Padwal/Parwal

We are pretty famous in office for having the weirdest discussions ever. Right from religion, politics to vegetables. This entry is regarding a debate we had about a certain vegetable called Padwal (Potol in Bengali). I like to consider myself a pure non-vegetarian (doesn't mean I am cruel to animals and support people wearing fur. So PETA activists sod off). Now occasionally my Mom has this brilliant idea of feeding me vegetables (apparently for a wholesome diet). There is an extended list of vegetables I don't like but Padwal (or that's what I call it) definitely belongs to the top 3 most hated vegetables.

So last week, Nabdu Anna, Mr Doubtfire and myself were eating lunch when NA noticed that I was looking at my food with a face that resembled a man with no hope in life. The reason was obvious, I had Padwal for lunch. And that is how the discussion began. I said what I was eating was Padwal while the other 2 insisted that padwal was a vegetable that was long and no where resembled the thing that lay in my lunch box. To make matters worse they had no name for it. We also confused it with another similar looking vegetable called Tinda. I suggested that they were confusing Padwal with Turai. We decided that we would go to the vegetable market near the office and solve the mystery once and for all. It never happened.

This weekend while shopping with my mom I had the brilliant idea of photographing what I called Padwal and showing it to the guys. And that's what I did today. Well when I showed them what I meant by padwal they would still not believe. To complicate matters, Ninja Hattori came in and introduced the Marathi name for the same. So now not only were we arguing about what it is called , we were also arguing about what it is called in Hindi and Marathi. A quick google search was done to make matters clear. Weirdly what google threw up sided with the guys. I was pretty amazed to see that Padwal was actually this long looking thingy (it struck me in a few seconds that I knew it by the name chichinga). One expressing my opinion there was a second round of explosion telling me that it is probably called chichinga in Bengali (which was partially true).

But then Mr. Doubtfire made a wonderful discovery on wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilingual_list_of_Indian_vegetables,_spices_and_grains
This cleared all our doubts and queries. The mystery unraveled in the following manner. What I was calling PADWAL was actually PARWAL and Padwal is also known as chichinga. So basically in some weird contorted way we were all right all along. Now as a Bong, a few things confuse me when Hindi is concerned (in spite of the fact that I have been speaking hindi almost all my life). As far as pronunciation is concerned, "R" (raw) and "D" (daw) does get a little confusing at times. I will not go into the other confusions I have in Hindi tonight :). That is a very long story!

It is weird how this sad piece of vegetable has got me amused to the extent that I actually dedicated a blog entry to it. Damn! Though my feelings toward it hasn't changed by an iota. I hated it and I shall continue to hate it.

Blyaaaah!!

I am just not getting a start tonight, It's 12:30 in the night and I am listening to U2's Stuck In a Moment You Can't Get Out Of and that's how I feel right now. I think sleep is the best solution at such times :)

I had a good monday. Got a lot of work done. I am getting a feel of the project now which is making me pretty happy about the whole thing. I guess the complete picture will clarify once I meet the customer. But then again, nothing beats the confidence of going completely prepared for a meeting.

Seriously, nothing's coming out. It's absolutely hopeless trying any harder.

And thus ends the weekend

Ok! I have no idea how the day just zoomed by! And it amazes me how I have got nothing done today. I was supposed to write (didn't even decide on a topic), work on the site design (got a little work done here, learnt some new tricks in photoshop), try out some experimental shots (managed to just charge the batteries :P ). Though I did manage to finally learn to play the lead of Wicked Game by Chris Isaak. Felt good :D

Met up with a friend after almost a year. I had last met her at her wedding where I was charged for the crime of being the most under-dressed person. It was once again proved that Apeejayites bump into each other at the weirdest places. We ended up meeting another friend and incidently I had last met her at her wedding. It was good catching up on stuff.

A new week begins tomorrow and I expect some more action. I had a good week :). I had a good beginning to my new project. Finally got my appraisal done (Still not decided as to whether I am satisfied with the results). Our Chairman, Dr. Shilowbhadra Banerjee thinks that I am good at communication and I need to make more use of the skill (I took it as a compliment cause when a person like SB says it, I guess it means something). A google would explain why I think so. I was finally satisfied with the amount of salsa I practiced this week :), joined back gym.

PS: This heat is seriously killing me and inspite of trying a lot I couldn't wish my mom a happy mother's day.

Mother's Day

Couldn't work much on the site today :( Hopefully will get some work done tomorrow. Saturday was brilliant as ever. The day just flew by. I had thought of putting something a little more creative on the weekends but after an extended salsa session, I just too freakin' tired to think much. The practice helped. Remembered a lot more steps than usual :) Plan to start different combinations within a couple week. I was supposed to go and find out about the swimming but that has not happened. Though I did find out about the new Front Street that has opened up at Nerul, sector 6. Its near the Nerul - Palm Beach crossing. They have awesome baked stuff and Italian food (I am not a very big Italian food fan but I am trying to acquire the taste and as a result I am saying they are good based on someone who actually likes it). I confused Fresh Lime with Sweet Lime and ended up having "Mosambi" juice with Apple pie. I know its a pathetic combination but I had no way out.

It's Mother's Day tomorrow. I get very uncomfortable on such days, mostly cause I don't know what to do about it. Like everyone, I do stuff for her all the time, but to make a day out of it makes me feel very pressurized. Celebrating your mother for a day is something I can relate to. I am just a little weird that way. I don't know whether its a guy thing. I haven't really heard any of my male friends celebrate a Father's day or a Mother's day. But my female friends are usually very excited about it and they seem to know exactly what to do. You would think that I would want to learn to celebrate from them but then again it doesn't come natural and I would probably just end up making my Mom uncomfortable. I would rather just be there for her when she wants someone to talk to or chauffeur her around to the weirdest places just cause she can buy things at a discount. :) Makes more sense to my stone age brain :)

Put on your dancing shoes and dance away your blues!

It's almost a year now since I started taking dance lessons. I wanted to learn salsa for a very very long time. I don't know why this particular form of dancing came to my mind but I am sure its mostly because of its fun and sensual nature. After searching a lot for a decent class, I found one close to my house. I was extremely apprehensive about the idea of me dancing. The reason was simple. I sucked at it! (I think I can say that I used to) It had actually come to a point where I had put it in my bucket list and made a resolution to learn it. I was googling away to glory when I chanced upon Conrad's dance class (www.conradcoelho.com). It was at Vashi, it was on a Saturday evening and you didn't require a partner to join the class. What else could I ask for?

I still remember the first day. Scared as shit I was. On reaching I realized that he starts with Ballroom Dancing (Rumba, cha-cha-cha, Rock-n-Roll, Waltz) and then after that had an option of either continuing with Ballroom or move on to Salsa. Though I wanted to start of with Salsa I thought of giving Ballroom a try. Now as I have mentioned before, dancing is not something I am comfortable with. To top that I had to do it with a girl. I didn't realize the graveness of the situation till I actually faced the situation or rather a girl :P I had heard of cold feet but I think I had probably gone cold all over. In fact I don't think I registered any of the girls I danced with. Being conscious was an under statement. It was more like being unconscious as far as I was concerned.

I thought I would be like a laughing stock out there. But fortunately all the guys sucked big time! Within the next couple of classes I felt at home. In fact I had also started looking at my partner while dancing. Though it wasn't before six months that I actually stopped looking at my feet and started looking up. By the end of Level 1, I had got pretty excited about Ballroom, to the extent that I went on to do Level 2.

Its been along time since then and I have now completed 2 levels of Ballroom, 3 levels of Salsa (LA Crossbody) and a Bachata workshop. Currently we are doing Casino Rueda which is basically a Cuban form of group Salsa where people dance in circles.

I swear to God, in certain aspects women are more intelligent than men, dancing being one of them. I know men who feel that dancing is nothing but epileptic attacks (Nabdu Anna) and for a long time I thought so too. Now I feel that I should have done this a long time ago. Its super fun, a good workout and a big stress buster. Though remembering all the dance steps is a tough job. I guess practice is the only solution and that is something I don't do much. That is something I need to work on.

Cliff Richard rightly sang, "Put on your Dancing Shoes, and dance away your Blues..."

PS : I am yet to do a public performance but I think the time is just not right, maybe one day soon :)

Ghost Adventures

I am slowly coming back to my usual routine life... office-home-gym. Almost missed gym thanks to Ghost Adventures on AXN but then pushed myself to go.

If I had to compare between Ghost Hunters and Ghost Adventures (both shows aired on AXN), I have to say that I prefer Ghost Adventures. This is one show that actually gives me an adrenaline rush watching it. Another show which is pretty scary is Haunting on Discovery (based on true reported cases though it is enacted). Ghost Hunters is a little more scientific and analytical in spite of the fact that they have got interesting footage too. GH tries to debunk hauntings and tries to explain the owners as to what could be the reason for the phenomenon, while GA is a little more dramatized. I do not know about how authentic GA is but GH is done by a recognized paranormal investigation group called TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society). What can I say? I love watching horror films but its been quite sometime now that I have actually felt scared watching a movie. I am not talking about being startled. I mean actually sweating, heart beating faster, feeling anxious type scared.

I find it very difficult to concentrate nowadays. Its not like I am listless, just that my brain's meandering a lot. Can't seem to focus on anything for more than 10 minutes. I think I need to start meditating. Never have been very successful with it but I don't see a choice. Or am I confusing it with impatience? I can manage impatience if I start painting. hmm.... now I have got myself confused. Damn!

Polaroid Photos

Today has been a good day :) Work was good. I managed to get my mouse interaction with openGL canvas working! Yay!! A lot more work needs to go into it but it was exciting. It was really nice catching up with my ophthalmologist friend today. It was equally fun to take nabdu anna's case after that. hehehehehe!!!

Went to the gym after a long hiatus. Felt really good and was pretty happy to see that I had not gained much. Half a kilo is hardly any thing :P That's a figure I can live with.

I have always found Polaroid photos very interesting though I have never used one or had my picture taken in the format ever. I had tried to get it done yesterday but thanks to my great achievement I couldn't :P. Well I managed to get the Polaroid effect done today. I have attached the result for a preview. Not bad eh?I hope no one minds the tag though (not that I give a shit). I plan to make more of these and use on my site. I just might put them up here too just to get some feedback.

The problem with going to the gym is that I just don't get any time to do anything else. By the time I get back home it is 10:30pm and then there's hardly any time to do much :( I think I'll probably use my weekends to write something a little more interesting instead of my mundane day-to-day activities. Aching to write some heavy stuff.

The second thing that kinda bothers me is that I still haven't figured out exactly how much should go on the net. It seriously inhibits one's writing when one is not sure who his readers are and whether they know him personally. I have decided not to use any names (atleast for the time being) on the blog without prior permission. They would be referred to by absolutely random names. It's how in mathematics, we wanna talk about a value and we start by saying, "Let the number be X". Something similar :) The name doesn't matter.