Happy Teachers’ Day to All My Students

Happy Teachers’ Day to All My Students

When I was a school teacher for 20+ years, every year on this day our students felicitated us, as did the school management. We were made to feel special throughout the day. I was fortunate enough to have been felicitated by the Lions Club in Raniganj as well. After I changed my profession and became a copyeditor for Macmillan, I was still wished and remembered on this day. But I realised that now I had teachers who trained me in copyediting so I started wishing them a Happy Teachers’ Day. Most of them were younger than me and they must have been pleasantly surprised at this turn of events. Today I add my yoga teacher to this list and wish her on this occasion.

While taking my bath today I realised that teachers in the conventional sense were not the only ones who had taught me my lessons in life. My students (children) had all contributed in a great way. They taught me how to be patient and how to deal with individual differences and gifts. So today I wish to thank and felicitate all my students (children) for having done just that. THANK YOU.

Only Pain No Gain

Only Pain No Gain

Life has a way of mocking us at times. It is said that there are rules for which there are exceptions. Similarly, there are adages and there are instances to prove otherwise.  Here I am going to bring out the opposite of ‘no pain no gain.’

The first instance that comes to mind is when people report an accident or help a victim and in return are harassed by the police.

In a lighter vein let us consider the case of Joe Bastianich, the Italian judge of the popular TV show Masterchef US. While judging the juniors in Season 03, episode 03, after tasting Jenna’s alligator curry he asked her if she knew how to do yoga. When she struck a pose, he told her that he would show her how it is done. What followed was a laughter riot for everyone else but Joe. He fell hard, almost landing in a sitting position, pushing the furniture to one side. The other two judges, Gordon Ramsay and Graham Elliot, were in fits of laughter and so were all the participants. But what did Joe get for his pain? Not the appreciation he had hoped for. (The producers of the programme may have decided to keep it for the humour content or was it intended all along? Hard to tell.)

So it is clear that there can be instances when in spite of pain there is no gain.

Good Luck

Good Luck

They say mediocrity has no price. Is it really true? Haven’t we seen umpteen examples of toppers slogging in mediocre jobs and the average students doing well for themselves: earning well and living life king size?

In Sociology we read about the division of society into three major classes – upper class, middle class and lower class. Mobility from one class to another happens all the time. Now if hard work alone was the key to success, all those in the lower class who work hard for long hours should not be where they are. 

I believe the class we are born into and the class we live in and die in are all a result of a combination of factors including our karma, hard work and, to some extent, luck. All this has made me a great believer in destiny. Our efforts will pay off  only when it is the right time for that particular achievement. Upward mobility is always welcome and downward mobility is a curse. So I think that in addition to working diligently and praying for prosperity, we need to hope for Good Luck. That is what I would like to wish for all you lovely friends. We need good luck throughout the journey called Life. So good luck for finding Good Luck. 

Small kids at home?

Small kids at home?

If you have some little imps at home running around  and spoiling your  furniture or the walls of your house, here are some tips that might prove to be helpful:

1. Walls:

• To clean dirt-stained walls without having to get a coat of paint on them, keep a box of coloured chalks handy.
•  Select a shade that is closest to the shade of paint on your wall. For all light shades, white chalk also works equally well.
• Rub with the chalk as you would with an eraser.
•  Take a clean piece of cloth or some cotton and dust off the extra chalk.
•  Pencil marks can first be rubbed with a clean eraser and then the same chalk dust treatment can be resorted to.

2.  Wooden furniture:

·       If the sunmica/formica has chipped off from some parts and the wood underneath is peeping out, find a marker pen closest in shade to the sunmica/formica and colour the wooden part with it.

·       Find some interesting stickers that go well with the decor of the room and cover the broken part with the stickers. Put some stickers on matching but unbroken parts too in order to maintain the symmetry and the look.

Who ties rakhi to whom?

Who ties rakhi to whom?

Now that Raksha bandhan is around the corner I was thinking we should reconsider who ties rakhi to whom? Instead of the present arrangement, I feel, children and the old and the diseased people should tie rakhis to all the able-bodied people who do not belong to that category. Also, all of us should tie rakhis to the people in the security forces for protecting us throughout the year . That would make the promise of ‘raksha’ more genuine and also enable people of all religions to take part, making it more like a national festival.

“Forward This” Can End Friendships

 

“Forward This” Can End Friendships

I know the mobile has brought a revolution in our lives and when I say that it has also done a disservice, the supporters of the gadget (of which there are many) will not agree with me. In no way do I want to underwrite its merits – I myself use it all the time – but the fact remains that I have had the misfortune of losing contact with some friends, thanks to this indispensable, constant companion.
The messaging option is a great way of communicating. When we call a person and that person decides that it is his or her gossip-away day, we’ve had it. Heaven forbid if it is some important talkative relative on the other side whom you cannot politely say that you will call up later. At such times even the text matter of two  or three messages is much cheaper and more convenient.
There are other times too when an sms can be quite a saviour. Had a fight with your spouse and don’t want to be the first one to say sorry? Just message across some mundane stuff and the patch-up has occurred. Don’t want to call up someone to inform about a programme you have made and are quite convinced that the other person is not going to approve of? Sms and your job is done .
Even with a limited friends’ circle, I was living a life of contentment when I started getting forwarded messages which invoked the blessings of some god/goddess and asked me to forward them to seven or nine people, otherwise something inauspicious would happen. If I did forward those messages, Lady Luck would favour me. I am quite a religious person, superstitious too at times, but I refuse to fall for this ploy, knowing it to be another brainchild of the telephone companies. In the beginning I understood the problem of my friends who forwarded such messages to me and sent up a short prayer before deleting them without complying with the demand. But there came a time when I found that the only time some friends of mine took the initiative to contact me was when they were in a dilemma about  meeting the numbers for such messages.
Post 3-4 such messages, I somehow distanced myself from these friends and began maintaining a dignified silence. I guess the message was conveyed because those smses stopped, but then so did all other forms of communication. Now I find that my limited circle of friends has shrunk further and it is all thanks to those forwarded messages – the bearers of good tidings for some (by raking in the moolah) but definitely not for me. Come to think of it, something inauspicious did happen, did it not? I lost some friends. So should I be advocating that all those who receive these messages should diligently sit and forward them to as many people as the smses ask them to? What do you think? 
 

Why do Indians feel that other Indians are stupid?

Why do Indians feel that other  Indians are stupid?

Just now  I got a message on my cellphone from the service provider which reads:

“Recharge with Rs. 44 and get 500 local/std SMS free for 60 days.” 

We get such messages regularly.

How is it free? You are offering it to us at a reduced rate because we are paying Rs. 44 for it. You did not just wake up one morning feeling extra magnanimous and decide to give us all 500 SMSes without charging us anything. Now let us consider the fact that after taking this offer we send only 20 SMSes. We end up paying more than two rupees for each. If we manage to send around even 100, chances are we are doing it unnecessarily, boring people to death with unwanted reading material.

On the other hand, makers of Hindi serials really think we are the biggest  fools ever. Why else would they fill each episode with flashbacks and time-wasting  techniques such as taking the camera from one heavily made up face to another accompanied by a loud ‘chunn’ ‘chunn’ sound after every other dialogue? Not only serials but our reality shows are no better. I used to watch them quite regularly but not any longer. They just seem to be scripted, with both judges and participants play-acting away to glory.

Programmes such as Masterchef have to be produced according to a fixed  format set by the original producers of the show that have the copyright. But what a difference between the Australian one and its desi counterpart! Ours is replete with family drama. The local producers feel that more than the cookery content we are interested in sob stories or romantic link ups. Sorry, we are not. So you have lost some TRPs because we shun your pathetic drama and have moved on to other better stuff.

Photomatter

Photomatter

Nowadays, most of our photographs are on our gadgets - cellphones, laptops, the works. We are at liberty to do what we like with them, the options being more than we had with our good old photos printed on hard paper which adorned our albums. Few years back I decided to do something more with my good old photos rather than seeing/showing them occasionally.

One day I sat with the numerous photos I had lying in various parts of my room as well as our house. They were there in drawers, in folders, in albums that were shoved in polybags and stored in some almirah of the house. I tried to think how often do I even sit and spend time looking at them and the response was may be once a year. So I decided to make a huge collage with some of them, get it mounted from the studio and place it above the television in my room where I can see it as often as I please.

The choice of photos did not pose too big a challenge because I decided to take for this collage one photo of each close relative of my family, quite like a family tree. Beginning with my grandparents, I came down to my aunts and uncles and then to my siblings and my cousins. Photos taken at weddings were quite helpful as I realised that I had just one each of some of the people I had chosen. Even though half of the people in that collage have left for their heavenly abode, they still live in my room fondly remembered and cherished. Instead of once a year I meet them several times a day.

Next, when one of my nieces was getting married, I decided to make a card for her using some of the photographs. I took a sheet of white chart paper and prepared a big card. On the outside page I wrote “To” and pasted photos of my aunt and uncle (that niece’s grandparents), my cousin and his wife (the parents) and of the niece and her brother. On the inside page, I wrote “From” and pasted photos of my immediate family. They loved the card. Specially because most of the photos had been taken at my daughter’s wedding and they were seeing them for the first time. After that I have made few other similar cards for different families for occasions like Xmas, engagement etc. In fact, the engagement card was more like “know your in-laws” one in which the relationship of the new entrant in the family with each person in the photographs was mentioned, like your would-be sis-in-law.........

These are some of the things I have been doing in my free time and I consider them as a huge bonus in the time frame called Life.

frequency

Hi friends,

Thank you for your wonderful response. With the start of yet another week you must be immersed in your day-to-day activities by now. I wish you a happy week ahead. I plan to share with you my thoughts in the form of posts twice a week - once around Wednesday and once during the weekend. However, your responses are welcome throughout the week. Please stay in touch.

Regards,

Pramila

Hi Friends, just getting started

Hi Friends,

Through this blog I would like to share with you  my views, ways of doing things, recipes etc. I have chosen this name for the blog because in all probability you will find that it is not what is generally accepted or what is commonly done. I invite your feedback and active participation so that we can interact and generally get to know each other better.

My first post is about repeating prayers.

I believe the best prayer is the one which comes straight from the heart and is not a part of the rituals of the religion we follow. But how often are we able to connect with the supreme being in that way? I do not see that happening in my case even though it would be wonderful to be able to converse with the supreme being as we do with our friends and family members. So what do we do? We pray to a particular God or Goddess by reciting the standard text be it a shloka or arati or any other form of prayer.

I am a devotee of Ma Vaishnodevi. In the morning after my bath I light the diya, sing the Ganesha arati, Vaishno chalisa and recite some mantras. Before ending I do have that heart-to-heart but that generally comprises of standard phrases. What I try to do differently is that I try to replace certain words with what I consider to be more appropriate ones. Eg. Almost all our aratis end with "............ki arati jo koyi nar gayey........" I prefer "jo koyi nit gayey". Similarly, in Ma Kali's arati "Ambe tu hai jagadambe kali.............." the last stanza is: Nahin maangte dhann aur daulat na chandi na sona, hum toa maangay ma tere mann ka ek chotasa kona......" My version is: "Hum toa maangein dhann aur daulat aur chandi aur sona, aur hum maangay ma tere mann ka ek barha sa kona".

Am I wrong in doing this? Please do share your views.

Pramila