I Recycle

I recycle. Whether its paper, power or people. I get tired of things easily and I want more and new avenues almost every second of my life. This makes it hard for anyone/anything around me to stay long enough without changing its form into something that suits my needs. 

I recycle when I give away my things to goodwill. I recycle because when I move to a new place I try to buy all my new goods from a recycling store or thrift store. 

I recycle when I move to a new city and meet new people. My old friends still remain friends but they evolve. Those that cannot be recycled need to be left behind to avoid toxicity and land fills for which I do not have the time or the space.

I recycle the way in which I interact with people. I need to know that there is a perfect PH balance in the relationship and to avoid too much acidity or alkalinity I like to shake up the dynamics.

I recycle because I cannot discard and replace. Its just not my nature. I recycle because I value not just the environment and its resources but also myself. 

Life

“Life is a long preparation for something that never happens.” 
― W.B. Yeats

I've Gotta Stop

Saying things in this manner "I was like..." "And like..." "In like..." basically stop using like unless I want to emphasize similarity

Craving mango ice cream after dinner

Trying to figure out whats going on in Pretty Little Liars - not gonna happen ever

Obsessing about the future

Sometimes You Stay Awake So You Won't Dream

Sometimes staying awake is better than a dream. Other times dreaming is worse than staying awake.

Quote of the Day

“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.” 
― Federico García Lorca, Blood Wedding and Yerma

How Are Two People Meant To Be Together...

If they can't live in peace even when they are apart.

How I feel today

Stuck somewhere between the gutter and the stars

I long, as does every human being, to be at home wherever I find myself...

Where I find myself sleeping, eating and being thoroughly spoiled.

I am back home after almost 2 years and for the first time in 2 years I have had one WHOLE week of uninterrupted sleep at night. The weather in Kolkata has been perfect (by which I mean slightly warm of course.) Its been in the 70's and the sun is up every single day. That does wonders for my mood.

I also get tea made for me, exactly the way I want it. And lots of fish...

I have ventured into the city twice and plan to do a lot more venturing soon. However, next week I am heading down south to Kerala. Looking forward to another trip. I like how I have already been travelling a lot this year... I hope to maintain the pattern.

P.S. I have a new interest and it makes my Dad very happy - gardening.

2011 - Year of Learning

Clearly I should not attempt to do anything semi artistically. I was trying to make a collage of the events that were highlights in 2011.

Some of them that made it to the list before I gave up on being creative:

1. THREE trips to California - January, March and August. I was SO lucky I got to go back to SF and Monterey and Carmel each time. Just really blessed.
2. My 8 mile runs around the DC national mall. There is absolutely nothing I looked forward to more after a day at work. Even when it was hot as hell outdoors I made it for my run because the mall never fails to overwhelm me.
3. Friends - Old and new!
4. Trips to NY - in winter and summer. Walking around central park with Shady, eating an ice cream and watching the boats and ducks in the sweltering heat is such an experience. However the best memory from the summer trip was definitely Williamsburg and the Tenement museum. If you are in NY you absolutely HAVE to go.
5. Surprise birthday trip to Chicago for the boy! Terrible weather all around made sure it was not a surprise by the time I landed. Memorable nonetheless!
6. Yoga- Hot, hard and sublime!
7. Puerto Rico - Beach bumming, kayaking, eating, walking, drinking and waiting for buses endlessly! Such a great great vacation.
8. Jewellery! Rings - diamonds, turquoise, silver and gold.
9. Loved ones - people I love and care about and who love and care about me. What would I do without you in my life?

Our Obsession With Our Early Ancestors

I have never understood our obsession with dieting and exercising the way our early ancestors did. Why should we do it? They didn't look good, they lost all their teeth young, most of them died young from unknown causes.

I am yet to understand why we obsess with what they ate and try to replicate that. 

Scott Schuman and Garance Dore Are Making Me Broke

Yes, they are. I am sure I am not the only one either. But what a happy way to be broke.

I started the new year with a resolution to pay off all my student loans and to make more of an effort in the fashion department. Clearly no goal congruence there. So I started with the easier one.

I love clean cute and paisley. Here are two pictures of things I bought:

 The dress is a Diane Von Furstenberg - so cute and clean cut. I wear it with a big black belt and black knee high boots. Its still cute.

The coat is from Anthropologie. It looks much better when I wear it than in the picture. Its cute and snug.



Hmm.. what next? I am thinking some very 60's dresses. I am talking clean cuts, bold patterns and fun! Something like this (not exactly that fabric)

The Sweetest Text You Ever Received

For me it was the 10 days that we were separated for in 2008. He sent me one reason everyday- one reason he loved me. The one on the 10th day blew my mind. Best separation ever :) 

Just Your Regular Sweet Nothings

Me and Shady have a HUGE fight in Chi. It is epic. It is all because he wanted to go running for 15 mins before we headed out. We were already late. I really wanted to see the city. He wakes up at 11.30 and goes: I am going to write a paper, work out, take a shower, eat lunch and then show you around. I go storming out of the door.

Later Mike acts as duck tape and brings all of us together. At this time the sulker in me is having multiple orgasms because I haven't had so much to sulk about in ages. Still giving the boys my somewhat silent treatment. This is one conversation I remember:

Me: (Gazing away at the city skyline)
Shady: (A little scared about approaching me, knows I am crabby crabbyson)
Shady: (Bites the bullet. Thinks its best to try and get shot down than not try at all)
Shady: What are you thinking about Boo?
Me: (Calmly) It is illegal
Shady: O! God. That was quick. You must really be thinking about killing me seriously.

We both burst out laughing. It is exactly what I was thinking about.

#laloca

Things That Keep Me Up At Night

Everyone is going all braveheart on the Republican nominees and their ridiculous opinions. Now they found some support from an unlikely source - Pat Robertson. I hear Jon Stewart and a lot of my friends on Facebook going - well if Pat Robertson says you need to tone it down you must really need to fucking tone it down. 

That doesn't make any sense. Here is why:

Pat Robertson thinks homosexuality and bestiality are one and the same thing. They are not. 

Pat Robertson thinks that Haitian's sold their souls to the devil to buy their freedom from France and their payment was extracted in the form of the devastating earthquake. They did not and it was not. 

Pat Robertson is a raging lunatic. 

He is the opposite of someone whose opinion should be quoted.

If he asks the Republican nominees to shut up - they shouldn't. They should do the opposite. 

The only reason the Republican nominees like Rick Perry should shut up is if sensible people ask them to shut up. If they aren't listening to the voices of reason why on earth would they listen to the senile voice of Pat Robertson. 

It is a little bit ridiculous that this is keeping me up at night!

Crazy Lady Attack

I woke up this morning to a couple of rather ridiculous/slanderous comments on my blog from an obviously cccrraazzayyy lady from Cupertino, CA, whose name is... wait for it... Gitanjali! She also goes by Gigi. For a second I was like.. What Would Don Draper Do?

She was bat shit insane. Like way way out there whacko. I am talking T-Rex on cocaine insane! I guess i made my point. Must control tiny fists of fury!

So CL/ T-Rex as she shall hence forth be known is at least older than 50. But, she thinks that her computer which was hacked at some point had material very similar to what she see's in my blog. Kinda weird since she is at least double my age if not more. So I have concluded that it could be one of three things:

1. She has never ever ever heard of a namesake and doesn't believe people can have similar experiences or,
she has wayyy too much time on her hands to Google not just her name but also her nickname



OR - THIS SEEMS MOST LIKELY

. 

This will explain why I have disabled comments on my profile. As my environmental econ prof used to say - don't indulge the crazies with argument they will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience.

A Letter To My 16 Year Old Self

Hi Gitanjali,

I am writing to  you from the future. I/you are now 9 years older and none the wiser. But, there are things that I think I can tell you that might make things easier for you. 11th grade is going to be hard. It's ok to not have friends or make friends with people you have nothing in common with. Studying science is going to be a struggle. Home life will also be a struggle. But after all these struggles you will have come out a much stronger girl.

Try not to live anyone else's dream. Clearly you missed the boat when it came to studying for medical school. Let it go and pursue something else. Don't dwell on it. You will be your own force of nature in your own way one day.

No matter how much weight you lose at this age it will not help your self confidence. You could be the prettiest, skinniest girl in the class but the only way you will make friends in your new school is if you are completely soulless. You aren't. Also losing a lot of weight is just going to make you sick. So eat all the delicious food that was denied to you in boarding school and be happy.

Two years from now you will meet a boy who will break your heart. It will seem irreparable but that is just the beginning. Don't think you can be a man. You are sensitive and you should embrace it. Whoever hurt you should know they hurt you. It is not a sign of weakness. Nothing is a sign of weakness other than keeping yourself shut and trying to manipulate your feelings to seem like something you aren't.

You won't meet many other men before you meet the right one. That is about 6 years away. But that is ok. You will still have questions about men and always be hauntingly suspicious and demanding. Embrace it because someone else will embrace that about you. Someone will embrace all your imperfections.

That stupid itch that you have before exams when your entire body swells up is a psychosomatic reaction - hives is what they call it in the US. That will go too :)

You are so beautiful and so clueless about your radiance. Try to maintain that and remain naive. No matter how much people try to show you the dark side of the world. Sometimes naivete is what it takes to make a regular day seem extraordinary and a regular life seem fulfilling.

Don't hate on your Mom so much. You are more like her than you think.

Love,

Gigi

Even Peace Maybe Purchased At Too High A Price

I grew up with a lot of Tibetan friends. I am still good friends with most of them and through them I have met some beautiful people. This article about Tibet (it will always be Tibet to me) makes me sad: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/world/asia/ninth-tibetan-a-nun-immolates-herself-in-anti-china-protest.html?ref=world

Weekend Shenanigans

What a great weekend this has been! It reinstates my belief that girls are so much fun to hang out with. Yes we are!

Friday night: Got off from work on a not so high note. Rushed to the metro. Saw a guy with a ukulele that had a feather on its back on the metro. He was playing and tuning the thing with so much enthusiasm. The thing is - it wasn't making any sounds. NBD. Got off at Chinatown and for some reason I felt completely lost. Met my friend at gallery place and soon three of us were headed to watch Moneyball. Those critics who reviewed the movie must not have watched it on a Friday night after a week of work. Also they could not have been sober. Also, I think they were all living under rocks for the last 20 years. It was an ok movie at best. It was such an OK movie that I didn't care enough to wait for the entire movie to end so I could go pee. After that we went to dinner and spend the entire conversation talking about hauntings and ghosts. It was really freaky. Ended up deciding to go on a day trip to Harper's Ferry the next day. Also, were too scared to walk/metro back home alone so we all got in a cab till J's car and then she dropped us home.

Saturday: Got in a ridiculous misunderstanding with my Dad. Cried for 2hrs on the phone with my Mom. It was a beautiful day so I got my act together and left the house on time to meet K at Silverspring for our road trip. Ok, it was just supposed to last an hour. But, the weather was soo brilliant and our conversation was so engaging that we overshot one exit by 30 miles. Then, neither of us had a smart phone or a GPS. Called The Boy from Hancock. No, I still don't know where that is exactly. He gave us directions which was through some of the most charming places I have seen in the US. We stopped at Historic Boonsboro. Disclaimer: From this point onwards most towns will be referred to as Historic. Got some apple cider, peach butter and honey. Took some pictures. Got back in car and drove. Reached (Historic) Harper's Ferry and still couldn't find it. Drove up to (historic) Bolivar. Drove back down to Harper's Ferry. Its a realllllly small but beautiful town. Situated at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers, it is really gorgeous. Little shops that sell cute souvvenirs and roughly two restaurants and THREE ice creams shops. Its all very charming. Bought little Wood Wick candles that crackle when they burn and smell like pine forests. Had dinner then headed to our haunted tour. That ended at 10 in the night and we drove back to DC.

Sunday: Went to Cox Farms for pumpkin picking! Yay. So grateful to experience fall in all its glory. Ate too much but also walked around a lot. The fresh air seems to make me really happy. Also being in green, open places reminds me a lot about my childhood days growing up in the tea plantation.

The best part about the weekend was being able to use my camera which has been lying around hibernating. Here are some pictures :)   

Free Sex

O! You wish! This post has NOTHING to do with sex. The reason I called it that is because I checked my analytics data for the last few months and noticed that the post "Hardcore" had the most number of visitors. It also *shockingly* had the highest bounce rate. O! they must have been SO disappointed when they read the post. So this is a dig at all you peops looking for porn and landing on this blog.

Ironically enough this blog is about the latest book I am reading (which also has nothing to do with sex... yet.) Its the autobiography of Gandhi called "Gandhi- An Autobiography. The Story Of My Experiments With Truth." So far its uninspiring. Though I might have just left it at a very critical juncture and so my follow up comments maybe drastically different. Anyway, for those interested I can give you a gist. Gandhi was a very very boring young boy, if such a thing be possible. Apparently he never lied. He was from a vegetarian family but ate meat because he thought it would make him strong enough to oust the British from India (endearing!) He got married at the age of 13 and I think had sex right about then too. He refers to himself as a very lusty young boy. I think he also fathered a child when he was in his teens. His wife had one miscarriage before their first born.

The tone of the book is somewhat contrived. Maybe that was the requirement back in the day. He seems to be trying to be very honest but I find some of the examples disturbing. There are numerous incidents of him ending up in whorehouses and being completely dumbfounded and shocked and ashamed and never participating in anything "sinful." Commendable... but I have met boys who are as naive as they come who haven't ended up with prostitutes as many times as Gandhi had. Suspect. Maybe its just the girl in me thats suspicious of this repeated folly. I am a stern believer that if you make a mistake once - you are about average. You make it twice - you probably are a slow learner. When you make the mistake a third time - you ought to go to hell in a hand basket.

Academically too he isn't all that I imagined him to be. Seems like a confused youngster who went to England and spent his family's money on clothes and trying out different kinds of vegetarian food and travelling and eating atop the Eiffel tower. All I am going to say here is: glad he got that out of his system so he could concentrate on more important things later in life - unlike our ministers in India today. O! for those of you wondering - no he didn't go to either Oxford or Cambridge. In fact he never even graduated college. He took the bar and became a barrister.

How did he end up in South Africa? Because he couldn't find any employment in India. On his return to India he seems to be stuck in between fancying himself an Englishman but being of Indian blood. This seems to hinder his progress in Bombay as a barrister. Also I have to mention that after all the money, time and effort his family puts into him he is unable to speak in the court of law! Obviously its a problem if you want to be a lawyer but cant speak up. So he heads to South Africa,

Another bone of contention I have to draw with him is: it seems like his wife is always an afterthought in his life. And I mean - ALWAYS. None of his decisions involve her. It seems to me that the only times he remembers her are when he ends up in compromising situations with prostitutes.

Phew! Had to get that out of my system. What do you know... this post has more about sex in it that I thought it would. I will post my reactions about the book more often. For those of you wondering - I am still a Gandhian. 

Men.. le sigh!

Background - Me trying to tell a story while the boy is completely jet lagged. He keeps falling asleep and I keep trying to wake him up. Telling him about my get together with two of his guy friends from high school - N and T. Both very heterosexual south Asian men.

Me: So then T and N and me went for a walk.
BF: hmmm... (clearly disinterested and half asleep)
Me: We bought a tonne of groceries.
BF: hm.. (hhmmss are getting shorter)
Me: We made truffles for dessert for thanksgiving
BF: (no response)
Me: Then N f***ed T.
BF: (Eyes shot wide open)

On repeating the story to the two men T and N

T: Lol.. what?
N: Ok, I need to know.. who F***ed whom?