I have an incurable habit of pleasing people.

I like to see everybody happy and satisfied. I dread the idea getting into anybody's bad books. Years ago, when S lamented that nobody treated her to ice cream, I gave up the pocket money that I was saving for two months, to treat her to an ice-cream. Never mind, that I was was a kid too and saving all that money to buy one for myself. I felt like an angel that day. When DC shouted at me the other day for no fault of mine, I kept quiet because I thought if I shouted back she might feel hurt - never mind that I was getting very badly hurt too. I even ended up apologising to her, because I was getting nightmares about the argument. I am addicted to making people happy and making them feel special. AG once told me that he did not like my perfume, I changed it the next day despite the fact that AG does not even count as my friend. I can take the stairs when my legs cry out in agony for the elevator just because the people I am with don't want to take it. I can go hungry and wait for food just because somebody's favourite TV serial is on. I can end up writing clueless compositions in new year resolution competitions just because I don't want people to feel bad that nobody participated.

Er...not quite. Its time things changed. No more pleasing people. This new year, I am going to be myself!

PS - its still December and I still don't want to hurt anyone. If you are reading this, don;t even try to work out the initials, because I changed all of them.

Hastalavista

My computer has crashed and I am bypassing the proxy server in office to blog (yes ! they 've blocked blogger as well!)


Duniya Waalon! I am not gone yet...should be back soon, with a brand new computer and more of my tales very soon!

A 1955 Good Housekeeping Article

Arranged Marriages and the Art of Mutual Fund Investments

Hmm, so where should I begin... Say that when I first heard the following line, I was, to say the least, offended. The similarity between a girl and a mobile phone is that "Kuch din aur intezaar kar liya hota, to aur bhi achcha model mil jata"

It left me astonished. But come to think of it, it was right to an extent. Like mutual fund investments, finding a girl, or getting your parents to do the same for you, can be a test of your patience, if you know the tricks of the trade.
Sounds confusing?
Lets take a look at the graph below. A bell shaped curve is shown with respect to time and expectations. In a typical case of a mutual fund investment, where you cannot predict the market, you are advised to invest in small amounts over a period of time. Whether the market is high or low, you can even out your investments and stand to gain in the long run anyway.
Arranged marriages are like a systematic mutual fund investment plan. If planned the right way, you mutually end up with a handsome profit. Rest not assured that one matrimonial section is going to yield the partner of your dreams. In a highly unpredictable world, diversify your investments. Look at all the matrimonial avenues, in all newspapers, websites. Don't confine yourself to partners of any one community - learn to be cosmopolitan. Spread your net over the span of time.

However, our bell shaped curve has its ups and downs. Say you are at point A. You have just started looking for a partner. Naturally, your expectations are on the rise. You reach point B, where you have almost met your criteria. If you are not the perfectionist, you are advised to quit at this point and give a big high five to the shehnaaiwala. However, if you are picky, you will move on to point C. This is the most dangerous point. If you recognise point C and realise that no matter what your expectations are, you cannot get better than this, you are a genious. Unfortunately, most of us are not. We reach C and then descend to B. With time, your expectations must lower themselves. At point B, most people would be wise enough to call it quits. A wise decision indeed. A majority of people fall into this category. Sadly, some of us still continue hoping that we will reach C and instead come down to A. At A - the game is over.

I am at a stage of my life where I am surrounded by friends most of whom are between B and C. Advice, comments and counsel flow as freely as the water of the municipal corporation. Some say its a gamble, some have learnt to measure it with their own stride and some have rather chosen to ignore it. I watch and learn...........

Yeh Haath Mujhe De De Thakur!

Rain Maker

I have a dress that used to be called white at one point of time. So, what's special you might ask. Every one has a white dress that does not remain white for very long. The reason I choose to blog about this particular garb of mine is that it is jinxed. It can make rain. Yes, in the 21st century where people scoff at witchcraft and wizardry, some whites can still be the reason behind 'black magic'.

Whenever I wear this white dress, it rains inevitably. While I don this dress, all cleaned, starched and shining, and pray fervently that it should remain that way till the end of the day, Mother Nature always seems to have other things in store for me. Last time I wore it was on a sunny day, when it seemed nothing could go wrong; it rained all of a sudden. It always has to rain just when I am on the road in that dress negotiating a particularly muddy area. Or when I am trying to cross a street and a moving vehicle splashes rain water.

As a result, my white dress has become mud stained, spotted and in short cannot be worn without proper restoration. I stopped wearing it for nearly a year and last night suddenly thought about it. It’s the middle of summer here and there is little sign of the much awaited monsoon. I smiled to myself because nothing could go wrong and put out the dress that had been restored to its old glory.

I woke up this morning to a flood of rain - it’s rained so much that most streets are flooded, trains are not running and going out anywhere is out of question.

I am next thinking of taking that dress of mine to some famine stricken area.

The 30 minute crisis

While the whole country is rife with speculation as to who will succeed Kalam as the next president, the Chatterjee household is biting nails trying to guess who will succeed PM as the next maid servant. PM quit yesterday and we are at a loss today.

It all started because of those 30 minutes. For reasons best known to her, PM always turned up at 4 in the afternoon even though my mother had made it very clear to her that she should turn up 30 minutes later. In a world where we always turn up late for appointments, we were taken aback by her overwhelming sense of punctuality. The only way the mother sought to counter this, was by switching off the front door bell till 4:30pm and this, my mother did with limited success. Trouble started during weekends when my father who is at home and completely unaware of such rules, admitted her at 4pm. PM started coming at 4pm on weekends and at 4:30pm on weekdays. Slowly, laws of induction started taking their course and she started coming at 4pm on Mondays, then Tuesdays followed, till my mother realised that 4pm was now the rule rather than the exception. Yesterday, when she came at 4pm, there was a minor argument at the end of which PM walked out for good.

At first, we were lost for words. We had got so used to PM, that it was difficult to imagine what life would be without her. Soon however, Chatterjee Junior ahem! Yours truly stepped in. It’s a weekend today and I volunteered to clean the house. Unfortunately, things are tougher for me than for PM and it has nothing to do with the fact that she is experienced in the matters of housekeeping. There are numerous constraints involved when a member of the household tries her hand at work meant for maids. Even though our neighbours know that we are short of a hand, I must not be observed cleaning the house. So, all windows were shut, the balcony was abandoned and the house was miraculously cleaned, seemingly without any human intervention. While I am technologically challenged, my parents are gadget freaks. There is a special mop reserved for use when the maid servant is not around. While PM can have it easy with a bucket and rag, I have to use this special mop (SM) which only my father knows how to assemble and my mother knows how to dismantle. SM consists of a really long pole and a flat blade. A special kind of cloth is wrapped round the blade which is then attached to the pole. As I was struggling to mop the house with SM, my grand father who was taking a nap, woke up with a start wondering what I was doing in his room, with a medieval martial weapon. My grand mother looked on with curiosity, following me from room to room tsching tsching that things had to come to this, that the daughter of the house had to do such menial tasks and I merrily worked, hoping that this exercise would help me lose some calories.

Things are fine for now, but I wonder what we will do during weekdays, when I shall not be around. 30 minutes - cost PM a job and me some calories and my mother - a whole lot of bother. Time will not be able to heal this one!

What women want

What my mother needs is a nice, docile "homely" disciplined daughter-in-law who will help with the household work effortlessly, i.e. without appearing to slog herself. She will know exactly where the Kashmiri Mirch Masala is kept in the kitchen, without my mother telling her. She will know exactly when my mother is not feeling well and take the reins of the household and then hand it back dutifully when my mother feels Hitlerish again. She will know exactly what to say at the right moments, and act in every way to make my mother proud of her. She must be able to take decisions which please my mother. She must not irritate my mother with simple and silly questions like "For how many minutes should I set the microwave oven when trying to make shahi paneer with combination cooking?" She must be beautiful, intelligent, working in a great job (sadly, the definition of great is not clear - but from discreet circles, it has been determined that a great job is one where you have a cabin to yourself and a peon who serves you tea) She must must must know how to drive a car, operate a demat account, play atleast two obscure musical instruments, know the phone number of every specialist doctor in the country and appreciate Lebanese food.

Interested girls out there may respond to fedupmotherseekstoexchangeuselessdaughter@digyourowngrave.com

There is a small catch: My mother has no son.

Okay

During my first year in college, I once overheard my classmates D and S (both females) discussing among themselves the merits and demerits of the other girls in the class. "What about N?" asked S. "Too showy" said D. "And R?" "She thinks she is pretty, and she is quite snooty about it" "How's Anwesha?" asked S. I held my breadth. "She's okay" said D. I must confess, I was disappointed. I thought D would display some more charity. That she would say Anwesha was nice, charming, friendly, polite and all the good words in her vocabulary. Years later, in a world dominated by back stabbing, criticisms and malice, I know how much it takes for a woman to call another woman "okay". Those words mean mean the world to me now. Thank God, I am OKAY!!!

Frozen watermelons on a hot Sunday afternoon.aah heaven!

Its grand pa's birthday today, though he is not very sure if it is on the 6th of May or 6th of April. He confessed this after we slogged it out on a hot morning, churning out lau chingri, pabda maacher jhol and paayesh. Atleast I thought it was a shade better than gran ma who has no idea which month she was born - she vaguely remembers spring - but it could even be summer. Grand Pa has his post graduation certificates and hences knows his age - grand ma does not even know that - in essence she epitomises Bryan Adam's eternal song : 18 till I die!

Kiss Ko Konnect Karu?

I hate it when a daily soap or a game show that you watch regularly comes to an end. No matter how detestable it is, you get used to viewing a certain program at a certain time of the day. When it goes off air, you are faced with a sudden void. It’s been two weeks now since KBC is no longer aired, and we are at a dilemma. Pre KBC, we used to fight for the remote over 'Kasam Se' or 'Hare Kaach Ki churiya' and all those nameless soaps - we hated each and every serial, but we loved the certainty of getting to see it at 9pm every day of the week. When KBC started and Dad insisted that refreshing our general knowledge was far more important than acquainting ourselves with the modus operandi of the scheming sister-in-law, we sulked, but we capitulated. Suddenly, 9pm was about Shah Rukh Khan and his silly antics. We loved it at times, sometimes, we yawned and looked at the watch wishing that sixty minutes would take only five to get past us and at times, we bit our nails, hoping that the hooter would ring and the contestant would get a reprieve.

But all that is history now and we are lost in a maze of ninety channels and more, wondering how best to spend our sixty minutes. I suggested watching news channels, but gruesome news about war and violence does not go well with paltry dal and roti. We certainly need something that is unreal enough to help us digest dinner. Its 9:20 pm and unlike the golden days of yore, the TV is switched off. I am busy blogging, Ma is finishing her novel, Baba is reading his newspaper and if we had a pet cat, it would have curled up and gone to sleep by now. We are probably the perfect picture of domestic peace, but I sense a restlessness that will remain until our hunt for the ideal 9pm time pass reaches an amicable conclusion.

I spotted a white man on the streets of Kolkata yesterday. Presumably a tourist, he was wearing the customary T-shirt with a rucksack on his back. But what took my breadth away was the lungi he wore to bear the brunt of the Kolkata heat. Green vertical stripes and blue horizontal stripes, he wore the lungi like all other men did. But, much as I appreciated his attempts to localise himself, I could not help noticing that he had missed a vital point. While men in India who do not have the privilege of working in air conditioned offices wear chappals or open sandals, our white man completed his gear with a pair of socks and sneakers!!!! I snatched my camera phone out of my bag but my bus had moved on by then. Perhaps, some impressions last best if left to the memory.

Ugh! Ash and Abhi married each other eventually. News papers and channels have had no other news for the last 3 days – one Jahnavi Kapoor slashed her wrists in public and Shah Rukh Khan and Rani Mukherjee were not invited. Somebody from Lucknow arrived at AB’s doorsteps with 500 ladoos and gate crashers were dealt severely by the security men.

Why should I care?

I do because I would hate to put myself in Abhi or Ash’s shoes. Marriage is after all a very personal thing and I would hate to have people intrude and comment on my intentions. It’s as bad as the whole of India demanding to know who made it to the national cricket team and why the world cup was a disaster. True, I pay to watch the game, but the hype created by the media is really unwarranted. We are a nation that lives on sensation. Following the Georgia Tech shoot out, a similar incident took place today in Hyderabad. A student shot at his college mates, because they were trying to stop him from ragging!!!!!

Cooped in my little world, shut out from ‘real life’ for the last few weeks thanks to a viral infection – suddenly the guns seem a lot louder, the wedding bells jarring, and the colours very garish. The world is too much for me right now.

Just read – Jhumpa Lahiri’s Namesake

Intend to – watch the movie

Oodles of Noodles

Has anyone tried the new Maggi Dal Atta Noodles???? It is to borrow an expression from Stilettoes 'craptacular'. I have always been a great follower of Maggi instant noodles and at the age of 4 along with Thums Up, it used to be my dinner on Sunday evenings. Maggi has rolled many stones since then (literally) - people accused Maggi of clogging gall bladders and small intestines and for malfunctioning livers. When I had a stomach upset at the age of 5, the doctor reeled under the shock of discovering my Sunday dinner Maggi habits for the past one year. Maggi was banned instantly.

Life was difficult and not worth living without Maggi - the advertisements on TV made it difficult for 5 year old A. Chatterjee to forget. Grief overcame me and when my parents found that I was but a shadow of my former self, they yielded...a Maggi a month they decided was not going to send me packing to the doctor again.....

So, I indulged...in Maggi Sweet and Sour flavour (that remains till date my favourite) and Chicken flavour and Masala (that's one the that has survived the see-saw of time) Then, there was Maggi Shrimp and Maggi Kheer (don't remember the exact name now - but it was a sweet flavoured horror) that I gave up after one try. As soon as the factories churned out new flavours and television announced it, it found its way into my intestines. Maggi and I were inseparable.

When we went to visit my super rich uncle - we played Genie and Aladin. He said I could ask for anything under the sun - i thought for thirty minutes and asked for Maggi noodles.

Then Nestle came up with Maggi Tomato and Maggi Curry - but they didn't tickle the palate much. I was into my teens at this time, and the only flavour that was easily available was Maggi Masala. It was too spicy for me and for a while I thought, I was going to give up the one food that I had declared as my all time favourite.

In the meantime, the pretenders were baring their fangs - I hated Top Ramen, but I got lured by Cup Noodles. For a while it seemed that I was going to fall prey to the charms to Cup Noodles vegetables flavour. That was before the great trip that turned me into a true Bharatiya.

Flung into a land half way across the world, where people counted their money in dollars and drank Starbucks coffee, I rediscovered Maggi noodles, paying for it at a premium price at Indian stores. It was the only food that I knew how to cook and for me Maggi spelt survival. Luckily, a few angles disguised as super chefs came to my rescue and I was once again eating 'ghar-ka-khana', but I could never repay my debt to Maggi.

Back home, there is a new flavour in vogue -Maggi Atta vegetable noodles - great taste and yummy - and considering that it is not made of flour , I also feel less guilty about having it. I am also looking forward to trying the Maggi Rice Noodles. But Maggi Dal Atta noodles yesterday morning, was a blot on the history of Maggi and sambhar. I love my Dosa and Idli and I think nothing makes the taste better than a bowl of well prepared sambhar. Maggi Daal Atta noodles is an insult to the holy sambhar and should be stopped. But what next? Shall we now have a Maggi Biriyani noodles? Maggi fish flavoured noodles?

I simply think that I am lucky to have been born at a time when they decided to invent something like Maggi for us common folk!!! Thank you God!!! Even though, you did not time our exit from the World Cup 2007 too well, you did a darn good job about timing my existence!!!!

I share my birthday with Osama Bin Laden.

I hardly know whether I should be amused, ashamed or flattered.........

Our Day

She could not have got it more correct. Claiming to be on the road to nowhere, I really think she is underestimating her capability for understanding people! Kudos!!!!!!!

Its Women's Day and I am pretty sure 85% of the world does not know that its Women's Day today and 90% of the remaining 15% could not care. That's why I got pushed in the train today and did not get a ladies' seat in the bus - today of all days. I woke up late and got late to office and the sun was beating down my head and nobody tried to be extra nice to me today!

But of the 10% of the 15% who care, there was a beautiful red rose for each of us women in the office. I got mails and smses from my dear friends and yes! there will be a function arranged for us in the evening, where men would be participating!!!!! Isn't that super duper nice?

Who cares anyway......every day is a Women's Day as long as you are proud to be a woman. If you hold your own respect and dignity even when the world refuses and if your conscience gives you a clean chit, every day is yours to celebrate!

Here's a big thank you to all the MEN who make women feel special. There are very few of you who exist, but your numbers are good enough for us to carry on smiling in this world!!!! Thank you, from the heart.

She says that I am true blue Bong! I could not agree more with her. I do not go to office on days when I feel that the weather is not fine enough for me to take the daily drudgery. I watch 'Saans- Bahu' serials with religious fervour and yet snigger at them in front of the intelligentsia. I miss my 'maacher jhol' when it does not turn up on my lunch plate and denounce swim suit rounds in beauty contests. I think drinking coffee and indulging in 'adda' in office is a mandatory part of my job in office and rush out of the office with my lunchbox and water bottle in tow, when the office bus takes off. I have routine stomach upsets because of street food and yet I am back at gorging them at the earliest opportunity. I do not hesitate to join the ranks of the protesting public whenever the boss declares that we have to come to office on Sundays to get over with extra work and do not miss my roshogolla in wedding parties. I hate Greg Chappell for throwing Dada out of the team and still hope that Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose will return and solve our economic problems by stopping construction of factories in Singur and Nandigram. I wanted to fast when Didi (Mamta Banerjee) fasted, but gave it up when I spotted 'beguni' being fried. I think no decision can be reached without discussing the same matter over and over and killing time till its too late to decide. I love to procrastinate.

And she says I am a true blue Bong! We need to sit down and discuss this someday and come to a conclusion.

Pritamania

All I knew about Amrita Pritam was that the movie 'Pinjar' was adapted from one of her novels. Till I read this Wild Flower

Now I am hungry for more........

Anwesha's laws for persons traveling in the ladies' compartments in local trains

Law#1: Persons who will get off at station: #1, #2 and #3 from the point of departure must not occupy seats. They must exhibit magnanimity by offering their seat to long distance travelers.

Law#2: No one standing is allowed to book a seat by telling the person sitting in the nearest seat that she will occupy the seat when the seated person gets off the train. Believe in your destiny. If you are standing in front of a seat, play the waiting game and wait for the seated person to get up on her own accord.

Law#3: Women in the ladies compartment are not allowed to talk to each other. It has been observed by independent sources, that meaningless banter is the primary reason for fist fights, foul mouthing and hair pulling sessions in trains. It has also been observed that most of the arguments are because of seats and always take place between persons who are not seated.

Law#4: In the event that two persons are found fighting for a seat, the seat will go to the person who makes them quiet. The law licenses such arbitrator to use violence if necessary to make them quiet

Law#5: Any vendor trying to sell clothes or fancy items such as hair clips or broaches will not be allowed to do so. Women tend to get excited over nothing. They spend hours discussing the merits of the item and then resolve not to buy it, thereby wasting time and patience (of the vendor) However, vendors selling food are welcome with open arms and must give special discounts to regular customers

Shah Rukh Rocks!

The curious thing about being Shah Rukh Khan is that the character he plays always slips into his skin. Raj Malhotra in DDLJ was acting as Shah Rukh Khan, so was Veer in Veer Zaara and Raj again in Kuch Kuch Hota Hain, and the injured footballer in a forgettable movie my memory has bidden Alvida to. When Don was bombing the place, in his mind he knew that he was only pretending to be Shah Rukh Khan and when a ghost in a deserted drinking place in Rajasthan pretended to be a living trader who was pretending to be SRK, he had his comeuppance!So what happens when SRK tries to act as SRK in KBC? While we juggle with acronyms, he gives away his wrist watch to a participant who was winning 3.2 lakhs and gave a wrong answer to slip to twenty thousand. His uncanny ability to dole largesse is not confined to green backs alone, he hugs men and women in the hot seat again and again kyoonki "main logon ko bahut pasand karta hoon" The shrill scream of delight when he phones a friend is real and he revels in it.KBC is fast becoming the show that actors are trying to host to reaffirm their popularity with the masses. Amitabh Bachchan's fading career zoomed into the stratosphere with KBC and Shah Rukh who needs a hit badly has realized that selling laptops and washing machines may not give him the boost he requires. Hence KBC. Under the pretense of exposing IQs the Baadshah upthrones the Shahenshah. Skeptics who had written off King Khan will eat their words. SRK is finally acting himself and what's more he is doing a good copy of Amitabh Bachchan!If the 70's generation is alarmed at the idea of the little guy trying to fit into the shoes of the Big B, they forget that SRK is an acquired taste. He grows on you till you learn that you have no choice but to accept him. He is everywhere. Greeting Ladies and girls and aunties and gentlemen and boys and uncles SRK is an epitome of chutzpah. The panache with which he wears a denim blue suit with tomato red stripes over an equally colourful shirt and beckons you from a billboard is breathtaking. Black satin tie over bare neck and a white shirt unbuttoned for as long you can see and a blazer over it - no one can carry it off like SRK.Watching SRK is fun. Like the way he pretends that his wife is calling him back home when the hooter blows at the end of the show, or his "Freeze It' call. The nicknames he uses for the contestants and the completely unfazed look on his face when he reads a question he clearly has no idea about. SRK is taking over the game in a way AB never did. Even though AB was the chief attraction of the show, he never let himself grow bigger than the game itself! With SRK it seems, things are about to change! It’s less about knowing the answer now and more about being feted by Shah Rukh in the hot seat, rolling with laughter with his gimmicks and getting hugged by him and telling him how much we love him. The quiet dignity of show is suddenly gone and with the infusion of young blood KBC's character suddenly resembles a day in office when the boss is away.The last word will rest with my father. A diehard SRK allergic, I was astonished after one particular episode of KBC. Dad just said "O Paarbe!"

Yahooooooooooooooo

ONE HUNDRED POSTS!!!!!!

It took me long, but here I got to a hundred posts earlier than Sachin got to his hundred one day centuries!

:-p

Me feels like celebrating!

Meri Mummy Ko Gussa Kyoon Aata Hain

Crash!
Boom!
Break!
Split!
Woosh!
Upset!
Fall!
Splush!
Throw!
Cling!

Just about some of the usual sounds that reverberate in the Chatterjee household when A Chatterjee Junior ( yours truly) is around have been listed above. I have been spoken of among the legends of goof ups. The other day when I could not get any sleep thinking of that bar of Lindt chocolate that tasted so good at dinner, I stealithily sneaked out of my room and opened the fridge at midnight. The crashing sound of the milk bowl falling woke the entire house. I was caught red handed.

The kitchen is my favorite battleground - burning food, breaking glasses and upseting the pan seems to be a normal day's work for me. So, when I was banned from entering the kitchen for sometime, alongside everyone else, I also heaved a secret sigh of relief. But even if you take me away from goofing up, you can't take goofups away from me. Like leaving the hot water tap on and cold water tap fully off and walking off only to hear a scream of agony as the person who turned on the shower next got scorched. Like dropping the terrace keys in the kitchen garden and remembering it at night when we had to use a torch to hunt for the keys in a virtual jungle. Like forgetting to lock the kitchen garden gate in the excitement of finding the keys and remembering it only after I reached the third floor of a building without a lift.

I have been good with the car so far, but I almost drove into a wall the other day as my father watched enraged because despite his warnings, I took to driving it when he wasn't around.

I also burst a bulb the a days ago. The fuse had blown up and I was looking at it intently, when somebody shouted behind my back. I shuddered and dropped it. I tried to clean up the mess, but when somebody hurt himself while stepping on the glass accidentally, I realised that the cleaning could have been better.

Talking about cleaning, Ma usually has to clean up my act - all the time - from forgetting to take out my lunch box from the bag to leaving home sans wallet - leaving my mobile phone at unknown places - she manages to handle it all. Patient that she is - sometimes (and this happens all the time) I get on her nerves. Yet, she never scolds me much. I have often wondered why, while slipping over sme oil that I had split in my room, she comes to my rescue time after time and why she never gives up on me. The only thing I could come up with was:

"Kyoonki Ma bhi Kabhi Main Thi"

New Year yes, but Happy????

Another year's here again and I hardly noticed how 2006 came and slipped by. As usual, I am stuck 2 years behind time, and I find it tough to believe that its not 2005 but 2007 that we are in - that's me as usual - jaded, confused and all muddled up.

Saji - a good friend - has resolved this year to eat his words if he cannot keep them. He has written down his resolutions on a piece of paper and has promised to chew it if he breaks any of them. Saji, if you are reading this - I already broke a resolution before writing it down, so I am glad that I did not chose to go your way!

My foremost resolution is not to miss the 7:20 train in the mornings - unfortunately, I missed the train on 2nd January. It would have happened earlier had 1st January not been a holiday. My next resolution is to give work a royal ignorance this year. Work must suffer and cry out in neglect, but I refuse to heed. I had a particularly harrowed time in the last three hundred and sixty five days and it has left me with coal black circles under my eyes and a bloodshot look above. I have been jaded and confused most of the time, have fallen asleep in all ( mind you all!) dinner parties that I have attended, forgotten friend's birthdays and feel like giving up this job by the age of 27.

New Year started with a rather ugly feeling. Some people empowered by USA hanged Saddam Hussein. The whole affair was distasteful. If the people of Iraq were the ones to sentence him to death, I would not have felt so strongly - but this was clearly a case of US orchestration. If the USA can get the President of a country hanged by his own people, then they can get any of us - ordinary citizens - killed any day without a reasonable cause. To begin with, the entire war centered on WMD’s which were never found, but it ended with the hanging of the head of the country. Can any of us be sure of our freedom and right to life after this? I also do not support the idea of capital punishment. Life imprisonment seems little more merciful. Who are we to take away the life that we have not created. When a common man kills, it is murder, but when the law decrees that a man be hanged, it is hailed by all. Isn't the end result one and the same thing?

Umm....terrible things have been happening in Noida too, with all the killings of children. Suddenly, the world does not seem as rosy as it used to be, when I did not know or understand these brutalities. Looking at everything through rose coloured spectacles, is merely a means of escaping from reality, but sometimes its best to ignore those things that we can do nothing about. On the better side, Mamta Banerjee will eat in 2007. The President of India, a former Prime Minister and low blood pressure made sure of that. True, it did not make much difference to the farmers in Singur, but she will live to cause more traffic jams, and train disturbances and make my 7:20 come a few minutes late. Touché!

PS - Tatas sure want to make a car that costs 1 lakh. Do they also want to create more roads for us? When a car starts costing 1 lakh, even an impoverished Indian as me will be able to buy a car with a few years’ savings. What will happen to our streets, when millions take to Geeta Pishi (our cook) who instead walking to our house in the morning suddenly drives her new Tata IndiSmall?