something something...!!!!!!!

I paused for a while when while surfing I read about blogfest.

I hesitated.

I have always loved writing but things like becoming a part of blogfest has never crossed my mind.
Never used to think of publishing a blog..
Perhaps that is why I am still way below the line from being known as a blogger.
And I thought it's always very very common to be fairly unpopular as a blogger since my topic of writing is not so much of those HOT STUFF like travel, food, cultural or parenting.

Just the other day I was talking to a friend about commercial blogging and I mentioned never thought of blogging with a business perspective.
Used to think why to publish..? Write for satisfaction of the creative part of my soul.


But then myriad thoughts started crossing my mind. What is the use of beauty without admirers? Why to write if you have no readers.
The personal journal I maintain can always be my source of outlet.

True, blogging today has a life of its own. And possibly this was the reason why I named my blog "My Virtual Space"...!!!!!!


Was a little late for Blogfest. Not sure even if I would have known about it, would have been able to go.

But yes, would have liked to be a part of it..!!!

I should make my work public, at least to a bigger group of potential readers.
After all it is the passion in writing that has helped me through the times where I felt lost and realized lessons.

down the memory lane...!!!!

I have listened to the whole audio on clearing clutter, but realised that I will need to go back to some parts to further release the blocks to clearing out clutter. Interesting how much emphasis is put on the emotional reasons for clutter. Makes sense too. There are only a limited number of things that one can do to deal with an item: file it away, attend to it, throw it away. But if we have emotional baggage around it, then it will seem like a big deal and we won't get to it. emotional baggague huh..!! attributes to a lot of things. results in many of our actions... homo sapiens is a species driven by desires and emotions play a huge role in driving instincts.

After thinking about emotional baggage and all this stuff I found myself clearing home. Probably was trying to find an outlet to vent out my energy. and admittedly was trying to figure out items which i do not require and was thinking of disposing them. but no..!! found myself going down the memory lane.. was able to relate to most of the things which i do not require but from which i was still not ready to part. An old card from my best friend, a page of a journal i used to write wen i was a kid, the wrapper of a chocolate a special friend gifted, a postcard of taj mahal which i my friend gifted wen i was leaving school.. multiple things..!! memories are associated with all of them and I realised, in my busy life, those small things act as lifelines and help me remember that I am human..!!

PS: whenever I think of the word stuff... I remember a dialogue from the movie The Devil Wears Prada. A dialogue which the character Miranda Priestly delivers with pure passion and precision. Since I have seen the movie can never think of  the word stuff without thinking of the movie and vice versa...

time.....

So, obviously i haven't posted in a really long time.

Some might think that the reason is may be i got lucky and got married to someone with whom i can spend the rest of my life, things are finally on the upswing and I'm happy..

Sadly, that is not the case at all.. Its was more depressing and uninteresting than that. Nothing has really changed at all and that isnt making me feel any better.


Have been quite busy with work and all. The only reason i am posting is because i have realised the importance of unleashing your thoughts.
and majorly..  Man!! I have missed this place...

have always been a journal girl. Like documentation through and through.
Like penning things so that when I go down the memory lane, i can relive those moments in great detail.

As a young girl, i could never figure out why freckles are bad or ugly. Or why some people had them and some didnt. Why some things were more hideous than others..

have come a long way since then..
have realised myriad things... the importance of good frens, the soothing calm which music provides... the multiple tips and toes which life teaches.. topsy turvy paths of lyf... the feel of ice sliding on ur face wen u are being scorched in a dessert...

hmm... some whr down the lane i realised.. work would alwaz be there but u need to find small moments to do what you enjoy most so that you dont end up being a machine..

happy realisation!!

Yet another cinema.....

Many a times i have been told one should not be a cinemato-freak like me.. as far as i am concerned i can watch any and every type of movie at any time of the day.. i don't exactly mind going for a movie show at eight o' clock in the morning. In a similar fashion i love late night movie shows.. And why not? Living in the fast paced lives the way we do, there are only a few things outside the circle of work for which we do get some time.. so when we go out for a movie.. its basically for sheer enjoyment. probably this is the reason why the farther the movie is from reality, the greater are the chances of the crowd enjoying it... i, myself, am a connoisseur of good serious movies.. but that does not mean i dont enjoy the far from reality flicks... take inception.. the latest flick by Christopher Nolan.. Lot of rules make way for a lot of loopholes. And moviemakers use these loopholes to cheat and let audiences fill in the leaps of logics. The latest Christopher Nolan flick plays fair. It will twist your mind, take you through highs and lows of logic but it is not a film based on twists. It will stimulate you to think where to draw a line between real and the not so real.. there is a lot to take in but the imaginative and thoughtful delivery of exposition keeps the viewer riveted despite the amount of information required in order to understand the premise, setting, and plot. And best part is, it’s not a confusing movie if you provide your full attention to it.


It includes probably one of the best fight sequences ever picturised. Take a moment to consider that: in the entire history of cinema, of every fight scene that has ever taken place, the one in this movie is among the best.  Watching a fight without gravity is incredible.  It’s not like in The Matrix where a character can defy gravity if they choose.  The fight scene in Inception has no gravity to defy and Arthur (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), the team’s point man, has to figure out how to achieve his objective while fending off projections.  I can only hope that someday in the distant future, when people with free time are on a space station in zero-gravity, they will re-enact this scene.  In the meantime, Nolan’s spectacular visual effects will have to suffice. While the sequences in Matrix look unrealistic, the ones shown here seem to be so real..  other action scenes are spectacular.
Visually lush and imaginative, Nolan transforms car chases into countdowns, fistfights into puzzles, and shootouts into…well, shootouts.  There’s a mission on a snowy mountainside that doesn’t work as well as the other set pieces because there’s a poor sense of location, a lack of visual diversity, and sloppy editing.  But that doesn’t really halt or hurt the film because Nolan brilliantly placed the car chase, the fistfight, and the shootout on top of each other.  You would think this would cause action fatigue, but by cutting between three set pieces and having what happens in one set piece affect the others, the action climax of Inception isn’t exhausting—it’s exhilarating.
With Inception, every character not only has a particular skill and task, but has a personality that mirrors their job description. With exception of Cobb( enacted by Leo de Caprio), we learn about the characters  by how they interact with each other and not with a monologue of past.
 The small moments between Arthur and Eames, “The Forger” (Tom Hardy) indicate years of working on j tolerating each other on jobs but with no animosity between the two.  Neophyte “Architect” Ariadne (Ellen Page) is a total jerk towards Cobb, but she’s the only one who’s willing to cut through his bullshit.  Cobb’s relationship with his wife Mal (Marion Cotillard) is the heart of Inception.  The interactions among the supporting characters are standard for a well-made action movie, but the relationship between Cobb and Mal is yet another reason why Inception stands apart. No wonder i enjoyed the movie... No wonder the concept of dreams in dreams appealed me,... 


come to think of it, many people actually live the life of lies or dreams. for them those are not really lies.. they are fabrications of their imaginations and they become so self engrossed that they start accepting the lies as truths and the actual truth disappears in the web of lies...

Rajneeti...!!

Much has been said about Raajneeti and how it is comparable to the Mahabharata and the Godfather; the performances, the dialogues and the screenplay have all been critically reviewed. But what stayed with me was how Ranbir's character Samar Pratap Singh, the reluctant politician, actually becomes the kingmaker.
I can't but think of the parallels with the Gandhi family, first Rajiv Gandhi and then more specifically Sonia Gandhi, who stayed away from the limelight for years. I have asked myself many a time, what finally made Sonia Gandhi take the plunge into mainstream politics?


For years, the Italian wife remained in the shadows of Rajiv Gandhi, a commercial pilot by profession, who reluctantly joined politics after younger brother Sanjay Gandhi's death and was propelled into the forefront after Indira Gandhi's assassination.


After Rajiv Gandhi's assassination in 1991, Sonia's decision to stay away from politics in an attempt to protect her children Rahul and Priyanka was understandable. Honestly, Sonia, the Italian widow didn't quite seem to fit the image of a politician ready to take on the reigns of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty.
What came as a shocker for most of us was her decision to assume the controls of the Congress party in 1998. Sonia was constantly criticized by the opposition for being Italian-born, of speaking Hindi with a foreign accent and having nothing but the Gandhi name going for her. And yet, she steered the Congress-led UPA to a thumping victory in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections.


For a moment, it seemed that Sonia too had been seduced by the lure of power to move out of the shadow and step onto the political front. And yet again, despite being unanimously voted to lead the government, she unexpectedly declined the post of Prime Minister. On the eve of the inauguration, amidst intense insistence and persuasion, she said, "I request you to accept my decision and to recognize that I will not reverse it…. It is my inner voice, my conscience."
Honestly when she decided to move in to politics, I along with many Indians presumed that she finally made a run for the Power…!


What then was the motivation for someone like Sonia Gandhi, who by default had become intrinsically linked to politics, to take on such a daunting task of leading a party that was on such shaky ground?
In a country where everything is politicized, whether it is the Naxal attack or the Bhopal tragedy verdict, I wonder where she fits in. Ranbir in one of the final scenes in Raajneeti says that he always wanted to stay away from politics because it brought out the worst in someone, making them manipulative and scheming. Ranbir, the shrewd Arjun in Raajneeti, plots and plans till he avenges his father's death. In the great Mahabharata of Indian politics, which character is Sonia Gandhi?

party moments.....

in a room filled with laughter and chatter
being unable to hear anything
looking for some semblance of reality
when everythings seems to be so unreal
fooling around
wondering how much is illusion

zapping and zooming around the surface
wishing to dig for treasures forbidden
desire to rage out of illusion
hoping for bits and pieces of reality

what has happened to us all
to cause us to float about
to flit in and out of each other's lives
to chatter but no longer touch the depths
greater emphasis on worldly self
than caring for soul

seems fun on surface
but isn't it all empty
lonely in a crowd
I miss the easy and simple life
now its just a crowd
I don’t do crowds well…

answer moment

we keep searching for answers
which cannot be given now..
we should not...
because we are not yet able to live them..

live the questions now
perhaps some day in the future

we will gradually
without even noticing it

live our way into the answer..


funny.. the way our super inquisitive minds work..
we may not be able to see into the future..
but we keep trying to do that
and meanwhile keep messing with the present,..

life is wierd...!!!!

Life is a parody,
at least most of the times.
We get what we never care for,
and not what we expect..
Love the picture perfect..
when we know its impossible
and we miss the real amidst it all..
We see only what we want to..
and ignore what we already have
and then out of blues,
one one eventful night,
we regret doing it all..
and then we say..
life is one complex entity...
where we wait all eternity...
for those special moments
which are rare as treasure...

monologue

There is a wanderer inside all of us, searching for that elusive something. We give it names like love, money, fame, lust, dreams, goals..but try as you may, it is difficult to express that one word. Even the most focussed and determined soul will find it difficult to do so. The problem is most of us, including yours truly do not know what we really want and a bulk of our lives go in searching for that elusive Godot. Those who do not participate in this search, content themselves by just existing,but some of us manage to live a bit of our lives this way. Sometimes even before we know it, time whizzes past like water draining through our fingers, leaving us limp and lost.

Many years ago, when I first set foot in Pune , I thought I got what I wanted. I also presumed that I knew what I wanted. A successful career, a sense of independence and an escape from cloistered life is all that I looked for then. Armed with a happy go lucky attitude, an inquisitive mind for a new challenge, a desire to seek a new experience , I landed in Pune, nervous and excited at the same time.
And around me was a collage of several minds all looking towards a new unchartered destiny. But one thing that separated me from my classmates was that I didnt share their fierce competitiveness . Their cut throatness shook me, their overpowering confidence unnerved me as I waited for my chance for a group discussion. I was confident in my own way and unlike my aggressive classmates, I let my assertiveness speak for myself. I wasnt the dark horse, but many told me later that I was like a chameleon, which could change colours..may be that instinct stood by me in later years.

Today I shut my eyes and the group discussions and lectures in the wide classroom came to my mind. We were a medley of people from different states and were as parochial as we could get. Yet no one could fit into the description called demure. We have come a long way since then. All are settled in lives of their own.

But it was also the first time that a naive girl learnt and experienced a new word in the English language - a word that most of today's 21 year olds wear on their sleeve, a word that I grasped while standing in the verandah of my yet to be classroom , a word that I will hear again and again throughout my career and a word that changed connotations many times - ATTITUDE. If Bihar shaped it vaguely , Pune fine tuned it for me .And in my quest , this attitude gave me company, letting me live my life, while changing gears, while taking major decisions, while hitting my lowest lows, and while reaching the high points..This has been one constant companion, no matter which shore Ive landed in . But today, I seem to have left it somewhere by the wayside and my quest has now multiplied two fold..oh !

Women Reservation : how effective will it be?

One cheer for Women Reservation Bill. Not two and surely not three. Of all the reservations we have devised till date to transform the society, this one will transform the least. Nevertheless, it may do some marginal good, so lets not make a total enemy of it.
Rotating constituencies would mean women cannot nurse a constituency. Reservations do not apply to Rajya Sabha creating a parliamentary anomaly. Reservations could mean more upper caste women MPs at expense of backward women. Everything apart, the basic flaw lies elsewhere.

Women suffer from thousands of forms of discrimination at most basic levels. Safety is still a major concern at most of the places. India has highest rates of female anemia and maternal mortality. And the chauvinistic attitude needs to be changed. Even with all talk of modernization, till this date women face a lot of prejudices. Surely Chanda Kochar, Akhila Srinivasan, Ekta Kapoor have done well. Surely, women have brought fame and pride to the nation. But still the fact remains that salary of highest paid women in the world is one third the salary of highest paid male individual. How does that justify the talks of equality?
Million dollar question is will all these factors change with more women in the parliament? Who would guarantee that seven daughters of a certain politician will all not end up being members of lok sabha?
Who would be responsible for equality in most basic terms. We already have multitude of laws for gender equality? And what has happened to those? We already have had dalit reservations for 60 years. What has been the progress? Has anything at all changed?
The need is to implement all this at grassroot levels. And this is the root cause. When we think of implementing a change, we try to implement it directly at the highest level of hierarchy. It would have been a lot better if a bottom up approach would have been taken. We need administrators, polices, judges who will implement laws on social justice. And most of all we need awareness and dedication to really implement the change. Before that happens, the bill would not be successful in its venture.