Newerways

We live in a digital world today and this digital age provides a lot of opportunities to most of us as long as we decide to meet it head on. My contribution to this formidable era has been quite insignificant till a thought prompted me to take on creative writing. So writing a blog seemed the simplest. It definitely was as long as I never got down writing it. There was a rapid fire of ideas for the topic on which I should choose to write on but, seriously speaking nothing concrete came on this page. A trash of can was the real beneficiary swelling day after day with sheets of torn paper. Nevertheless, determined as I was of dishing out a wonderful piece, my venture undiminished by my grit, enthusiasm and passion to be a solopreneur, I walked the lonely road ahead. Professionally I have been a dentist (yes! I continue to be one today too), my seniors said dentistry is “Art and Science”. Well now I think that everything is art and science including writing this blog stuff. If o...

                                       Technology was introduced in our home by my husband when he purchased a Celeron desktop for the children. We were all very excited about it .My sister got them a home publishing CD by Microsoft for activity and their friends exchanged video games. This all was moving too fast Mario, Age of Empire, Sim city and many more games whose names I do not remember. Gradually they were hooked too long and summer vacations were a time when all the indulgences were uninhibited. Once I was so annoyed that I told the children to delete all the games right before me as sequelae to bad grades. With tears in their eyes the games folder went to the trash. For a few days I did not see them play only to learn they knew of the “Restore” feature which brought the folder back in ...

Surely, SUPW (Socially Useful Productive Work) was something I enjoyed at school not because we could do something worthwhile as the initials stood for, It was like a silver lining during the exams when we could take leave to prepare for exam or perhaps even skip school for a Saturday Sunday outing by missing on a half day school which had two periods of SUPW . SUPW class was meant to give us an opportunity to be introduced to newer skills which we under normal circumstances avoided. It was CBSE's smart initiative to make it a part of its curriculum. Strikingly a number of projects that I have executed until now owe their roots to those formative years. The cognitive abilities acquired then, have been the foundation stones to many projects taught to my children. Every time an idea was required I had something new to offer for which I was gratefully thanked by my two teenagers. Though my creative talent oscillated between bad to good I had a wonderful and enrichin...

CASTLE BIJAIPUR      A HERITAGE RESORT We all know stories from Chittorgarh in Rajasthan; it is famous for its fort, its ruler Prithviraj Chauhan, and his valour. What we do not know is about its lesser-known “havelis”. Modern-day restorations and the service industry have transformed them into heritage resorts. Castle Bijaipur is one such place in the backdrop of mountains. Ever been to a heritage resort? No, then one must go to these beautiful places at least once, travelling backwards in time. Doing so reminded me of a “Star Trek” time travel to unexplored destinations. The road to the castle is lined with trees and wild plants on both sides, in all imaginable shades of green. Its entrance is marked by a huge door with beautifully sculptured arches and ornately decorated with flowers and leaves. The monsoon season we visited had just lit up all the shades of nature. We were staying on the topmost floor, and the view from here was splendid. The “jharokhas,” ...

My son had just won the documentary-making competition at Life in Mayoor School. We were watching this for the nth time on the laptop. It was sheer fun watching it again and again. My son clicked on the project folder and opened the list of projects he had created for the cultural week and annual functions at school over the years. They varied from short stories to informational projects to movie trailers and documentaries. Watching this all reversed the time clock for me. Every project had its own story, enthusiasm, excitement, excellence, our fights, and, above all, togetherness. We always had our ups and downs doing such things. I could hardly do what my children could do on the computer. I was their constant companion with suggestions on how what they were doing was shaping up and what would make a difference. Sometimes my suggestions were considered, and at other times, rubbished. We all worked very hard in our spheres to do our best, they on the technical side and I on the emotio...

My school was a fantastic place to be in. It was one place that opened the gates for exposure for me. It gave us the memories we would cherish forever. In junior classes whenever my sons would prepare for debates, speeches, recitations, elocution, extempore, stage performances I would imagine my class fellows speaking their mind over the podium. Though I was never directly involved in these activities I remembered my teachers’ giving practices. Their emphasis on full stops, commas, sarcasm, humours, and an array of emotions was really commendable. The voice modulation, ascent and descent in tone, the monotone was all I imagined very explicitly and vividly. Those were not the days of internet but reading and experience were the guiding fronts. Assimilation of these inputs I realized, years later had become my strength. I may not have mastered the talent but loved to repeat the same with my children. I was particularly impressed when my son organized a talk show on “social networking...

My life continued to revolve around my two sons and house. I was full of contentment for all that I had. The desire to learn to drive a car was never there, even when coaxed to learn that flame never kindled. No amount of persuasion could take me behind the steering wheel. “I have a full-time driver (my husband) who would take me wherever and whenever I shall go” is all I could say to justify my action. I started learning to drive after immense persuasion from all quarters. Every day I touched the vehicle, I convinced myself of my [dis]abilities to learn it. The dogged helplessness I felt after helping a stray dog to make an obituary and a near-fatal accident at a right-angled crossing near my home paved the way to let driving be a distant dream for me. Overcoming those mental barriers to resume my driving lessons took almost three years. I finally succumbed to my sisterly pressures and took to wheels. My sister would always call me at four in the evening to ” Take the car and go.” Ano...