Christmas!

I know, it has been ages since I last posted. No, I'm not dead, in case anyone was wondering or pretending to care. I've just not been in the mood for blogging lately. Its not like I've been overly busy with work or something of that sort. To tell you the truth, I've been doing everything but work these days. My days generally consist of endless procrastination, heavy lecture skipping, talking to TPF on the phone, going out with TPF when I'm not on the phone and attending various social events.

Yes, I did say those magical words, social events. It is after all the time of the year where Pan actually goes out for social events and does not shut herself up in her bedroom, listening to alternative music.

I have always viewed Christmas season with a mixed feeling. It is one of the few religious holidays that I'm not totally indifferent to. I, for some strange reason actually care about Christmas (I blame this completely on my convent school upbringing). However much of a clichè this might sound, Christmas season makes me cheerful; the lights, the decorations, the irritating repetitive songs, the silly red hats (especially the ones with stars that light up) make me happy.

The best part of Christmas is Christmas carols. Anyone who knows me can confirm this. I love Christmas carols. I make it a point to sing them randomly all through the year. I also happen to be one of those creepy people who know the lyrics of the second and the third verses of 'Joy to the World' and 'Silent Night'. I can never make up my mind on my favourite one though. It changes from year to year. Presently, I'm stuck somewhere between 'The First Noel' and 'White Christmas'. The only problem about Christmas carols is that ahem, I don't sing very well. Sometimes I feel sorry for the people I hang out with. They must really love me if they can bear my rendition of 'Silver Bells' or 'Winter Wonderland' and still speak to me after that.

Another great thing about Christmas is Boxing Day. The thought of Boxing Day shopping is already making me smile.

I suppose, the whole deal with singing about reindeer and Christmas trees is all very silly considering the point of Christmas is to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ (who might or might not have been born on the 25th of December). But nobody cares about these unimportant details, do they? This point always seems to get overlooked for some strange reason.

But Christmas season isn't always full of joy and happiness. No, Christmas has a dark side that also needs to be explored. It involves Christmas presents. There, I've gone and said those evil words. Every single year, I have to spend time, energy and money on buying Christmas presents to a whole load of people that I don't care much about. I'm not even Christian, so I'm not quite sure why I'm buying these presents, but that is how it is! Christmas presents are really stressful. They involve a whole load of strategic planning. Its not just the money that is the problem, every year I keep running out of creative ideas on what to buy for people. I cant get someone a scarf because I gave them a scarf last year. I cant give someone a pair of gloves because that is what they gave me last year and thus, the problem continues.

Christmas in Milan is no different from Christmas anywhere else, although it involves a whole load of pandoro and panettone. The problem with both, panettone and pandoro is making up your mind, which one you prefer, and this decision is not half as easy as it sounds. Its almost like Sophie's Choice actually (by the way, has anyone apart from me actually read that book? No, having watched the movie does not count!).

Audrey!

To say that I love Audrey Hepburn would be an understatement. It is actually surprising that I've never mentioned her on my blog before. I know that a lot of people think that she is over rated, and I suppose they might be right, but I fall into that mainstream category of people who believe that she was the most beautiful person they have ever laid their eyes upon. My current Audrey Hepburn merchandise includes:

1. A large Breakfast at Tiffany's Poster.
2. A small poster from Charade.
3. A small poster from War and Peace.
4. A small screen shot photograph.
5. A hand bag with a screen shot photos on both sides.
6. An Audrey card that TPF gave me last Christmas
7. A bookmark with a Breakfast at Tiffany's picture.
   
8. A big, door poster that I'm not supposed to know about because it's my Christmas present this year from TPF

This list will probably go on as time passes because I don't see myself getting over her any time soon. I know it is very superficial to like somebody because they are pretty, but however cruel this sounds, looks are quite important. Why do you think people worship Becks? No, it's going nothing to do with football. Its just that people can recognize a fine piece of ahem, booty when they see it. I'm not trying to say that Audrey has a fine piece of ahem, booty here. In fact, people hardly think about any of her other assets because they are so enamoured by her pretty face.

She almost makes acting a dignified profession. You can't imagine Audrey Hepburn baring it all on screen because the role demanded it or even participating in a sex scene in any of her movies, can you? She is a dignified person who wouldn't stoop to that level, even if the role demands it. People can see that she is beautiful woman, even without her showing any skin at all, and that is a rare quality in a person.

The first Audrey Hepburn movie I watched was My Fair Lady. I was quite young when I first saw it. It was a great movie and I loved it. I could never quite figure out the end actually, but I thought that it was a wonderful movie in any case (and Audrey totally deserved that Oscar that went to Julie Andrews for Mary Poppins that year!). I've actually not even watched too many Audrey movies. I've just watched My Fair Lady, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Charade, Wait Until Dark, Roman Holiday, Sabrina, War and Peace and Funny Face. Actually I was re-watching Sabrina on television the other day and it struck me that she wasn't just beautiful, anyone can do beautiful. She is charming and elegant and stands out, and this is what makes her different from all other Hollywood actresses.

I didn't particularly like Breakfast at Tiffany's actually (because I read the book a week before I watched the film and the end of the film is completely different from how the book ends), but I thought Audrey made a delightful Holly Golightly. I thought that Wait Until Dark was a brilliant, but it scared me. I can't take thrillers, its just too much suspense and I get frightened quite easily. My personal favourite is Funny Face, because you get to see Audry Hepburn dancing with Fred Astaire in Paris. What more can one want in life from a movie?



As a short footnote, I would like to apologise for the infrequent blog updates. I've been really busy with real life lately. Its driving me mad. Sigh!

God save the Queen!

I'm back! Ok, I've been back since Monday actually, but I haven’t had time to do absolutely anything. Once would think that they would give you some leave once you finish your mid-term exams, but nothing of that sort seems to be happening. It's just work, work and more work for me. I don’t think I like Uni anymore.

Well, the trip was great. England, according to me would be the most beautiful country in the world if it was less colder or if it rained less there or if it didn't get dark there at 4 in the evening or if it was not full of drunk British people. But what would the world be without British people, really? British people are so absolutely strange that you can't help but be fond of them.

I love being in England. People there actually speak in English! This means that I don’t have to actually try to eavesdrop on people. It just comes naturally. Even rude airport staff in England speak English! You have no idea how great it feels to have people talking in English around you. It’s not that I don’t speak Italian, it’s just that I’d much rather speak in English than in Italian because lets face it, my Italian is not very good.

I remember when I very young my mum had gone to London for work once. When she got back I asked her all about it. Since I was too young to understand anything much about tourist-London, my mum described England in the best possible way that one could to a child. She told me that in England, you could press buttons and get Dairy Milk from machines. Ever since that moment I’ve always been fascinated by the concept of vending machines (you see, we don’t have vending machines in India). I love England because it’s full of vending machines. I pretend not to, but I still get a minor thrill every time I put in some coins, press buttons and get things.

From this trip I have learnt some new things about the U.K and English people that I didn’t know before:

1) People from Aberdeen are supposed to shag sheep. I still haven’t quite figured out why sheep and not cows, but I’m working on it.

2) Pastries are not sweet in England. The can also be salty, like stuffed croissants.

3) Crisps and chips do not mean the same thing. Crisps actually mean chips in the normal world and chips in England are French fries in the normal world.

4) Sainsbury makes the best chocolate chip cookies in the world. Nothing can beat those cookies.

5) ‘Chavs’ are bad, bad people, and you don’t want to be considered one of them.

6) People have to actually show their IDs there to buy alcohol. (This is so not the case in Italy)

7) People actually use the words ‘blimey’ and ‘cheers’ as a part of their normal vocabulary.

8) Scottish people have their own currency, which could possibly be labelled as one of the most useless currencies in the whole world.

9) British people are very fond of potatoes. I’m not sure where this obsession comes from, but it’s definitely there.

10) However funny this sounds, people in England still drink to the Queen.

And one more because I love prime numbers so much.

11) What is the deal with dinner at 6 in the evening? And why for the sake of God do people refer to it as supper or tea?

I'm getting very fond of lists these days. I should stop doing these.

Having said all this, I have to admit that I’m very fond of British people. After all, they all have sexy, unintelligible British accents and have the best tabloids in the world.

Cheers!

And she's back...

After long night of sleeplessness and dreadful days that didn't seem to get any shorter, I'm back! Have I mentioned somewhere on this blog that I hate exams? Well, I've never met anyone who actually likes exams in my entire life (unless it's TPF who says that she had a lot of fun doing the SATs), but I happen to dislike them more than most people.

Ha, at least I've finished my midterms now. I have more exams in the first week of January that I'm not even going to bother thinking about at this moment because I suspect that I'll start worrying if I do think about them. I know, I can never be happy, can I? I keep worrying about everything!

Hmm, this blog post doesn't have a point if you're wondering why I'm not getting to it. I don't have any news, and I haven't even been following world news for me to discuss what is happening in the world. Actually, I do have some little things here and there that have been happening. So let me write a small list of the things that have been going on lately:

1. I fainted. It sounds rather funny when I write it down, but it did happen last week. I'm not sure why it happened or how. It was at about 5.30 in the morning. The alarm rang wasn't supposed to ring until 6. I should have known something was wrong, since I had actually woken up before it rang. So, as soon as I woke up and got out of bed, I started shivering. I went to brush my teeth and started feeling rather ill. Then, I started sweating and feeling very hot. I finished brushing my teeth and started walking towards my room to go back into bed because I was feeling rather ill. On my way back, I lost consciousness for a few seconds and found myself on the floor. After an another hour, I started feeling completely normal and nothing has happened ever since.
2. I had a terrible sore throat and cold all through my exams courtesy TPF, who passed it onto me the weekend that she were here. It just couldn't have been worse, could it? I've never felt this ill all through exams ever before.
3. If I cough once more, I might consider strangling myself because it is seriously getting on my nerves.
4. I have a Facebook account. I feel strangely exposed. It even has photographs of myself. I'm paranoid about putting my pictures up on the internet. Facebook is repulsive to me and therefore that makes it extremely addictive at the same time. I considered linking up blog up there for 10 whole seconds and gave that idea up. I don't think I am comfortable with a whole load of people who I know in real life reading my blog. (Also, if they started regularly frequenting my blog, this would mean that I couldn't bitch about them any more.)
5. My Facebook account lists me married to TPF. It feels great to be married!
6. My beloved ipod has officially stopped working. You can't even switch it on any more. I miss it. I'm going to buy one of those cool, new 8GB Nanos some time next month, but I would much rather prefer my old second generation, bulky, scratched ipod. My mother thinks that I'm the most sentimental person she knows, but I can't help being sentimental about inanimate objects.
7. The love of my life, Julia has also ceased to function. She refuses to start up anymore. It's making me miserable. I hate living without her. I'll have to contact the support people after I get back from England. *sigh*
8. I'm leaving for England tomorrow. YAY! I still have to pack though, and am not sure when exactly am I going to find the time to do so because I have to go out tonight and I have lessons at uni early tomorrow morning. On a second thought, maybe I should be doing that now instead of updating my blog.
9. Have I mentioned somewhere in here how ill I am? I'm really ill. I've been following the sit-com routine lately.
10. I have dark circles. There was a time once when I was actually proud of them because they made me look mature and old. Now I just look old and ghastly.

And one more because I lurrrrve prime numbers

11. I've become stalkerish in the last few weeks. I'm such horrible person because I don't even feel guilty of my clandestine activities. I keep looking up random people on Google and Facebook searches. You'll be amazed about the kind you stuff you find out about people on the Internet.

That is all from me for now. I promise to be more interesting for my next post. I'll be back from England by then, and I'll have loads to write.

Mid-Terms *sigh*

This is an unfortunate post to let my imaginary following know that I shall be away from the blogosphere for the next few weeks on a mini-break. I have my very first university mid-term exams starting from next week. Whoever said that uni was about debauched, decadent alcohol ridden parties was so very wrong. I haven't partied properly since high school ended now. It's not that I actually enjoy partying, but it's the lack of opportunity that I find frustrating.

But on the other hand, I have some good news too. TPF is going to be back home for the weekend. It's the first time I'm going to see her in a month. Okay, I know she's not been away for that long, but you know how we both are. Although, she couldn't have chosen a worse time to come to visit. Something tells me that I'm not going to get any studying done this weekend.

I cant wait for my exams to get over because once those are done, I'm going to be in England in the second week of Novmber. I'll just be there for 3 days though. I'm visiting TPF for a long weekend of fun, fun and more fun. WHEE! Okay, I'll stop. I'm just excited.

Right, back to studies now :)

Diwali!

Happy Diwali everyone!

Diwali is the most depressing day of the year in Italy. Also, if having a depressing Diwali in a European country wasn't enough, it had to rain all day and be dark and cloudy. However, it could be worse, right? I mean, at least this year Diwali has fallen on a weekend, and so we have some semblance of a holiday. For the last three years, I've been going to school and pretending that it's just another day.

*sigh*

Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain

After much deliberation I have finally decided to write my first review. I’m always cautious about reviewing because I’m a very biased reviewer, as in I only like reviewing the things I like. Also, I don’t like reviewing the things I don’t like because someone has worked very hard to make a film or write a book and I feel guilty making flippant remarks about someone else’s hard work (unless it’s Dan Brown, of course. I mean, his name is DAN, why would people even consider reading something written by a man whose parents weren’t imaginative enough to give him a name that is no longer than three letters?)

But as usual I digress, the subject of this review is going to be the movie Amélie or Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain, as it is called in French. Don’t worry, there are not going to be any spoilers in this post, just some silly gushing that might give some of you an insight into female sentimentality. The movie is made in such a way that you either dislike it because you think that it is plot-less and well, a waste of time or you love it. I, unlike my unsentimental father, fall into this latter category.

I’m not sure what is it about this movie that makes it so different from all the other movies that I’ve ever seen; maybe it is the way in which the movie is filmed, maybe it is the soundtrack of the movie or maybe it is Amélie herself that I can identify with because she reminds me so much of myself. The first thing I wanted to do when I finished watching the movie the first time was re-start and watch it all over again

I’m not very sure how one could possibly label Amélie into a particular genre. I’m not sure whether it would be appropriate to call it a comedy. It doesn’t make you laugh out loud, just subtly smile and maybe even have a good cry. This tale of an innocent, lonely, naïve girl living in Paris charms everyone’s hearts. At the end of the movie, you can’t help but fall completely in love with this delightful character.

The movie has a brilliant cast. Audrey Tautou as Amélie is wonderful and I cant think of any other actress who could have played a convincing Amélie. The only danger for roles like these is that it might make an actor typecast for a certain set of roles. Also, just after seeing Amélie, I also watched Un Long Dimanche de Fiançailles (A Very Long Engagement) which is also directed by Jean Pierre Jeunet and stars Audrey Tautou in a very Amélie-like character. Even though that movie was great, I was kind of let down because of Tautou’s stereotypical character. Of course, I then watched The Da Vinci Code, which TPF has written about in a fabulous review that describes all my sentiments for that movie. Mathieu Kassovitz, on the other hand, is absolutely adorable. I am completely in love with him. I remember squealing and gripping TPF’s hand hard in the cinema hall when I realized that he was in Munich.

The movie has a wonderful soundtrack by Yann Tiersen. I’ve never loved the whole soundtrack of a particular movie before. But every track in Amélie is heart warming and it is impossible for a person to be indifferent the music in this movie because music plays such a pivotal role in this film. You just have to feel something when you listen to it, and I’m not saying this because I’m an angsting alternative-music listening teenager, but because I really do mean it.

Another strange thing is that though I’ve seen Amélie several times now, I’ve always seen it in Italian. Since Italian is not my first language, I don’t focus much on a movie when I’m watching it in Italian, but end up just keep trying to figure out the plot. It is rather rare for me to actually feel any emotion to what is happening on screen because I’m so caught up in the plot. Also, since it was a French movie translated into Italian rather than an English movie translated into Italian, it was much harder for me to understand it, at least the first time I watched it. I wonder how the English translation is. I am rather curious. I shall watch it in English eventually if I manage to find someone who owns the DVD in English.

Having said all this I have to admit that this is not a movie for plot oriented people, but for people who like focusing on the cinematography and the actual filming of movies. It is also meant for sentimental teenage girls who are looking for the smallest possible excuse to shed copious tears.

As a side note, I have a humongous Amélie poster in my room bought by TPF from Istanbul.

Another one of these meme thingies

TPF tagged me for a meme ages ago. I love memes because this means that I don't need to think of something relatively intelligent to blog about. This does not necessarily mean that most of my posts are intelligent, but still I don't need to worry about finding a topic to blog about.

This meme is part of her 'meme experiment'. I have to post the 10 most played songs on my itunes counter. This means that, however weird my results maybe, I have to do this meme because I don't want to get on TPF's bad side. Actually, the results of this meme are going to be completely incorrect because even though I've had itunes for about two years now, I recently changed computers from Quincy to Julia, all my old play counts were deleted and I basically restarted the whole list. Therefore, right now, the most played music on my counter happens to be my recently added music.

1. Dhadak Dhadak from the movie, Bunty aur Babli. I went through a whole period a few months ago that I was obsessively addicted to this song and used to listen to it more than once a day. Right now, that phase of mine has passed and I no longer listen to it with the same frequency that I used to. But, it's a great song and rather catchy.

2. Tainted Love, by Soft Cell. I heard this song for the first time when I was in the Supermarket with TPF (don't ask me what were we doing together in a supermarket, it's a long story). Marilyn Manson has re-sung this song and it's electric guitar version is quite popular. But I downloaded the original version of the song by Soft Cell just a few weeks ago. It's a great song and I listen to it at least once a day on my way to and fro from uni.

3. Sexy Back, by Justin Timberlake. Oh Justin, Marry me! *sigh* Sorry, that was the teenage fangirl in me talking. I wasn't a very big Justin Timberlake fan for a long time. (Please feel free make fun of TPF, a few years ago she went to a Justin Timberlake concert). But this song is the epitome of good pop. It's so catchy and had a great video with Justin looking overly sexy. Britney must now feel like an idiot for leaving him to marry that sleeze bag of hers You show her who's the cooler one, Justin!

4. Supermassive Black Hole, by Muse. It's from their latest album. I'm not much of a Muse fan, but I love this song. It's great, but I'm not a big fan of it's video. It's creepy because it has the band playing in masks, and I've been terrified of masks ever since I was a child. It's just one of those little things that I really don't like.

5. Every You and Every Me, by Placebo. TPF called me mainstream when I told her that this was my favourite Placebo song. Well, I cant help it if I'm mainstream. I mean, it's mainstream because it's their best song, isn't it? Things are always mainstream for a reason. So there, that is my excuse for liking the most popular Placebo song.

6. Bohemian Like You, by The Dandy Warhols. Well, this is the only Dandy Warhols song that I know apart from, 'We Used to Be Friends', which is also the Veronica Mars soundtrack. As a side note, how great is Veronica Mars? I am mildly obsessive about it. Anyways, both these songs are great. But the only reason this appears so high on my playlist is because I recently downloaded it, which means that I listen to it more frequently because it is on my Recently Played playlist.

7. When You Were Young, by The Killers. Okay, I like The Killers. Anyone has any problems with that, huh? Do you, huh? No, tell me, do you? Because I don't care! Hmph! I like this song. It's from their new album. I even like their old songs. The Killers are a great band and I am not looking for anyone to tell me that they're not. I almost bought myself a band tshirt a few years ago. The only reason I decided not to buy it was because the infamous Vintage Girl had the same tshit and it would have been silly for me to own the same thing.

8. Main Hoon Don from Don. It's from the new movie Don starring Shahrukh Khan. It's the remake of the old Don movie by Farhan Akhtar. I can't wait to watch it. It's going to be great. I also have another song, Yeh Mera Dil, which I listen to much more often than this track, but I managed to get Yeh Mera Dil just a few days ago. Anyways, call me mainstream again, but I love Shahrukh, even though he's the crappiest Bollywood actor in the film industry. But god, he's Shahrukh Khan, how is one supposed to dislike him?

9. Tell Me Baby, by Red Hot Chili Peppers. It's from their new album, Stadium Arcadium. It's a great album, even though I've heard just two songs from it. I loved Dani California. It kept playing everywhere when TPF and I were in Bombay a few months ago and Tell Me Baby is just as good. I'm not a hardcore Red Hot Chili Peppers fan, but they are a good band.

10. The Blues are Still Blue, by Belle and Sebastian. I discovered this band via TPF who went to a concert of theirs a few months ago in Milan with her brother. Anyways, both TPF and I have become big Belle and Sebastian fans after that. It's not a very popular mainstream band, but I love it. All their songs are great. This also happens to be my only alternative entery in this top then list. (I am pretending to ignore the fact that Radiohead missed this list by like 2 places or something) You know, I just pretend not to like alternative music. When it comes down to it, I'm as big an alternative music fan as anybody else.

And one more since I am so fond of prime numbers:

11. Cakkidi, by Kenan Dogulu. Ah, my first and only Turkish entery in this list. This is such a great song and I even have the video, which is as great as the song itself. Turkish pop is the best kind of pop in the whole world. Once Tarkan figures out his sexuality, I'll be his slave for life regardless of what he decides.

Technically, since I am known to be the meme killer and everything, I'm not actually supposed to tag people. But I shall have to make an exception in this case since this is TPF's meme experiment, and I cant kill it at the second person. Therefore, I tag Nitin, Szerelem and Eris.

Libraries

The best things about libraries has always been the way they smell. I don'’t think there is anything in the world that smells better than read, dusty, old books.

Libraries have always intimidated me ever since childhood. I think this is mainly due to the fact that my old school library was an old chapel converted into a library. Therefore it always seemed a little daunting to me, until I eventually got used to it. It was a humongous, dark room with little sunlight, stain glass windows and no electric lights (at least during the day). If you entered the library in the afternoon, you would get temporarily blinded because it used to be so dark inside.

It was a beautiful room with stone floors that kept the temperature inside cool even in hot and humid Bombay summers. The room was equipped with a large circular table, which always fondly reminded me of King Arthur's round table and had a large circle of locked cupboards around its edges. Sometimes when I entered the library I liked imagining that time had suspended around me and I had entered another dimension. It was the only place in school where I could be alone and all by myself (because none of my friends cared much about libraries or books) and it comforted me. I used to sit for hours there and go through books until the dreaded bell told me that it was time to come back into reality and return to class.

Most of the other people in school ever read anything apart from old Enid Blyton books from the library that I had already grown beyond when I started borrowing books from there. So after much begging on my part, and deliberation my teacher's part, she gave me (and Eris, of course) a free reign to go through all the locked cupboards that were full of books no one had ever bothered to look at for decades and I'm sure no one after me will probably bother with them for a few more decades. I discovered some of my favourite books hidden among those shelves. I would not have read the whole Narnia series if Eris had not discovered it by mistake while looking for Trixie Belden books in those shelves.

My high school library, on the other hand, was much more modern and full of well known books. It didn't have any rare or hidden or dusty books as a matter of fact. It also had an electronic check out system (with the kind of machines you have in supermarkets) and a whole load of computers that we were supposed to use for research purposes. Most people actually used these computers for playing flash games because the library computers were not supervised unlike the school computers by our computer teacher. Most of the times the library was used either as a 'hang out'’ place by people on rainy days or as a last minute 'homework copying' place. I had a young, sweet, library teacher who was also my English teacher for my first two years in high school. I always knew that something was missing from that library, until I realized that it was the dark, ominous atmosphere and written check out library cards that I missed. Until that moment I had never realized how much I loved my archaic, middle school library that I grew up in.

Right now all I have an access to is a humongous University library where I have to look up all the books I want via an online catalogue. No more going through library shelves or reading book jackets. Sometimes, just sometimes I detest technology.

PS: On a completely unrelated note, today is also Pan's birthday. She feels too old to be true!

University Reds

First of all I must apologise for my recent disappearance from the blogosphere. University began a few weeks ago, and therefore I have been pretty busy lately. Also TPF is leaving for Uni on Wednesday and I have been spending every bit of my spare time with her later.

What can I say about Uni? It's different, very different from high school. Everything seems so completely and frighteningly big here. When I say different I don't mean bad different though. But I miss my friends and Dave. TPF darling, it's not the same without you! *sniff* I can't make silly jokes anymore or make obscure references and have someone actually understanding them. On a lighter note, I emailed Dave a few days ago and he replied today *fangirlish squeal*. It made my day. I don't sound like an almost 19 year old University student, do I?

For those who are actually interested, I am getting my degree in a course called, International Economics and Management. I'm sure it sounds more impressive than it actually is. It is not as cool as it sounds (well, this is assuming you think it sounds cool) It just involves a lot of Maths, Economics and Law, at least for now that is. I've been meeting loads of new people, practicing my Italian (which sucks, by the way) and pretending to actually care about my studies. I can't believe I actually have three hour lectures. My longest lesson in school used to last for 70 minutes. Yes, I am whinging here, so please bear with me.

Social life seems to be on a weird high (kind of). I just got invited today to go to Germany this weekend for three days for the October Beer Fest (which is a beer festival, as you must have already deciphered from it's name). The festival involves going to Germany on Friday, drinking beer all of Saturday, getting hung over all of Sunday and coming back to Uni on Monday. If people have already started tutting and mentally chiding Pan off, I am not actually planning to attend this thing. I am a responsible young, adult who would not even dream of going to weird alcohol festivals.

I've been meeting a whole lot of new people lately and I'm terrible with their names. I don't remember the names of half the people I've had conversations with. Therefore, I've been a very horrible person and come up with mental nicknames for people. These include AcneBoy, FizzHead, HotBoy, CuteRear, NerdyGirl, FashionVictiom etc. I have also started catagorising people by their nationality, which admittedly is not a very nice thing to do. But I'm always going to be known as IndianGirl to people, so it is not technically horrible of me to call people NorwegianBoy or HungarianGirl, right?

Anyways, after more than a week of attending Uni I have come to the conclusion that the world is full of a hell of a lot of weird people and I happen to be one of them.

If she thinks can she tell me to prove it...

I've been tagged by TPF for a silly picture. TPF has asked me to prove her wrong by actually attempting to do this meme, so here is it. TPF is generally hardly ever wrong and so whenever I do get this great opportunity, I love doing it. Therefore, I have finally found a picture of myself which can embarrass me for life if uploaded on the internet and here I am doing it myself.

What can be sillier than a humiliating naked picture of yourself bathing in a bright, orange bucket? My mother put me in a bucket for god's sake when I was a child and then people wonder why I have issues about my childhood? Although I love my partially serious expression for the pictue. Ah, I was always the intellectual thinker even when I was a baby bathing in a bucket.

I think the legs behind the bucket belong to my mother, but I'm not very sure why exactly is she wearing a dress/gown that makes her look like a badly dressed hospital nurse. The thing in my hand is a chewing thingie that babies use when they are teething. Mine was blue and elephant shaped and I loved it from the bottom of my heart. *sniff*


Hmm, tags?

I refuse to tag people because I am officially the meme killer :) But if anyone does want to do it, they can feel free.

Pictures, pictures and more pictures

I have finally managed to find the time to post some of the Bombay photographs that I had promised. It took to me ages to upload everything here, so please appreciate my hard work and effort. These pictures were taken solely by TPF and me, therefore no one else gets any credit, apart from our wonderful cameras, of course. I'm putting the pictures under sub-headings because everyone knows how anal I am about organisation.

These pictures are dedicated to Nikki, since I promised I would get something back for her.


The funny pictures that people with a sense of humour might enjoy:

I'm not sure if the above sign is readable. It was taken in a bus. The sign in English says, 'spitting and smoking prohibited'. I like the idea of random people trying to spit at each other in public transport.

I love how they are so honest about the warning above, and I'm sure the threat works. I mean, who would want to even risk parking there in order to see whether their tyres actually get deflated? Alright, maybe I would, if I had a car of course, but still, it is rather funny.

This sign was hilarious, I love the last line that says 'Fancy Item Available Here'. While I was talking this picture, there were a lot of guys around the shopkeeper of this store and I hear one of them telling this shopkeeper, "She's going to publish this picture in a big foreign newspaper and you're going to be famous." So yes, I now have the reponsibily to make someone famous.

Oh come on, we are not perverts, just hormone infested teenagers who tend to notice these kind of signs, point at them in the middle of a crowded street, giggle like lunatics and attract even more attention by taking pictures of the sign.

I think it would have been a bit more easier for this 'Order' to make a sign about the things one could actually do in the park, rather than the things that one couldn't do in there.

See, what I like so much about this pharmacy was their directness towards their customers. The customers don't even have to bother asking for bags and then have the shopkeepers rudely refusing. Instead, they just have a polite sign out up everywhere in the shop.

What more could a man want in life than a hairdresser who is also an expert on ingrown nails and corns. Ah bliss! How does one become an expert in ingrown toe nails? Is there some sort of university degree one can do?

This was funny. How can they randomly prohibit people from procrastination is beyond me :)

The not-so-funny pictures that amused only TPF and Pan because let us face it, they're idiots:

It says 'Fire Box'. I'm not sure why that's even minutely funny. It just is! 'Fire Box', ha! Alright, I'll just stop!

'Tourism Police'. That is almost as funny as 'Fire Box'. Oh come on, we were just being silly, don't look at me so strangely please.

There is nothing wrong with the one above, apart from the whole 'belt' bit I think. It must be funny if they check your clothes, shoes and not to mention, belt before you actually go in there.

In India, we have taxis and we have rickshaws (known as 'ricks' for short). I love rickshaws, they are three wheeler vehicles with open sides, flimsy canvas roof and a seat that can just barely manage to squeeze three people at the back. Although, I have sat in one with five people (alright, this was when I was about thirteen or fourteen so we were small people) . All the fare meters in rickshaws in Bombay have 'Don't Touch Me' written on them. As a child, I've spent many happy house pondering on how the fare meter could paint signs on itself when it didn't have hands. What can I say, my mother, as usual ruined all my fantasies.

This sign is printed at the back of some seats in public transport buses in Bombay reserving the seats for women. It's not very funny to anyone apart from TPF, Harry and me because it reminds us of an embarrassing incident which involved my friends actually making people (men) get up from those seats so that we could sit down in a rather crowded bus. I've never felt so privileged to be a woman in my entire life.

The Garbage Bins (because they are Pan's specialty and she can't not post them however silly they maybe):

The Touristy Images (which for some suspicious reason happen to be very few):

Most of the touristy pictures are taken by TPF because she is a great photographer. I, on the other hand, am rather bad and end up messing everything up, so I must thank her for letting me use her pictures.

We had such a lovely trip, and I must thank Eris and my other friends (who probably don't read this blog) that made it even more fun for us. Eris darling, you know how much I love you and your fuzzy hair, right?

Meme Time :)

I would like to apologies for my late post. I've been back for a while now, but have been busy with real life. I've been tagged by Sophia, which is great because now I don't need to write a comeback post.


1. One book that changed your life: This is a hard question, TPF and I had even had a conversation about this one. We interpret the question in very different ways. According to me every book I read, good or bad manages to have a tiny effect on my life. But if I was forced to choose, I would probably say that the first book that changed the way I viewed life was the play Equus, by Peter Shaffer (I hope plays count in this meme!).

2. One book that you've read more than once: Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte. I normally don't bother reading text heavy classics multiple times, but what can I say, Wuthering Heights just has that kind of effect on me. It's a wonderful book for angst loving, romance wanting teenagers and I would recommend it to anyone.

3. One book you'd want on a desert island: I would love to take with me any elaboratete Dickens' novel with multiple plots and a lot of characters or maybe I might just decide to take along War and Peace and finally manage to finish it.

4. One book that made you laugh: The Simoqin Prophacies by Samit Basu. This book is hilarious and Samit Basu is one of my favourite Indian writers. It is full of really funny sections and one liners that actually have a point and are related to the plot. It's sequal The Manticore's Secret is also just as good.

5. One book that made you cry: To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. I have read this book several times now and the last two pages of the book always make me cry. I guess, it is a sort of a personal catharsis that I undergo every time I read it. But tears just can't stop falling every time I read this book.

6. One book that you wish had been written: I would have loved to have an Emily Bronte's autobiography or another novel by her.

7. One book that you wish had never been written: Sweet Valley. I have wasted too many important years of my young and innocent reading life over this series and I genuinely wish that the whole series didn't exist

8. One book you'’re currently reading: The Brothers Karamazov, by Dostoyevsky and Two Lives, by Vikram Seth (yes, both at the same time. It's a childhood habit of mine, I'm always in the middle of at least two books at a time)

9. One book you'’ve been meaning to read: Bleak House, by Charles Dickens. Well, I first need to buy the black Penguin edition of this book (you know the ones I absolutely adore) and then I will eventually read it.

umm... I refuse to tag anyone else because I am the 'meme killer'! :)

Break Time

I'm leaving for our annual family vacations early tomorrow morning. I'm not exactly sure if I'm looking forward to these vacations or dreading them. You see, when we're on holiday, all the members of my family end up getting on each others nerves so much so that by the end of it, everyone is extremely relieved to get back and return to work/school.

We're going on a road trip to the north of France and Spain and are going to be staying in a little seaside town next to the Spanish border in France. This does mean that I am not going to have internet access for a week or so. University starts almost as soon as I get back and I'm not particularly looking forward to that. But that qualifies for another post on it's own which shall be written as soon as I get back.

Right now I have a long list of things I have to do before tonight, written down for me very thoughtfully by my dear mother, who didn't think I would remember them. This list includes a whole load of ironing, vacuuming, clearing up my room and not to mention the packing which she has been nagging me to get on with for a week. But yours truly, as usual, has left everything for the last day and doesn't feel like doing it anymore now that the last day has actually come up. I'm in it for a 'Talk' tonight, I can feel it.

Happy Birthday, Mummy!

Today is my mum's birthday. My father was thankfully nudged into remembering it by me last night because I didn't want him forgetting her birthday three times in a row this year. Luckily for him, my mum is one of those people who does not care much about birthdays; so my dad'’s forgetfulness was not too much of a big deal.

My mum and I normally don't exactly get along. We fight a lot. This is actually an understatement. We fight all the time is probably a more accurate description of my relationship with my mother. She always tells me off for not being more useful around the house. I always tell her that she should appreciate having me as a daughter and be thankful that I'’m not a drug addict, teen angsting, alternative music listening, purple haired creep, which I could have pretty much turned out to be if I had wanted. But mostly we fight for the same old reasons, and normally require external assistance in the form of my father to send us into our respective rooms in order to have some peace and quiet in our household.

What I personally love about our fights is that she is always the first one to make up. She can never be upset with me for more than an hour. So I guess, there'’s no bitterness in our relationship. As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, my ability to judge how much I love a person comes from how much that person can affect me enough to get on my nerves. Sometimes, I have to guiltily admit that I feel like throwing things at my mother.

My mum can actually read my mind. It's scary, but it'’s true. Sometimes when I was younger I used to think that she was literally inside my mind. She always tells me that she just knows. Now, I don't even bother asking her how does she always know. I never need to tell her how I'’m feeling or how my day was. She claims she can read it on my face, however well I'’m trying to cover it up. This makes it very difficult to lie or conceal things from her.

According to my father, the only thing I've inherited from my mother are my procrastination abilities and my immense dislike for any sort of work. Both of us don'’t even bother denying, this. What can I say, there has to be something other than my height that I should have got from my mother'’s genes. My mum is tiny, she'’s really small and thin, well, smaller and thinner than me at least. This makes it possible for her to have a complete access to my wardrobe. We fight over my clothes all the times. I hate it when she wears my clothes. She never minds when I wear hers.

My mum was relatively young when she had me, and she'’s managed to age quite well. Most people normally mistake us for sisters. I love people complimenting my mum on the fact that she looks so young. It makes me happy because she'’s so pretty. She always tells me that she was too young when I was born, and had no idea how to deal with children. Well, I personally think she did a fine job. Mum'’s also great with people. Everyone who knows her loves her including the people she works for and all the cleaning women. What wouldn'’t I do to have her social skills?

My mum is rather absurd. She comes up with the silliest suggestions, which involve no logical thinking whatsoever. She is terrified of heights. See, the fact that she has problems with heights wouldn'’t matter much to me, but the fact that she insists that I keep away from them is what leads to our inexorable arguments. My mum also has every phobia in the world -– heights, darkness, closed spaces, crowds, insects and every other thing one can think of. But she i’s always a good sport and doesn'’t mind our incessant teasing.

She likes things done her way all the time, which inevitably leads to our numerous arguments because I like the same. She never ever gives in when we fight. She i’s the most stubborn creature I'’ve ever come across. She is more stubborn than I am and that takes some effort.

She always falls asleep mid way of movies, a habit that I'’ve recently started finding adorable.

She is also obsessed with cleaning. If I could divide every person in this world into six different groups based on the characters in Friends, my mum would definitely be a Monica. She'’s scary when she cleans and the problem is that she'’s always cleaning.

She is great at finding missing property. It's a skill, I tell you. She once managed to find a pair of our house keys on the street two days after our maid had accidentally dropped them. I've lost count of the number of times she's retrieved lost items for me - missing earrings, bags, food, books, important documents, keys and the list continues.

However she may be, she'’s still my mum and I love her from the bottom my heart. She i’s the bestest mother in the whole world according to me, and I wouldn'’t replace her for all the riches in the world. So, here'’s wishing her a very happy birthday.

Independence Day

Tomorrow, 15th August is the Indian Independence day. Yes folks, at the stroke of midnight exactly 59 years ago, in the year 1947, we became free. Freedom is a very subjective word in this context, I suppose. It is also the first date I actually remember memorizing after my own birthday.

When I was younger, my dad and I used to spend the Independence day morning watching the national parade on television. He always made me stand up when they played the national anthem because according to him it is blasphemous to sit down when the national anthem of any country is playing. So we stood up as soon as the President's orchestra started playing. I loved standing up. It was always a special occasion for me. This was because, on most other days I never had the opportunity to consciously stand up straight, while looking at television for a few minutes. Then, we used to watch the President's speech, whilst I normally lost interest in it mid way because I could never understand the big Hindi words he used in this speech. Mind you, this wasn'’t because I was a stupid child; colloquial Hindi is so much different from formal Hindi, that I still normally don't understand all of the President'’s speech.

As I grew up, it became mandatory to participate in the school independence day celebrations where we had to stand in the hot sun all morning, sing patriotic songs in three languages (Hindi, English and Marathi). Then of course, there was the flag unfurling ceremony where we sang the national anthem. I loved singing our national anthem and still do enjoy singing it, even though I haven'’t had the opportunity to sing it in the last four years. I don't think I liked it because it made me feel patriotic, but because I always felt that it was a beautiful song.

I'’m not exactly what you call a nationalist, well not consciously at least. I'm the first person to criticize my country where it deserves, which is what I normally do. But today I have decided to do something else. I ha’ve decided to talk about why I like my country and not why I dislike it. I'’m not going to talk about the hypocrisy with which Indian culture treats women or how religion is going to be the end of our people or about the absolute poverty, illiteracy and corruption, but about why I love it so much. Whatever faults India may have, it is still my country and I love it very much because it defines who I am and where I allegedly belong, well according to my passport, at least.

I love my country because I grew up there and whatever little morals I may have, they are because of my upbringing there. I love it because of it'’s wonderful film industry (yes, I am one of those one billion suckers that actually likes Bollywood movies). I love it because we have great food. Seriously, which other country can boast to be more creative than us where vegetarian food is concerned? When I talk about food, it encompasses all kinds of foods including snacks, three course meals, street food and junk food. I love how we like to Indianize every western item we come across, even McDonalds rather than fall pray to plain old westernization. I also love it because we have seasonal fruits that you don'’t get anywhere else in the world.

I love it because our national sport it cricket and we'’re great at it. The World Cup is next year, and wait and see, we'’re going to be absolutely brilliant. I love it because of it'’s chaotic traffic. You never feel alone or lonely, at least in Bombay. I love the fact that you can never be alone on the streets whatever time of night it may be because there are people everywhere, all the time.

I love it because we have the monsoon season, which according to me is the best season in the world. I love it because we have a great sense of style and clothing. In India, I can wear a pair of jeans with a kurta and not have to face hoards of people looking at me strangely. We have even managed to make ourselves look hot in saris, a garment which was created supposedly to cover up our bodies. I love it because everyone there is so friendly and I wouldn't even think twice before asking my neighbours for any sort of help. Here, I don't even know who lives next door to me.

I love it because we have so many languages (and yes, they are languages with different scripts and not just dialects. The next person to ask me about this is going to have to listen to a long rant). You just grow up speaking and studying two, three different languages and understanding at least one or two more. I love the fact that whenever I am there, I always end up speaking in a bizarre, incomprehensible mixture of Hindi/English/Marathi all at the same time, and everybody still understands me.

I love it because every single person you meet from there comes from such a diverse cultural background that everyone might as well come from a different country, and yet we manage to love each other just fine. I also love it because in India you grow up having a lot of friends everywhere. I knew practically every kid my age on the whole street where I lived because everyone always knows everyone else. India is a country where it is very difficult for someone to keep a secret. But what I love the most about it is how people like me can grow up there retaining our own culture and languages, while watching American sitcoms, movies and speaking fluent English. It'’s like you grow up belonging to two different worlds. I can listen to Led Zeppelin and love Bollywood music all at the same time.

So there, that is how I'’ve spent my Independence day this year. I can't watch the parade on television here or sing the national anthem, but what I can do is give us a fine tribute that even the President in his fancy Hindi might have problems trying to compete with.

Mera Bharat is truly mahan! :)

Introducing Julia!

I would like everyone on the blogosphere to get acquainted with Julia. Yes, I am officially replacing TPF from her 'best friend'’ status. TPF lost this position the moment she abandoned me in this strange, foreign country and returned to her native land. I am fickle enough to replace and abandon old friends as soon as I find new ones that I like more. Julia is beautiful, interesting, intelligent and all other adverbs of admiration one can think of and I am totally enamoured by her. She is also the best thing that has happened to me since cable television in this country, which clearly shows how much she means to me.

For those who has not figured this out yet, Julia happens to be my new laptop. I have always wanted a laptop ever since I heard about them. I mean, what could be better than a computer, a computer that you can use in your bed, of course or on your couch or in the bathroom, for that matter. For the record, no I am not using my computer in the bathroom, but I would like to have the option to do so in any case, thank you very much. Julia also happens to be password protected, which means that I can write/view pornography on it without my parents knowing or checking my browser history. No, I am not into writing/viewing pornography, but I still like keeping my options open. Privacy matters, especially when you have a teenager with nothing to hide. That is why I like to pretend that I have a big secret up my sleeve or in this case, in my computer.

Julia is a graduation present from my parents. Initially I was going to buy a Mac because Macs are so cool in teenage land, but then I started looking beyond the pretty looks and being the non conformist teenage that I am, I decided that I was not yet ready to try to learn to use a whole new operating system all on my own. I also figured that my Mac dreams could wait until I started earning my own money and let my parents save bit more for my future educational dreams. Turns out, Julia was a bit more expensive than the Mac that I wanted, but it was love at first sight and even my parents couldn'’t deny that to me.

No, I'’m not getting rid of Quincy (my old computer) or forgetting him as soon as I have a prettier replacement with no sexuality crisis. What kind of a person would that make me? A teenager, I know, but as I previously mentioned, I'’m one of those unconventional types, therefore I am still emotionally attached to Quincy. He has been with my through my good times and crashed through my bad times. I love him very much and will always care about him even with Julia in my life, however pretty her in-built web cam may be or however cool her in-built DVD burner is. Yes, even though Julia may have the beautiful blue lights and the in-built wireless connection, but Quincy is still my hero.

These days, I feel like a computer whiz. A few days ago, I made my home wireless entirely by myself. Alright, I'm sure this is no big feat to most people, but trust me if you had to call up Internet technicians and ask for computer help in Italian when you don't really speak Italian, it is a big deal. Therefore, yes I am proud of myself.

Mid-life Crisis

Most of the times, technology scares me because I feel too old for it. Most children these days start using computers at age three on cool Macs. I, on the other hand, had my first home computer when I was in the third grade. I’m not sure what operating system we had at that time, but my first memories of actually using a computer is with Windows 93. The computer belonged to my mum’s office. I still remember logging off Windows and going on to 'DOS' and typing ‘c-drive’ and playing games such as ‘Prince of Persia’ (yes, the original ‘Prince’. I sucked at it, by the way. It used to terrify me and yet, I insisted playing it.). I could never understand how key boards worked and why all the alphabets were not in alphabetical order or how in the wide world could my mother type so fast. Today, my mother is the slowest typist in the family. It is funny how things turn out to be, isn’t it?

We got Internet at home when I was either in the sixth grade or the seventh grade. At that time, I don’t even think my parents knew what exactly the Internet was. I’m not sure I still know what exactly the Internet is. I remember my mother teaching my the basics of email in seventh grade and opening a hotmail account for me. I never thought that I would even use it. After all, I did not have anyone to write messages to. Then, I was introduced to chain forwards, which I have to shamefully admit that my 13 year old self was addicted to. But my exposure to the Internet did not go beyond email. That was until I was introduced to something called ‘Google’ of course. Suddenly my vision of life had changed. I still hold Google responsible for changing my way of thinking.

Right now, I find that children are introduced to computers much before kindergarten. My three year old cousin, who has not even started school yet, proficiently plays all sorts of ‘educational’ games on her computer, which teach her how to count, learn the alphabet or does puzzles. She has a lot of fun doing them and learns at the same time. I just learnt the alphabet from boring, little school books. When I was little, my idea of fun on a computer was ‘Microsoft Paint’ on which I have spent endless joyful moments. CDs were practically inexistent all through my childhood. All I knew were the big floppies for the A-drive by my parents for work purposes. The little floppies, which are outdated right now seemed like a digital revolution to me.

It’s not just computers, it’s every piece of technology that we presently use seems foreign to my childhood like laptops, ipods, DVD players, DVDs themselves, mobile phones etc. The strangest thing in the world is to see my two year old cousin using the DVD player. He knows how to switch it on, select his DVD and play it. At two, I hardly knew what a remote control for our television was and grew up watching VHSs on our outdated video player.

Since I am the only fruit of my parent’s loins, they but naturally freakishly obsessive about knowing my movements. I got my first mobile phone when I was about fourteen and hated it. All my friends could never understand why I disliked it so much, but I did. It made me attract attention. I didn’t like the attention. I did not have any numbers stored on my phone, and I did not even know about the existence of text messages. There was nobody else of my age group who owned an actual cell phone. I used to get into so many arguments with my parents about carrying it all around. Presently, I’ve been carrying a mobile around for about the last 5 years, I still don’t use it much, (because it is permanently out of money) but I don’t think I could live without it. It just makes me feel safer having a phone around me in case of late night emergencies. Normally, my mobile phone is more useful to me as an alarm clock, rather than an object of communication, but it’s something I still need to have for personal comfort. It feels great to know that all the people I love are just a button away from me.

I feel too old for a lot of things actually. Just the other day TPF had come over to my house for a sleepover and we were supposed to have a movie marathon all night long. The next day my dad asked me which movies we saw all night and I told him that we just went to bed at 11 because we were too tired to do anything else. He then teased me about all the fabulous plans we had made that evening. My reply to that was: “I think I’ve become too old to stay up all night long, dad. When I was 14, it was alright, I used to have all that energy, but right now, I just don’t think I have the capacity to stay up late.”

That’s right, my dear readers I’m almost 19 and am going through a mid-life crisis. I’m too old for this young world that seems to get younger each day and all I can do is sit and collect stories to tell my grandchildren.

Birthday Girl!

I wish I could say that I was the subject of this post, but unfortunately my birthday isn't till September. This post is going to be solely dedicated to our favourite Poodle. It is her birthday tomorrow and she has decided to become into a full fledged adult. She has finally turned 18, which means that now she can legally watch R-rated movies, have sex and drink in this country without feeling guilty for breaking the law (we all know that the law and not the lack of opportunity was the only thing that was keeping her from indulging in these activities)

Even though we have been going to the same school for about four years now, we have only been friends for about a year and a half because well, we had different social circles in school. Alright, who am I kidding, TPF was a bitch for two years, until she finally decided to start being nice to me. It is rather strange that in a grade of 47 people and a school of less than 250 people that we did not become friends straight away. Predictably enough, the first normal conversation we had was on books and ahem... fanfiction. We have been close friends ever since. There is nothing better than Harry Potter bonding to bring people together.

To say that both of us fight a lot would be an understatement, but to say that we both get along would also be one too. I judge how much I care for a person by their ability to get on my nerves. This is a strange parameter to measure love by, but I've found it particularly useful. I think the only person how can get on my nerves as much as my mum happens to be TPF.

In less than a month, we're leaving for university and it's going to be very frightening not to have her here with me living fifteen minutes away from my house or going to the same school as me. I'll miss spending all day together only to get home and talk to her on phone while finding myself emailing her the same evening for absolutely no reason. I think, I'm even going to miss our adorable arguments.

Sample Argument
TPF: 'Is my hair looking okay from the back?'
Pan: 'Do I look like I care?'
TPF: *sulks*
Pan: 'Alright, I'm sorry, it's looking fine, really!'
TPF: *sulks*
Pan: 'Oh my god, do you have to over react for the silliest things?'
TPF: 'Oh look whose talking!'
Pan: 'What is that supposed to mean?'
TPF: 'You think I'm touchy, have you seen yourself?'
Pan: *sulks*
And so the vicious cycle continues for 2 whole minutes till Pan and TPF are either tired of sulking or have forgotten why they were mad at each other in the first place

As Harry once put it , on an average we fight for about 30 minutes a day. (Oh god, we do sound like a married couple, don't we? We remind me of my mum and dad and that is definitely not a good sign).

I'm not even going to try wishing her the very best in life, because I know that she doesn't need luck. She happens to be the most intelligent person I've ever had the opportunity to meet in my short and insignificant lifetime. I love her very much and all I can say is that she's the bestest! As I've told her so many times, I only love her because she's so intelligent, funny and pretty. Now on the other hand, if she was stupid, boring and not to mention horribly ugly, I wouldn't have bothered with her at all. Its the blond hair, green eyes and the pretty dimples that keep me in her company.

Aww, our very own Poodle is finally legal now and all I can do is get teary eyed and go: "They grow up fast, don't they?" and reminiscence on how I've just spent the best two years of my life with her.

Football Fever

I've never been much of a sports fan. But I can well understand why it means so much to a lot of people. I am moderately fond of cricket because I'm Indian and any self respecting Indian is supposed to love cricket.

I also quite enjoy watching football, but only with my dad or TPF because all through the match they're always giving me random and not to mention useless factual information about the players. They only do this because they know how much of a sucker I am for useless and random facts. Therefore as you can see, I'm not overly testostrony about football like most of the people I know, but I have to say the World Cup is a completely different issue.

I like football mainly because I get to watch overly cute men running around in shorts for 90 whole minutes. Additionally, I like it because the teams sing their national anthems before every match and that for some reason makes me cry. Superficiality apart, I'm also in it for the sportsmanship, team spirit, also obviously for an opportunity to watch a good game and blah blah blah.

TPF and I had been following the first round of the World Cup rather badly because we were in India when it began. This does not mean that we don't have television in India or that one can't watch football in India, but means that we were invariable not at home when the matches were aired. So we almost missed most of the first few matches, including Italy's first match against Ghana. But we've been religiously following the rest of the World Cup ever since we've gotten back, ahem...well except from the Portugal-Netherlands match because that evening Harry and I thought it would be a good idea to go swimming in the sea at 11 at night without towels when were were staying at her grandparents house near Genova (But that's a different adventure which shall be put up here in due course)

As I said, even though the World Cup fever was not lost on me, I was still unprepared for what I saw last Sunday at the finals. The Italy-Germany semi finals match was great. Michael Ballack (he's the German captain) looked so ahem... hot when he was crying after the match that Germany lost, that I almost want to re-watch that match only to see him crying at the end of it all over again. Alright, I agree, I'm a horrible person, but he is rather pretty.

Sometimes I forget I live in Italy because I'm rather absentminded and not to mention unaware of the world around me. But ever since Italy became the World Cup finalists, the fact that I'm actually living here has been brought to my notice with celebratory screams and these horns that are so loud that you jump every time somebody blows them, around the city for a few days before the actual match.

The frenzy in Milan right before the match was absolutely crazy. There were more than 10 thousand people in the city centre who had come to watch the match on a tiny screen that had been put up there. Most of these 10 thousand people had flags with them, which they found necessary to wave around wildly all the time. This also meant that whatever little one's view was of that tiny screen was completely obstructed.

As you may have already noticed from the picture at the side which was taken by Pan before the match started that she was one of these 10 thousand idiots at the main square along with her dad and TPF. Thankfully we thought it prudent to return home for the second half of the match and watch it like civilized people in front of our flat screen television. This has to be one of the smartest decisions that Pan and her father might have actually made together in their entire lifetime.

Anyways, I did spend most of the second half and the extra time with my head into a cushion on my couch because I just couldn't bear to see what was happening. I was too nervous to watch most of the match. But surprisingly enough I gathered my courage and watched all the penalty kicks. Normally, as a principle I don't watch penalties, but this was with World Cup finals with Italy playing, so I just couldn't have missed that.

My dearest wish for the outcome of the match was wanting Italy to win, but also wanting Zidane (the captain of the French side, who also happens to be my favourite football player in the whole world and mind you, extremely attractive too) to score. And score he did on a penalty kick. Anyways I'm never going to forgive Materazzi for for being an asshole and making Zidane headbutt him. No, nothing anyone says is going to convince me otherwise. Zidane is like Eric Clapton, he's God!

After the match we went out to the main city centre. After all, that was where about 10 thousand people saw the match. By 'we' I mean, Pan's mum, Pan's dad, TPF, TPF's 10 euro Italian flag (which was completely worth it) and your fabulous and extremely modest narrator, Pan. The pictures posted up here are all taken from my Dad's exceedingly old cell phone and so they don't portray even half the atmosphere or emotions in the air before and after the match. Although, you can see from the picture below, there were naked people dancing around in the city's main fountain, which was just plain ewww because I suspect that the water in those fountains is slimy and unclean. For once, even your prissy narrator, Pan looked upon these barbaric people with a fond eye because Italy had won the World Cup after all and certain allowances had to be made for the night. Of course, Pan did get wild when the dirty fountain water was splashed by fat, naked guy on her beautiful shiny tresses reminding her of the wild night where there was a lot of cocktail throwing in the air and her hair had gotten stuck in the cross fire.

It was a great match and Italy deserved to win, not because they were a better team, but because Pan supported them and because they were prettier than the French side.

Back from the Dead with a Big Bang!

Look who's back. It's me, everyone's favourite drama queen back from the dead, although I wasn't exactly dead; so the title of my post sounds rather silly, but I've always wanted to use that phrase at least once in my life and right now seemed to be an opportune moment.

So at this moment the reader might be wondering where the heck has Pan been for so long. My answer to that question would be a shameful 'here and there'. Alright, I admit it, I've been guilty of procrastination and haven't been on any website apart from my email and mugglenet for more than a month now. Although, I have been busy doing other things like attending various 'social events' (in normal teenage terminology 'social events' means decadent, debauched, alcohol ridden parties). Additionally, there was the Graduation Day ceremony last week where Pan almost tripped on the flag of her own country because she couldn't control the sari that TPF had forced her to wear. Pan was also forced by mean teacher to give a speech and be a model nerdy student, which she certainly is, to a bunch of parents, most of whom don't understand a word of English on Graduation Day. And how can I not mention the fateful and depressing thing called examination results that we got a few days ago.

I can never make up my mind about examination results. They always depress me for some strange reason however well or badly I may have done in them. Maybe it could be because there is so much hype building up before the marks are given out, one can't help but feel a bit let down when one finally gets them after a long wait.

Results aside what else has Pan been doing because it has been almost a month since she came back from India. Well, I can't resist it anymore, I have to bring the second part of the post title into motion. Last night, Pan and TPF went to the Rolling Stones concert. It was their first concert in Europe of their 'A Bigger Bang' tour. The concert began at nine in the evening but Pan and TPF were there since seven listening to crappy introducing band (called Feeder) and socialising with creepy, old man next to us. Alright, I'm lying here. TPF was the one talking to old man next to us, while Pan just looked the other way and pretended that she doesn't understand Italian and know either of them.

No, we didn't see Mick from that close. That's ahem... the picture of the screen. We did have the cheapest tickets (which were not cheap under any circumstances, we bought them for 50 euro), so we were the furthermost away from the stage. There were about 60 thousand people there, so one can only imagine how full the stadium was. Needless to say, the concert was fabulous. It involved the most varied age group of people I've ever seen. There were people from age 16 to age 70. I am now the proud owner of a Rolling Stones t-shirt and a band poster. Of all the strangest people to bump into at a concert with 60 thousand people, we bumped into Mags and her sister (Hopefully some of you might remember TPF's friend and drug addict extraordinaire, Mags who has made several drunk appearances on TPF's blog)

Pan almost cried when Mick sang, 'I can get no satisfaction'. It was also the exact moment of her life that Pan realized that she was born in the wrong times. Pan's not meant for the 21st century, but for the good ol' sixties and seventies. I mean, if I was 18 in the sixties I wouldn't be sitting in front of a computer updating my blog. Pan from the sixties would have been half way around the globe on a trek to Katmandu listening to Cream cassettes on her cool, new walkman. But no, she's dumped against her wishes into the 21st century, where she is forced to listen to Cream and The Rolling Stones on her ipod instead.

But as usual I digress. Coming back to the concert, Mick Jagger looks as hot as ever. My god, he's in his sixties and I'm crushing on him, I should really stop. Keith Richards looks like he's going to drop dead any second. TPF and I were really afraid that we were going to be a witness to Keith Richards' death. I also have a minor crush on Keith, which is just plain scary, and so I don't like thinking about it. On top of it all, we also saw Materazzi and Del Piero at the concert (to all those ignorant people who don't know who I'm talking about, they are famous Italian football players). This just reminds me of the subject of my next post which is going to be football. As everyone may know, Italy just won the World Cup last week. (If you didn't know this, please stop reading my blog right now and go and get an update on current world news).

So there you go, you've just got an update on Pan's social life. It is rather strange that after a four year slump my social life has been on an all time high these days. But after all this is the longest holiday I'm ever going to have in my life unless I'm unemployed in the future, so I might as well enjoy myself. Although I must admit, it feels odd to be happy all the time. I mean, I'm one of those teen angsting people who gets depressed and morose rather easily. Poor TPF, you should ask her about it because she's the one who has to put up with my mood swings. Although, we are married and everything, so I'm not sure if I'm supposed to feel guilty about it. But as I said, it's been really great these days. I shall post the photos of our Bombay pictures next week, so that everyone has something to look forward to.