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 |   Birthday Bash Relay. Excited on Second Place! Now for various WDC contests and activities |
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Team Ahimsa ▼ My Turn ▼ For
Thanks! "  2021 Blog Relay Winners!"  ![Merit Badge in Blogging
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Congratulations to 'Team Ahimsa' for your excellent entries earning you the 1st-Runner-Up prize in [Link To Item #1803384] !](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/type-Blogging-2180.gif) "Note: They came, they ran the race, they conquered! ..." "Congratulations November 2021 Winners!"
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PROMPT November 8th What would you have to start doing now so that in 10 years you feel like you just had the best decade of your life? Well, well, well. The actual answer to this can be found in "Marcophily - #30DBC" .I AM doing it with a view to having some sort of presentation or exhibition at a time when nobody knows what 'post' was in snail-mail parlance. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to going on lots of trips to collect post marks, once this pandemic lifts. So yeah, Jim, I'm already doing it!  But since I've already blogged about it, I'll take a different sort of approach here. There is something I need to do to improve my quality of life, and it is something that is in my control. These days I find that I get negative very easily about a person or an episode. To give a simplistic example, if we're due to go someplace and it rains a bit, I might say 'let's forget about going, I don't want the bother of an umbrella'. I need to get a more cheerful, positive attitude, which I know I have in me and I know I can genuinely bring to the surface. Starting — NOW!   |
PROMPT November 7th Today's prompt is taken from a book I own. "Great Quotes From Great Leaders", published by Motorola, my employer. This one is from Norman Vincent Peale. "The trouble with most of us, is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism." Do you feel this is a valid statement? Tell us why you feel the way you do. My mother's youngest brother committed suicide at the age of nineteen. It was his second or third attempt, and he desperately wanted to succeed, and die. (My father accompanied him in the ambulance and heard the last mutterings of 'want to die now'.) His parents, my maternal grandparents, were known as the 'perfect couple' in our community. So perfect that they could not have a youngest son who was (perhaps, not definitely) gay. Their perfection drove their child to suicide. They merely pretended it had been an accident and moved on. Except that my grandpa never could move on. He pulled on for another twenty-five years, but once asked my Mom if he could've been a better father to his son. He finally lost his mind and succumbed to Parkinson's. My grandma died within the year. The perfect couple ...? I was four when my uncle died. Nobody told me he had died. We were the perfect family, and people don't die young in perfect families, especially not of suicide. I searched for my uncle in his room at my grandpa's house every time I visited, for three years after that. Remember, I was four when he died. I searched for him for three years. That was almost half my life at the time. I was seven when I cornered my Mom and yelled, "WHERE IS HE" and she quietly replied, "He died a few years ago." I felt so betrayed. I would never be able to trust an adult, ever again. The perfect couple. The perfect family. Very praiseworthy, indeed. PS - Yes, it's all true. |
PROMPT November 6th You work alone from home, logged on to your work PC. One day you log on, and start your routine. You look at the clock on your desktop and eight hours have passed, but you have no memory of getting any tasks done. Tell us what might have happened to you during those eight hours. Hermione Granger pointed her wand at my head. "OBLIVIATE!" she cried, in an attempt to erase my memory. I ducked. So for a while, I couldn't recall what had happened to me during those eight hours. But Because I had the presence of mind to duck, even Hermione's spell lost its effect after a while, and now I know what I did. I visited Hogwarts. Yes, Hogwarts. Yes, yes, actual Hogwarts - not the Warner Brothers set or Disneyworld or any of the other mocked-up places. I visited Hogwarts. I met McGonagall and Flitwick and Sprout and Slughorn. I met Neville Longbottom in Greenhouse #4, with the most dangerous plants. I met Albus Severus Potter. What did I do? What did they say? Alas - Hermione's OBLIVIATE charm comes into effect again. I don't remember. |
PROMPT November 5th You arrive at work today with five donuts and five coffees for the people who are scheduled to be there. But you have a problem. Counting you, six people are there, and all of you love coffee and donuts! How do you and your friends resolve this? Ha ha ha ha ha! This is where we Indians, and especially we Bangaloreans, steal a march over the rest of you folks!  For us, this wouldn't be a problem at all. Our culture is geared to sharing with as many people as are there, be they expected or unexpected. We have this system in restaurants called 'by two coffee', and even 'by three coffee' The coffee is served in a steel glas, with a smaller steel class as a lid. Should someone else need to drink, the lid becomes another glass. Three people? Easy, use the saucer. In the office, they'd simply use the office cups for the extra people. Donuts would simply be divided as best they could. Each would be cut into two or three and the pieces shared as equitably as possible. So — yeah, what was the question again?  PS: On a side note - wedding invites, up until a decade or so ago, were addressed to the person 'with family and friends'. So an invite to my Dad would say: To Mr. Arun Bhatia and family and friends and he would actually be welcome to bring not only me along, but anyone else he happened to feel like. This is changing now, with more people becoming Westernized. Now, it's specific people and RSVPs. RSVPs were unheard of before. It was expected you'd show up and eat, what's there to inform someone about? |
PROMPT November 4th We've all heard of people who mysteriously 'go missing'. Tonight, write about a person who 'goes missing'. Someone that you read about in the newspaper or online, but nobody seems to know them, or remember them. The headlines were full of it. The TV channels screamed the news. Social media was choked with posts, one of which I shared on my timeline. The photo showed a kindly woman, middle aged, with curly brown hair. She had big black eyes and her cheeks were so wrinkled, they made you smile. She had gone missing, and everyone was searching for her. Two children had reported the loss to their teacher. The teacher had alerted the police, who, after searching on foot and by bicycle and van, had put out an alert. Check-posts were set up at all the bus stops, train stations and airports. The traffic police were on alert at the toll booths for road users. When pressed to do so, the children described her. A sketch was made, of which a photo was circulated. Nobody had seen her lately, though everyone admitted she was vaguely familiar. Like someone they had known years ago and couldn't quite recognize at this age. Maybe they had seen her here, maybe they had seen her there. The policemen and policewomen on the job got personally motivated – like they'd lost an aunt. They went beyond the call of duty to search for her. It was a smart young interviewer, new to the job, who thought of asking the children if they knew her name. They didn't. They only knew what they called her. "Ma Daya" - Mother Kindness. The children lived on the street and they found that, just during the festival of Diwali, when she should've been more prominent, she had disappeared. Can you help find Kindness, this festive season, for the street kids? |
PROMPT November 3rd You live in a tourist town. There's always an 'interesting' mix of visitors. But this year they are especially... In what way? It was Roger and Betsy Kalter who started the trend. They had a four-year honeymoon round the world, on their bicycles. Yup, yup on their bicycles. When on land, they'd cycle. When not on land, they'd be on ship, their bicycles safely in the hold. They didn't go any place by air. They paid for this extended honeymoon by sending newsletters about their travels to people who wired the subscription money to Roger's mother, and she'd in turn send it to them wherever in the world they were at the time. Unusual. Tourists who didn't use motorized transport. Tourists who paid for their travel by writing about their travel. When they visited us in Mumbai, I was fascinated by their stories. Meeting them over dinner one evening, my uncle asked them if they caught cold often, riding their bicycles in all weathers. (They didn't.) They were followed by Ankit Arora, the thin bearded boy (young man, but oh, so young) who wanted to cycle across India before the year was out. His luggage comprised a pair of pants and an extra shirt. Nothing else. Cycle parts, in case the bicycle broke down? Someone always donated them, he declared. He paid for his travels by giving lectures and slide shows. Yes, there was a camera as well. I didn't mention it as 'luggage' because it didn't seem to be, strapped across his shoulder all the time. Ankit either cycled or walked. He abhorred the sound of mechanized transport of any kind. "You need to hear yourself breathe when you're moving," he stated. "You need to hear the wind in the leaves and the chirping of the birds. These engine noises are so intrusive." On a noisier note, there were Maneesh and Minu Pandey. They were on a big motorcycle. Maneesh at the controls, his wife Minu riding pillion, cuddling against his back, and their sleeping bags tied firmly to the rear guard. They slept under the stars each night. No hotels for them. They carried the ingredients or packets of 'instant' and made campfires. Independent, self-driven (literally and figuratively) and willing to see famous tourist landmarks from a different perspective. The people I mention are all real, and the stories of their travels are real. They didn't all happen in the same year, but I took bloggers'-license on that, twisting the prompt to write about them. I am happy to have met all of them and heard their stories. My article about ANKIT: https://bengalurureview.com/the-man-who-cycled-all-over-the-country-and-made-peo... |
PROMPT November 1st We all have possessions of some type. Tell us five possessions you can’t live without, and why they are on this list. It's strange you should ask me this. Me, who always claims that 'things' are not important, people and emotions are. (Sorry if that sentence isn't up to the highest standards of grammar, but you know what I mean.) And yet, weirdly enough, I cling to things. I cling to the oddest of things. 1. My books, especially those by Paul Gallico, Rumer Godden and JK Rowling. I can't read ordinary type any more. My eyesight is weak. I have switched to audio books. Yet, my books are taking up space on the shelves, on the floor, on the spare bed ... everywhere. 'Why don't you donate them?' The 'sensible' answer is: Once the pandemic subsides, I may start classes again and may need these books then. The emotional answer is: a. I love them. I don't have to be able to use them any more to love them. b. They represent a time when I could read. When I loved reading. I don't pity myself for not being able to read now, I am happy with audio books, but I do like the memory. 2. My collection of post marks. They're valuable in themselves. I talk about them a lot these days, here is a newsletter I did "Short Stories Newsletter (October 20, 2021)" about them. But - like the books are the fond memory of the past, the post marks are the fond hope for the future. That I'll survive the pandemic. That after I've survived the pandemic, I'll have a presentation / exhibition of my post marks. That this is going to be my legacy - the memory of what was - 'the postal service' - when it has gone extinct, perhaps during my own life time. 3. My Dad. Technically not a possession, but I'm his only child and now that Mom is gone, it's just the two of us. So we belong to each other. I guess if earlier, it's been the past and the future, Dad is the present. He's eighty six. He may leave this earth any time now. I have to enjoy each moment with him. I have to know how precious he is. I have to prepare for the time when I lose him, and then, learn to keep his memory alive. That's past, future, present. What's left? 4. Present-continuous. My WdC account. I'll get my '15 year achievement' badge in April. I can't do without this community now. I hope I'm not sounding cheesy, saying this because I am on WdC. If I sound cheesy, well, cheese is tasty and filling, isn't it? A comfort food? 5. Past-continuous. My house. It was built with a different viewpoint. I was supposed to marry. My husband, kids and I were supposed to visit my parents on vacation. Now, it's too big. Dad is eighty-six. I just turned fifty-four. We're rattling around like two dried beans here. But I can't give up the memories, the familiarity, the neighbors. My extended family, all well meaning, is on my back to shift to an apartment. So much more practical. But no. Mom designed this place. We've had good times together here and seen each other through the tough ones. Can't leave. If the taps leak and the plumber needs to visit, or the wooden door swells in the rain and needs to be jerked open -- well, they just do. That's the quirky entity that is our house. That's it for today, folks! Thanks for reading! |
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![Merit Badge in Condolences
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I send this for all the hugs you didn't get and all the mourning you were denied.
Your uncle was my age. I remember that year. I would've been devastated, as I was when Bob was killed in a motorcycle accident that same year. My parents realized that I wouldn't take it well, but they never realised how it affected me. One of the worst times of my life.](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Condolences-1969694.gif)