Fresh out of college, I used to work for a local, city-based portal as a content writer and then later, Web Content Manager. In that guise, I met many interesting characters, attended many functions and generally led an interesting life. But of all the people I met, none affected me more than Vandana and Vaishnavi, founders of women’s charity organisation, Banyan.

I wasn’t a trained journalist so had none of the grit or the backbone needed to tough it out in search of assignments. All I had was a head full of ideas – ideas on what was great and good about my city that I could showcase on my website. Through a teacher at college, who was a good friend of Vandana, I heard of Banyan and was really impressed to learn about two women, who, in the prime of their life, threw away a regular lifestyle and immersed themselves in caring after mentally challenged women.

It sounded like a plot of a movie – too fantastic to be true. Clueless about what to expect, I asked for an appointment to visit the place to write about it. That visit and the women I saw, changed me and I honestly feel, I grew up in that space of two hours I spent at Banyan. I remember crying bitterly on my way back to work. Seeing those women, in their bedraggled state, not knowing what was happening to themselves or where they were, affected me like nothing had.

Though it has been years since I met them and the women and their organisation have come a long way since, I constantly think of them and their dedication to their cause. I cannot think of two better examples of women to salute, on International Women’s Day.

If you’d like to donate, please visit this page to learn how.

My Baby is 6 today! I know, I cannot believe it! I keep looking at him, looking just the same as he did yesterday and the day before and today, suddenly, he is a year older. How surreal is this? Where was the red-faced, wrinkled, squalling baby I held seconds after he was born? When did he go and become this child-person who talks cohesively? What the hell have I done with the years?Already, he is concerned that he is becoming older (!) and that in a few years his voice would break ‘into pieces’! I am not ready for this!In the meantime, happy birthday dear heart! May you spread happiness and cheer around you always. And, more importantly, may you always have it in you.

Mind numbing though it is, it sure is true. 7 years ago today, S and I got hitched in front of friends and family. As we both are from different communities, we decided to have an Arya Samaj wedding. Well, I decided and he concurred! And it was a beautiful ceremony. Only snag was, as one of my cousins put it, we knew exactly what we were signing up for, with the priest explaining the mantras in Tamil and English.

It was funny sitting there and murmuring the unfamiliar words, followed by the explanations and to have married cousins and friends whisper ‘Shucks man! I never knew I agreed to do that!’ The venue was Sri Shirdi Baba Mandir in Injambakkam, ECR, Chennai and right beside the beach. So the previous evening, my folks had arranged for a get-together for my side of the family. It was a beautiful evening, peaceful, surrounded by the fragrant trees and the grand finale was sitting on the shores of the sea with my closest friends around me.

The food was a high point – the contractor was an old friend of the family and he took care of everything. From beautiful garlands for us to the seer bakshanams, mouth-watering grub for breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner. He made our wedding and reception food unforgettable. My parents heard for months afterward from friends: ‘Went to this wedding last week pa, the food was hardly a patch on your daughter’s wedding!’

Anyways, that was the day.

The past seven years have been eventful, to say the least. Many, many hiccups, some made by us, some contributed by others, as is the case with most families. But we have weathered them so far and hope we shall continue to do the same.

So let me finish by saying to the hubby, onwards and upwards!

For instance, when P was very little, he once asked me why we got married. A thousand replies weaved through my head:
“To shove a thumb up your paternal grandparents noses”
“To have hot, monkey sex at the drop of a hat (or any other apparel)”
“To get away from your maternal grandparents when the GRE route got blocked”
but as none of them were U rated, I decided to plumb for a tamer reply and fed him some jazz somewhere along the lines of a megaserial maa:
“so that we could have you, beta!”

When I had just found I was pregnant, I tried to test P’s reactions in a roundabout way. I did not want to give him any concrete idea about the imminent arrival as he is somewhat of a blabbermouth. So I tried my hand at subtlety and asked him:
“would you like to have a baby brother or a sister, kanna?”

To which, he replied:
“yeah, but I don’t cos you wanted only me and nobody else!” (another web I had spun earlier when he first asked for a sib.)

“Er, what if?”

“Well, then you’d have to get married again!”

“What? Where did you get that?”

“You only said, mummy, that mummies and daddies have to get married to have children. So if I should have a brother or a sister, you should get married again. Daddy would be so upset; he would leave!”

Next time around, I shall stick to the tried-and-tested-truth, shall I?

Oh yeah, I’ve got a bun in the oven – again. Am only at week 9 or thereabouts so am probably jumping the gun in putting the news on my blog (but who reads it but my loyal 4 anyway?!) but then, think of all the lovely posts I am missing – runs, projectile vomiting, nausea and other deep joys that my life is so full of now. So I thought, what the heck.

What is it with guys and these sort of animal behaviour? Is it repressed sex, as some bright soul stated on a blog somewhere? They are not getting any and as self service isn’t quite as fulfilling, they decide to let themselves loose on the girls out there – is that it? I do not know the reasoning behind this, if at all there’s any, and chances are the red blooded males that get into the act are clueless as to what they are trying to achieve either.

What do they aim for? A grope? A feel? Ok now you’ve felt a girl up, got a nice buzz going – now what? Jump her? Rape her and get it off your system? What?

As far as I know, there’s no point in even going to the cops as they operate under the typical sentiment of ‘well, you are dressed in such a way I know you have boobs and other female apparatus, so you must’ve asked for it!’ There was even this case of some poor girl in Mumbai getting raped in the police station. So, where do we go from here?

This kind of behaviour is on the rise apparently – guys all over the country have decided the women are easy pickings and they can just cop a feel or worse any time of day or night. Why the hell will it stop, unless something happens to make them stop? These lecherous bastards have been doing it for years and as nothing has been done to stop them, they see no reason to stop at the juvenile level and are just graduating. And why ever not? What is there for them to fear?

I feel that when a day has come when a person has to rethink about indulging in the simplest of pleasures like going to the beach or for a solitary walk or any of the other innocent joys of life, then the time has come for a shake-down. Time for the fat cats in the so-called government to actually do the job they were ‘elected’ for – govern the bloody place and make sure there’s some sort of order. What kind of a country are they running where accompanied women can’t even welcome in the New Year without getting raped in the process?

Who was it that said “until the day a woman can go for a walk at midnight and return safe, we haven’t got true freedom”? Looks like we aren’t free yet.

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I wasn’t doing a post on this but an email from the hubby of one of my mates changed my mind. He had written to me to say his wife, one of my closest friends since college, has given birth to their daughter on Jan 8. The previous day, I had spoken to the dazed husband of a blogging-and-real life buddy who had given birth to their daughter on Jan 8th as well.

So my heart is full of baby girls being born now and as I saw the pix of one of them, looking pink and displaying a very nice pair of lungs, I couldn’t help but go “awww!” and in true blogging style, write about it!

What is it about babies that make us go all soft and mushy inside? So helpless and demanding, they take over everything – most of all, your heart. It is so nice to see my no-nonsense mate become a mum – she has always been one of the most steady souls, with a wickedly cynical side. Even though her daughter took her own sweet time to arrive (she was almost a week late), my mate didn’t dissolved into a puddle of nerves. She was calm and like “hundreds of women go through it everyday – I reckon I shall be alright. No point in getting nervy now.” Oh how I envy you, R!

She’s the third of my closest pals to take the plunge into motherhood and with everyone, I am awed all over again. To see the girls I cavorted about town with babies in their arms is like a jolt! Though I was the first of us to have a child, I was too busy doing other things to look at the bigger picture. But now I see it and I cannot help being amazed at this giant step we are all so casually taking!

So welcome to the world, Baby K and Baby A. I cannot wait to meet you and get to know you.

What a lovely, lovely news to start my day off – I feel like I could do no wrong now. Hopefully that’ll mean I’ll ace the exams tomorrow!

What do you do when you are bored and are randomly surfing the net? Search for your favourite TV shows, play some games, Stumble upon something? Well, why don't you log on to Free Rice, exercise your brain and donate some desperately needed Third World rice in the bargain?

All you need to do is test your vocabulary skills. Simple! For every question you get right, the organisation behind this effort donates 20 grains of rice. It used to be 10 but just a few days back, the count was doubled to 20 grains per correct answer. As you answer the questions correctly, the level becomes tougher. Every time you chose a wrong answer, you go down a level and get a question in that level. You can play as long as you want. But a piece of warning: it's addictive!

This site was begun on October 7, 2007 with 830 grains won on the first day. Yesterday a whopping 235,092,740 grains were won, bringing the total upto a mind boggling 5,541,225,910 – and counting!

So how does this work?

The grains you win are donated to the United Nations World Food Programme, the world's largest food aid agency, who work with thousands of organisations to reach this staple to the starving masses. You could also take it a step further and donate desperately needed cash. other vital items. Won't these make a better Christmas gift that a party gag?

While on the subject of alternate, humanitarian Christmas gifts, visit the Good Gifts site to learn how you can donate a cycle to poor children in India, donate books and things to open a library in Africa, modernize a hut in Rwanda – or you could even give someone the incomparable gift of sight. Other organisations like Oxfam have a special section named Oxfam Unwrapped, that gives one suggestions like building a bog, donating tools for farming, condoms and even the ultimate Christmas 'takeaway' – school dinners for 100 children at a paltry sum of just 6 pounds.

How cool is that? To be able to make a difference in someone's life at the touch of a button. There's no bigger high than knowing you have just made some nameless, faceless stranger happy by feeding them; knowing that one hundred poor children will have a full tummy this Christmas because you spared some change. My little boy just gave me the 6 quid from his money box. If he can, you sure can.

Go on, make a difference.

Be there!

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Tags: radiochat, immigration, britain

Blogged with Flock

Tags: radiochat, immigration, britain