Exhaustion of Spring Cleaning

For most of us kids who are now living on their own, away from their parents and homes the onus of maintaining a house is almost a challenge. We take to the task on a war footing trying to prove that we are independent and don't need our mums for everyday chores but now only for emotional support etc etc etc

So a big part of living on our own includes keeping the house spic and span. So once in a while I indulge my house in this cleaning activity - and I do it with the utmost care and dedication. But honestly, I find the process very exhausting. Most people also at the end of a spring cleaning day will land on a couch with a thud refusing to get up - but with me the exhaustion is very emotional and mental and not at all physical. On the contrary actually, cleaning gives me a weird energy to keep going on at it because I know otherwise the emotional exhaustion will take me to another zone. 

Every time I clean my house I realize how much debris I have accumulated over the years and how every cleaning somehow only increases it - or I think it increases it because in my memories the debris becomes larger and more important. 

And even though I wanna throw most of them away, I just cannot. Every time I try, each of them brings back some random but very important memory and incident and then all of it seems like a keepsake. Its almost like these things have become living memories trapped in inanimate objects and they come alive every time you try and destroy them. These memories transport you to a world which was a part of you and a world you wish you were somewhere still living in. And none of it has to do with love or the remnants of a broken heart. Nothing like that - in fact most of them have to do with things very very far away from romance. 

For instance, I have a bag full of these notebook papers from my MBA days which has these notes scribbled on them in margins and corners - these are the side conversations I had in class with a few of my favourite people in XIMB. Some of the notes are intense and very serious while others are just making fun of most people in class or the professor and it has now been close to 7 years since I left that place - yet the dates and the class notes on those pages transport me to the exact time and class and setting that these conversations took place in. Needless to say, they also bring (sometimes in excruciating details) back all the incidents which led to those conversations or the incidents which happened post them. And in all these years I have never managed to throw these papers. They have now become yellow and the ones written in Pencil have become pale and yet I read them as my favourite novels. I laugh, cry, get angry, get embarrassed and worst of them all - get terribly nostalgic. I think it would just be easier if i threw this trash out - but I can't.

Then there are these posters and flyers from Echo - our fest way back at Hindu - I graduated from there 10 years ago. I still have 1 copy of a poster from each of the fests that we were all a part of and it brings back such amazing memories of putting them all together. The afternoons spent in the Eco corridor painting them together, making fun of each other, getting to know the seniors and juniors better and planning everything to the minutest of details. Also, takes me back to the days of the friendships which got formed during these times and of camaraderie which grew from strength to strength while doing this together. And then one can't help but feel the distance which has crept in among friends from this side and how we have all traveled far and wide across the world and have scattered ourselves all over the place.

Some things in this pile which stand out and baffle me the most are my first expense statement as a management trainee, every single appraisal letter till date, copy of the first claim i signed as an ASM, copy of the first expense statement I signed as a manager, the first appraisal I wrote for my team, sheets of paper with Xpressions schedule that we made as SEC, exam papers of Maths when I finally managed to get some decent marks, tickets/passes for all music concerts I have been for, wrapping papers and cards on gifts and not from very special people - mostly all of them............

...........and there are millions and millions and millions such things stacked up neatly and some not so neatly in different corners of my house. I wipe all of them clean of cobwebs and dust every time I clean. Pile then neatly organize them, sort them and eventually add some more debris to the pile by the end of it. 

Thus keeps growing my pile of debris and brings with it more and more exhaustion with every spring cleaning.  

Old hindi movies

Out of sheer and sometimes annoying habit of switching channels I chanced upon a really old film....Chhoti si Baat......its such adorable watch. It got me thinking about the indian cinema of that era and what it means to me personally

I of course for exposed to these movies when i was slightly older and hence my comprehension of these movies is very cognitive as opposed to movies i watched while growing up. What i mean is that i have watched these movies with a lot of concentration and involvement rather than movies just playing on TV randomly.

And something about this genre of cinema just tugs at your heart. Its real and yet its not in your face or trying to prove a point. And i really want to draw a parallel with cinema that we call real today. They all are somehow about these issues which are kept under cover or sex or corruption or even when its romance its very "what does youth of today want" - none of them genuinely manage to take a slice of life and amplify it for one to be able to watch it over and over and over again. And the beauty of this era of cinema was its strong roots in the "life next door"

It also gives one a kaleidoscopic view of our parents lives when they grew up and how their dreams and ambitions were well grounded. What really appeals to me if the pace of life depicted in these films. Its not slow - its just right. Its not cramped with 100 things and million gadgets and zillion technology points. It is however cramped with conversations and interactions and so many more smiles and so much more pleasure.
I am really proud that indian cinema had film makers like Hrisnikesh Mukherjee and Basu Bhattacharya who brought alive movies like Choti si Baat, Jhoothi, Chupke Chupke et al for our generation to watch and enjoy. 

the stories behind us....

the weekend has been rather interesting.......after years i went to Prithvi Cafe to catch up with a friend from a looong long time ago..........well as usual I was early and in my moments of just soaking in the cafe and absorbing the people around me i started thinking about a rather funny conversation i had with my team 2-3 days ago where were making fun of some takiyakalams that we all use.

and this got me thinking about where did mine come from and it was quite an amusing chain of thoughts. I went back in time and dug out from under the rubble of millions of memories the stories behind the things i say........

something i more often than not say is - "dekhoji aisa hai ki......." and those who have seen me say it know the exact hand movements and the tone of voice...........and its quite amazing from where this came from........lets go back 5 and a half years. I was fulfilling my long standing dream of being in FMCG sales.........basically main Haryana mein sabun bech rahi thi. So the story of this statement has its origins in a small city in Haryana called Panipat.........there was this wholesaler there who thought he was the king of the world..........he used to behave as if my sales system would come to a standstill. so every time we went to him to ask him to buy - he used to start with - bitiya dekhoji aisa hai ki na..........mere yahaan pe to dooor door se retailers aate hain aur market mein to rate wahi chalta hai jo is dukaan se shuru hota hai.........then sometimes it used to bitiya dekhoji aisa hai ki........aaap log to mere liye family jaise ho.........apse kya rate ki baat karni.........etc etc etc..............eventually my monthly visits to his outlets were an entertainment dose for me........in my head i could relay his dialogue word by word by word...........so that's the background of the story...........the day it became a part of my vocab was when I had gone at the end of a quarter to close his wholesale loyalty programme purchase and i was in a shitty mood and ultra stressed ............ and uski chik chik shuru ho chuki thi.........and for once i lost it with a shopkeeper - and i said - dekhoji aisa hai ki yaa to maaal utha lo ya phir apne poore saaal ke points to goodbye bol do.........usne to stock nahi uthaya but evers since then this statement became a part of me..........i still use it very often and its only on days like yesterday that i remember the story behind it........

such moments make me marvel at the lives that we have led and how some extremely small and insignificant people and incidents actually leave a lasting impression without us ever sparing a thought for them. 

Wonder in my eyes.....

I sometimes wonder if we ever grow up - i think our feelings and reactions inside us are still very childlike and momentary. We have just trained our minds to process that reaction - churn it through so many times that little of its originality remains. We then shape it into acceptable moulds according to our TG (sorry the marketeer within me does not allow me to use any other term) - their limits of handling enthusiasm, excitement, immaturity and ingenuity. 

But this morbid processing is not what this post is about at all. This is actually about still feeling the butterflies in my stomach before doing something new. Its about the feeling of sheer joy with every new experience and the wonder in my eyes with new discoveries........and sometimes that feeling overpowers everything else that I may be feeling.....

Very recently I experienced something that - lets put it this way - i have been obsessing about for almost 6 years.......and needless to say i was bursting with energy (for all of you who know me - think of it as around 10 times more than my usual self) so much so that i really wanted to find an open field and just scream my guts out.........it was oozing out of every single pore in my body and surprisingly in the most positive manner - not in the usual restless impatient manifestation that i am most used to.

And this day truly built my lost confidence in innocence and naivety  For a long time i have been brooding over how the 'big bad zaaalim zamaana' has taken away our innocence. How our beings are laden with social expectations.........our 'swachchand' (cant find a suitable english word for this) thoughts are layered with social acceptance and most importantly instead of becoming more articulate about "what i am feeling" we are becoming more and more reserved about them.......

But when i clapped like a little child with all the zest and wonder in my eyes about what i just did i was reminded of my first school picnic and with how much excitement i told every little detail to my mom including the tearing of the chips packet and half of it falling on the ground. And i heaved a big sigh of relief - all is after all not lost to the duniyadaari and political correctness of the world. We can still be children inside and feel that joy albeit in a few snatched away moments - but then even those act like a caffeine shot - waking u up and making you run with a new rigour........

Dilli!!!!

I am quintessential MBA types.......MBA kiya sur sabun tel ke pyaar mein chal pade bbay ki taraf......so I am part of the many million single independent women in Mumbai. The city is exhilarating ...it lives in your skin and after spending some months here you almost forget that you are not an inherent part of the city but actually more like a money plant which has been snapped from somewhere and just put in some water in a pretty decorative pot.......

And then after a few months I pack my bags with some basic things - light packing is what i call it. Though something about my packing for home always baffles me. I am usually a very meticulous traveler  I know precisely what i would need and pack accordingly. However, my packing for home is clumsy, inadequate and looks like a tornado has hit my bag. I have never figured it out. I think my mum looking at my suitcase and sighing with disgust has become an integral part of being back home. I cant think of any other reason. For my mum - her project Anupriya starts with looking at my bag and continues till the end of my trip......the crux of the project is - i need to organize her life for her - somehow clean ironed clothes, 3 home cooked meals, well organised cupboard are in her mind the golden key to an organised and sorted life

And home for me is the city called Delhi......or as i like calling it - Dilli. Delhi somehow doesn't have the heart in it - literally of course! And for me coming home is as much about the city as it is about home.......


the entire experience starts with watching the plane land......the first glimpse of the city is an ever comforting feeling.......looking for the familiar buildings and places and roads and tracking them on the plane window with my fingers is now a routine. So on my flight to Delhi I always take the left side seats (a, b or c) because the view from the left side is better - am gonna say why in a bit. So much so that i am cranky and irritated if i have to sit on the other side.


So landing in Delhi is a well orchestrated routine. The plane bends slightly while taking the turn and i get my first faint glimpse of the city lights....this is my cue to sit up straight, push my specs closer to the eyes, press my nose to the window and wait for the plane to turn completely and go ahead for 1 min - for my first familiar building - JNU library.....it is a 6 storied building and tallest in quite a large radius owing to JNU being surrounded by wilderness.......and while the plane is heading for the airport - i spend 5 mins trying to locate the other part of JNU - PSR (which was right behind the library), SPE, stadium all of it to live 1 yr in 5 mins......by this time we are almost touching down and we land with a thud......

And this is how my rendeavouz with meri dilli starts.....its now been 5 years n its just the same.....


Once here one cant help but compare one's life in the 2 cities and what would be different and what would be liked and what would be acceptable and what wouldn't be.....and i have reached a conclusion - i want to stay in mumbai n not shift to delhi (am using delhi here and not dilli coz one cant make a choice b/w the heart and a physical space)


Phir bhi once am here, dilli does something to me......its an intense and draining experience and a little disturbing too......its almost like i am living the experience and yet i am experiencing it as an outsider and a spectator.....the girl who is living it is someone i don't even recognize at times. She floats through her time here half living in reality aka present and half in a fantasy world which i don't even know if existed or could exist.

So dilli infuses this nervous, on the edge and impatient energy in me......my eyes widen with curiousity and ears open to absorbing the daily hustle bustle of a city i have known for over 15 yrs now. This is the city which saw the transformation of a schoolgirl into an independent opinionated discerning woman. And yet i absorb the city like its my first and last day here.......

Dilli also makes me break down the past 18 years into smaller time periods and see them through a microscope to find those tiny cluster of moments which i can carry back with me to a city i now call home and spread them in my house there to add some heart and soul to it. And its funny how i dig through the 18 years every time to find the exact same moments and memories - detailed to the last T in exactly the same manner and length. And at the end of it i wonder what do i actually intend to carry back with me - the rummaging through the rubble of 18 years or the actual memories.

But it is a ritual of sorts for me.....a dilli trip without this is incomplete and leaves me feeling agitated, incomplete and inadequate. I find my house in mumbai cold and dreary otherwise......


Dilli - the city where amidst all the madness i find the quietest n the most peaceful corner of my heart.......where everything except myself is a blur and stays like hat- never once threatening to become clear!

the feeling of letting things go......

I have been struggling with saying what i am going to say for almost 3 years now.....i just didn't know how to put it into words which made sense. But then i guess one sometimes needs to just get down at it and take it up as a "to do" and hope to finish it...

I sometimes wonder what people mean when they say - one needs to let go or one needs to move on. I personally find both these expressions immensely amusing. Every time i hear one of them I have a speech bubble in my head with the following scene running in them

One needs to let go - Popeye holding Pluto by his neck after popping a can of spinach and Pluto saying Let me go - Popeye one needs to let go!!!

One needs to move on - Charlie Chaplin's movie (i keep forgetting the name) where he is in a prison and the person ahead of him is fighting with the server for food and Chaplin just points to him and says one needs to move on - move it - move it!!!!

And when people say it to me they possibly see this blank expression in my eyes b'coz i am trying very hard to look concerned and agree with them but then all i can manage is not laugh uncontrollably.

For me holding on to things and events is not such a bad thing. I personally think we as people are a sum total of all the experiences we have had and our character is a like a mosaic - which is an ever evolving thing with every chip or experience that you put into it. So if this is true then i don't know where letting things go fits into the equation.

Let's take an example. Say a person gets fired from his first job. Now in his head he did everything he could to be a success and he also thought that he was very good. But then someone whose opinion mattered did not. And undoubtedly to his impressionable mind it was unacceptable and he couldn't stop wallowing about he doesn't understand why and how it could happen to him. Say this was 2 yrs ago n let's fast forward to today. This person would have had 2 choices - to let things go and to hold them in some corner of his heart and let the pain or humiliation hit him in small doses sometimes.

I think if he chose the first route he would have been happier in the short term and possibly regained confidence sooner and would have attacked the job market with a vengeance. But in this process he would have made 2 cardinal mistakes - he would have moved on from this incident believing that life had been unfair to him and  would never question his own ability. On the other hand if he wallows in what happened for a linger time and carries this incident as an important event of his life with him forever then he will think about it so many times that he will eventually know precisely what went wrong. And most importantly what to watch out for in the future.

Needless to say i prefer the second route as long as it doesn't become self destructive. I think good or bad incidents in life must be treated like a holiday. The small moments within them should be sorted through, clicked n then pasted on to an album for keepsake. And someday while you listen to your favourite music and sip a cup of tea or something stronger as you wish - you should turn the pages of these albums n laugh, cry and sometimes hate yourself ......but do always remember that you are a sum total of all those pictures put together.