thot-splinterz

summer heat wave

2007-04-02T09:53:00.000+04:30

So here I am back and sweating.

Yesterday i was greatly consoled by the comment of a friend saying:

Thou cannot die from bad climate!
(Though you can due to dehydration by oversweating.)

i made the first bit my new mantra.

i sweat still the same, but it feels so much better!

Flower show in Lalbagh

2006-12-15T17:12:00.000+04:30

The show is on till 18th December.

Highly recommended!

2007

2006-12-11T09:55:00.000+04:30

If you have any plans or wishes for 2007 i suggest you to write them down now, make a drawing or picture, visualize it as clearly as possible. Be as specific as you can about what you want from your life in 2007.

In case you feel like it, make a little ritual based on your tastes or preferences. It may or may not include incense, candles, music or else. Take your list and read it out loudly.

Have fun!

Father Xmas vs. St. Niklas

2006-11-30T16:24:00.000+04:30

OMG, OMG!!

Did thou read the TOI (Times of India) 2day???
On a regular day i like the bizarre corner in the glossy blore extra
but today was so badly researched i felt like kicking the author
of this piece of dumb writting!

End of the day St. Niklas got blamed for bringing the christmas gifts in Germany and also in Austria. This is simply not true! St. Niklas brings small gifts, fruits and sweets in the night of 5th to 6th December to children which have put a shiny shoe outside their rooms.

Father Christmas in every shopping zone to give small sweets and ready to be photographed is an american marketing measure. As much as a flood of chinese plastic guys having chinese eyes mostly being sold cheaply and or in bulk is a pain in the bum to every true christmas arts and craft fair lover.

That much being clarified i need to refer to some magazine mentioning Vienna, Waltzes and Mozart in one go in the travel section. I almost through up! Waltzes are a very much 20th century phenomenon and a cpmposer named Strauss was very wellknown for those. The poor old Moyart composed Menuettes and Gavottes and knew nothing about later dance fashions.

Why throw facts around wrongly if not looked into carefully?

What else is the Internet good for if not that?

I strongly object!

So my dear friends, mention whatever you like, but if thou give a reference, please make sure before you post contents is reliable!

(Otherwise thou can only get employment with TOI!)

Indian obesity

2006-11-20T15:32:00.000+04:30

My morning paper (TOI) has a big thing about obesity at the moment. No wonder as it was obesity day last week on tuesday. Bangalore is supposed to be the world obesity capital in 2030. On the weekend all of us readers got another lecture on animal fat and junk food. As the paper gives constant lectures on what to eat and what not i cannot help it anymore to pass some of my own comments.

It seems only fast food and non-veg eaters get the blame. Spell whoever eats at McDees, KFC or anywhere on the street in the invariable "sagars" is to be blamed and heads straight for a bypass operation and/or a failing pancreas.

The other side is the extreme advice to prefer apples to bananas as they are too calourious. Hello, hello and where are we going here?? Anorexia I hear thou knocking!

What i see all around me is overweight housewifes. Saris drabbed happily in XXXL style, and olive skinned hip-gold flowing in folds over expensive zari or zardosi borders. Sternfaced they walk in aged shalwars and worn sneakers in earnest rounds in the park believing the 15 minutes daily exercise will make up for their extended desi ghee consumption at mealtimes. I can see them at dinner table slapping themselves another overloaded tablespoon of ghee onto their unsuspecting basmati rice. I see them smiling and frying the spices in half liter of coconut oil. Beta, the taste won't come out if you take less! Apart from the grammatical error this is an error in perception aswell!

The pure amount of sugar and oil consumed in any normal household here daily makes my pancreas and heart feel shaken. I avoid any so called "tea" or "coffee" out off my own house. I usually find they are hot watery sugar brews which i am unable to consume at all (even if i asked for "less sugar" initially already). Oil dripping dosas come swinging their fatty borders like heavied, filled skirthems from homely kitchens all over the city.

Where this eating habits lead to is very obvious:

Diabetes and heart problems are not a hand clap away.

My heartfelt wish would be to give everyone better advice how to implement a reduction of oil and sugar into their daily diets. I feel there is nothing wrong in occasional visits at fast food stores say like once a month. Street side vendors serve great lean food aswell, Idli for example. Why is noone telling folks which are the harmful foods and which are perfectly ok, I wonder.

Anyway, enjoy your meal, whatever it is. But please make sure thou insert some fruit or fresh (sugarfree!) juices into your diet here and there!

So long farewell!

Joke

2006-11-08T09:02:00.000+04:30

Q: What do you call a man in salt acid?

A: A solved problem!

Apples!

2006-11-02T16:01:00.000+04:30

Disclaimer:
This is not a Government of India Promotion

Today I got apples from the market. And what apples I will tell you. Normally despise apples as most are imported from the US of A. Why should I pay a hell lot of money (spell 120 rs.) for something I don't even like. The street vendors press them unto me. Ma'm, they are from America. So what? What's the special thing in that? They don't taste even good, particularly not after sitting around in a board display next to a busy street but seriously I don't believe they ever taste good at all.

But today came a revelation to me:

SIMLA apples

Do I need to say more?

I picked them up and a fine sweet fragrance touched my nose. I lifted them up and I felt like smelling a new an wonderful perfume. I handed them on to my friend and promptly ended up buying the double amount of apples.

But smell is one thing and the real test is the taste. You have to peel them before eating (which I normally don't) as there might be traces of mould in the pip department. That spoils the taste if you eat the complete apple. When cut and peeled it is no problem.

So please guys and gals. Eat SIMLA apples, cook apple pudding, bake apple pies!
Now is the right time, go ahead!

Diwali?

2006-10-26T18:00:00.000+04:30

A happy belated diwali to everyone!

I wish all readers a prosperous and lucky time!

May all your positive wishes come true!

The colour of your skin..

2006-09-11T17:01:00.000+04:30

Picking up the eternal question again:

why can't people we happy with any given colour of skin?

again in TOI today, women put 150 different chemicals in their faces daily.
Whereas the average european would do anything to gain a 'tanned' look including risking skin cancer due to overuse of sun beds, the regular asian would put any amount of harmful chemistry into his face called 'fairness creme' or even go for removal of outer skin layer called euphemistically and latinized 'dermabrasion'.

I wonder who is more crazy really at any given point in time!

What is the underlying problem i really would like to understand. Can anybody please explain me?? Which real live changes does it make if i look more dark and my asian neighbor looks more fair? Im supposedly more healthy looking and he/she is potentially more successful?

Do I sound very traditional when I point to inner rather than outer values and general charisma deciding in favour of a person?

WHERE???

2006-08-10T11:22:00.000+04:30

inbetween worlds

inbetween lifes

inbetween chairs

where are we for real?

my weekend's say

2006-07-23T15:51:00.000+04:30

DO NOT EAT AT:

Sahib Sindhi Sultan!! (Forum Mall, Bangalore)

It possible is the last dish you will ever eat. I wish i could say something else but i can't. So sorry. I was about to get myself a t-shirt printed with ' i survived south indian meals'. Now i'm not so sure even about that anymore. The setting an the ambience of the restaurant as a train is really wonderful, so are the waiters dresses e.g. conductor uniform all that. But once your through appriciating that the cumbersome business starts. The dim lights don't faciliate reading the menue. The table being so crowded with glasses and huge metal plates one struggles to place the menue somewhere remotely tablewise to study it. The place is booked at lunch and dinner so it's busy and the service is a little chaotic, not that there is not enough waiters around but they don't seem to know where they exactly serve or not. Ordering is troublesome and don't make the mistake of ordering some less or more spice, it definitely is too much to ask. All the food is incredibly spicy, not to be compared with the bland food the original trains serve. The food ingredients seem good but the primary taste of chillis doesn't leave any space for the tasting of anything else. I started with charcoaled quail and that already set my mouth on fire. The mild fish we ordered was substituted by chilli coated one, which was eaten by my unsuspecting companion. It caused exaggerated water consumation plus a good deal of water in his eyes. The service people felt sorry and offered a complimentary dessert. Then all our order went topsy turvey. The request for a new plate plus unspiced fish proved too much. Dishes arrived, but rice was neither to be seen nor traced. The fresh plate was as accessable as the holy grail. Our ordered drinks also were pretty invisible. Repeated reminders proved fruitless. Half through our food they suddenly appeared. Sadly my wine came from a bottle which had been open for days. As the road for complaints was open already i made just another one. A fresh bottle was opened at the table now. But unfortunately I had used the mean time to bite into a hitherto invisible chilli concealed in some lightcoloured gravy belonging to an otherwise completely mild dish. I sat thunderstruck for a while, until the first shock waves calmed down. The taste of the fresh wine, which still was of the wrong temperature didn't cheer me much anymore. Even the lamb dish proved too spicy for our native Indian. I heard the guest at the next table also complain about being served food which wasn't ordered so our trouble didn't seem to be a one off. All in all a useless way to blow money. I'll go back to my veg south indian meals for 35 rs. in the Jalaja Residency Hotel. Served quick, no lack of attention once your plate goes empty even though the place is crowded at lunch. Woodwork and big windows are sufficient for me, no fancy waiters again! Thank you!

Restaurant critique

2006-07-22T16:12:00.000+04:30

DO NOT EAT AT:

Sahib Sindhi Sultan!! (Forum Mall, Bangalore)

It possible is the last dish you will ever eat. I wish i could say something else but i can't. So sorry. I was about to get myself a t-shirt printed with ' i survived south indian meals'. Now i'm not so sure even about that anymore. The setting an the ambience of the restaurant as a train is really wonderful, so are the waiters dresses e.g. conductor uniform all that. But once your through appriciating that the cumbersome business starts. The dim lights don't faciliate reading the menue. The table being so crowded with glasses and huge metal plates one struggles to place the menue somewhere remotely tablewise to study it. The place is booked at lunch and dinner so it's busy and the service is a little chaotic, not that there is not enough waiters around but they don't seem to know where they exactly serve or not. Ordering is troublesome and don't make the mistake of ordering some less or more spice, it definitely is too much to ask.

All the food is incredibly spicy, not to be compared with the bland food the original trains serve. The food ingredients seem good but the primary taste of chillis doesn't leave any space for the tasting of anything else. I started with charcoaled quail and that already set my mouth on fire. The mild fish we ordered was substituted by chilli coated one, which was eaten by my unsuspecting companion. It caused exaggerated water consumation plus a good deal of water in his eyes. The service people felt sorry and offered a complimentary dessert. Then all our order went topsy turvey. The request for a new plate plus unspiced fish proved too much. Dishes arrived, but rice was neither to be seen nor traced. The fresh plate was as accessable as the holy grail. Our ordered drinks also were pretty invisible. Repeated reminders proved fruitless. Half through our food they suddenly appeared. Sadly my wine came from a bottle which had been open for days. As the road for complaints was open already i made just another one. A fresh bottle was opened at the table now. But unfortunately I had used the mean time to bite into a hitherto invisible chilli concealed in some lightcoloured gravy belonging to an otherwise completely mild dish. I sat thunderstruck for a while, until the first shock waves calmed down. The taste of the fresh wine, which still was of the wrong temperature didn't cheer me much anymore. Even the lamb dish proved too spicy for our native Indian. I heard the guest at the next table also complain about being served food which wasn't ordered so our trouble didn't seem to be a one off. All in all a useless way to blow money. I'll go back to my veg south indian meals for 35 rs. in the Jalaja Residency Hotel. Served quick, no lack of attention once your plate goes empty even though the place is crowded at lunch. Woodwork and big windows are sufficient for me, no fancy waiters again! Thank you!

soccer, soccer before i die!

2006-05-25T14:20:00.000+04:30

Yes my dear reader,
once more i got to pester you with the latest news on Germanys soccermania. I already thought we reached the peak, but, err, no, we actually didn't till yet. The supermarkets offer vegetable assorted in black, red and gold (aubergine, for da hindi speakers: bhengan, chillis and potatos) also assorted pulses in the same colors (lentils red and yellow accompanying black beans). I swear i have never in my entier life been confronted with our flag colours ever before. I usually claim the germans don't have much feeling of nationality. Only when soccer comes up nationality gets displayed. But to what extend, it is indiscribable, really... My bank sales little paper flags, in 10er packets with german colors, mixed flags in 14 colors, which are more dear. The post office has german flags on every counter, small paper again, i assume they can't afford more, then surrounding that is a straw collection, yes, you will know by now, 3 pieces, in black, red and yellow and each has a small paper football attached in the middle. I simply wonder why people are not wearing the colors till yet. Black trouser, yellow tees, red vest or vice versa, though i thing red and gold trousers would be a little hard to find. Particularly with mens but even with women as the shops are full of petrol, pink and turquoise clothes. I don't want to talk about all the lotteries and draws connected with soccer, fake games, computer and else in teams, advertisements using scores under the weirdest sort of pretexts. This wolrd has positively gone mad! The police is terrible worried about overboiling negative emotions against foreigners. The shopowners are worried they won't sell all their three coloured, cheaply china-produced stuff, and i gues they should worry a lot. There's definitely not enough people around with all the rubbish that is on sale and most things are just totally useless, football candles and mugs, scarfs and what the h*** else, i think i have given the dear reader quite an idea about the german marketing guys 'creativity' before. On the radio a song blares: Football is coming home!

I'm off, i m very glad i don't have to see the misery!
Neither the games, nor the mess on and off field.

soccer madness 2006

2006-05-13T20:12:00.000+04:30

I can't take it anymore!!

vacuum cleaners in football design, rolls with football pattern,
football sausages, football vocabulary everywhere
potato-salad in green grass play field design, football chocolate,
coke with ballacks likeness, cigarette packages with faces
in national colors, whisky in a soccer shoe glass bottle,
soup tin cum flag, football mix and fan gums (sweets),
footbqall ashtray, silly hats in flag colours,
if you can't make any other sense, give do (2) pieces and called
it fan support package.

It's mindless sick
It makes me feel embarassed
Only 12 more days
and i will join a different sort of madness
in the north of south of India.

C u there!!

with all my heart

2006-04-27T20:18:00.000+04:30

Have you ever wondered about your own personality? Your big and small habits and your little quirks and basically how you came to exhibit those or truelly call them your own?

I have recently come to rediscovered one of my worst weaknesses: The failure to resist a good piece of literature and my complete loss of self-discipline when it simply amounts to stopping to read.

I have dearly suffered from this addiction as a teenager. I kept two heaps of books in my room, one read, the other unread books and i like to watch the daily change of height of my personal twin towers. One of the peaks of my immersion in books was definitely 'Lord of the Rings'. I must have been fourteen i think. Someone was said to have finished all three parts in two weeks. That made me very determined to finish it off in less then that. And even at that tender teen-age what i had set my head on, was going to happen. The only problem i was facing was gettin enough reading time out of the twenty-four available daily hours. The two utmost hinderances being the necessity to sleep and my obligation to attend school. At that time the only classes i ever bunked were sports which i hated with ferocity.

Actually i did take books with me to school but then i found reading in class never gave me the pleasure i expirienced reading at home. So when had started the first book of the trilogy i forgot everything. Maybe i need to explain a little more. I lived in the books, it felt as if i was there rather then here. The times i closed the book i felt like visit to other-world. I ate, i slept, i went to school but the only focus was, when next i could spent time on reading.

The other day i saw a guy reading a book in the street while walking. I can remember reading while bicycling. I was irritated with every single word my mom demanded to talk to me. I tried to keep my replies as monosyllabic as possible. While she was addressing me, i was at all listening but reflecting on what i had last read and how the story would continue. I actually felt with the characters. Everything was so amazingly real.

When i visited my friend, who had lend me these books, i tried to share my feelings with her but realized, though she was two years older then me, that the Lords of the Rings didn't have half the spell on her than it had on me.

During nights i read most fervently. Maybe you know this feeling when your hands become numb from holding a book. I lay in my bed and my body started aching from being fixed to long in an unmoved position. But i felt angry with myself for this physical distractions as i seriously tried to block out all but the book contents.

I can vividly remember blocking out hunger, pain, sleepyness and the need to use the bathroom. My favourite argument with myself being: i'll just finish this chapter, then i ll go. When i finished it, i thought: i'll just read a couple of sentences from the next chapter and see how the story continues. So actually i never stopped at all.

Finally it took me ten days for all three books including two weekends of non-stop reading and then i was done. It was weird to be back after that. It felt like loosing a group of dear friends and another world on top. I was sad and i felt lonely, coming back into my own life as a stranger who had gained a different point of view. Details i had never thought about or trivialities i had never cared about stroke me suddenly as odd. I decided to change someting about my outside, so i visited my friend and made her spontaneously cut my hair from waistlength to earlobe. My mom was shocked. The cut-off hair i gifted to a friend who had asked for it, whenever i would have the length cut of. He displayed it openly in his room tied to a heating pipe. He used to joke about how he had descalped me.

All in all, i used to be a manic reader. It definitely amounted to a good loadful of escapism.

Outgrowing my teenage years, i heavily reduced the reading practise, but i never completely grew out of it. But i was always aware how starting a good book i would get tempted to forget plainly everything around me.

During my exessive reading, i learnt to read fast, no matter if the books where in my native or english, that simply didn't change the matter at hands.
So when i aquired books for reading the main priority was length. A book under say 700 pages was non-considerable. Around a thousand seemed just the rite length, though i can tell you the actual size of a pocket book this length makes it physically not very convinient to handle! But on the other hand a book of 200 pages would be finished in an evening or barely cover two days, not even a weekend could be nicely filled with that. They used to be finished before they really started according to my judgement. The characters not becoming my friends because they had departed before i would have really time to get to know them.

I fixed myself on epic novels for some time. I particularly liked them, when the historic background was well researched and the imminent love-stories not occupying to much of the foreground of the story.

So why did i get back to all these old stories really?

I have started reading again. I mean to say real reading, not the weekly half-scientific magazines i have read for a couple of years now. Neither my long term Dickens project, where i have slowly but surely chewed myself through the 700+ pages, chapter by chapter, night by night, very differently from the notorious way of reading i used to do.

No explanation comes to my mind, why i suddenly started to read three to six books at a time. I can hardly finish one book, when two or even three related books will be dropped on me by friends or i would be heaped with recommondations for further reading.

And the old tune is back, i can't stop reading. There's not even the need for a good story, i read non-fiction books aswell these days.

But trying to make a full circle with the beginning of this post, or rather make the serpent bite her own tail, Ouroboros - as my last read taught me - i never used to feel guilty about the time spent reading, as i thought it was well spent but nowerdays i do feel guilty. I can't indulge anymore in disappearing between the pages of a book. My 'real' lifes grip has become to strong on me and it holds me back from getting immersed in the stories as i used to, forgetting all around me.

Maybe that would be one of the advantages of retirement, when the reckless non-stop reading can start again. The sometimes almost painful self-denial of an enthusiast reader, who becomes more than a peep- hole voyeur on different accounts of worlds and environments.

Anyway...so long farewell

my bookworld calls ;)

Joke

2006-04-22T16:54:00.000+04:30

Why are Indians better at cricket than at soccer?

Because every time you award an Indian a corner, he opens a shop.

(Dilip Modi, Spice Communications)

Soccer Worldcup Germany 2006

2006-04-18T00:09:00.000+04:30

I have been actively pressurised to blog again on this not so worthy topic.. and believe me, no, actually you wouldn't.. anyway..today i saw a busker in a public place, his collection box sitting on a chair with a soccer ball cover. The supermarket sells 'champiolade' a special chocolate edition of a well-known brand. I personally wonder if excess consumation by the german national players is the only way to ensure entry into the half finals. The shopping and marketing side has become a terrible mess already. I really wonder how came our easter eggs didnt sport a destinctive black and white pattern.

So Our role model goal keeper Oliver Kahn has been displaced to no. 2 and we don't understand how he with the unbreakable will to win has suddenly become so soft spoken and accepting. So an internationally unknown Jens Lehmann will try to resist the hostile attacks .

And our never ending story Ballack, finally after endless public discussion where he is headed and what are his primary motives, where money was certainly mentioned a couple of times, he finally gave voice he is negotiating with Chelsea.

Back to the visible bit: about 50 magnified, electric blue lighted goals have been distributed evenly over central city roofs including the townhall. A local fire brigade put a home made version on their roof on the benefits of the also local DIY-Shop and were promptly under fire from the original 'artist'. They changed the colour to red and the name away from 'doorway to hamburg' to something less significant. Soon there will be a mini-edition for a measly 150,- Euro, home-produced that is. The artist is quoted as saying he doesn't want any china-made sh**.

The bag shops sell backpacks and purses, lane yards and etc. with the logo. The toy shops the logo lion in all sizes, sport shop loaded with caps, shirts, sweats and else, food sports a sudden WM 2006 soccer packing, media shops advertise as best fan supporter (via cheap TV and DVD recorder offers). I heard an ad on radio for a car posing as supporter transporter...

Fortunately I have been saved from toaster, irons and water cookers in distinctive national colors and logo loaded!

Towels and swim wear, mix and match, why not a brazil (green/yellow) bikini top with a german (red/ black/gold) bottom, shoes and sandals, mugs and i dont know what all else and sundry.

The non-food section in the discounter blocks happily your way with threesomes of socks, 'Germany' always sold out first (white with small flags). From everywhere it blurrs and screams visually at you: ONLY 53 DAYS MORE!

Who cares?? I certainly don't!
Its such a madness already, such an overrated event already. I wouldn't wonder when the german team silrntly disappears in the first rounds, but then whenever Germany has had a particularly bad phase before the worldcup, everything suddenly changes. And even when the play lousy on a repeat basis like 4 years ago, the still manage to reach half finals.

And one more i gotto give before i go, the ticket sales business. The prices are outrageous, if you are able to get hold on tickets that is. Ten times more people signed for the tickets then available, it was really like lottery. Then theres a 'safe' bying system, you only need to file shoe size, highest final exams, your daily intake of calories, ladies the bra size, your mother-in-laws maiden name, and your favourite color, all will be saved on your ticket and you only gotto show the ticket and the counterproof in papers and physic and you will be never bothered again once you have entered the stadium.

Should I tell you about how the security plans to deter tourists??? Actually I won't but it involves flying over the stadiums and costs another hell of money.

If anyone cares a fig what i think, anyway i don't, ill tell you anyway!

I think it is bloody ridiculous to spend such a hell of money on entertainment.!!
There's no more worthy causes? I beg your pardon!

Soccer is the modern circus.
The players our modern gladiators.
The don't risk their lifes,
they risk their health only.
But..
the plebs asks to be entertained!

So for bread and games!
Same as 2000 years ago.
Why change??

2006-04-06T20:43:00.000+04:30

What do you call it when german women forsake sex aswell as watching TV??

Football World Championships

hinglish

2006-03-30T19:17:00.000+04:30

rediff turns my letters hindi,
on my forehead i put bindi.

watching black n muna bhai
make my heart fly very high

let me quickly visit shiv mandir
anybody else worth seeing here?

don't my kurta suit me nice,
quick i smear with kulfi ice

eating plain cooked dal and rice
no thanks, for me little spice

too much chilli is no fun
-to the restrooms-
here i run

pani, pani hear my shout
asmani can't you sent a cloud?

use karai, wear dupatta,
is that gobi with the matar?

where's my clean clothes mr. dhobi?
KFC stil plays BON JOVI

madame, madame, hear da shout,
is that me they talk about??

mosquito stitches as i relax
quickly put the fan on max!

chalo guys i gotto go,
hope u did enjoy my show!

Spring at last to come!

2006-03-27T16:36:00.000+04:30

And yes my dear but neglected reader,

i'm back in town!

Surprisingly to all of us ice- and snowridden personages, spring is finally starting to preceed. Suddenly and very much over night almost all snow has mysteriously dissappeared (i wonder who is bothered by that now...supposedly it has travelled back to siberia where it initially came from..). The temperatures reach an incredible 17 celsius and i can tell you that after our frosty nights of minus five or six or whatever else celsius it feels sort of almost hot! My return from India presented me with a happy difference of temperature of more than 30 celsius and i can't say i liked that at the least, but what to do, yes, what to do. I can't remember another winter like this lasting for a full four month and all those weeks full of ice and snow and awful temperatures all below zero. If i happen to read any scientist laying claim to global warming, i will sue him/her, believe me, i will!

Actually i m very much full of the comparison of the two worlds i have seen in the last 3 weeks -but as reality claims my presence more than my blog does- only now i find time to drop a couple of lines inbetween. I wont make any bold promises on how much and what i will blog on in the future, as it may never get written in or out of time.

By the way, i cannot believe i don't have to wear boots anymore now and that i can bin all those stupid, scratchy, itchy, yucky tights. Not to dress anymore onion-style, like 'what-else-can-i-wear-to-make-me-feel-warm-outside-without-risking-not-being-able-to-close-the-zip-of-my-winterjacket' or 'how-many-extra-pairs-of-socks-can-my-boots-soak-up'.

There's flowers on the lawn and bloming also. I thought i would never see that again as a new ice age was dawning on us.

The bad news are, an army of ants has decided to claim the house as theirs, but this time i will strike before they have found the honeypot and laid a claim aswell as an official road to that!

woman, thy weakness is shopping!

2006-02-25T21:30:00.000+04:30

Why oh why, my dear reader, do i have to live in an eternal state of temptation?

It's not that I'm not trying to resist hard. But then when I'm least shielded against it, thinking I have almost mastered my habit, it strikes back at me strongly. I happen to be in the city for some very innocent business. I don't even plan on hitting the shops. I'm just there for a coffee with a friend or some banking stuff and then suddenly I have a couple of minutes to spare, maybe even half an hour or so and here we go...

Down, down, down!

The times where a lack of coins or other ready money sort of saved your days are over! In every corner an ATM happily grins at you and even much, much worse, all those plastic things in your purse screaming in your ears: USE ME!

Even the good old train stations are not only heaped with shops sending out the nicest of food whiffs very deliberately in and around your nose, no, jewellery, shoes, clothes, cosmetics and perfume, ties, bras and the like beg at your knees to take them home with you!

How to withstand all that?

The will is strong, but the flesh is weak..

Finally coming home you happen to catch your own reflection in some passing mirror. All loaded with this and those shopping bags, half of which containing stuff totally unnecessary. It will end in some never visited corner of your wardrobe, the darkest corners of your drawers, finally to be thrown out with the next spree of cleaning out and the attached wondering how ever you came to buy that article, or even think you wanted it.

One day, yes, one fine day, I will move into the country, just out of the way, I'll live a happy and contained life. And yes, maybe I need to form some other weird habits, milking a goat, spinning wool, knitting, cross-stitching or even crocheting and hopefully I would be in a place with no connectivity to DSL or other temptatious stuff. Maybe I'd even need a place without phone...

But then, thats seems a far way and long time removed.

I better get ready now, ehm,
I need to do some urgent shopping,
you do excuse?

lifes' quests

2006-02-22T22:16:00.000+04:30

On a trip to Barcelona a couple of years ago, where my sister happened to work at that time, my capacities for trials was being put to the test.

It started of with a visit at Subways. I simply wanted a sandwich. The guy asked if i wanted 'integrale'. I didn't know Spanish, he didn't know English.
Gosh, what has maths got to do with a sandwich?? It turned out laters he asked me if i wanted wholewheat instead of white bread...

My sister having been there only for a couple of weeks and working, asked me to have a copy of the flat-key made and gave a superficial direction of where to find the appropriate shop. Unlucky the key master had left for lunch or siesta as the spanish call it, and left a monolinguistic daughter in charge. i don' want to get you - my reader - bored yet! A mere 2 hours later i was in happy possesion of two keys.

The next chapter were tickets for an eqine gala. the naive me thought: Nothing can go wrong here! Oh, how wrong was i! I had to deal with another monolinguistic of course, but that is not the funny part of the story... The event took place in a sort of stadium with endless different price categories. Neither could i say the letters of the categories in spanish nor say the prices.
I started sweating a bit, but finally i got the tickets.

Starting to feel like the prince in fairytales, the worst of all was still to come. My sister asked me to buy a pair of black tights for work, as all hers had ladders and gave me a maximum amount to spent, which was not very high.
If you think thats an easy task, you are com-plete-ly wrong.

My sister happens to be 5.11 ft. The average spanish female is a couple of inches less tall. i learned the word 'grande' and added an extra to it, in order to indicate Xtralarge or better extra long. It was a nightmare as u can easily imagine. Finally, when i had almost totally given up on ever succeding, i called at the corner shop, which looked simply antiquated to me. Surprisingly the furnished me with the required item, though not the required price, but i really felt much to exhausted to mind at all.

I can't say my sister valued my sucessfull quests as i had wished her to and finally there was no princesses' hand to be won, but anyway it was worth going for!

Top 5 quirks

2006-02-20T22:16:00.000+04:30

This is a really difficult one..

1) i am addicted to anything that comes on paper, so i have an eternal fight against the heaps i build up of the former.

2) i cannot help colour coordinating my clothes

3) neither can i help being magnetically drawn to any shop with a 'sale' sign nor any item marked ' reduced'

4) in public buildings i tend to be stuck to the same toilet and i get very annoyed in case someone else dares to occupy my cubicle when i come in.

5) i change my habits quickly e.g. for a certain period of time i might drink black tea only after a sudden transformation i will only drink espresso in huge amounts.

Note: i m not proud of any of those and i do feel a little embarassed about posting them, but as i proudly promised syl, i better keep to that...

life under -10 degree

2006-01-24T12:45:00.000+04:30

in case, dear reader, thou hast wondered y i didn' blog these days, i have tried to withstand a winterly weather which confronts me with temperatures down to -12 c. this is not just the normal cold! my heating is fighting hard to cope with the temperatures and i'm very grateful for itz mometary eternal struggle to keep the warmth up in my badly insulated home. Very surprisingly indeed after at least a minimum of 5 repairs last year, i have astonighingly hot water. I can even take a hot bath with say 42 c. i can't remember when tht was possible last in cold winter. So i don't have to rely on hot soup and hot water bottles as much as i had to do in recent years and do rely benefit from a feeling of warmth all over the body rather than only in selected places. Talking about going outside. itz a real no, no. But then again it gets inavoidable as the fridge slowly gets drenched of edible stuff. I do have an extensive lot of winter clothes which i can happily display this year due to constant cold. But then i'm still prone to fatal errors. Yesterday i put my pink furry coat on display and then walked a lot, so i got hot, as i also added obviously too many layers underneath. Then i changed into a thinner jacket and oh boy, i lived to regret it!! With these temperatures a jacket is a fatal choice and a coat is the only thing that keeps one from freezing alive.
Gosh i can't remember when i last felt my behind freezing while walking and my thigh musles slowly cramping up due to the cold. On top theres this icy wind. no, i don't wanna deter anybody from visiting this oh so beautiful country, but don't dare to come in january or febuary for a tour of the usual sites! My region is not even hard hit i see on the news. The south suffers a happy -28 c at nite. me thought those temperatures where only possible in Russia. but u never know wot happens next and wot changes you have to cope an adept to next time u open ur eyes....

just average?

2006-01-17T17:46:00.000+04:30

Only yesterday my womens mag informed me that the average height of a female in this country is 5.6 ft. (average weight 67.8 kg in case anybody is interested..) I have been severely pondering on this piece of news. In the European contest we do lead together with denmark. I keep on wondering about the indian average i must say..

I never considered myself particularly tall. But then i can add another 3 inches to the average. To spice things up for the time being i was adding another 2+ inches today with my boots. And the guess what...

Not only did my feet hurt like hell, as i usually prefer sneakers and eqally flat shoes or boots. No, no... We had icy rain, which turned the pavement into a sort of mirror-like surface. I was unhappily sliding along as to avoid going down.

The morale?
You tell me..

How do all these american high heelers manage?
My personal theory goes: they hardly ever walk more then a couple of steps at any one given time and they are never under any time pressure!

I wonder seriously how they would fare in case they ever had to walk my average 10 km per day...

merry xmas!

2005-12-23T21:09:00.000+04:30

to all my faithful readers:

i wish you a happy xmas
and a happy and prosperous 2006!

May all of you celebrate in peace and harmony
and find some minutes to reflect on the origin of xmas
rather than following our materialistic whims.

Jesus Christ brought light into our world
(neither a present buying frenzie nor an overeating orgy
plus family row!)

women in danger

2005-11-30T11:44:00.000+04:30

as online news call attention to a case of a young pakistani bride having her legs chopped of by her in-laws for family honour reasons, the general situation of women looks pretty dismal according to 'the economist'.

women in danger

New Trophy Wife

2005-11-17T11:35:00.000+04:30

I just came across this article in Psychology today.
Thought it is quite interesting.

New Trophy Wife

male dissappointment in LOVE

2005-11-16T11:39:00.000+04:30

from a newsletter:

.... but I would emphasize the social context for so many men being disappointed in love: Many high achieving women leave love relationships as a residual category compared to the network of relationships they need for career success and personal emotional support. When women don't"live for love" anymore, men have to compete with the woman's career--and low achieving women are not as desirable--especially not if the man's counselor is herself a high-achieving career woman and hence a model of the kind of women of which few are expecting to be swept off their feet. That said, self-esteem building is a good sized industry. I expect to contribute to that from my love theory, but not till 2007.

Norman Brown PhD PhD
Assoc Prof Psychology & Humanities
Embry-Riddle
Aeronautical UnivDaytona Beach FL

Breathe (BLU CANTRELL)

2005-11-15T11:40:00.000+04:30

You say you love me, say you love me but you’re never there for me,
yeah, mmm...hmm...
You’ll be cryin? slowly dyin when I decide to leave, oh, oh
All we do is make up (make up) then break up (break up)
Why don’t we wake u and see?
When love hurts it won’t work
Maybe we need some time alone we need to let it breathe

You’re only lonely when your homey ain’t got a ride or no loot,
yeah, uh-huh
Then comes the drama some other girl is claimin she’s goin out with you,
hmm…mm…
All we do is make up then break up
Why don’t we wake up and see
When love hurts it won’t work
Maybe we need some time alone
We need to let it breathe

BreatheBreatheBreatheBreathe (Uh...huh...)

Breathe

There always is a prize to pay..

2005-11-10T15:30:00.000+04:30

Talking lately to a friend of mine we hit on single motherhood. My friend, having access to the really well-heeled community of this city, introduced me to the concept of hidden single motherhood. She said most couples with a very well earning hubby end up living more or less separate lives. The husband hardly sees his kids during the week either due to working late or being on business trips, even weekends he may not make it home, all resulting in a wife being alone with the kids almost all the time. Apart from the financial security and lots of plastic cash to fulfill her every wish, i can't see a lot of advantage to this lifestyle. Unfortunately i see marriage as a partnership and not only a mans responsibility to provide financially for his loved ones and advance on status plus its manyfold symbols. But then.. who asks me?

avian flu

2005-11-07T12:24:00.000+04:30

Seriously, i don't know what the big hub is about! Everybody going made about this virus and the eventual human fatalities. America goes berserk as usual, headed by chief red indian Bush, blowing is antiviral clarion, leading the worldwide collection of chemical weaponry... the media going hoiti- toiti on single cases in birds and every dead bird gets dissected as if they are expecting any second to find it turned into a zombie. Hey! Where do we life? What do we fear? The real lifethreats are surely sitting somewhere else and not in a peaceful dove leaving her equally peaceful excrements in front of our doorstep. 3m homeless people will die in Kashmir's winter in the course of the next weeks if the rest of the world doesn't take money fast from its respective pockets. That's a life threat, so much for sure, but not for the cushy western world, so why should we care??

i like your way

2005-10-30T17:30:00.000+04:30

when we are sitting in a bustling eatery sharing a curry
everybodys cell ringing, lots of people talking,
music playing loudly, videos on huge displays
children playing all around

on an isolated island by ourself
nothing else matters than the two of us
sharing food aswell as understanding

forks hanging uselessly in the air as we forget to eat
no words necessary to communicate or comment

seemingly unnoticed you try to push a piece of chicken my way
while i m well aware of what you are doing
a mischief-full glance as you realized i saw your action

coffee?
my nodding assent is barely noticably
we rise in unison to pick it on our way out

arranged marriages

2005-10-28T11:30:00.000+04:30

i cannot bear the thought of it!
why is that i would get asked
it makes my stomach revolt
and go round in circles

its against the principles
of freedom, choice and independancy
and by chance those happen to be mine

i dont say love marriages are made to last
surely they are not
but then again
i deeply believe
everyone has a right
to make him/herself unhappy
rather than being made unhappy

making decisions spells responsibility
for your own actions,
the ensuing results
and thats important

for me
that is..

girls

2005-10-28T10:23:00.000+04:30

thighs delight me
jeans excite me
but i must remember much
i m not allowed to touch.

in memory of J. Miller
scottish artist (sculptures)

Today is Blog Quake Day!

2005-10-26T11:18:00.000+04:30

from desipundit:

Taking inspiration from Instapundit and TTLB, and the massive donations they were able to collect for Katrina relief efforts, we are calling for a BLOG QUAKE DAY on Wednesday, Oct 26, 2005.
We request each of you to make a small post about the earthquake, and direct your readers to a suitable avenue for donating to the relief efforts.
Every single dollar contributed, multiplied by the vast numbers of bloggers, will go a long way in helping these people rebuild their lives. Our experience of the last few weeks showed us that, no matter how small our blogs, and no matter how few our readers, the words we write and the way we use our blogs can have far-reaching consequences. We learnt not to underestimate our powers. Let’s now use our powers for good.

Some organizations that are extensively involved in relief and rehabilitation efforts, and could use your monetary contributions, are listed below :
CARE
Oxfam
UNICEF
World Vision
Humanity First
Hidaya Foundation
SEWA International
International Rescue Committee
Pakistan President’s Relief Fund
The Human Development Foundation
The Association for the Development of Pakistan ’s Earthquake Redevelopment Fund

For more information about the earthquake, and the subsequent ongoing relief efforts, you can visit the following sites, that are doing an excellent job of aggregating related information.
South Asia Quake Help
South Asian Earthquake Relief
Pakistan Wiki on Earthquake 10-05

Swimming

2005-10-25T15:23:00.000+04:30

i m moving in a sea of pessimism
its all around me
an all i can do
is put my magnifying glasses on
and search for optimism
positivism
it comes in bubbles
sometimes diminuitive
others fairly sized
but after a while they burst
they never last for very long
but deep inside i know
they have built a lake somewhere
maybe another sea
an ocean even
one day i'll detect it
until then i wont stop
to look out for that
and meanwhile
hop from bubble to bubble

inventions the world waited for... 1

2005-10-21T10:26:00.000+04:30

yesterday in my eternal hunt to protect my body from the waves of winterly cold i came across a product that i think needs global attention:

climate-controlled tights with aloe-vera equipment

what sort of immdidate need made someone invent a product like this???

dialogue 1:
darling, what is this whiff i m smelling,
oh god, you are wearing those tights again...

(and i can surely put this dialogue in a more rude and sexual context..)

dialogue 2:
and believe me, i will never wear tights again,
they are such an itchy thing i just can't bear the feeling on my legs!

Problems, problems, problems....
these daily troubles women have to face..
keep a stiff upper lip and just live through all these simply reducing circumstances..

but now, all your problems are solved in one go!!!!!
No whiff!
No Itching!
Save the daily moisturizer for your legs also!!

I will definitely continue to bring the most important new product released to my readers humble attention.

55 word poem

2005-10-20T10:33:00.000+04:30

Coral red her lips,
i watched silently,
her ebony teeth showing
-regularly built- irregularly

no soundwave
able to destroy
my quietitude

i smiled
my glare still fixed
astonished
for the thousands time
how many shapes
this door could take

u always act like dumb
aggressively she said
i'm done with you.

Why did i listen?

nodding flowers vs. sex education

2005-10-19T18:07:00.000+04:30

i feel highly inspired by eM, our compulsive confessor.

So let me add my personal expirience:

guys, particularly the sexually not so expirienced yet ones, seem to be porn-educated rather thn having enjoyed a regular sex education, which may end u up in weird situations...

they think, that women seriously enjoy, wot is shown in hard-core porn
rather than taking into account that these movies are purely made for and aimed at the male public and particularly their visual enjoyment.

So u mite find urself ending up with a guy highly convinced he does all u ever dreamed of... whilst u think: wot the hell is he about????

The following clarification mite leave the guy in question a lille embarassed - and with his trousers down also - but i can ensure itz worth the interference in case u think u got a rite 2 a bit of ur own fun aswell.

jist:
i dont think that movies are very much educative one way or the other, just forget about either the nodding flowers or the xxx-rated movies....

note: the almost fatality according 2 kamasutra use will get blogged in the not- so-distant future.

personal preferences

2005-10-13T13:52:00.000+04:30

cocooning>shlomping
net>TV
dentist>gyn
haldiram>chocolate
coffee>tea
blog>chat
honesty>politeness
reading>cooking
values>status symbols
genuine fun>alcohol
new>old
pasta>chapati
kid>career
savoury>sweet
hoeg>kundera
frying>cooking
broom>vacuum cleaner
landphone>cell

when dreams come true..

2005-10-12T12:45:00.000+04:30

I had a weird dream last nite:

Arriving in a public swimming pool by bicycle
(i rode that ride 2 the front of the counter)
asking 4 a ticket and opening my purse
i tried 2 pay with a currency no longer valid
my surprise was huge 2 find
i had no valid money with me...
end of the day
i asked 2 elderly ladies,
which i obviously knew
to lend me some money
but i had 2 pay more then I expected
some initial fee
and suddenly i found a new 10 unit note
which helped to contribute to the whole amount.
I was utterly confused.

I love watersports,
though i consider swimming
the most borin one
of those available.

I dunno wot 2 make of the rest of the dream.
monetary confusion..value confusion..
currency confusion..confused values!

positive thot

2005-10-11T00:26:00.000+04:30

gras grows
wind blows
on the whole everything is alrite

Galsang Tschinag

frust

2005-10-10T19:27:00.000+04:30

a) i m sexually frustrated
b) i m frustrated in my mother role
c) i m healthwise frustrated
i still got this cold
it sticks 2 me thru thick n thin :S
itz 2 weeks now!
d) i m computerwise frustrated
my laptop breaks down whenever
i use real player or flash player...
e) the book i read dun cheer me...

i m out now
sun is out also

rumble in kashmir area

2005-10-09T15:32:00.000+04:30

i am thorougly out off love with anything to do with pakistan due to personal reasons.. still i was very much shocked about todays better tonites earthquake. i think havin been in the hit spot makes things rather worse. 10 years is a long time to build unstable buildings. that was the time since the last earthquake of this impact. i have stopped to care for the people i used to know there, but it doesnt mean i m wishing them any bad..