Bitter Sweet

(This is an old post, which never got posted...)

I am sitting at work and i have no motivation to work. None whatsoever, i have a never ending list of things that i need to finish, soon enough, but i cannot find the motivation to work. There are reasons for this and i am not sure if i should write them here. how appropriate it would be if some present/future employer googled for me and found this blog post about me cribbing about my work and such!

Now this coming vacation is making me very nostalgic about my childhood and how things were then and have been since. of course i have grown up, moved from one city to another, gotten educated, married but the heart still craves for those "good old days".

Some of my fondest memories are going with my Dad to get ice cream and he wanting mango and me wanting chocolate and i would be amazed how anyone in their right minds would want to eat a "mango ice cream"!!! Enough already with that fruit! But now i like that so much myself, i actually like fruit flavor ice creams now! it's a far cry from those days. Another very distinct memory is sitting down to tackle math problems with my Dad/Grand Dad and it used to be a huge nightmare, but it was always exciting, always one to "show off", I would try and do math problems from lessons ahead so that when they sat me down for a math lesson, I would amaze them with my shear brilliance :)... Dad would never really praise me...but i would just be happy to let him know that i knew the stuff!...

So now 2 weeks to get back to the place where all the above and more happened...can't wait to touch my pillow!!!...India here we come....

27 days to go!

i am on a constant shot of adrenaline, i am sleeping, walking, talking my impending trip to "India". That 5 letter word brings this huge smile on my face and i begin to dream of who all i will meet, where i will shop, what i will eat and how the trip is going to be so short :(

I am going HOME after 4 years, the house i have a few thousand dreams, laughs, breakdowns and memories in. I am going to go to Delhi, my home, Mumbai, Gourav's home and Jabalpur, my Mom's home town, which is also where i did my Bachelor's from. I can't wait to see my grand father, whom i am very excited to see. After 4 years, in which i have not had a chance to speak with as much as i would like, because of my own incompetence to make those calls and his to hear me. There have been so many new additions to the family, weddings and kids, i can't wait to see them.

And i have this whole new family that i will meet for the first time, which are my own and since my wedding, which is also getting 1 year old :), i have been getting real close to. Having a sister in law and a brother is law is fun! they side with you, very much like your own siblings who fall for your partners charms!

This is going to be one hell of a trip and i cant wait to land. 27 days and counting :)

This has been the longest time when i have not written anything.
I have been lazy, very lazy. Not that there weren't interesting things to write about!

I have spent these past few weeks admiring my mom a whole lot, not like i have not always been extremely proud of her and proud to be her daughter, but some of the things she does and has done are just exemplary!

My mother is a very strong lady, she has a lot of strength and courage. When my sister and I were very young, i was only 4 years old, my Dad went to Nigeria for a two year deputation, my mother, a doctor, by occupation, stayed in India with us because she was worried about our education. Staying with two children in those days, alone, was quite an amazing task for a woman, with children so young. She did a splendid job, my sisters and my dance classes were never stopped, she still managed to take us out to our favorite places and do all the things that we would've done with Dad around, we did miss Dad, but we managed well. My sister had an operation in this duration and I had a fracture, but my mother didn't get hassled by all this, sometimes my Grand Dad was there to help her, other times he wasn't. We had very bad neighbors who gave her grief for no fault of hers and i remember her being to agitated by it but didn't complain about it to us. Dad and she manged things so well despite the distances, it was amazing. It was like a bout of bad things to happen to her, just before we were

My Dad had to tour a lot, so even after coming back from Nigeria, he would travel to Vizag on a monthly basis, my Mother's strength saw us through it all.

Now my parents are back in Nigeria, Mom is working for an IV clinic, and I am amazed at how fast she learned the new technology, not that it was easy, being used to old ways and not used to the computers that were pushed her way, she is someone, whom i had a had time teaching, Ctrl C and Ctrl. V, but this lady has now mastered the art of Microsoft Powperpoint! i was delighted to see the presentations she makes, complete with a graph!!! She doesn't take any help for house hold chores, my Dad helps around, but despite the grueling hours at the clinic, she still goes for her walk, makes the most splendid meals, takes care of the house, socializes and does all this with a smile on her face.

Mom, i am so proud of you and i strive to have your patience, perseverance and simplicity. If I could even be 10% of you, I would call it an achievement.

I love this weather...spring by far is the best season followed by fall! the best thing i think the Dept. of Transportation does is put bluebonnets on the sides of highways, so the whole place looks blue and green and you can see parents taking photos of their kids with the flowers. it is an absolute delight!

my life has been very hectic a work, and that is unfortunately having a very bad affect on my food and my gym. the former i am seeing too much of and the later hardly! so i am back to square one, those 2-3 happy weeks of regular gym ming are a thing of the past...i need more motivation to go there and not just sit and watch some damn movie or TV. aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh....

so India didn't make it to the world cup! thank god for that...if it had sneaked in to the super 8s because of other's misfortune i would have been more angry and the Indian team more cocky, it is time for them to really get their act together! And as the BCCI is very "wisely" saying Ghee (saturated Fat) should be banned, yes that indeed is the solution to our cricket woes! There is so much going on in India right now that it's just amazing how one country can concentrate on so many "big" news and events at the same time. There is the Big Bollywood wedding of Ash and Abhishek, which if you ask me is not getting enough media attention, and enough speculation. What these people in the public eye should realize is that we make them what they are today, the adulation, the attention and the insanity it all is because we want to know what is going on with them, so donot please shun the media and not give us the scoop we are looking for.

But truth be told, I really donot care about the wedding, except i want to see what Ash wore at the wedding and the other guests, that is all i care about, so i am hoping atleast some pics are put somewhere!

Then there is the Richard Gere Kissing Shilpa, Oh My God, i am besides myself with rage, how in the world could Richard Gere, come to 'some' show and take advantage of 'one of our dear indian girl' like that! Who cares what the cause is, what the reason for all this and who all contributed to this event and what this event will help in, i don't care about it, i want to go and burn some posters of Richard Gere, make spoofs of his films and when he finally gets back here, stone his house!

***Clarification**** I am being sarcastic above please do not think i endorse the "Shiv Sena" view point! As some people have pointed out that they have not been able to see the sarcasm!

Phew, then there is Sanjaya Malakar phenomenon happening!!!! It truly is just that! One started of as being a joke on the hugely popular American Idol show, how now become quite the rage that the show needed, now they will not admit this, they are making a huge deal out of it, that if he wins, so and so will quit and this will be the worst season ever, but what they dont realise is that in most seasons by this time, people loose interest in the show, but this year the ratings are high and people like me are watching it solely to see what the "wonder kid" will dish out this time, a wacky hair do or a bad rendition of an old favorite! One thing which i love and admire about him is his strength and ability to stand up there and take all the criticism that is being hurled his way, every week Simon will say something mean to him, i don't know how they think that helps, for he is not there of his own accord, they chose him to be there and now the public is voting for him, what is he supposed to do? He is doing his best to come out there and entertain people. I don't think anyone should be mean to him, but what i do know is that the public is mean very mean and for his sake, i don't want him to win the contest, cause the public will not leave him alone, like it is his fault! But the incident at the game that he went to is i think a good indication of what can happen. I have heard and read a lot of people saying because of his Indian background I should be proud of him. I just think this is misplaced patriotism. But that's just me, and i will not support him for this reason, in fact i don't support him at all, i just admire his courage.

The past week is up there in my list of "worst weeks".
Not only was it a hectic week, it was sad and i was very week emotionally and mentally.
It didn't start on a good note at all, for I had a deployment of a new application, the deployment had a lot of hiccups, the network not being available, my import programs running slowly. But Monday morning things were running smoothly...with the initial user errors and some things we didn't think of happening and solving the programs on the fly. it was a hectic day and finally when i went home that day i just prayed that things would get better. Well they didn't, it seemed like everyone wanted me to do everything at the same time fir them and i was not really handling all the pressure well, i hate being the only one who knows how to do somethings. i wish there was a back up plan intact here, but it isn't.

Thursday rolled by and my life was really not going well, the only thing looking positive was that Gourav would be coming back from Kansas City that day. Around lunch time that day, i got a shock that would probably change our office forever. Our network Engineer had not been feeling well that week and hadn't been coming in, but we hadn't heard from him in 2 days and Jeff got worried about him and so thought he should go and see how he is. His name is John Thomas. John is divorced and used to live alone so when our calls to him went unanswered, it was concerning. So jeff went to his house and he saw John's car was in the garage but he would answer the door or the phone. So Jeff called the cops for he was really worried now about John. Jeff was the first person to discover John dead. John was probably trying to make himself a bath when he died, he was suffering from pneumonia. Jeff has not been himself since and we cannot get ourselves to get used to the fact that the guy who sat not more than 1 feet away from us is no more.
Jeff cried and that broke me completely. It's like when a person who you regard as your hero breaks, you think the end of the world is near. I have been not able to shake this feeling of utter chaos and loss from my heart since. i have spent some sleepless nights, thinking about John and how he must be alone...i cannot deal with the empty desk in my office. Jeff came that very night back to the office and cleaned John's desk, it's blank and it stares at me all the time and i cannot look at it. i have to pass it each time i enter the office or leave...

Friday was the day when i finally lost all control and broke down, the stress of all the work i had, seeing Jeff like that and John, it just broke me and all I wanted to do was run away from work. it was one of my weakest moments at work, and i cried. i felt like a fool after that, but it did some good, i just started doing things mechanically without thinking, so that might have been good.

I have been thinking how i am going to go to John's funeral today. It's not about me and it's not about Jeff, it's about seeing John....

May John's soul rest in peace and may God give his family strength to deal with this loss.

I just got back from lunch and i am in a huge dilemma!
I wrote earlier about these flying objects on the roads and how they scare me, so well today when i was driving back to work, there was this truck with a trailer attached to it, going in front of me. It didn't look very well kept and there were pieces of cardboard in it and some empty plastic crates. The crates were all loose and were moving around in the back of the trailer and this trailer was open at the end, so things could fall off!

nothing untoward happened but the crate fell, it caused people to change lanes and such, but the truck driver happily and ignorantly kept driving his damn trailer and took off!

now my dilemma is, i want to report this guy, i want him to tie his @#$%^&* crates together and not have them strewn around the whole Metroplex. but i don't know what the cops will do, i don't know if he has a license even, if this is his only means of lively hood and how i might endanger that. but i want such drivers taught a lesson.

what should i do. i still remember the registration number of the vehicle.

Ctrl F

Finally i am back to feeling a 100%, it's been an ordeal fighting fatigue, weakness, fever, cough...but now i am back to being healthy! What is not strange is that i had been willing illness to come to me, i mean i was praying that i would fall sick, that way i would get the much needed rest, but i think I pleased the god of sickness too much and the god of wellness too little and thus the infection and symptoms went for a bit too long. lesson learnt, too much praying is literally not good for health!

Meanwhile, for a lot of time now, whenever i have some time and am not looking for anything else on Google or wiki, i am looking for 1 of three things. Now for quite sometime now, i have been spending a lot of time, trying to find two lost friends and 1 series i used to see in India way way back and now want to see it again. Now, one of the two friends, Mandavi Saxena, I am writing her name here so that if someone who is in touch with her, reads this, can tell her about me. So she and I were very good friends in school, then i moved away, and for sometime we kept in touch, we even met some 7-8 years ago in my solitary trip to Ranchi. But after that, I have not been able to find her. None of my other friends who know her, know how to get in touch with her! to imagine that in this day and age there are people who do not have an active email address. Same story is with another friend of mine, but in her case, i have finally been able to get a valid email id and if Gods willing and Jagariti willing, she will reply soon!!!

Ok now the third thing and arguably the most irritating, most tempting and most sought after amongst the three! When i was maybe 12 or 14 years old, there was a Japanese series that was aired on Indian television, Oshin. It was one of the most popular, non-Hindi series ever to hit the indian television! The showed us a significant part of the series, but suddenly for no apparent reason, the series can canceled and was aired no more! Back then, there was no Internet and i had more pressing matters to deal with, like my friends, school, the games we played and so much more. But now for about 8-10 months, i have been looking for a DVD collection or any such digital copy of the series, but so far i have come up with zilch. I do find some DVD collections on amazon, but they are in Japanese and cost like $2000 but other than that i have found wiki entry and some blogs and even IMDB mentions it, but i cannot find any digital copies. Not netflix, not blockbuster, not eBay, nothing.

But my search shall continue, i am not going to give up this soon...

Why is that one cannot tell someone something that matters to you and they not pass on the thought to someone else? And then those super geniuses have to trespass your thoughts all the time!