A dinner rant.

Jocks sometimes wish that their Numbers could be retired forever, many people have special numbers, lucky numbers and in India and some asian cultures they believe in auspicious times and dates when the moons and suns and gods align. but iam really not into all that kinda stuff......but last night i really wished that i could stand up and give two minutes of silence for 8.15 p.m , you might be scratching your head and wondering what this is all about?! well the significance of 8.15 p.m was" dinner time "back home in my growing up years actually till i was 23 years old....without fail we as a family had dinner together,no books or toys were allowed nothing to distract the family from eating and catching up on the day,though my family is very Britsihified when compared to most Indian families( there are major reasons but thats for another day) when it came to dinner instead of sitting on the dinning table ,we sat in a circle on the floor( how Indian!) ,laughing,shouting even fighting at times, passing the salt ( how ENGLISH!) becoz my dad doesnt eat salt and after years of the" salt debate" that goes on till today at my place. my mom no longer adds salt to the food but we sprinkle it on top of our food. anyway the topic of the said rant is coz of the lack of a proper "dinner time", in todays world or atleast in my home ,we no longer have dinner together, the baby has to be fed first,josh makes such a fuss its like somebody is forcing him to eat bits of cement and gravel, after years of battle ,though he feeds himself now after millions of time outs, alarm clocks, removal of tv time, playground time, punishments and rewards....i still have to monitor him and still our friend manages to eat for an hour plus the longest timed clocked in being 2 plus hours.....so he's the last to get off the table ....hubby cant be relied on to get back at normal dinner time, the world despite all its iphones, blackberys ,macbook and ipads has still not made it any easier to get the man of the house in time for dinner with the four of us.....all this new technology is supposed to make life easier ,one would think people would have more time but most of us are struggling with the 24 hour time limit......so i have my dinner whenever i have a breathing moment and on a good day hubby might join me but my beautiful teak(recycled wood btw) dinning table which i had comissioned lies in the corner gathering dust . i long for 8.15 pm ,i wish i could wave a wand and make it happen just like in the past....modern life has killed the culture of dinner altogether for me. so i pay hommage to the dying art of dinner time and hope against hope that hubby would read this and make it possible. how did our parents do it??? really is it that hard....working all these weird timezones is horrible..........ah i rant on....dont mind me iam in a bit of a foul mood, blame it on the lack of company at dinner time.

Cheers its time to sleep!

I enjoyed the world cup footie just like the rest. secretly glad its over too, bloody late night T.V was getting on my nerves. even the alarm clock had to do its share of the work.....but sleep deprived people who have to keep themselves awake with intensive games of scrabble are no longer easy to live with.while the whole world suffers withdrawal symptoms i revel that nobody will start hogging the T.V AND F.B will not be flooded with similar posts! The octopus will no longer be harassed with insane questions and made to predict the fate of an entire country, as much as i cheered for my favourites who lost by the way.....thanks for the entertainment FIFA WORLD CUP , time to move on.....much needed sleep its time we catch UP! zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Day and night.

Was having a bad day. At approximately 4 in the afternoon things took a turn for the better, good music, a game of scrabble, a near win , laughter and a hug later was having the best day in a longtime. At approximately 7 in the evening, i had a lot more to be happy about than when the day began. Good feeling overall. Diagnosis "Good day"

Scary date night.

I am a typical girl, i get scared at the usual stuff like lizards, cockroaches, moving shadows, etc etc but the stuff that really is not my cup of tea, are "SCARY MOVIES" apart from the fact that the mild range ones and the usual thrillers give me a kick and totally spook me out. lately i have stopped watching scary movies all together and though iam not in my dote age, i have simply sobered down, i rather have a pleasant and much needed sleep these nights than staying awake and reliving the scary bits and even worse controlling my bladder on these nights.....so couple of years ago i called it quits to watching horror movies.
Well after a very longtime last week hubby rented a horror movie behind my back and wanted me to watch it with him ,i refused and with thanks went to bed! but the expression on my hubby's face kept haunting me ,it said.....gosh you're such a spoilsport and you are always complaining that you never have time to do some couch time with me alone anymore....so i leaped out of my warm bed, longlingly looked at both my boys asleep peacefully and thought with a sigh iam gonna regret this in the morning.
Hubby beamed when he saw me and patted the seat beside him, patiently rewinding from the beginning.....well the rest you can imagine!!!
The movie in all honesty was not scary at times even funny....but unfortunately iam easy spooked,so after the movie was done we hit the sack groaning at the lateness of the hour and having the usual regrets, funny thing was the moment i tried closing my eyes my over-imaginative mind went into overdrive and lo and behold i was scared....hubby asked me what the matter was and i asked if i could hold his hand, he laughed and said ok.
At somepoint in the night i wokeup and found my hand and shoulder a bit stiff, i realised hubby was still holding my hand.
Yes my lovely readers its time for the you to realise its time to say awwwww!
i dont believe i am too old, but i've been married for a longtime (coz we really got married young )next year we will be celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary. so ya we dont get googly eyed at each other and we have kinda got comfortable with each other but i loved the fact that we held each others hand like teenages and slept. so hubby if you are reading this bring on some more of those horror movies iam ready for a night of popcorn and soppy handholding :)))

Dessert for the weary soul!!!

People talk about bare necessities ie, food ,shelter and blah blah.....i say add friends to that list too....talking of friends i have to tell you about one of mine who raised the bar on making friends a must have this season!!!!
Kellin my dear girl i have known for the past 8 years i met her one day when i was a first time mom with a 3 month old baby and a homesick heart, she instantly became my friend the second she offered me a sandwich that sunday morning soon after she said hi!!! she was my first chinese friend in Singapore....new to the city far from home ,lonely coz of all the nightshifts hubby was putting in and clueless about babies ,her daily calls to me cheered me up no end!!!!
She is such a blast!!! i always tell people everyone needs a kellin in their life....she is a ray of sunshine and an ever optimistic chatterbox.....we've have close times and distant times over the years. but.......
The other day i bumped into her in the lift , i was struggling with loads of bags and joash the brat was clinging to me, i must have looked a wreck coz an hour after i bumped into her. the doorbell rang , she was carrying a box of Rainbow ruby ice kechang( shaved ice with coconut milk, gulla melaka and more kinda red stuff) all the way from Serangoon Gardens just for me... i tell you i just went to the study sat on the blue sofa and just ate it like a kid....i felt like one too and in that moment all was right with the world once again.....only after an hour it hit me she had done the most unexpecting and heart warming thing anybody had done for me in a longtime...the last time i felt like that was when one day my dad came home from office with the most amazing gateaus ever and we were not expecting it!!!! You ask why wud any one do such stuff the answer is..."just like that" !!! i wish more people do this kinda a thing for each other......just like that ....just for you ,coz you'd like it ,coz it would make you happy.......we all let each other down nowadays, wish we could build each other up instead!!!! in this hot country there is no soup for the soul only ice cool desserts for the soul !!! kellin spared a thought for me one tired mom to another.....she understood she proved that everyone can do without many things but none can replace a good friend.
Kellin thanks for being my friend! thank you and i love you!!!
So go on add a friend to your shopping cart , having a good one is a must this season!!!

Birdie woes!!!

The stuff iam about to share might make you wonder about my sanity or lack of it......but hey its me so iam sure this doesnt come as a surprise !
Gosh saying it aloud is crazy but iam having bird problems...you must be going huh???!!!! ya ya i know it but its true recently i've been suffering from insomnia due to some lousy meds dat i need to take( no they are not looney pills!) anyway just as dawn is breaking i slip into the much needed sleep and lo and behold at bloody ( forgive my lang) 5 o clock our resident( kokila) bird starts its loud cooing (i always associated cooing with love birds silly me!) and off it goes for 2 bloody hours koooo oooo ooo koooo koooooo , i mean hey desperately in need of sleep person dying can we cut that out or what.......perhaps i 've understated the prob, but this has gone on for days......everybody is pissing mad come morning but does our friend the lonely or more like bloody bird relent nooooooooo it just keeps at it!!! well respite came a couple of days ago ,the bloody bird(BB in short) didnt start its racket.....bliss bliss iam sleeping and thinking hey imagine telling anybody that a tiny bird is in control of your sanity....ha ha ha i thought what a laugh.....poor birdie must have found the other birdie it so desperately needed to get in touch with.....damn it i began to feel all lovey dovey towards the BB !!!
Next day poor me was up trying to sleep and finally around 3.00 am my peepers started to droop....eternal bliss must feel like this....around 4.am the BB is back with a bang ...hey whats that racket !!!!!!!!!!!!! not this crap again!!! with bloodshot eyes and crazy hair i dash out ready to kill somebody and if you ask me really i wanted to wring the neck of the BB !!!! i dont believe in Guns at all ,i dont allow my boys even a toy gun....but suddenly i wanted one badly to shoot BB , hubby who didnt suffer much coz of said BB, as we all know Men are never effected by nagging or kids screaming or loud heavy metal music coz they have fine tuned" the art of mental blocking any irrelevant sounds".
He woke up to a wife foaming at the mouth and crying for blood!!! after hearing my tirade he didnt know whether he needed to call the Animal rescue or Mental health......i know its funny you may laugh people but poor me was a sleepless zombie !!!
Anyway thats all in the past the BB disappeared for a bit and i thought of "it" coz "It" made a guest visit this morning again. so i thought i'd get it off my chest before you read in tomoro's news "WOMAN ON RAMPAGE ARRESTED FOR CRUELTY TOWARDS RESIDENT BIRD" please dont judge me too harshly coz iam just another sleepless sod who lost it!!!
anyway to end this episode of my life threatening woes......i recently remembered a movie.....again pleez dont judge my taste in movie but there is this sideline story in the movie"Failure to Launch" where a girl is similarly harrassed by a bird ...pleez go to You Tube and check that bird episode out!!! its funny and exactly how i feel......so ciao my friends pray that i get the much needed shut eye and deliverance from the BB.

Fear!

I've been afraid many times in my life, shit scared too. But this time round it gripped my heart with a vice like grip! give me a moment before i explain myself. sometimes i write on this blog vaguely becoz there are things that are too hard to share......so we hid behind doors and only let out the safe stuff but i want to change all that crap of taking time to heal , or hiding it under a deep recess of my mind.

What i share today is something personal ,something real.....believe me when i say iam not doing this for sympathy or any support..... i just want to say it out loud so "Fear will not hold me prisoner but hope will set me free".

Even as i write this i have already overcome part of the fear, i have made peace with the demons inside and am slowly understanding things are not as bad as i first thought or imagined.

So to get to the point joash my youngest is 2 years 7 months and is not talking much which btw is normal for some kids but i was beginning to get scared about some of the things he was doing!!!!

we've been to a doc and a couple of speech therapists and have decided to start him on it! yesterday was his first session and he did good! it was fun actually....so iam hoping that in the coming months my dahlin boy will start rattling off like good ole me.....but this irrational fear follows me around nowadays!!!

so if you pray sometimes or all the time ! just say a prayer for my baby and me !

I told my eldest josh recently that joey his kid bro was not speaking and as we are concerned ,he will be going to speech therapy, so pleez be patient with your baby bro when he bops you on the head instead of saying whats on his mind! i asked him pleez pray for joey ok! and he said ok mummy i will! the very next day instead of buying himself a snack with the money i gave him. he bought his bro a small ball!!! joey was soooooo happy! but i was touched that a 7 year old had his bro on his mind even at school.....i mean just tugs at your heart strings( and you guys know what a sentimental loser iam )

People always say Mom's are strong and i guess they are, but they are vulnerable too and sometimes need a bit of rallying around ! iam not feeling real strong but i feel the strength creeping in my veins slowly and steadily .Its funny how one thinks of themselves in different roles but as of now i just feel like a "mom" all other personas have faded at the moment.

dont know how to end this.....so i will just say i might be overeacting and so on so forth( so dont share this stuff with others!!! special warning to family members!!!)

wow saying things loud always does make things better! Thanks for listening anyway!!!

Gosh its proven i need a head check!

There is no shortcut to saying this but i got a nasty shock a couple of days ago.....a random fellow blogger left me a nasty comment .....well! stupid me immediately went ahead an reacted and wrote an equally childish retort on said person's blog.......what is wrong with me, you say ?!( just the usual) soon after i deleted said msg coz poor me couldnt handle the truth.( ha ha ha !!!!!)

Truth is the chap though equally insane like me did have some home truth's for me...firstly he called me" pathetic" , thinking objectively i guess from his point of view i must have really looked so.....just to clarify i agree with "you"(random blogger) wholeheartedly! secondly he said i was so sick to be indulging in my "pleez love me a little syndrome" that i needed to be locked away......... this i totally well i partially agree with......firstly every person to think about themselves cant be locked away now can they?! i believe healthcare systems are finding it hard to find places in looney bins for the real criminally insane to begin with.....doesnt anyone read the bloody newspapers anymore???? and regards to the fact that i am a bit sad and indulge myself on my own blog ,which btw was the main purpose for its creation, i will continue to beg for love if i want too!!!!

its not like i am asking anybody to send me guns nor iam plotting to start shooting random people at the mall......Even the "Beatles" my fave band in their song say " all you need is love"...so said person back off!!!!

lastly i was accused of being shameless to think of myself when millions of people in this world where suffering and dying and there was more of that stuff.......i mean helloooooooooooo

where did that come from seriously that was unfair and uncalled for.......this is serious i mean my mom would always start off with random stuff like this all the time " did you know that people in somalia are dying of hunger and you refuse to eat your spinach" really i mean i know what she was saying but hell i dont like spinach( i love it now btw and of course iam not a kid anymore either)

Peoples i love the dying masses as much as the next person unless he belonged to the Taliban mindset.

Everytime there is a Tsuanmi or Bomb blast or Earthquake , i equally feel and am angered by the hate and destruction ...... i even do my part in whatever small way i can.......and yes i am not with Doctors without Borders, or an Activist for human rights or a Volunteer at the Red cross. but i care enough ,you random stranger, i care enough to rant and rave and be candid about" my pathetic life" as you put it. so that when i get off my computer i can go back to being sane and a caring and loving mom.....i do my part alright!!!

what this world needs is well adjusted kids and adults ...so if my being home and "trying" to bring up the next generation to be normal bothers you (again random blogger) i am sorry you feel that way! i really dont have to answer to you or anyone......coz like the rest of the world iam just trying!!!!

so you think i need my head examined or a real good kick in the ass for being such a cry baby!!! i agree with you but thanks for the reality check anyway!!!!

About deep ends and year ends.

Two years a ago soon after i turned 30 i plunged into a deep abyss which has lasted for two years and now at age 32, i can finally say that the dark cloud has passed ....my hubby might not agree with me. he might ask me who was that screaming banshee just a couple of weeks ago....this will be my answer " duh ever heard of PMS" so i still get down and i still wish i could strangle a lot of people from time to time but thats just part of the natural cycle of life...not the deep abyss i was talking about....

sometime in 2008 when i escaped to my bosom friend aps place to clear the chaos that my mind couldnt make sense of i wrote down a list (not the insane or silly stuff i post on my blog) but the real one nobody has seen......well as this dark cloud has lifted i have found out that almost 99% of the list has come true and a million of my prayers answered.

i have travelled more times this year than my jetsetting hubby.

Done stuff i never done in my life......got more gifts , surprises good and bad and much much more.

i have made peace with a lot of my inner demons and discovered a load more about myself and others.

iam a person who believes in certain intangible stuff in life.....a couple of years ago no matter what i did i kept bumping into the word " Faith'' i couldnt understand its true meaning....2 years ago i even thought i 'd name my 2nd child Faith if the baby turned out to be a girl....alas i had a boy but you must understand how strong this word was hitting me.....i had no clue that over the last two years how close i came to losing faith in God and mankind.....i was on the brink of giving up on the human race as a whole( no this doesnt mean i wanted to off myself) i now see it was just a reminder that tough times happen and i was to simply to " keep the faith".

Now that i have come back to myself this past year a new word has made its presence felt "HOPE" i am really feeling a whole lot healither inside....my hubby bought me a beautiful delicate necklace for christmas ( shhhh i am not supposed to know of course) but guess what the pendant on it said "HOPE "!!!!!!!!! on a tiny coin both in English and Hindi what are the odds????!!!!

so as the year winds to an end iam full of buck and beans and looking forward to a good year with a grateful heart for all the good and bad stuff coz sometimes its the bad stuff that teaches us who we really are and helps us understand a bit more of life. so here's to Hope !!!!!! and i wish you all a Blessed year ahead!

Sister of my Heart.

Its been a week since my sis left after a month long vacation with me. iam much better now but i was suffering from serious seperation anxiety and depression soon after her departure...which iam sure is normal but this time round i felt her absence keenly. Nins my sis and i have an 18 month age difference , as long as i remember she has always been a round ,we played together ,went to school together ,we shared the same bedroom and wardrobe all our lives....as all siblings do, we had our share of love ,hate and fights.
I've never really been apart from her most of my life apart from the odd stay over at a friend's....in 1999-2000 she left to pursue her higher studies in Australia, i never realised she was going away and life would never be the same ever again, it only struck me at the airport the moment she waved one last time before disappearing, i broke down in the airport and cried like a baby everyone was staring but i didnt give a hoot, just before leaving and giving me the last hug she handed me a letter i dont remember what it said but she did say she loved me.....that was the moment i felt a premonition that life would never be the same.( around the same time aps my best friend left for pune and deep my hubby and then boyfriend was overseas working)
when i went home her bed was stripped naked and her side of the cupboard stood half open revealing its empty shelves, i felt hollow inside and ever so lonely.
My premonition came true the following year i got married and moved to Singapore , my sister missed my wedding but aps stood in for her as my maid of honour. Life was never the same!
over the years we've had holidays and reunions with her.....but this holiday made a big diffrence coz it was a longer holiday than usual and as you must know i live with boys ,i forgot how wonderful hanging out with a girl was like laughing at private jokes, looking at each other with understanding even though no words were uttered, shoppping(iam not a shopper but i got converted coz of her for a while) dressing up to go to dinner,gossiping and catching up on ole friends and dissecting others behaviour....movies , food, music dancing the whole nine yards.....it was a blast.

I miss her a lot! but i know she's a phone call away and we will meet soon! In case she's reading this just wanted you to know. I am glad i have a sister and i am glad its you! Thanks for being around! love you. miss you sleeping beauty!

Sleeping beauty.

Iam a light sleeper.My sis on the other hand is what we Indians call "KUMBHAKARANA"( a character in Indian mythology who sleeps for 6 months and then eat a lot the other 6 months) when it comes around to the sleep factor.
Sleep is next to Godliness in her book. her sleeping patterns are much fodder for family get together jokes. but here's an incident which my father still cannot believe to be true.
Long long time ago in the good ole days ,when i was still in school and reed thin. one day we had to go out for a get together and my sis had an exam the next day and was left behind at home....we asked her to lock up the house from the inside and told her we would be back in no time as an extra measure we locked the house from the outside too.
so dahlin sister in true fairytale fashion was locked in the castle like a good ole princess.
After a couple of hours had passed we all returned home , the lock was opened but my sis had locked the door on the inside....so we rang the bell and waited there was no sound of my sister coming down the staircase....we then yelled up at the bedroom window still no news of the dear girl! having waited ...we the mob kinda got a bit worried and angry too.after hammering on the door and yelling at every window that my sister couldnt possibly ignore ...i was made to climb the chiku tree that leaned against the upstairs open courtyard from which the doors to the bedroom, could be accessed and which were left open most of the time.....so i legged it up the tree over the parapet wall and into the courtyard only to find dahlin sister had locked the doors from the inside i pushed at the door and through the chink could see her lying on the bed a few meters away....so i yelled for her to open the door and banged the door in anger but still no response.....finally i who could put a paper to shame had to pry open the windows to the livingroom slither through the bar which believe me even my skinny son cannot go through...of coz bruising my ribs et all got into the house ...went down the stairs and opened the door.....my Dad who is the most peaceful man i know on earth and who would give a murderer the benefit of the doubt....suddenly saw red...he marched upstairs and woke up Sleeping beauty who from the look of it was sleeping as if only a kiss from a prince could wake her up from the living dead situation. once aroused my dad accused her of being petty and she neednt have pretended to be asleep just coz we had left her alone....for those who know my sister ....who is a cool cucumber if i may say so....just rubbed her eyes sleepily and smiled ...this my father thought was a sure sign that she was feigning it......but truth be told till today she holds out that she was really sleeping!!!!
anyway the reason iam telling you all this is coz my sister who currently lives in Aussieland is coming down for a visit soonish...i called her this morning ( afternoon in downunder) and it was my phone call that woke her up ...i told her she better try waking up early as the time difference would kill her and her sleep cycles once she was here......she laughed said she'd try and i thought " right!!! pigs will fly next"
so sleeping or not iam totally looking forward to the arrival of" Sleeping beauty".hippieeeeeeeee to the reunion of the ya ya sisterhood!
Cant wait to have some female bonding....after being smothered by male company with my bunch of boys....totally looking forward with much anticipation!!! Just cant wait!!!

My to do Check list!

I have delibrately decided to write despite the fact that my grey matter including the remaining goo like matter has oozed out of my brain and i can sense flies or such creatures buzzing in my empty upper storey ....i have come to the important conclusion that i must and will continue blogging despite no topic or idea coming to mind ....simply coz i cant take this writers block anymore......so i convinced myself that i will cook up something and perhaps unlock my dead imagination....so bear with me peoples!

so here goes the list:-

1. i will write marvellous write ups in the near future.
2.i will become a sparkling conversationalist and peoples will flock around to hear
my stuff.
3.i will go to Photography classes and become a wonderful phototaker.
4.i will learn to bake and make a kickass wedding cake with dainty flowers et all.
5.i will get back my posh british accent and just love talking that way though iam sure to annoy a couple of people.
6.i will win the battle of the bulge come what may and get back at some people who have been giving me a pretty bad time.
7.i will continue to salivate over some people like Johnny Depp, James Mcavoy n Jonathan Rhys Meyers.( sorry hubby i cant help it .... but you're still the one i Love)
8. Buy Loads of BOOKS!!!!!
9. i will take a walk in the rain delibrately of course.....gosh the last time i did that was 10 years ago.
10.i will one day have a beautiful garden....yes yes i will......and if i dont have green fingers i will cultivate them.
11. i will grow my hair long and try not to cut it half way down the required length.
12. i will learn how to wear eyemake-up without poking myself in the eye and going blind in the process and make my eyes all smoky and hot!!!! sigh this one may be a dream.
13. blah blah blah......sorry the tom boy in me rebelled the moment i tried to become all girly....can you believe it next thing i know i would be taking moisteurising to a new level (in my case hard to believe). so i will stop before iam gonna give up and back pack into the wilderness and be eaten my wild beasts.
thanks for all those who wasted their precious time on reading this junk...im so grateful....hopefully i will write some brillant stuff next time round and knock your socks off!! till then
ciao.

On being a mom!

Friday last week saw me in tears and feeling emotions i didnt know one could feel! damn being a mom its horrid ... the helplessness one feels when one cant help their child in pain.....joash had to go through a minor surgery and they couldnt really help him with the pain for various reasons.....though the torture lasted a couple of mins ...i couldnt handle it at all......it was so horrid.i wish i could take all the pain and hold him tight but i couldnt...it was like something out of a nightmare....but the dahlin bounced back just like kids have a wonderful way of doing!!!!

so glad and relieved !!!! Gosh being a mom is tough! but i wouldnt change that for anything in the world!

something warm and fuzzy.

Yesterday my baby boy, joash did something i have never saw him do before.....the little tyke is down with a bad viral fever but nothing keeps the fella down...he plays as usual and makes cheeky little faces at you , after pulling my hair for the nth time when i finally think he's been at it too longer i will give him a firm "no joey" immediately his face changes , he's hurt and cant understand how anybody can scold him, in fact being the youngest and the baby of the house has spoiled him rotten...he believes that nobody should scold him ...in fact sometimes his expression gives you the impression that says "how dare you curb me or my activities".......

but the poor chap feels poorly from time to time ....he will come around and ask me for a hug or he'll go to tess and play the poor me face card and win a hug from that quarter too...but what amazes me is since he's been sick.....he grabbed my t-shirt which was left hanging on the door ...and started carrying around ...at first i thought it was a game but soon i realised that he was it carrying around like a security blanket...coz it smelled like mummy...awwww my heart melted....coz unlike most babies both of my kiddos are very independent ..unless very tired or in a strange place they dont cling...or constantly seek our attention ....they are very independent!!! so when the same thing happened today morning....off he went in search of the same red t-shirt and spent the whole day trailing it all around!! it warms my heart!!!!
how wonderful to know that ...i am that person who makes him feel safe and secure...and when iam busy..my t-shirt which smells like me....will keep him company and it makes him feels like i am around!!!!
lovely.....certain smells and sounds remind me of home and things with nostalgia ....its so heart warming to know i mean soo much too him.....i know it will pass , as kids grow up and also away from their parents we are no longer the center of their universe, but iam glad to know for the moment ...iam the most important person in the world for him!!!!
thanks joey we've made your mother's day!!! love ya!

The different me.

The last two months have been busy busy busy.....first i went for a short five day workshop in may....to check out if i could hold any clout being in the art world alas as fun and enlightening as it was i came to the realistic conclusion that in another birth or time i could have been a patron of arts but not the creator of anything closely resembling the fine arts....so that dream along with the boat crashed and burned !!!!

then my birthday came by, which was a happy time hubby made it real special and folks iam 32 yes yes dahlings there is no shame ....officially i've two legs in the thirties and i feel gooooood!!!! i sported a flashy jade green top and almost killed hubby trying to wear my hot red shoes ...iam sure he thought his wife was a hop,jump skip away from joining the looney bin....but no such luck honey!!! in a couple of years perhaps....iam loving the new 30's person who has emerged ...i who wanted no jewellery and wore subdued colours for my own wedding.....have become a colour freak and large jewellery is kinda my latest thing....bold is my middle name.....loving it!!!!

Joash my baby turned two!!!! time flies!!! with josh my eldest time went by slowly but with the super brat all things are whizzing by!!! joey is a cheeky bugger and more alive than any picture could captured ...so my little rascal hope to see many more fun filled years to come with you!!! God bless you!

June saw me breaking a leg at a friends party ....dancing???? you say yes folks dance is an unknown factor in my DNA ....but must be that small amount of the "juice" which my system cudnt contain .....made me "FEEL" all apsarasa like....gosh donno how embrasssing it all was...but who cares??? not me!!! no sireeee!

Then came the piece de resistance for our recent family vacation and i mean my hubby's entire family trooped over to 'Nepal' hubby bought me wait !!!!its a big one!!!!A Nikon D90!!!! iam over the moon...in 1997 i thought God please let me have a camera .....i want to be a photographer.....finally God has answered....whats not to like about the thirties???!!!
Nepal on the other hand was beautiful yet disappointing cant explain !!! people its not cold at all unless you are actually heading for the Everest peak! plus all of us took turns having the runs and vomitting...so it was a total wash out!

My friend recently had a blast on her beeday which she totally deserves , many more to you babe!!!!!!
and honestly what more could a girl ask for all i can say is" it is well ,it is well with my soul!!!!"

The circle.

Empty spaces echo in heart and hearth
charity is an illness and has no cure
staying,yet leaving only in the mind's window
knowing,debating and minding
Oh minding endlessless,like a dog after its tail.
escape the tedious waiting....oh the waiting
ceaslessly in the mind's labyrinth
waiting, waiting never resolving
never leaving,never changing.
charity is an illness and has no cure.

Perspective.

I live in Singapore....the land of progress and every thing new. It is a so called developing/ developed countries in Asia.
Most of the families here have both the husband and wife working and so most of these couples need somebody at home to clean-up ,cook and take care of the children....so having a full-time maid is quiet common...expensive but a necessicity one cannot do without. These maids come from poor countries like Philipines, Srilanka and mostly from Indonesia.....their salaries are low but when they send their money home it helps stave off the debtors and keeps them from starving....so these women leave their families and children and come working far from home and do their duty to their families.

Here is a true incident i encountered , My friend S has a srilankan maid.....we call her Nanny.....she has 3 grown children and her youngest was about to get married.she was heading home to attend it . every 2 years the Maids get their 1 month homeleave. i was visiting my friend S and i saw that Nanny was very excited and happy, as always i asked after her health and family and she beamed at me and told me the good news of her daugthers impending nuptials....i was happy for her....she then ran into the room she shares with the daugther of the house and began to show me the white sari she bought for the wedding ceremony and the peach one for the reception to follow.....It was lovely! the sarees where not expensive but simple and sweet and i was happy for her.
i then returned to my conversation with my friend and i saw nanny leave the house and come back an hour later with a truckload full of newspaper i asked my friend what does she want with all the stuff......S explained that Nanny had collected and bought many things for her family over the past two years....clothes old and new, glass bowls, milk powder, soaps etc to give to all her family members when she went home and she would be wrapping all those things with the newspaper....i was a bit taken aback and said i didnt think the Airlines would allow so such luggage.....Nanny laughed and bid me to follow her....in her room stood a container which covered the entire room...she said she would be shipping it back ...so that by the time she reached the container would be docked at a port near her home town for collection......she beamed at me like Santa claus .she told me magazines and newspaper were hard to buy for the poor people of their war ravaged country and so when they unwrapped the goodies inside they could read the articles on the newspaper wrappings......boy was i blown away!!!! i was speechless!!! touched beyond words! and ashamed at my wonderful life and i had the nerve to be dissatisfied with it!!!! i felt ashamed at the luxurious way i lived and turned my head upwards and Thanked God that i was born into a good family.
I have never seen Nanny sad.....she accepted her life and never gave up on hoping for the best for her kids ....by working hard her kids have good jobs and are well settled the youngest is now a trained midwife and recently i heard expecting her first baby......Nanny you amaze me!
i think i've written and said enough! i think this puts things in perspective!
Dont you think?!

Book zone.

If you were to ask me what is the one thing you cannot do without my answer would be BOOKS .
From the time i was a kid and i mean really little i've read books and like the character in " To kill a mocking bird" nobody taught me or my sis to read we were born reading, its true!!!and believe me that is not a sign of a genius but a true blue blooded book lover!

My dad tells me his father had a library at home and they were poor folks and read by hurricane lamps !!! so i guess it runs in the blood....my fathers sis is a literature prof and i've even seen her Mphil dissertation which i helped at one point prove read! lofty eh! i remember one day she took me to see her guide at some university too young to remember which one and left me in the library while she had a talk with him......i think that was the best thing that happened to me......the library was mammoth and given my size iam sure it looked even more impressive.....but what i love the most was the smell...no dont worry iam not ga ga yet....but really i love the smell of books they turn me on so to speak......those days books meant kiddy stories and all the classics...i didnt know about Foucault and Trisham shandy.....but i remember choosing a load full of books and taking them to a cubicle and just touching the leather bound books and smelling them and looking at the words.....just sitting there made me feel intellectual!!!!

My fate was sealed that day i decided that i would want to do literature when the time came.....and i did it and i enjoyed it! iam not one of those really deeply crazy philosophical types that wear specks and reads aristotle for breakfast no no iam not so highbrow folks...iam more the fiction type....just to clarify and to also let you know iam not boring either!

Anyway, though i have days when i cant read which happens from time to time...i still have a book around me otherwise i cant sleep or even visit the loo...atleast a page or two and then there are manic days when the world ceases to spin i dont know whats happening and i get into the book zone.....sleep is lost.....daily chores are unbearable and the telephone becomes a pest.....i devour books !!! from last week or more i've gotten into that mode! facebook is something i forget..people i avoid and hubby's coming home late is not bad at all!
I've read "The bookthief" " Harry potter and the Deathly hallows" again while reading " Pride and Prejudice" at the same time and the moment reading " The time travellers wife"....also i confess to reading some light hearted trash by some author whose name i cant even remember....but iam coming out of the zone now coz i can focus on other stuff and even checked the papers for any interesting movies and iam blogging again albeit inane stuff.....i also think the reason i am coming out of the zone is tess( my part time helper) ...its her last day today and i wont be seeing her for a month.....so cant afford to be "lost planet".....but i enjoyed every moment....cant wait for the next crazy book zone session!!!!

Your value???

Recently i found myself asking the question ,what is my value??? In a fallen world where people judge themselves by their bank balance, the kind of house they live in, what car they drive. what is their ranking and current salary....how many perks are attached to their job portfolio...people are even judged by the phone they carry. their branded clothes...heck even the schools their kids are attending .....how many vacations they have taken......kids parties are places where one parent is trying to outdo the other with the kinds of themes and cakes and goody bags they have given out.......boy i could write lists on this kind of comparsion and lifestyle......
people only feel they have made it! if they measure upto these materialistic symbols.....its a sad day for folk like me ...when all they've got is the number of years we've clocked in and no visible signs of all the hardwork they've accomplished.
people say empty crap like...oh you've done such a good job of raising the kids and how wonderfully you hosted the party you've thrown! some of my friends go as far as telling me...how great you get to chill at home and check your facebook account everyday!!!! boy did that hurt!!!
suddenly i felt like crap...felt like what rot hubby better pay me a salary.....next shopping trip iam gonna shop guilt free ...i mean i deserved all the stuff afterall.....or dont i???
hell i started to feel horrible .....i started to feel regret that i wasted so many years at home doing nothing but change diapers and wash dishes....where is my job satisfaction???...and so the list went on till my head was spinning with self-doubt, million justifications for my said unproductivity and i even worried about my market value .....no experience....no degrees...hell i dont remember even owing a C.V ......i was like totally mind-f------!!!!!
I was about to weep in despair and felt a totally shattered self-worth......but as always i remembered something that somebody told me years ago..its found in the Bible it said something to the effect that" Man looks at the outward appearance but God looks at the heart"
In a moment i felt all better...i felt nobody has the right to judge me and even if they do....i dont care my heart is in the right place.....i know my worth and so does God ....so the rest can do or not do anythingelse.....iam at peace with who iam and what i do! iam afterall human and if somebody told me they appreciated me and what i do.....i would be on cloud 9 !!!!!
but really what's my worth??? at this point i dont really care!!! coz iam invaluable and priceless!
so three cheers for moi...hip hip hurrah!

A mango and a Fall!

kavya and siri were upto to their usual pranks....afterall it was the summer vacation and school and homework were a distant memory for the next month or so.
Every morning their mother would nag them for a good hour before either of them would stir from their slumber....
but during the summer holidays they were up with the larks....begging for breakfast and waiting for appa (dad) to leave for work....they would fidget and irritate each other till they saw their father put on his shoes and take out the umbrella from the stand and shout out that he was leaving for work and that he would be back... supersitious like all Indians they dare not say iam going but always added the required i will be coming back!

They would hang onto the gate and wave at their father till he turned the corner of their street....with appa out of sight ,the sisters lost no time in giving a big whoopee of joy and dashing off to gather the rest of their friends and the whole morning would be spent in delightful games...

anyway , today was different for some reason they found themselves with only each others company....they began playing amicably till the bickering started....just as they had thought they would start fighting in all earnest.....the snooty girl (sony) who lived upstairs who was always showing off her expensive toys (which by the way she would never share) joined them!
kavya and siri's eyes immediately alighted on the huge juicy yellow mango in her hands!
kavya the eldest couldnt contain herself and asked sony if she would be eating the mango all by herself.....about to answer in the affirmative, sony one of those devious kids one finds in every neighbour , said would give kavya the mango on the condition that she jump off the roof of their 2 storied building!!! one thing kavya couldnt resist was a dare.....siri being the youngest seeing the glint in her sister's eyes knew that her mad sis was about to take up the challenge....so she tried to intervene and tell sony that they didnt want her rotten mango anyway.....but kavya hushed her sister and dashed up the stairs to jump off the roof. sony who thought she was a smartass started to panic....her plan was going awry and a hint of a canning she would get if kavya really took up the challenge loomed large in her mind.
siri knowing kavya started the usual tattletale story of chechi ( elder sister)if you dont come down i will go and call amma( mother) NOW!
Looking up the girls spotted kavya on top of the roof....without a single glimmer of hesitation she leaped off the building to the horror of the young girls down below..............there was a lot of screaming and the next thing they heard was a loud thud as kavya landed on the ground at their feet and then there was silence not even waiting to see if her sis was alright siri took off to get her amma and all this while sony was screaming kavya's dead , kavya's dead!!!!!!

when siri and her mom came running , they found a winded but uninjured kavya trying to stand up while dusting her skirt at the sametime ,she was moaning in pain! her mother both relieved and angry didnt know what to say and demanded the whole story ! The mother held onto kavya's ear and told her she would be learning her lesson soon enough ....she informed the girls "wait till appa comes home ...surely your goose will be cooked"!

Leading the girls inside their mother turned to tell sony that she had been a very bad girl! kavya was quiet throughout the reprimanding suddenly burst out saying i mean iam gonna get punished anyway but can i have my "mango please"! afterall i did jump didnt i?! everybody was flabbergasted...but today years later it only brings out good memories and laughter !!!!

p.s: Fiction.