My Gadget Speaks For Me

 

This article is an official entry for the Dell Change Is Easy Contest on indiblogger.

Technology has changed lives. We have come a long way with new developments and technologies springing up every single day. Apple was just a fruit when I was born and now so many years later my phone is called an apple. Similarly blackberry was a fruit for all of us once upon a time and now it’s the name of a mobile phone that people crave for. Things have changed and Change has been easily accepted. People have moved on with change. today when I say “ I brought a blackberry” , the thought that would come to every single mind would be of a blackberry phone rather than the fruit, and no one would even ask “fruit or the phone?”

Guess that’s the impact gadgets and technology has had on human lives. Whatever gadgets have been invented , they have been created with human beings,and their comfort in mind. Or we can say gadgets have been built by man for the human race and have a humane touch to it. For eg. Nokia phone –connecting people or Iphone which screams out “Touching is Believing” .Somewhere it has qualities which we have ; touching or connecting people,in some or the other way where it does have a striking resemblance.

The moment I saw the topic “how gadgets reflect your personality “sponsored by DELL I really had to think hard as to which gadget would represent me. I asked my friends as to which gadget reflects my personality.I was amused by the answers. Some said you are like a bread toaster ; u just cant keep things to yourself they keep popping out. Someone said you are like a coffee vending machine; one press of a button and there you go on and on. A cleanliness freak friend said you are like a vacuum cleaner “you eat all the garbage ie.street food” I was like Whoa! look at the way they are dropping subtle hints  J

The gadget that I frequently use these days more than any other gadget is my hurricane lamp with usb .Thanks to the frequent power cuts that forces us to stay armed with gadgets like these specially during the rainy season. I think I would rather let my gadget talk what they think is common among both of us till the time I am winding up with my important work.

Hurricane Lamp With USB says:                                                                           

Hurricane Lamp With USB

I guess you all know what I am and what I am used for. I was brought in by my master ; your fellow blogger because she stays in a place where load shedding  is  quite common.

I have been living with her since a long time and I have known her really well. Ah!! she is such a sweetheart.

Talking about sweetheart I feel she does have some of my characteristics *Glows with pride*   

Same Same Inch pinch!!

1) Consistent: We both are consistent .Just like my flame is consistent and doesn’t flicker I have seen her being consistent with her studies and whatever she has done in her life.She has always studied keeping me close to her and she has been consistently  clearing the exams with flying colors.

2) Helpful: I have spent my life adding lights to the life of people. I realized she is helpful when she kept me out of the house at night during one of such load shedding sessions so that others could find their way.I didn’t like staying out with so many mosquitoes howering over but then the motive behind her this action made me happy

3) Temper: Just like the way I get hot, she too loses her temper easily.

4) Mood Swings : I have this special ability to glow in different colored flames.My color changing flames are just like her frequent mood swings; sometimes happy ,some times angry and sometimes sad. Her mood just keeps fluctuating.

5) Naughty:

She is one of the brats in the colony who keeps on hiding toys of children, scaring oldies in the dark, teasing guys, I must tell u she’s an Adam Teaser. I have been silent witness to many of her pranks. I too be naughty at times and I refrain from glowing many a times when she presses the knob and specially when she needs me the most.I like to see the naughtiest gal being frustrated.

No Way! We Are Not The Same !!

1) Curvaceous Figure: Yeah this is what my fellow gadgets envy me for. I have got a body that I can flaunt and that is something she lacks. But yes the change is easy and she can easily attain my body type. .I hope she is reading this *Giggles*

2) Jealousy:  I know her little secret; She is jealous of the next door Pinky(shhh!! Keep it a secret) and yeah this is something I can never be.Its these qualities that make a human, a human.

3) Charging: I need to be constantly charged to work properly or I feel damn low at times *Sulks* But my memsahib isn’t like this. She is all charged up for every occasion. She just wants a reason to step out of the house no matter what time of the day it is.

4)Chatterbox - She is one helluva chatterbox.Whenever i try grabbing my forty winks ,she starts chitchatting over the phone.She switches me off and then sits next to me chitchatting,gossiping. Don't I have a life??!!! *Sigh! Rolls eyes*(voice from the background-"that Varun Sharma from Citibank was so handsome..blah blah blah!!!)I guess she is coming.

And Shhh!!! Let all this be a secret!!! Ohh !! there she comes…and I think she would switch me off.. No!! No!!! (Switched off)

The new Dell Inspiron Laptop helps us adapt to different scenarios fashionably and accept the change gracefully.Vote for me at Indivine

My Dad Is 61 Years Old.

Writing comes naturally to me but words have failed me when I thought about writing something for my dad. Finally on the Eve of Fathers Day I thought I could write something for him…I don’t know whether he would read it .Even if he would read it am not sure whether he would appreciate me directly. But one thing am damn sure is he would be extremely happy and would bless me.

Right from my childhood days for me my dad has been my inspiration. Though he never took interest in the studies part for both sisters (since both of us managed it really well) he inculcated in us an interest for playing badminton. He put a lot of efforts in teaching me cycling..But an heavy baby that I was and I am ,I could never learn it. I have no regrets I could not learn it but those memories are damn precious. Taking a break out of his Sunday holiday and teaching me is still a priceless memory.Those were the days when he used to teach me whatever new things would come up. He was the script writer for most of my elocution competitions.I loved every word he wrote. He has become old now. He became 61 yr old just three days back. Post one bypass surgery ,he still doesn’t look 61 and is still quite younger  at heart.

I could never cometo terms with the fact that my dad is actually growing old .For me my dad is still the same .  

But these days…

While climbing stairs, when he waits and gasps for breath of air ,

I realize he ‘s growing old.

While he asks me to thread a needle

I realize he ‘s growing old.

While he asks me to read him an article

I realize he ‘s growing old.

While he asks for help to carry luggage

I realize he ‘s growing old.

While he asks how to use a new electronic device

I realize he’ s growing old.

While he takes time to match our steps while walking and Is somewhere way behind

I realize he’s growing old.

While the number of medicine prescriptions increase

I realize he’s growing old.

While the number of visits to doctor’s  dispensary increases

I realize he’s growing old.

When he dyes up his hair and asks me “safed bal dikh raha hai kya?(can u see any white  hair around?)”

I realize he’s growing old.

-Chitra

I have noticed the fact as parents grow old we need to treat them like our babies and do everything they once did for us. Right from reading to guiding them to how to do certain things.Last week when I created a resume for my mum , I was like wondering she is the one who taught me and now she wants me to write it for her..Strange!!!!but true!!We learn so much from them during our entire life and then when they get old we just have to  do the same for them Whatever done by them cannot be paid back but yes an effort to keep them happy can  always be taken. It feels nice to read newspapers for them, read them some articles, and thread needles for them because it takes me back to the old days where they have done so much for me.I love the child like enthusiasm I see in my dad whenever I gift him something these days and the way he keeps it carefully. Then I relate it to my childhood days when I got my first Bharatnatyam ornament set as a gift from him. I was excited in the same way. I am a lazy bone but there are times when I thoroughly enjoy cooking up his favourite dish or making him a cup of coffee…My dad has never been like  my mum ,they both have been totally different. My dad is the patient one and my mum, the impatient one. My dad has always been a strength   through difficult situations. He has been practical all his life and my mum simply emotional about all the stuff. He has been supportive both to my mum as well as both his daughters in every phase of life. He is a man of few words. But that is how I like him.

I hope by now all of you would have related   it to your own story. Yes !! Now  even  I have decided to come to terms with the fact that my parents are growing old and I am the one who needs to take care of them. Through this article I would like to convey a message   that as your parents grow old they need you just like the way we needed them when we were new to this world all alone. They turn into small babies when they grow old and expecting them to act maturely just because they are growing old is foolishness. Treat them like a 4year old, pamper them and see the happiness that you get. I expect my friends to be sensitive about their parents. One of the most beautiful relations that we are bound with ,as soon as we are born is that of a parent and a child. Day to day communication and splurging of expensive gifts is not necessary .All that is necessary is to let them feel that you are always there for them whenever you are around.

Happy Fathers Day to All the Wonderful Dads In the World. Being A Dad is not that easy…..Salute to all the Wonderful Dads Around.

What Color Do I Paint?

  While  returning  from the office  I have my company bus  to drop me home and I feel lucky and   blessed  because I don’t  have to face the hassles of the local trains which the common man in Mumbai has to go through   while  travelling  to their workplace and then back home. My bus drops me  near the east west  connecting bridge and the only hassle that I have to face is to cross the over  crowded bridge pushing and punching the pervert man, people who are always in a hurry and some who never want to reach home and just use the bridge to loiter around or coochie-coo with their partners. By the time I reach the western end of the bridge I am a sight to see,hair all messed up, my specks in  a balancing mode , my bag hanging precariously on one of my shoulders Once I cross the swarm of people   I heave a sigh of relief to find myself alive and that I haven’t been a victim of stampede.

One day as usual I wrestled my way out to find a lady sitting on the bridge with a   baby on her lap. Nothing seemed unusual about her and I thought she’s one among the beggars who   just want to earn their livelihood   by begging and by doing nothing else. As days passed by,I found out that the lady was blind. I find her sitting there at the same place daily. I see at times the baby crying and she feeding the baby. I   don’t know how she reaches the bridge who helps her or how does she take care of the child. How  she manages her little world is still a big question,a mystery to many of us born with eyesight. Seeing her I have often pondered what is it to be blind. What do they see? What colors she could see? What color the sky would appear to her???I wondered whether she had seen her child,whether she had seen the father of the child. 

Thinking of her or rather passing by her daily reminds me of several other visually impaired people   who see no color in life except black and white.How hapless is it to be appended to the stick,to be dependent on people to move ,eat  ,sleep ,live etc….

Of all the senses, sight must be the most delightful.

-Helen Keller

And we all do agree to what Hellen Keller has said . Eyes are one of the best creations by God and both, who have it and the ones who don’t have it know the worth of it. I often wonder What color do I Paint their lives with??? I want to fill in those colors in their lives which the privileged one’s enjoy. I want them to enjoy the canvas called as life and the various colors splattered on it. I managed to pen down a few lines just to share the plight of visually impaired people, on what things they miss and why their life is colorless or plainly black and white..

I look here and there

And into the void I just stare.

Day and nights pass by

But I cant see what changes in the sky

Birds chirp around

All i can hear is their sound

The rising and setting of the sun

Oh!I can see them none.

Quiescent water deep of lake

That i can't see it ,makes my heart ache

Can feel the  pleasure and pain

But how do I see the beauty of rain?

People around me donot have a face

Even though i can feel their warm embrace

I can feel love, make love, and be with my love

But then would I never know what is my love?

I may get my charming prince

Handsome he would be,to my heart i convince.

To a child I can be a mother

Hows the face of my child i would always bother

Of all the senses sight is the delightful

Because eyes are the ones that makes the life colorful

I wonder how it would be

If i had the eyes that could see

I aint sure would it worthy to be(not blind)

But i just wished I could see!! i could see

-Chitra

As mentioned in the above poem a visually impaired person misses out on almost all the important aspects of life. A single day if I forget wearing my specks I end up creating a mess.I end up bumping into people ,I end up doing things wrong.I wonder how they manage to live without those  natural specks.

 I wish to color the life of every blind person so that they too can see the rose red in color, sky in its cool blue color, a rainbow which is a union of colors. For them every other thing would be the same either in black or in white. I wish to add the colors to their imagination. I wish to color their life with the paint of love so that every visually impaired person could get the opportunity to see the prince/princess of their   dreams. What life it is if a mother cannot see her own creation ,her own baby. I wish to color their life’s with the unique and most mesmerizing color of parenthood. I wish them the color of beautiful dawn and dusk in their life. 

Just try blindfolding yourself and staying the same way the whole day and try doing things.Y es!! helpless is the word…So through this article I need to pass on the message  “Donate Your  Eyes  “  so that after you, someone lives through your eyes and sees the wonderful world through your eyes

Let’s make someone’s life colorful  today and give them a better tomorrow.

 Get a print out of my article if you find it touching via HP Laser Jet Printers

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Blogging Ka Pehla Pehla Prize

 Its 16^th of June and my eyes are all set on the Indi blogger webpage, right from morning am just eager to know who the winner is. I thought I dint have a chance to win with so many experienced bloggers competing with me..I wondered whether they (the honorable jury)would have atleast read  the article.( http://zindagiunlimited.blogspot.com/2011/05/beauty-lies-deep-within.html)The total number of people who had read my article were mere 60, atleast they were the ones who acknowledged that they read my article and gave their valuable comments. The clock went tick tock and all I did the whole day was checking and rechecking the website again and again. At night by 10pm I thought of going through it for the one last time before I hit the bed and what do I see!!! It was a Miracle!!!! My name was in the winners list

I wondered whether “Chitra “written in the Winners list was actually me.I went and clicked on the link and Wow!!! My blog opened.!! That was me!!!!The first expression when I realized it was ME!!!was something like this…

Google.com

And then something like this:

Google.com

I just broke out into a jig and flung the door open of my room and hurried to tell it to my parents.My parents were extremely happy and I was all happy too..

What is so special about this award is not that am winning 3000 bucks, I would have been happy even if it would have been 10 bucks as prize money. For me the money didn’t matter, what mattered to me is being on the list with so many expert bloggers .The award is an encouragement for lazy people like me who need to set their mood to pen down their thoughts. Right nowI am on cloud nine. Its an achievement to know people actually love my thoughts and yes write now I feel like a Miss World Contestant who’s just won the crown .I always used to wonder why those gals on ramp would be speechless and would often be like the pic above when they won the crown. Today I realize what it feels to sharpen your skills in something you are not good in naturally and then give everyone a run for their money. And yes!  me too going to come up  with the winning speech.Here it goes:

“This prize is dedicated to my parents because now they have finally realized what I do on the internet all the time and they have no issues with me sticking to it forever now.  To all my friends who ask me whether I am working for FB. Guys working for FB was never this fun. To Karanji aka Abhishek Karande  (yes now don’t be humble…you definitely need credit for this) who gave me the idea to pen down my thoughts ,may be because he himself didn’t want to suffer alone listening to my nonstop bakwas.To my sister who is the architect of my blog.The entire look is her effort. And to all my friends who after reading say with a suspicious look “kaha se dhapa?”(From where have you stolen this??) And to the bus gang who never read any of my articles but are the first to shamelessly ask “party kabhi hai ?(when is the party?)” To Suneal whos been a support big time. To “Appy Iyer” aka G.R.I who’s one statement “ I was yawning and yawning when I read your blog and then later on complimenting my blog(Even though I don’t know which one is true the yawning part or the compliment J :P your comments have definitely encouraged me to write better.

And yes to the wonderful indi bloggers  who have read my article patiently J

Phew!!!! That was indeed a long speech but then they deserve the credit J

Beauty Lies Deep Within

This article is one among the winners for the 'Real Beauty' contest by Dove & Indiblogger.

 

Early morning I rush in to have the first glance of the newspaper. I don’t know why but there has always been a tug of war for the paper at my place right from my childhood days. So it’s like whoever takes the paper first gets to read the paper first. Today I was lucky to be the first one. As I flipped through pages of the newspaper, I went through this article with the headline “Acid Attack victim sets an example….” something on these lines. I first avoided reading the article because I thought its one of the many cases that happen in the city and which never see the light of justice. 

I thought to myself,” This story would also lose all its glam in the next few weeks and the face would get lost somewhere in the crowd.” Something in me told me to go through the story which was supported by a picture of a lady in her early thirties .Even though the picture wasn’t clearly visible, it was obvious that there was something wrong with her face.

 

Now let’s name this lady as Jennifer or rather Ms. Jennifer (name changed). Jennifer like any other girl wished to marry the prince of her dreams and live her life as the one’s we have in fairy tales. She did meet her prince and did get married to her charming prince. Little did she know that her life would crumple down soon! They started having irreconcilable differences and finally they parted ways. They stayed separately even though they weren’t divorced. Her prince I believe could never accept the fact that Jennifer had left him alone to fend for and the grudge he had for her just became worse day by day. Like everyday Jennnifer returned back from office and on the way back she was stopped by her ex-hubby on a bike. He was dressed unusually with gloves in his hand, a mask on his face which he removed when she came near him. The moment she came closer to him, he put his hand in a bag and took out something and then there was a Splash of something on her face. For a moment she didn’t understand what had happened , what was the substance thrown on her face .Her world had become dark, she could see nothing but just feel the burning sensation all over her face. She could see smoke rising from her face. The burning pain was too much to bear and she yelled out in agony and pain. No one came forward to help her or catch her hubby who by then had fled. Her face had been disfigured for life. The burnt marks on her face were a cruel reminder of their love story gone sour.

For months she locked her up at her place, people used to look at her with sympathy wherever she went. Their sympathy hurt her even more. Even though people were sympathetic they avoided sitting next to her in the buses, trains etc. She was disfigured. Her college friends don't visit anymore, and children are terrified of her. The beauty was lost. People would listen to her story, show sympathy and move on. But this sympathetic approach instigated her rather than leaving her paralyzed for life. She thought of doing something. Her anger still burnt inside her heart. She was a victim for no fault of hers. She knew this wasn’t the life for her definitely. She thought of changing the way people looked at her. She started with, going to police stations and tracked down her hubby and she saw to it justice was done. What I found amazing in this real life story was the self less work she did for the other burn victims.  She attended the World Burns Conference in Michigan; in 2008, she made it to the UK for a Masters in Development and Human Rights; she trekked north to Kashmir in 2007.Now, she’s on the long road to reformation. Aware only too well of the purgatory a burns victim in India lives through, Jennifer wanted a way out.

She then started a non-profit organization called Palash, after the flame colored flower called Flame of the Forest. This NGO wants to reach out to are usually inconspicuous. Through this NGO, Jennifer wanted to reach out to the Burns survivors, particularly those who suffer disfigurement, are to a greater degree than people with physical or even mental disabilities, a secluded lot. Jennifer researched about burns and came upon an online database of burns survivors in America. She got in touch with them because she wanted to start a similar forum in India. She was invited to the World Burns Conference where she presented a paper on burns and domestic violence in India, then lived in Detroit for 18 months, where she went to colleges and schools and spoke about the life of a burns survivor. In the US, She shed her mask which she usually used to cover her face and felt the wind on her face. It was a sign that things would change and the best was about to come.
With Palash, she aims to change the way people look at acid attack survivors. She wants to give them a new lease of life. She is also assembling profiles of burns patients and essential data such as the number of burns specialty units and hospitals in Mumbai, beds in government hospitals, post-operative facilities, counseling services, charitable trusts for funds and so on. Palash plans to form support groups and offer psycho-social rehab, empower survivors, restore their self-esteem and find them opportunities to earn a living.

I read this story and was touched. What I found amazing was the undaunted spirit that the acid could not burn. What I found beautiful was the strength that she had to gather the pieces of her life which had been torn away by the acid attack. I found Jennifer beautiful for her unparalleled courage and her thought of standing up for other burn victims when she herself had lost it all.I found her real beauty in the fact that she thought about others when she had no other way to go. I think her real beauty is visible through her thoughts, her actions even though the acid has left her scarred physically. This is where the saying goes true,”Beauty lies deep within”. 

What is more beautiful than using our lives to light up several other such lives? Nothing in this world is more beautiful than seeing some one smile through their pains when they find some solace in some one, somebody something just because of you. Nothing in this world is more beautiful than the feeling to know that there is someone who is there to help you start a new life all over again when the entire world turns their back to you. Nothing in this world is more beautiful than the hope that you give someone that this too shall pass and there is more to life. I found her as an epitome of everlasting beauty and this beauty can be seen through her organization Palash. Cosmetic surgeries and makeup can hide the scars on your face, turn you into a princess from an ugly duckling but nothing can change the way you are as a person. Nothing can hide Jennifer’s works for others; nothing can stop her from changing the outlook of the people towards such victims.