bookish

delhi is full of little pavement book shops, where you'll get good books at competitive prices (provided you know how to bargain). this one was clicked in the bungalow road area, at one of our book shopping haunts.

poetry as i live it

reading Dushyant Kumar's collection of poems, 'Surya ka Swagat' published by Vani. brought it home from Delhi book fair, in September last year. this is the first poem and it well, literally sums up the poet's (and my) life. i loved it for being so 'me' and on a larger level, being the story of India also. am sure anybody who reads it will identify with the struggle inherent in these words.

अगर इस लड़ाई में मेरी साँसे उखड गयीं,
मेरे बाजु टूट गए,
मेरे चरणों में आंधियों के समूह ठहर गए,
मेरे अधरों पर तरंगाकुल संगीत जम गया,
या मेरे माथे पर शर्म की लकीरें खिंच गयीं,
तो मुझे पराजित मत मानना,

read the complete poem here, on my other blog. please do comment.

men at work

dig a road and another department will come and dig it out for you
...ye dilli hai mere yaar

@ North Campus, New Delhi

for Delhi's Women Drivers, Mommy Bloggers and Indian bloggers in general

hello world,

a few mails i got today from my facebook contacts. please go through them as they will definitely come in handy.

01)
For women drivers in Delhi

Here's something I thought everyone in Delhi would be interested in, especially women who want drivers, but not the lechy-belchy male ones. Saw this info in today's HT city.

The NGO Azad Foundation has made this service available to "families, NGOs, corporates etc". These women drivers are trained (also in self defence), and can be booked through: mobile : 9313844015, email: azadfoundation@gmail.com

Their only condition apparently is that there should be a woman passenger.

Do share it with fellow bloggers and your families.

Cheers
Sanjay Shrivastava

------------------------------------------------------------------

02)
For Mommy Bloggers

Hey all,

There's a mommy days contest being organised by indusladies.com

~~What's the Contest?~~
Bloggers need to write a blog post (in their own blog) on their best parenting experience. Attach the above IL banner to your blog post and add a link to IL. (as i don't have it, please go check the website.)
Update a link to your blog entry in the comments section below.
Through two rounds of voting readers will select 3 winners. Get your friends to vote for you when voting starts!
~~Who can participate?~~
Women Bloggers (regardless of where you blog i.e. inside or outside IL)
South Asian descent and over 21 years of age.
Bloggers who blog outside IL should have a blog about six months old and have at least 30 entries
See terms and conditions for details and exceptions.
~~The prizes~~
The Winner gets $200 as prize money
The Second position gets $100
The Third position gets $50
All the top ten entries get Indusladies Tee Shirts and caps.
The first 25 entries "Jaldi 25" will be awarded with the Indusladies Letter Holder Gift
~~Deadlines~~
Participation ends April 26th
First Round Voting 27th Apr - 4th May
Final Round Voting 5th May - 9th May
Winner Announcement - 10th May, Mother's Day

More details at :
http://www.indusladies.com/forums/blogs/phoenixritu/mothers-day-competition-1717/

cheers
Priyanka
PS. pls invite ur blogger friends to join the group! :) this is what i'm doing :)

------------------------------------------------------------------

03)
Hey all,

Blogworks.in is publishing the 1st edition of the India Bloggers Directory.

The aim is to publish a pocket guide to an ever growing list of Indian blogs, the directory aims to help users and marketers navigate the web by informing them about sites of interest, categorized by subject. The book will also have a select listing of Twitter users from India.

To submit one’s blog, he/she can fill in a simple form with all details. The online form can be viewed here -- http://tinyurl.com/indiabloggersdirectory


cheers
Priyanka
------------------------------------------------------------------


one request, whoever participates in these, please give a link to me also :)
-adee

How to Be Green At Work

so many things that we actually practiced in our (Indian) way of life have now been rejected in favor of the westernized life. needless to say, the west is discovering our way of life and encouraging us to do the same as if it has discovered something new :)

sweets on wheels

a mobile rasgulla shop.

a 'rasgulla' is a round, white, spongy ball of sweet, most cherished in the eastern state of West Bengal but almost equally famous in the northern parts of the country. the poor guy will be traveling from place to place in this big city of mine, bringing delicious smiles to so many amongst us, rain or sunshine.
clicked opposite the LSR college T-point on a Saturday afternoon, last month.

a picture is worth a thousand minutes

god, i need more lives *corrected*

01. anbraham maslow's 'the farther reaches of human nature'
02. 'remains of the day' by ishiguro
03. a book of essays on male sexuality and its effect on society
04. 'the hours' by michael cunningham
05. 'einstein's dreams' by alan lightman
06. an anthology of (ancient) greek plays
07. a book by marquez whose name i don't seem to remember now
this was wrong, i didn't buy any book by marquez. tried selling her the fact that i did and fought with her :( found out that my memory deceived me big time. the book i bought instead was, quite ironically, the memory keeper's daughter
:)
and my favorite,
08. journals of captain Scott on his last expedition to the antarctica.
*wink* *wink*

all of these for only Rs. 440, that is Rs. 55 per book. can you beat that?

those who live in Delhi would know what i'm boasting about. sunday afternoon found me rambling alone amongst delhi's largest collection of used / second hand books. dressed in a crumpled bermuda, even more crumpled tee and sandals and cap, i must have looked like a geeky backpacker to most of the people when i landed up at the Sunday Book Bazaar in the Daryaganj area of central Delhi. perhaps taking pity on my pestered look (it was unbearably hot) the shopkeepers gave me these fabulous prices, but i'm sure, more seasoned adventurers get better books at better discounts! me and dee have sometimes bought 20 books in around a thousand bucks! no wonder i missed her so much. i say boss, if you happen to be in delhi on a sunday, this place is a must visit.

what i am reading these days - updated
am reading The Fragrance of Guava, Marquez's take on life, books, family, love and everything under the macondo sun and boy, it is such an engrossing read. apart from that, a little sprinkling of sheharyar's poetry and the world's best copywriter's trying to instill some sense into my already-cluttered-with-advertising-mind in the much revered 'the copy book'.
well, left all of these midway and started Arthur C Clarke's trilogy. i know, it's quite late in life! have completed the first, that is 2001: A Space Odyssey. almost half way through the second one, and then there's the third one too. needless to say, even after all these years, the books are unputdownable.

what i plan to read
and believe me, there are literally a thousand must read books, that well, i must read before i die. god, i need a separate life just to read to my fill, then one to write about it all, then one to travel the world and take photographs, and one more to write blog posts about this all.

----------------
Now playing: Muse - Supermassive Black Hole
via FoxyTunes

Maria Elena used to say that only unfulfilled love can be romantic

this is Maria Elena and well, i don't completely agree with her, but then i also believe that a relationship between lovers cannot be completely complete. there always has to be something left for them to complete, to fulfill, to strive for. otherwise, their life would become stagnant like Judy and Mark's did.

Maria Elena, if you don't know her, is the estranged ex-wife of Spanish artist Juan Antonio. they shared a bitter-sweet passionate relationship, but somehow were never able to stabilize it. then one day in a fit of jealousy, Maria Elena stabbed Juan Antonio and the marriage was more or less over.

Judy is a distant relative of Vicky who is doing her masters in 'Catalan Studies.' the practical, traditional Vicky is soon to get married to Doug, who is a successful career minded person and brings the same business-like stability to their romantic life. quite unlike Cristina, who is Vicky's dear friend and completely unsure about what she is going to do next day, hour or moment. Vicky and Cristina have arrived on a little summer vacation to Barcelona, where the former will try to do her Catalan project and the latter will try to find out what she 'not wants' from her life. the problem is, fate, and Woody Allen have something else on their mind.
because their paths will cross with Juan Antonio and Maria Elena will later say that only unfulfilled love can be romantic.

to make some sense of this little story i told, please do visit here, here or click the video below. and then, if possible, do share whether you agree with Maria Elena or...

----------------
Now playing: Biel Ballester Trio, Graci Pedro, Leo Hipaucha - Your Shining Eyes
via FoxyTunes

आंसू शब्द बन जायें तो

आज
ऐसे ही अचानक
मन भर आया
कुछ बिछुड़ते दोस्त याद आए
कुछ घावों ने गले लगाया
एक गाना सुना
ऐसी भाषा में
जो पूरी समझ नही पाता मैं
पर फिर
संगीत को भाषा की जरूरत पड़ी ही कब है?

आज
ऐसे ही अचानक
एक कविता ने
दरवाजा खटखटाया
हाथ थाम कर बोली
जब मन भर आए
और रो न पाओ तो
मुझे लिख लिया करो
आंसू शब्द बन जायें
तो संवर जाते हैं

और फिर
ऐसे ही, अचानक
हम दोनों मिल कर रो पड़े

after a long long gap, blog surfed a little. checked on a few old friends, read a poem or two, and watched a very beautiful post/song in a language i understand little. all that and my peculiar state of mind, resulted in this poem. hope you liked it. thanks for being there with me, always. and do check the links above. btw, can anybody help me translate this? :)