:)

Agneesh
Samridhi
Ruhi
Mansi
Daksh
Sumit
Tarun
Neha
Avantika
Lynn

Some of the very few people I like,
the people who always make me smile,
and the people who make life beautiful.

Mmmuuuaah!!

The DMRC Bubble

It's time for some DMRC bashing today. In the last five years, I have never heard anything negative about it. In fact, it's always been a lot of praise about their way of functioning. Now my opinion shall differ since I am seeing and experiencing things first hand. The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation is carrying out its construction work not more than 100 metres away from my home. Even though there have been quite a few inconveniences in the past year, I have been patient about them because they are all temporary. I need to walk ten extra minutes to reach the market that was literally two minutes away, I have to sleep on a bed that vibrates through the night (and nothing fun in this vibration, so hold that thought.), and in general, live with a lot of chaos and noise. But it's all fine. What is not fine is this - to carry out their work, they have blocked all drains leading out of this locality. In some parts, they still unblock them once a week/ten days, and let the system clean up. But on my side of the world, they don't believe in taking the trouble. It has been three months. Of course, first we thought that it is something wrong with the drains leading out of our house. So we contacted the concerned authority - CPWD in this case. Turned out that the drain for the entire lane is blocked. So it was now NDMC's work. NDMC is one government organisation that I LOVE. In the last 11 years, they have never given a reason to complain. And mind you, maintenance of houses that were built during the British times is not easy! So, people from NDMC visited the area every single day for about two weeks. Every day they tried their best to clean up the place. Finally they told us to directly get in touch with senior Metro officials. Well, the Metro people have to live by a certain image built over time, so they are polite every time you talk to them. But, they seem to be only talking. Officer 1, officer 2, officer 3 - they are all the same. When no. 3 was approached, no. 1 was sitting with him and recognised us as the ones who came with the same problem earlier too. Some guts I must say! To not do someone's work and still recognise them. Unique they are for sure.
My house has obviously become a shelter for mosquitoes. Air fresheners obviously do not work. Neither do requests. I hope, like a lot of my posts, this reaches the top of Google's results when someone comes looking for DMRC. And in case they come ego-surfing, I live near the under-construction INA station. Thank you very much! Bloody @#$%^&*!!

Live with it

It was the April of 1993. Thursday of the third or fourth week, Dekh Bhai Dekh was on. That was when I first got an asthma attack. Been a long association. A lot of midnight visits to hospitals, innumerable days off school, special treatment from March to May, sacrifices, loads of prescriptions, immunotherapy, unwanted sympathy, and a lot more.
Allergy to wheat dust always made me hate April. Used to get too exposed during school days, so every morning a decision had to be made - whether I am fit enough to spend half a day outside. I could never participate in any Annual Day functions of the school 'coz it used to be in the first week of May and I could never go for rehearsals on Saturdays or stay back after school. While teachers got to know the new students in the new academic year, I used to be the one with the maximum holidays and a medical certificate. Could never come to terms with it then. Just hated everything that made me miss school!
Around '99 it got real bad. I'd almost started taking it as a given that I'll be rushed to the emergency once a season. And it did happen for four consecutive years. Inhalers just didn't seem to work.
I was 14 when somebody suggested that I take a treatment from the Patel Chest Institute. So we tried that as well. The doctors there made many claims, increased the number of doses of medicines, and that year was one of the worst of all time. So it carried on...
The pollution levels weren't getting any better, and neither were the global weather conditions. Delhi's March became what April used to be, and on the day of my last 12th standard board exam, I was just glad I could reach back home. It was March and so I wasn't carrying my inhaler.
In first year of college, I met Dr Jaggi, and so started a long ordeal of about 65 injections over a period of six months. Immunotherapy it was this time. My family likes to believe it helped a lot and that I am much better post the treatment. Well, I am much better, but I get a feeling it is because over the past four years, I have mostly been indoors during these months. But whatever the reason may be, things have been much peaceful lately. And that led to complacency. There still are a whole lot of precautions that I need to take. But when you feel fit, you tend to not care much. So I did not stop my ice-creams, cold drinks, chocolates, etc. this season, and I got a taste of the past today. It was horrible, and I hate myself for having acted so stupid.

The state of things is quite bad all around. Every second person I meet now has asthma. It was still a unique thing that people listened about in awe 15 years ago. Allergies is one thing, but pollution and global warming another. I wonder what tomorrow holds.

Life as on April 19, 2008

My latest status message on Facebook reads, 'Richa's love for herself is almost obscene :P'. I am smiling non-stop. No real reason as such, some silly stuff that made me happy. But really, I wonder if everyone is as self-obsessed as I am. Not just that. Happy and no regrets. No qualms about being touchy, impatient, confused, and needy. Can't find a word better than 'obscene'. :D Oh, I also left modesty far behind. Bitch I've become! But I take pride in that too. Tch tch. But indulgence is nice. I've never found anything wrong with it. Not just self-indulgence, but indulging in anything. It comes with its cons, but so does everything else. At least it is fun.

But another fact is that I know other people like me. And I love them! Emotions always running high, and almost out of control too. But maybe the out-of-control happiness makes up for the out-of-control fuck-ups too. We (or I) may wail and howl even when an ant dies, but the happy exciting times are equally action-packed. At times I do feel that exogenous variables should not affect my life so much, but I am not so full of myself either that I can satisfy all needs with the self. A world around me exists, because I believe in the literal meaning of 'theory of relativity'. Being detached from it will probably mean death.
Jayant recently left a comment here saying being crazy seems like an 'in' thing nowadays. Isn't that incredible? :) And people keep asking me if I have always been pagal and if I plan to remain pagal in future too. My answer's always in affirmative. Really, something inside me will be dead if I stop being crazy.
I still have a boring, serious, uninterested side to me too. Some people find that crazy too. Hee..
I don't.

I recently finished reading The Godfather. The book is still on my bed, and so I clicked some random shots around it. Somebody saw the recent images in my camera and said that I should post them all as 'confessions of a bored photographer'. Valid enough. my camera is permanently in the macro mode and I click everything from water bottles' rims to my specs' rims. From coins to notebooks. Everything!!
So here's something that I clicked today. And I am totally in the mood to relate to it too.

Godfather, God, Photography!

Flight

I shall live till the day I live.

Shady Happiness

I have been breaking into a song every couple of moments for the past few weeks now. Whatever a conversation may be about, I'd have an instant song ready to go with it. Of course, the sur-taal still choose to remain miles away from me, but thankfully words don't desert me now like they used to earlier. There was a long phase when I had completely stopped singing. Never even hummed along with a song. This was, of course, post the sabbatical from the stage (yea yea... I could sing once!). Anyway.
Coming back, the non-stop singing. From romantic to comic to corny... I sing them all. From the Dev Anand-Madhu Bala ones to Rakhi Sawant and the gang. Yes, the domain remains Hindi. Can rarely happen with English songs. Thoda haath tang hai, you see.
And if I think about it, the only reason I can associate with this behaviour is a happy state of mind. Sure I still crib and sulk. Small things never cease to bother me beyond belief either. But, I am happy. And I do not think I need to type out the reason.

Moody's

Strange things keep happening all the time. When you're looking for chocolate, you end up getting vanilla. You crave for a smile or two, turns out they're still behind the tears in this queue. You reach a point where you do not even want to crib about things -- you just wonder! The 'whats' and the 'whys' start taking over, and you wonder if that paanchvi pass was a better point in life. You are down in the dumps, and you wonder why you're treating yourself like that when you deserve something better. You wonder why you always feel that there is something better around. Is that what life reduces you to? To keep consoling yourself?

I went to Jantar Mantar today. I had been avoiding the place for a while because I had my doubts about how I will click there. And I was right. It is too much of a lot things for me! Firstly, I have a crazy fear of climbing heights. I enjoy being on top, but I am shit scared of climbing. So today, I somehow managed to climb a creepy steep set of stairs, but later realised that I was too scared to even move to come down.

Phew! Too steep, no support!

Secondly, architecture is not my thing. I never know how to click it. And something as complicated as the Jantar Mantar is way off my league. I kept wondering why I have never seen anything from DK on that place.
Thirdly, I was not understanding the physics of it either. Not that I needed to, but it's always nice to understand a place that you're visiting.

Anyway, I clicked nonetheless. Spent an hour still. Met an interesting guy too. His name was Saroj and was a final year student at the National School of Drama. And quite dramatic - he had studied science and hotel management, and then had run away from his home three times to become an actor in Mumbai. Then some sense prevailed. His parents were visiting him from Orissa, and they were damn sweet too. Very simple people, even simpler smiles.

He offered to click a picture of mine :)


I could not even jump on to one of these slabs to click something nice. :|

He gave me 10 precious minutes too. I would never have climbed the second long set of stairs if it wasn't for him. But after he left, I enjoyed myself sitting right on top. The sun was penetrating my skin, but the wind was nice enough to even it out.

View from the top

I needed to get out of the house, and I did. I wonder if I take my freedom for granted. It is precious, and I love it.

Playing Favourite

The one that I mentioned yesterday.

This Rainy Day

Save water, save life
Originally uploaded by RBhardwaj

I don't know why the title, but it was one crazy evening. There was something I wanted to click when it started raining, and there were no shutter speed controls. So no rain drops in a puddle!
Then when the rain almost stopped, I spotted something in my backyard that I wanted to click. At least 40 shots!! Now call that determination to get it right, or uselessness at clicking, or the fact that the wind was strong and my subject was shaking. Also my hand which held such a light camera in an awkward position! :|
Did manage something, but not quite what I set out wanting. I guess that's just a trend which is here to stay for a while. (OK, no cribbing!)

Will upload that shot later, for now this was a lazy makkhi which I thought was dead. In somebody's words, usey ulta taang diya gaya tha. :D But it did fly away, was only willingly posing. Hee...

Enjoy!