December 3, 2009
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Very strange!!, craps ..., uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 2:43 PM
Scenario 1:
You go to one city on a vacation, you roam around, you visit the city’s famous tourist places, you go for shopping in the city’s biggest shopping area, you eat at the city’s famous food joint and you find the city interesting; you fall in love with it almost instantly. After going back to your own place you keep on telling about how you enjoyed staying in the city, and how you find the people so welcoming, and how the unknown language spoken by them was so sweet to your ears even if you do not understand a single word of the entire conversation.
Scenario 2:
You go to the city because your company posted you there, you don’t get too much time to roam around apart from going to office and coming back to the place where you stay and call it “your room”, you visit the nearby bus sop to catch a bus and go to office daily, you go to the daily market near your place for the vegetable and grocery shopping, you eat at the office’s canteen or any food joint that is available near to your place which serves the most non-edible food you ever tried (forget about a decent vegetarian dish if you happen to be a vegetarian and the city happens to be where I am staying) and believe me or not you find the city disgusting; you start feeling the first kind of emotion which cannot be called love in any way, the very instant. You long to go back to your place and once back you want to forget your stay in the city as a nightmare which you never want to have again. Sometimes though you love to rant about how you survived there and how you found the people so selfish and how you were forced to learn the alien language as that is the only language people spoke there, even in the office, during any official meeting.
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AND you guessed it right, I am ranting now. After spending more than 3 years in Kolkata, at-least I cannot stop myself from ranting. People (Except few) here are kind of people who dance upon seeing money. If they see you are paying 200 for something without complaining then the next day they will ask you 500 for the same thing. Nothing is what you call a smooth-process over here if you are not ready to spend as much as they are demanding, even if it is almost same as getting bankrupt after spending that much. The way they behave is the most irritating thing. You go to a vegetable vendor, even if you are in the best of your moods, I give you my 100% guarantee that at the end you will get frustrated. They behave as-if they own us. In office, if you behave little saintly and extend your hand for helping somebody then be sure that you are going to be gulped down by the same fellow.
Yes, people here are too much proud for their heritage. But these are not the places where you go daily. And the place you spend maximum of your stay, makes you feel the instant need of resigning and running back to your Mom.
Now if you are wondering what exactly the thing that made me writing this post is, then say thanks to the flower vendors near my apartment for inspiring me. After coming to Kolkata, if anything in my behavior has changed then it is my temper; I have become short-tempered. Just a single person’s behavior in the morning can put me in one my worst moods for couple of days. And that very thing happened with me today. Normally I do my Puja with incent sticks and a diya. For some special occasions I buy flowers. As Bou is here, I buy her flower for daily Puja. Today, when I went to the flower vendor after the morning walk and asked him for 2 Rs worth loose flowers, he straight said “Chaar taka r niche kucho phool habe na” [You can't get loose flower worth below 4 Rs]. I expressed my astonishment as every day I buy 2 Rs worth flower only. But he simply said “Habena” [You can't get]. Okay fine, even if the rates have increased, he could have told me so, but the tone with which he addressed me, made my temper show its signs. I could have bought 10 Rs worth flower if he were not have made that disgusting face and showed me that attitude. I did not buy anything and returned home empty handed and told my mother to do her Puja without flower.
No intension of self praising, but I am soft spoken person. I behave very politely and give respect to everybody irrespective of the person’s position; He may be my manager or may be a rickshaw-puller. So is it wrong if I expect a more cordial answer from other people? I don’t think so. But here, people behave you like you are just not a human.
A city is not merely the pleasant things you get to see around when you visit. People staying in a city make what it is. You get a glimpse of the culture of a city from the behavior of the people belonging to it. There are monuments, temples, caves, beaches, market places, food joints, architectural beauties almost in every town you visit. It is just that they look different. I am not complaining about the dirt, filth, poverty, or the political Bandhs here. Being in India, you will get to see it everywhere, somewhere more, somewhere less. At the end of the day it won’t make any sense to you whether the Rabindra Setu, Victoria memorial, Esplanade or Botanical Garden was there at Kolkata or not. You will only remember how people behaved when you were there. And to speak of mine, I am very sorry, but it is not a very pleasant experience staying here.
October 12, 2009
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Very strange!!, craps ..., uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 5:35 PM
Sometimes, when I sit in front of my system in office, my thoughts fly out of my mind and travel through all those seen & unseen paths, cross all those rivers & seas, jump over time; sometimes forward and sometimes backward. My heart wants to be anywhere but this place. Yeah… I want to run away; run away from this mad-mad rat race. I don’t want to be a part of it, because at the end of the race (if there is one end at all!), I will still be a rat.
Lately, I am having these feelings… as-if I am losing many things along with the so called rat race. I tried to divert myself from these feelings. I did lot of things to do so. I read lot of novels, watched many movies, tried my hand at some new recipes, wrote some stories, cleaned and recleaned my flat, studied, and recently I started needle works. But even after doing all these things, at the end of the day when I go to bed, I still feel lost.
It’s a feeling of not doing something which I should be doing. I don’t know exactly where I am going wrong, exactly what I should/should not be doing. It feels like a void somewhere in my life.
September 26, 2009
Filed under: Behind the screen..., I~), Very strange!!, uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 9:43 PM
Tomar jonyo pathaalaam,
Baganer sob phul
Akasher sob tara
Ramdhonur sob rong
Chokher sob swapno
Moner sob asha
Aar…
… Amaar onek bhalo basa.
I wrote these line atleast 20 times, in Bengali script, before finally writing them on the card, which I sent to I~) for his birth day. I can read Bengali. But it was the first time that I wrote a Kobita. I don’t know whther he liked it or not. The first thing he asked me was whether I copied it from somewhere !!!!!
Today is Asthami and most probably this is the first Durga Puja in which I~) is away from his home and Kolkata. And his MBA course is taking a toll on him. He had exams, assignment submissions… etc etc on those few days of Durga Puja. The day before panchami he was very upset. So I thought of taking pictures of all those Durga Puja Pendals and sending them the same. So on panchami, I left little earlier with 2 of my collegues. I walked from 6.30 PM to 10.30 PM and covered most of the famous pendals of Salt lake. I sent those pics to him so that he could atleast see this year’s Puja decortions. The next day the reply came… “These are the worst pics I have ever seen… you need to stand in a corner to take a pic of the pendal … and blah blah. You have put on so much weight… need to lose… blah blah…” !!!!
I have decided that I am not going to do anything for him now onwards. 
August 11, 2009
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Very strange!!, uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 11:45 PM
:-)
Few days back, I had been to Kolkata’s Botanical Garden, with couple of friends. There when we got bored of clicking photos of each other, I found this very romantically colorful couple taking a stroll. So I took a snap with one of my friend’s camera. I did not check the pic then, but when I got this pic from my friend, I thought, What a pic man!!! I should be placing it in my blog.
I don’t know exactly why I like this snap… Obviously not because of the extra romantic couple… but may be due to the presence of so many colors. Just look at the girl, her hair, her dress, her bag, everything is so bright. And there is so much greenery all around. As a whole, every color fits really well into this photo. Till I come across anything else to write about… enjoy these colors 
June 1, 2009
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Funny!!!, Very strange!!, uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 12:04 PM
You know, it feels wonderful and lovely when a complete stranger in a crowded train recognises you by just your name and praises you for something you had done 2 years back…
Yes, it happened with me.
Last Friday, after office, I was at the Howrah station to board a train to Bhubaneswar, my home-town. At about 10.30 PM, the train came to the platform. All the people boarded the train and so did I. After I located my bearth, I sat there waiting for the train to start the journey.
There was another girl sitting in front of me. Due to some reason, the conversation started. Lets call her, Girl I Met On The Train (GIMOTT).
GIMOTT : Which company are you in?
Me : XYZ.
GIMOTT : Ohh… I am also in the same company. [Smiles]
Me : Oh… That’s good! [Smiling back]
GIMOTT : What’s your name?
Me : Sxxxxxx…
GIMOTT : Sxxxxxx what?
Me : Sxxxxxx Sxxxx. [Successfully omitted my middle name which I really hate]
GIMOTT : Sxxxxxx Sxxxxxx Sxxxx ??? [Successfully re-added my middle name which I seriously hate]
Me : How do you know my full name??? [Totally Surprised... ]
GIMOTT : You contributed some story in our company’s creative writing competition?
Me : Yes… but that was long time ago… around 2 years back.
GIMOTT : You won’t believe… I was very eager to meet you. That story was awesome and after reading that I tried to find you out, but never could.
Me : [Now beaming and smiling from ear to ear] Oh really… Thank you
She was talking about my first story Forgiven, which got a runners up award in my company’s creative wrtiting competition. I was really pleased, that someone, a total stranger, could recognize me for some story I had written a long time back. At that moment I thought about updating my blog, continue writing. Who knows, some other day, in some other train, I would meet some other stranger who also would know my middle name!!! 
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