight..

I consoled myself, thinking this is prolly cause, the rate by Air india/ Indian Airlines is 1/3 of sing airlines. Hence the crowd..and mebbe they dont fly as frequently as IA did...

WRONG...
some how got into the flight...

and as vi or some one else said...

At the ticketing counter outside, there were scores of ppl, waiting to get a seat, and they were being turned down saying NO place sorry..

Once I got inside and everyone had settled down( thts a misnomer..nobody settles down:-) more on that later )

I could spot atleast 4-5 seats that werent taken the whole journey...Talk abt wastage..shuks..

Now comes the interesting part..:-)

The moment u step in the plane, the feel and smell and the commotion..sacchhe mein..:)
reminded me of a Bus station in India..

ppl were like fighting jostling to get it...the others wont even wait for u, they will just twist their body and go past u.
No wonder I guess, that they airhostess seemed pissed of the whole journey..:-)

It was very sultry and I thought lets turn on the vent above us, No sooner did I do that., there was this thick white smoke coming out from them and all over the plane at all vents..
with a chlorox like smell...
shuks..

At my wits end, I asked the Air hostess wat this is all abt, she just mumbled and went off, prolly the guy next to me was a freq traveller on this flight, just laffed off and said..dont worry, u wont notice it when the plane takes off :D

and I thought he meant they will go...But note the words..U WONT NOTICE IT..:)

Then finally after a 30 min delay it took off though I shd say, they landed on time)...and unbelievable, the moment the flight took off...
ppl were walking here and there on the flight as if they were walkin in a train..
some with babies..in their hands that were crying no end...
and others with their lungies and munda banians..:-)

and others like me who wanted to cry but cudnt and only ended up cursing my travel agent...

apparently the airhostesses got tired of telling them to take their seats...they infact never bothered...
little wonder they wanted to get the business of food done pretty fast..

10 mins into take off, one of them a above middled aged 'aunty' brought a tray of eclairs...
I looked at it, and they were off various shapes..and sizes, not like the eclairs I had seen when I was in india..:)
One look, I decided I dont want it, and said no thanks. She gave me one frightful stare..:-s and shoved the tray right under my nose and said" TAKE IT"

Like a scared school boy, I took 2 lest she should shout for taking more than what I am allowed..
Man that make up she had...the less said the better..
all tht was probably because of the airconditioner barely working..
Mebbe she felt it even worse than me..what with sweat dripping over all that makeup :-)

Then came the lunch or mini meals or watever..
had 2 packs one upma combo for veges and other an omlet combo for NV.
I had ordered veggie and wanted to find out what the NV was..

she was like " what did u ask for. That s what I have given u. Eat it"
me : " no I dont want this. tell me what you have in the other box"

she: " no u dint order this. How does it matter to u"

I just got totally pissed off and glared at her. She then gave me the other one and said itz got omlette in it.

the one next to me was having that, and afterI saw how it looked like, I decided to go for the veggie again..

haha...u can visualize that..for sure..:) when I asked her for the veggie thingie again...

rofl, her expression said a thousand words..
thankfully she just gave it to me and pushed of..


Finally in 2.5 hrs it touched madras...and I heaved a sigh of relief....

and rather than thinking of the 3 month holiday ahead, I was thinking of what to do on the return flight..to see if I could change it to something else..


Now MAKE UP ur MIND... :)

PS: this was in 2000. Might have changed for the better now..hopefully:)

Office Space

I was thinking, on a monday evening am I the only one who doesnt want to do anything @ work..
Mebbe others are pretty much productive..
So thought will take a stroll around the work place and seek some inspiration frm them..:)

Here u go.........
.

Person 1: Staring blankly at a 'blank' notepad

Person 2: Staring into his windows screen

Person 3: Staring blankly at his outlook window

Person 4: Looking at his outlook window and wondering whether he should touch his mouse or not

Person 5: Replying to a mail in Outlook

Person 6: Opened a MS word window

Person 7: Staring into the calendar..

Person 8: Opened his CCL aplication and just starin blankly..

Person 9: opened a sql plus window and typing and re typing

Persons 10, 11 and 12: Not at desk

Person 14, 15 and 16: Talking to Person 17 who just got back today after a 3 week medical leave

Person 18 (Me): Walking around and seeing wat others do..:)...


Soooooooo...I got back and etched it in Virtual space for posterity :)

For a change

"I dont wanna talk to you anymore "
Count ur child hood friends,the close relationships that you developed as an undergrad, past that stage..

How many ever people that you meet everyday, how many ever people that are there on ur IM or that many ever people that you knw on a message board, say like sulekha,, there are very few people, infact you can count them by hand that remain close to you past the initial buzz.
.

Amongst all this there is only select few that you really really care about.

and when one of them says the first line to u..

how would u feel.

I have been guilty of the same crime with my close friends before and one such character really stands out.

Infact had she not had a BF whom she eventually married, I would have made sure I had her.

Every time I used to fight with her, be it me or her that starts it., she would have just half an hr to collect herself back and get back to me as if nothing happened.

In the beginning that used to drive me even mad. But slowly that caught on to me.

How much ever I try to sulk away, she just would not bother any more about it and it dint matter to her if the mistake was hers or mine.

Now that shez married and settled in India, I miss her, but then she isnt wat this post is all about

I have always been hot headed, being the only kid dint help matters either.

It just amazes me how much one can be different and how 'stripped' you feel when you come across a character like that.


Getting back to the first line again..

when one of those select 'few' that I really care about said that that to me,

I again got back to the vikram aur bethal thing

as the saying goes in tamil 'Vedalam marupadiyum murungai maram erithaam'
a reference to the countless no of times that the bethal in that story keeps running away from King Vikram after telling a story..

I again got mad and decided I would never talk to her again..

It took me exactly a couple of days to realise how wrong I was..

This time it was a new group of friends @ work who had just joined last week..

A couple of them had cars and I started riding with them to work...giving a break to my bus routine

I know thatz a forced break to meeting with that black girl that I meet in the bus :)

It so happened that all 3 of them had a meeting that went pretty late into the evening..

and they totally forgot that I was waiting for them as well.

In the end I realised that they left without me and by then it was past 8:00.

I got so mad as usual, and was about to blast them over the fone but somehow restrained myself.

They were almost home when I got them on the fone from work, and was about to ask them to turn back and pick me up.

One of those guys dropped the others, and called me up and said, "I'll comeback and pick u up"

I thought it was just another of those shooting from the mouth instead of the heart thingie, declined and left it at that.

But when I got home later, he was there waiting for me and said " Im really sorry dude. I'll make sure this doesnt happen again"

This from a guy that I have known for not even a week.
And if he could do that, I thought " why cant I be so to the people that I really care about"

I got back to her on the phone and as I had suspected, she was really upset and hurt.

Hopefully I have mended fences with her.

It really gives you a sense of satisfaction when you can set aside differences and talk to people.

It really makes you feel light. like a heavy load has lifted of you.

Its really a wonderful gift, trust me, not a sign of weakness when you can break the ice after a potential conflict.

I believe one should really have lots of guts and self confidence to go ahead and be like that. I hope I can always do this in times of crisis.
Not that I want to be in a crisis all the time..something all of us can do without :-)


PS: not bad...I can write serious stuff too :D

Hey black man...how are ya

I was walking to the sandwich place for my lunch, past the bank of america entrance.
It was already 15 mins past 12 and had to rush back for a meeting at 1:00.

"Hey black man ..how are ya..."
"

Looked as if someone was calling me

I turned back, completely and utterly bewildered to see who the heck was that calling me one.

It was another black fella..

A flood of thoughts swept me over..(Naah..no tsunami similies here...)

For a second, I was like, am I really tht coloured that a black man could mistake me for one.

If you could plug in a head phone into me and listen, you would have heard a zillion expletives

hurtling out far greater in numbers than the Tsunami aid amount.

I looked at him quizzically, he saw me and said "hey man how r ya".

I dint knw if I shud react to that. Then I saw another 'bro' coming out of the bank.

The smile returned, I mumbled something and off I went :-)

Fast forward to the sandwich place..

I was thinking of this again. Then I remembered seeing others blacks in

the bus, that have as much brown skin as Indians and

wondering "Boy..if not for that THICK lips, this

guy could pass off as an Indian..only if he dint open his mouth."

Now dont ask me why I was looking at a guys' lips.

I wasnt. I just look at girlie lips and morphed that into a guy :D

Well anyway, coming back to the topic, Itz not a bad thing to be called a

blackie afta all iz it :)

U do get the blondes...that way :D

Only if I did not open my mouth as much....;)


and BTW...I need proof that u read this..attendance please :)