2011.

I was buying some flowers when I saw this little girl sitting on the sand. She was no more than 3 years old. Her mother was inside, mixing the cement for construction work. The little girl was sitting on a huge pile of sand next to a dog. The girl had the dog’s face in her hand and she was talking to it. Although the words were quite incomprehensible, the dog had its eyes focused on the girl as though listening to her in rapt attention. Quite a double irony actually! The little girl then took some sand from the pile and started putting it on the dog’s face. The dog closed its eyes slowly and I swear I saw a trace of smile on its face! It stayed there silently while the girl put the sand on its face like a face pack. Then the girl’s mother called out to her. She quickly got up and left. The dog stayed there for 2 seconds, opened its eyes and shook itself all over. All the sand fell off and it trotted behind the girl faithfully.


A big flashy car suddenly stopped at the crossroad. I screeched to halt behind it. I’m not the kind of person who honks at cars or cows. I just cursed under my breath and took a dangerous swerve to avoid a collision. An old man was standing there, outside his house, observing my reactions. As I sped off, his eyes met mine, and he raised his hand and mouthed “Calm down, Calm down”. I instantly slowed down with a smile on my face and rode away.

My aunt had a Prepaid Mobile connection whose call rates were 1Re/min. She talks a lot on the phone. Her mobile Bills, needless to say, were quite high. Her husband was not very happy with this. When I went to visit her, she complained to me about this. I told her that she could switch the Call rates Plan to something cheaper. Being a little ignorant to the tech-world, she asked me if that would change her number. I told her that the number would remain the same, only the call rates would go down. She confirmed this with me 6 times, by asking the same question in 6 different ways. “Will the phone number change? Will my friends need to call on another new number? Will I have to give all my friends another number? … ” After about 20 minutes of Q&A, we walked down to the Mobile shop and got the plan changed. The first thing she did after we got home was make a nice big hot cup of tea for me. Then she sat next to me and peeled an orange. She said, “Thank you. I can now talk longer with my friends and my husband needn't worry”. Her husband grimaced behind her but she smiled and started peeling another orange for me.


Small instances like these make you feel so positive and happy. It needn’t always be alcohol.
After one dormant blog year, it’s a post.
Happy new year.

....tick....tick....tick....

The clock doesn't stop. It ticks on. Another eventful year passes by. 2009, for me, started on the wrong note, but ended on an excellent one. I thank the following entities for making my 2009 rock!
(I'll be generic here :) )
1. God. The real meaning of multitasking - God knows! Pun intended. :)
2. My family. For all the love and care.
3. My friends. For being there. Love them, hate them, can't live without them.
4. My colleagues. For all the support and learning opportunities.
5. My vehicle. For taking me places.
6. My mobile phone. For helping me create contacts.
7. My wallet. For...well. Self explanatory. :)
8. My computer. For making MY world a global world.
9. My comb. For making me look right.
10. My jacket. For keeping the coldness away.

The list goes on. I stopped at 10 for 2010. :) Sorry to other important or mundane things I left out of the list.

Have an excellent year people. Love your pets. Be good. And slap yourself if you use excess plastic.
Cheers!

le or la?

French gender is a constant headache for many students of French. Why is manteau masculine and montre feminine, when both men and women wear both of them? Le is for masculine nouns and la is for feminine nouns.
Why is it la beard? La beard is usually on le boys. Usually. It doesn't make sense that the beard gets a female gender.
Why is it le baby? If someone is having a baby, how do we know its already le and not la? Unless of course, you get an ultrasound and get to know beforehand.
Why is it le vegetables? Why are vegetables masculine? A bitter gourd definitely doesn't look male to me. Heck, none of the vegetables look masculine to me. They're just vegetables.

Here's a question: What would "the blog" be? Google Translator says its le blog. Well. I would like to call my blog la blog. Thank you very much. Call me feminist. Whatever.

Imagine if english had genders for non-living things as well...
I went to the market today. He was very crowded. I had to buy some vegetables. I bought some carrots, to try a new dish with her in it. He came out very well. After dinner, we sat and watched TV. She had become very old. We needed to get her exchanged in the market. But since he was crowded, we decided we'll keep her anyway. Tomorrow is a brand new day. I hope he will be good. He who? He, the day!

PS. I found the Gender Genie. Check it out. Its fun.