Eye opener III - The god mother

This incident took place in a place near my house and this is a real life incident which happened in front of my eyes.

A person was honking his car horn like hell at a girl who was standing in front of his car. I was about 100 meters away from the actual spot and was surprised to see this girl standing in the middle of the road. In fact, a few bystanders were also staring at what was happening. It really looked like this girl was trying to get herself killed. The person in the car kept honking. Some of the bystanders who were nearer to the scene even started laughing at what was happening. As I neared the scene, I could see a stick in her hand and in an instance realized what was happening. The girl was blind and she was trying to cross the road.  An old lady (bystander) asked her grandchild to help the blind girl. The grand child was little hesitant. I guess that was because the blind girl looked untidy. Anyways, the old lady was adamant and she forced her grandchild to help her. While the blind girl was being helped, the old lady who could hardly walk on her own held on a telephone post. Once the blind child crossed the road, all the gentlemen who had gathered to watch dispersed. The person in the car, who seemingly was in a great hurry, also left the place.

I don’t understand what to say after seeing all this. The person in the car did not want to wait for a few extra seconds so that the little blind girl could cross the road. I guess if none was watching, this person would have run over the girl. I still wonder about those gentlemen who had gathered around, laughing and were least bothered to help. What was so funny there? What was there to laugh about? A blind girl struggling to cross the road. Was that so funny?

The old lady was a real hero. A true inspiration, especially for the younger generation. Actually I felt like going and hugging the old lady. God bless that mother. But in my view she herself is a god.

Nemo - The Hero

We’ve started enjoying the life with our pet fish, Nemo. Nemo is actually our first pet. A dog was the only choice of pet that we had ever thought of. Honestly, we thought a dog could make a big difference in our life. But then, in 2 weeks’ time, this little fish has started changing our life for good… It is so nice to look at it and its activities. Believe me… it is actually a real tension reliever… J

These days we have noticed that Nemo plays tricks to grab our attention. It swims fast, it tries to make splashing sounds, tries to jump out of the water (Lucky Nemo, we have a cover for the tank), tries to bite the tail of other fishes, especially the little sharks. Looks like he is doing all these to get our attention and thus get some extra food from us... He loves eating... I had never imagined that a fish could eat so much. I got to know from our friends that gold fish eat a lot and dirty the tank. Nemo eats more than any of the other fishes in the tank. Guess, he was born hungry J.

We have got two more gold fish for his company. They are little tinier than Nemo... so he is like a hero for them, actually he plays one...hmm…the tiniest fish always likes tail gating Nemo, but Nemo never care for this and throws attitude on him as well. Poor little fish L. He thinks that he is the senior most in the tank and to prove this, he roams around, shakes the stones, goes near the plastic plant as if to check if everything is fine with the plant, goes near the oxygen pump and confirms if it is working properly, and if we tap on the aquarium and throw in some fish food, he makes sure that he reaches the top of the water level to get the food before anyone else. I guess he is trying to showcase that he is the boss (But actually food is where he loses all his pride) …..

We feel that these fishes may get bored of the same old fish food served every day. We actually want to give them different foods like rice, bread crumbs something of that sort for a change. But we think that their little stomach cannot digest these kinds of food (that’s our assumption, not sure about this).

Anyways we stopped eating fish after Nemo came into our life. J

Pencil drawing: The flower

An attempt to draw a flower. Remembered seeing a photo of two flowers somewhere on the internet and based this pencil drawing on that.

Nemo gets a new home

After seeing Nemo for a day in his own little world, it was evident to me that he was not happy and was missing being in the company of other fishes.

So, we went out to buy a bigger house for Nemo. We looked at a couple of stores and finally selected a bigger house and some friends for Nemo.

A bigger house, 2.5 feet long fish tank. The whole kit included a fish tank, a stand for the tank, an oxygen pump, a tank filter, a few mixed variety of fishes, a net to catch fishes, a box of fish food, an anti fungal agent, lots of gravel to replicate sea bed for the fishes, 2 plastic under water plants.

We had quite some trouble getting these home without breaking anything. But managed it. Once home, we setup the tank in about an hour. Till then we had to force all the fishes to share the small home that Nemo was living in.

Some basic things to remember while setting up a new tank are;

1) Clean the new tank with crystal salt water. This helps remove the smell of the new tank and any remnants of chemicals used while putting together the fish tank.

2) Before you put the gravel in the tank, clean it with water. (No chemicals to be used for cleaning the gravel) This will help make sure that the gravel is dust / chemical free when it goes into the tank.

3) Set the gravel into the tank bed. Do not throw them into the tank as they may crack the tank.

3) Fill 3/4 of the tank with water.

4) Buy a bottle of anti fungal drops and put 3 drops of it in the tank with water (without the fish). Wait for 30 minutes to transfer the fishes to the tank.

5) Fix the oxygen pump and the filter to the tank.

6) Place the tank on a stand. We purchased one that fits the tank well.

These are just basic steps to be taken while setting up a tank.

So back to Nemo, we set this tank up and let all the fishes be in this. There are now 7 in the place of 1. And Nemo seems to be very happy. He is now swimming around with his new friends. :)

Here are some photos of Nemo and his friends.

Fear of failure

Many a times in my life, I have asked myself "What is failure?". Seldom did I realize that every time I did a mistake while I was in school, I was failing my teacher. Every time, I disappointed my dad, I was failing him. Every time I did something that hurt my partner, I was failing myself. So after lot of thoughts, I realize that failure is a part of our life and that we are nothing without failure.

Some say, talking about failure shows the negative aspect of a person. I would not agree. To me not talking about failure is because we are scared of it. We are scared of failure, something that we have crossed across so many times in our lives.

According to Wiki "Failure refers to the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective, and may be viewed as the opposite of success." To me failure is life.

When you are a child(about 1 year old), you try to stand up and fall. You fail and again fail and again fail, till you learn to stand up straight and walk. One such person is Lightning Bolt. He may have failed many a times as a kid, but learn to live with the failure and grow beyond it.

In short, failure is what we all go through most of the times in our life to become successful. So we should stop fearing it and learn to live through it. Time for you to decide.. :)

I found my Nemo

We have been thinking about having a gold fish in our house for sometime. But never were too eager to buy one. Yesterday, we were gifted one by our friends. Our own "Nemo". He's next to us right now as I write this post. I'm sure, you would have seen the movie 'Finding Nemo'. This is our dream Nemo and we have found him. In-fact we have named him Nemo.


Here he is.. Swimming to glory.

Eye Opener-II

I am here with a news which shook me totally and would like to share that with you. A person has been killed for no reason. "No reason", this should be highlighted, since the blame against him has not been proven yet.


This guy was travelling in a bus and somebody pickpocketed his co-passenger's money, which was around Rs10000. The person who lost his money and his pals found money with this guy and started beating him brutally since he was having money with him and this ended up in his death.


His relatives claimed that he got money from a bank after pledging his ring. They could even produce the evidence from the bank.  So only because of a mere doubt he was forced to let go of dear life and for no reason he had been declared as a  "theif". He died before he could prove his innocence. His poor soul may be trying to shout aloud that he was not a thief. The actual thief may be sitting and relaxing at his home. Fate!!!!  How many innocent souls are we going to take just because of our whims and fancies?


God, you too are unresponsive now a days????

The Big Banyan Tree

One of the best places to visit in the outskirts of Bangalore. Big banyan tree is located in Ramohalli, about 20 kilometers from Bangalore. It seems this tree is spread over 4 acres of land and is considered to be one of the biggest in the world. It's age is about 400 years.

    

Not many have lived for 400 years and most of those who did.. were forms of god. I see a true god in this tree. If you see the pictures, there is a center to the tree and multiple branching roots at different locations. This is like god and the multiple religions around the world.


 Anyways, coming back to the Big banyan tree, this place is worth a vist, especially during the evenings. The place is cool and with the evening's setting sun, the whole place around the tree gets a glow of its own. You can also see a few monkeys playing around the tree.

The location is a best suit for a weekend family outing around Bangalore. We spent about 2 hours around the tree taking a lot of photographs. 

Over all the tree is amazing and one look at it would dazzle anyone. 400 years of growth and still known to be growing.

Anger

Have any of you got angry anytime? I'm sure everyone does. I have… many a times.

But as I think about the times when I had got angry, I realize that most of the times I got angry for no real reason. I remember my dad telling me when I was young, that it is when one grows old that his boiling blood starts to cool down. As I grew older, I realized that he was correct.

When a person is in his/her adolescence, his/her blood boils. He/she gets angry for no real reason... Fact is, he/she has many people who he/she can be angry with... Friends, family, neighbor and others person and does not care much about hurting their feelings.

As the person grows, the people he/she can get angry at become limited but the level of anger increases.

As he/she becomes a matured person, over 30... The boiling blood begins to cool down and now the person takes a deep breath before getting angry at anyone or anything. The person learns to see the pros and cons of getting angry about a situation.

With my personal experience, I have learnt to get less angry over a period of time after I got married. The secret is… the feeling that someone is dependent on me and I am dependent on this special person in my life.

When you understand this, you start falling in love with the other person. Once you are in love with this person, you obviously do not want to hurt him/her. So you start practicing being patient with your partner. Slowly the practice changes directions and you start being patient with everyone.

In a few years you become matured to be patient for everything. Even the worst situation would not aggravate you till your cool mind tells you to do so.

The realization of this at an early age would reduce the amount of anger that we currently posses. Love everyone around you as human beings, respect them for what they are and start seeing only the good things in everyone. Most of all... never do anything that will hurt anyone. By doing this, you end up being named as a nice person, you have peace of mind as you do not get angry anymore and you become matured at a young age.

An eye opener

The cost of a human life is 27 Rupees(50 cents)? This thought has been haunting me since I read a news about the murder of a toll plaza attendant. Was his life worth only 27 Rupees? Absolutely not. He was the only hope of a family of five. The only earning member of a poor family. I read in the newspaper that his siblings are mentally and physically challenged. His family doesn't have any other source of income now to survive. His mother says, "Our son used to help us a lot. He had opened an account for us and used to send us money.  I, my husband and my physically and mentally challenged sons would survive on that. Now that he has, gone our source for survival too has gone," she said, sitting in a corner of her house, holding his photograph close to her. (Courtesy: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/police-say-toll-plaza-murder-solved-suspected-killer-arrested-136203&cp). These lines made me to write this post and think more about it.


What happened to us, humans? Where have our humanity gone?  No sense or nonsense? People have turned out to be beasts? No hearts anywhere.


It seems this murderer was drunk and his sudden reaction, emotion and anger made him to kill a poor guy and ruin his family’s only hope for survival. What is he? A moron? He had money to drink, money to buy a gun, money to buy bullets.. but no money to pay for toll.


While anger is understandable, it should not rule us. We, humans should learn to rule anger…not only anger, all emotions.


Look at this guy, the murderer, the moron, the nut case who killed a young boy for 27 Rupees. Can this guy return the lost son to his mother for 27 rupees? Can he ease the sorrow of loss for this family?

Ezhimala - Hanuman swamy statue

A few months back, I got an oppurtunity to see Asia's tallest statue of Hanuman swamy. This is in a place called Ezhimala (ezhumala,Translated as Seven hills) in Ramanthali near Payyanur, Kerala.

Hanuman swamy is beleived to be a follower of Lord Rama. During the times of Ramayana, when Hanuman was carrying the Dunagiri mountain which had the Mrithasanjeevani herbs to Lanka, a piece of the mountain fell down in the location which is now called as Ezhumala. This piece broke into 7 pieces on impact with mother earth. Today, these 7 pieces (hills) together are called as Ezhumala. Ezhu refers to 7 in the native language (malayalam).


It is beleived that Hanuman swamy still resides in the Ezhumala mountains. And hence a temple was built for him at this location. The statue of Hanuman swamy is huge and gives a realistic view of swamy with his gatha (weapon).


The temple is about 286 meters above sea level. Reaching there would require a drive of about 45 minutes from Payyanur. Though the first half of the stretch is easy, the second half of the drive is a little tedious. But the scenic beauty as you reach the top of the hill is worth the effort. Above this, the sight of the statue of Hanuman swamy adds joy in our hearts.


I've been to this place a few times now and enjoy my every visit to this holy place.

Power of Truth

Many a times I had lied as a kid and as a grown up and every time I ended up getting caught. I'm sure, most of you would have ended up in the same or similar situations. All that while I did not understand what truth was. To most of us, truth is correct information being passed on without any information being falsified for unlawful benefit.


The way I look at it, truth is the oppurtunity to present yourself in front of god and be able to disclose honest information such that the ones who beleive in you and your own believes are not hurt.
More than anything, when you lie.. you inevitably end up hurting someone who loves you. I've decided to be honest with myself and my loved ones so that the eternal harmony of life is not affected.


Truth could be painful at times, but could bring a lot of joy to your near ones when they realize that you are being honest with them.


You don't need a new year resolution for this.. just decide to be honest with your loved ones. Would you like them to lie to you?.. I'm sure you don't.. so just don't lie to them either.

Car Craze !!!

I still remember the day I got my first car. For a long time, I have been thinking about getting a car, but never got the guts or the money to do so. Even when I had the money, I was not sure if I should buy a new car or a used one. Finally, when I had the money and the guts, I got one. A Maruti Alto. A new one and my dream car.

But there was a problem. Though I held a valid driver’s license, I had never driven a car by myself. So now... how do I get my car from the showroom to my house? A friend in need is a friend in deed. So I asked my friend to drop the car off at my house. He did... a good friend :).

Now starts the real fun... so I wanted a car and I got it now... what next? I stay in an apartment and to get the car out of the parking lot without a scratch requires more than guts. Anyways... it took me about 20 minutes to get the car out of the apartment. All thanks to my navigator (my dad). He was the one who had guided me my whole life... and here he was, guiding me to take my car off the parking lot. So after 20 minutes, I got my car out... Not a single scratch... yaaahhhoooooo...........

After this more fun started... I had lot of difficulty in shifting between 1st and 2nd gear. (Indian cars normally come with a manual gear system). Every 10 minutes, the car stopped... (Actually, I did not realize that I was removing my leg from the clutch too quickly). Since this was not working wonders for me... I decided to call it a day.

A week later, when I got some more guts, I called upon a driving trainer to teach me to drive my own car for a few extra bucks. The guy agreed and there I was in about 20 minutes driving my car with more confidence. My dad was sitting behind and giving me his regular piece of confidence speech. Man... I love him... He is a real role model for me and has taught me how to handle every situation that one can think off.

Anyways... back to my car and my driving. So that day with my dad and this trainer with me... I drove for about 20 minutes in the nearby lanes. If any of you have not seen the traffic in Bangalore. It looks like a full battalion of Roman army running for dear life. (No offence meant of the Roman army). A 2 lane road has 2 cars, an auto rickshaw and 2 motorcycles next to each other. The average distance between cars in Bangalore traffic is about 15 inches on all sides. Sometimes, it is lesser.

So, after 20 minutes of driving, I was little more confident about driving. So the same day, post lunch, me and my dad set out on a driving mission. To me that was like MI2. With some difficulty I got the car out of the parking lot and drove for about an hour. As time went on... I felt more confident.

It has been over 3 years now since I got my first car. I still use it and love driving it. A bon voyage to myself :)

Elephant Craze !!!

How many of us know about elephants? I did not, till the beginning of this year. Infact the maximum elephants that I have seen in one place has been 2.



This changed about 8 months back, when we went to Guruvayoor temple in Thrissur, Kerala(A hindu temple of Lord Vishnu).


The journey was tiresome, with over 500 KMs of drive (My husband did the driving). After our darshan (view of god) at Guruvayoor, we decided to go to Anakkotta (Elephant Fort), where the elephants belonging to the Guruvayoor temple are kept. They had about 64 elephants when we visited this place. Believe me.. this place was truly a elephant fort. 64 mamoth elephats. I was taken by surprise to see so many of them together in one place.


We also learnt a few tricks of handling elephants from the friendly mahouts (elephant trainers).

1) Never stand in front of an elephant and stare at it for long. It feels threatened. Below is one elephant which we stared at. For a minute he was silent and kept staring back at us.. Then he got wild and we had no options but to move away from that place.

2) When an elephant is angry, never stand anywhere near it. You never know what they may do. They may decide to chase you or just snap a branch from a nearby tree and hurl it at you. The one below was angry about something and was busy hurling things at whoever stood near it. Luckly no one was hurt.

3) Elephants enjoy their bath time. Give them a bath twice a day to keep them happy :) A good scrubber or a big brush is used to rub their skin and remove dirt from their skin. This is very important as elephants are not too fond of being covered with dirt. During the bath time, the elephant is made to lay down on its side so that the mahout can clean it well.

4) Elephants need their mahout to be around to keep them in control. Most times, when the mahout is away from the elephants, they become naughty and could at times loose their cool. So, mahouts have comeup with a technique through which they give their elephants the feeling that their mahout is somewhere right next to them. To do this, they use a long metal pipe and leave it behind the joint of the ear. It seems, every time the elephant shakes its ear, it feels the pipe and thinks that it is his mahout's leg.

5) The best time to watch elephants are when they are in a good mood. You will know it by looking at he elephant. See the one below. This guy was enjoying his day and though gave us a stare, did not bother about us for long.

Next time you are in Kerala, India, don't miss this place.

Pet Craze !!!

Today I am here with a very interesting topic, which is about my cute neighbors.  Well, not about my actual neighbors, but their dogs.  Our neighbor’s balcony (neighboring apartment) is visible from ours and is always filled with a variety of dogs.

Most of my time at home goes looking at these dogs playing with each other. I’m sure you  can understand 1 or 2 dogs.. but imagine almost 6 of them at any given time.

Not that my neighbor has these as his pets.. he runs a pet shop. Dogs are just the ones that I see in their balcony. But I’ve heard that they sell rare birds as well. Not sure where they get it from though.

I would prefer talking about the dogs as those are the ones that I see and those are the ones that I like as pets. My apartment association does not allow pet animals. Hence I’ve not been able to get a dog for myself even though I have a strong desire to make one of those as my best companion. 

The way they interact with their owner, the kind of love and intimacy they show to him is amazing. They probably do not know that one day their owner is going to sell them.  Anyways I don’t  have to discuss in detail about this, as this is his business. But the intelligence, the affection and the loyalty that dogs show towards their owner is remarkable.

Following are the breeds that I would like to have as a pet.

Alsatian or German shepherd:  It’s a very good guard as well as loyal in nature. It’s a nice breed and gets along with the family well.

Labrador: My personal fav. Minimal barking, but very affectionate and a true family dog.

Boxer:  Very good security for home. Easy to look after and handle. Widely used for security purpose.

Dalmatian: This breed is also a good guard. They are prone to diseases like skin allergies. This one is suggested for city life.

Doberman:  This breed is considered to be an excellent guard and is easily trainable.

Rottweiler: An alert guard. Not good for apartments. Not that easy to train.

Great dane: Good family dog. Easy to maintain and train.

Pug: Cute but not easy to maintain. They are not aggressive also.

Hopefully someday, I will move to a different home and if things work out, get one from each of these breeds for myself.