How Things Go Phbbt! Memoirs of Day 1 of Project

6.30 a.m: Wake up all excited at the prospect of the first day of project: reading done? Check! Notes ready for reference during the interview? Check! New stationery to take notes (copius) during the interview? Check! Smartly dressed for office? Check!

7.00 a.m: Bathed scrubbed to a shine and ready to leave in full office formals, feeling very professional!

8.00 a.m: Got a good seat in the train (after elbowing and being elbowed)...feel good about myself! Head chant keeps repeating itself: Thou shalt be confident! Thou shalt be polite but firm during interviews! Thou shalt finish at least 5 interviews today!

11:00 a.m: Reach office...greet everyone with a big smile, be allocated a desk and set it up for yourself all professionally and very neatly (controlling the instinctive urge to have everything on desk at one go so that you can have everything you want within hand's reach.

11:15 a.m: Start going over your notes....with a cup of chai...

12:00 noon: First call! Here goes! Put a smile on your face so that it reflects in your voice....

12:01 p.m.; Trin Trin..Hello? Mr XYZ This is Disha from the HR team...you must have received a call about the project we are doing....?

Voice on phone: "Sorry Ma'am no call!"

12:02p.m.: Ask colleague for help in checking....

12:03 p.m. All potential regions of South and North not informed!

12:10: Try West..they're informed!

12:11: Nope not informed!


12:15: One informed to be called....

12:17: "Ma'am please call after 3.30 p.m
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Nothing significant happening really!

3.35 p.m: First interview.

4.15 p.m: Leave office: no other scheduled

Target: 5 interviews

Completed: 1!!! :-0!!!!

All About Food

Dear All,

It gives me great pleasure to announce that I have (finally!) started my own food blog. The first post is about the first meal of the day.... Breakfast Times.

Hope you will join me there soon!

Disha

Toasts

No! This post isn't about bread....I sitll haven't lost my mind enough to write about that.....! I mean really: how many variations can there be to that toast? Really??!! This post is about the anticipation of that "heady" feeling; the small celebration of things that is before a drink.

I love raising toasts! There is definitely something to be said about the summing up of the reasons of celebration (be it birthdays or weddings or simply the end of a long Monday!) in a few words and dedicating that drink to it.

My father, a solitary drinker on most family social occassions, would tell us this story almost every time he raised a toast about why toasts are raised (or in his words why "cheers!" is said) before a drink. You see, a drink has something for all the senses: colour for the eyes, taste for the tongue, smell for the nose and the coolness for skin, but it doesn't have anything to give to the ears, and hence toasts are raised to make up for that particular lack.

Some of my favourite toasts? My fathers "cheers!" before his annual beer bottle (yeah my mom used to allow him like only once a  year), the one raised to fresh lime soda on my ex's best friend's birthday, the one raised on the night of my first beer, the one when me and CD went out for our first drink together, the one raised on and to my first cocktail and of course our perennial toast to our "San/Sun"/ All these toasts hold great memories for me!

So ladies and gentlemen, please raise your glasses to the "cheers" that create great memories...to toasts!

Malgudi Times

Nostalgia thy trigger is simplicity! Ah how simple times were when we were younger. Of the shopping expeditions I have been on off late.... they have included books too! See now I realised I used to hate shopping till I realised shopping can be for books too! Bazinga! Yay to that!

This blog is dedicated to some of my all time favourite books which I bought more of this time: to R.K. Narayan and his town of Malgudi. I managed to lay my hands on a few of the episodes of Malgudi Days (remember tana na na na na na na?) and that in turn triggered off a shopping binge of R K Narayan books....so I bought Swami and His Friends, The Bachelor of Arts, Malgudi Days and the Financial Expert....ah! Some of his other books that I have savoured are the Guide (trust me the movie doesn't even come close to doing any justice to it!) and Salt and Sawdust (this one though not one of  the more popular ones is a must read!)

What strikes me the most about his books is how he managed to create an entire town with its own geography, customs, quirky characters. Malgudi is just like another town we would find in South India and yet it has its own unique flavour! Another thing about his books is the Narayan style of humour....its quite subtle and very unique and hard to emulate....many havee tried and failed because there can only be one original, isn't it?!

So a toast to R.K. Narayan, his Malgudi, its characters and to warm childhood and adolescent evenings spent curled up to good books!

Some Craft: Bookmarks

I love trying my hand at making new stuff...especially stuff from old non-beautiful stuff....so here s a new idea I had. I have some old visiting cards:

 

 I took a couple of them and stuck them together, the printed side facing each other; and used felt tip pens to decorate them... and voila!

Small bookmarks; individualised for my two best friends...they'll kill me on seeing them here before in their mailboxes...but I'll take the risk!! :-)

A lot of variations can also be used for the design by adding drawings, collage works out of old newspapers and magazine papers.....any further ideas? Drop a comment..would appreciate it!

Random Thoughts

You know what I like about boring lectures? Your mind is not under any obligation to stay in the class (wish it were the same about your physical presence....however....) so you can take your flights of fantasy and jot down some random thoughts (if you are someone like me.....)

Chick lits of today are modern day fairy tales written by cynics who don't believe in romance and are neither waiting for their prince charming but definitely want to and actually do believe in happy "endings"....

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It is ok to take certain unimportant decisions to please others like wearing a dress you don't particularly like for a loved one whose special evening it may be.....but it is ABSOLUTELY NON NEGOTIABLE to to make the important decisions of your life like whom to love and marry to please or appease someone else.... ABSOLUTELY NON NEGOTIABLE!

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As I grow older and need to be "responsible" I have noticed a increasing gap between the the things I would LOVE to be my priority....such as reading, writing, blogging, drawing etc....and the things I SHOULD make my priority.... tests, assignments, stupid presentations! What brought on this rant? A blog that wasn't updated in over a month! A short story haunting me for the past one week and no time to write it in peace! Arghhhh!!!!

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With the explosion of the number of ex IIT-ians and ex- IIM-ians leaving lucrative jobs and getting into full time writing...one thing is for sure.... students in our country are getting into the wrong streams...getting into somethings they definitely don't want to do..or believe they want to thanks to what is being said around them..till they discover otherwise...but well at least somewhere they do realise what they really want and have the guts to go for it! So kudos to that!

And Je is Back!

Well this post is just going to be an updation rant since I last blogged! A few key things happened this weekend which were great!

Firstly  I had my first experience of shopping online and that too for books! I got myself a great deal! On great books! Thanks to flipkart.com. And I ordered all my favourite reads from some time back: R.K. Narayan! yaay! Great fun! Also got the first delivery today! Felt all nice and important and all...considering for some its such a mundane thing but well it was a new experience for me! :-)

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I splurged like crazy on books this weekend! I did not even think twice before putting books into my shopping bag! It was therapeutic! I hated shopping till I realised books are also something I can shop for! Hahaha! Late but happy realisation.....

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I read Nirupama Subramanian's Keep the Change. Its a typical chick lit with the simple girl moving to a big city with a new job and her experiences with falling for a typical "bad guy" and then the  friendship with the good guy turning to something more....what I liked about the book was her writing style. She manages to bring about something fresh to the genre! A good read if you are into chick lit!

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Je got myself this lovely journal by Paper theatre...its made of recycled papers, sturdily hand bound with a cover so beautiful that its perfect to capture my thoughts (which are strictly non-class related) and daydreams (strictly class duration related!!!). The size is also perfect enough to carry around in my bag and hide away if the professor catches me writing! It also took me hours to decide on one journal to buy as there were so many I wanted to buy but i had to restrict myself! These beautiful journals are available at Crossword stores across Mumbai and are worth checking out! Alternatively you can check out their collection online at: http://www.papertheatre.com.

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Also a quick mention of me having joined indiblogger.com and a quick hi to the two new bloggers: soulcare and Vijaykrishna who have joined me on the blogosphere!