A day in the life of my "smart" phone

As the sun's first rays strike my shiny display, i brace myself getting ready for that familiar vibrating sound to resonate through my core... The neighbor's dog's barking as it usually does at this time of the day... The doorbell rings, Ah! must be the milkman... Perfect timing! Any min now!... 

Any sec now!...... 

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Whats wrong??? Where is it...that familiar SOUND?? Why isn't it ringing?...

A cool breeze blows through my bedroom window, brushing my bangs out of my face. I hear the soft chirping noises of the sparrows and the sweet cooing of the cuckoo from the tree beside the window. A gentle smile spreads across my face. I slowly open my eyes and shield them with a quick gesture of my hand from the tender sun's rays. Slowly I get down from the bed still yawning... I head out of the room, humming my favorite tune, to get started on the wonderful day ahead of me......

WAIT!!!... Plug me in! It's time to charge!!


As I take off from my garage, I look towards the usual place where I keep my mobile and realize with a broad smile that it isn't going to accompany me today.

 No missed calls to worry about,
 No checking the phone anxiously for an awaited sms or cal from someone,
 No beeping reminders,
 No to-do alerts,
 No checking for remaining battery power wondering when and where next to charge it,
 No  involuntary, random unlock-lock cycles to check the time.

I decided to go old school today on purpose just to get a feel for how life could be without my phone. I have to admit that life is a lot more peaceful without all that constant ringing and beeping. For the first time after a looong while, got around to completing most of the tasks I set aside for the day without any interruptions or without procrastinating.

True, smartphones make life a lot easier with the many useful apps that enable us to get laborious tasks done in a jiffy. But it's very easy to get caught up in all the smartphone hype. According to a study,

On an average, people check their phones 150 times a day or every 6.5 minutes looking at the time, skimming emails, downloading a game, thumbing through photos. Add to that attention span an average 41 apps per smartphone, and you've got a recipe for a distracted disaster.When handset owners aren't tapping their touch screens, they're watching television on their phone (168 minutes per day), using mobile apps (127 minutes), or browsing the Web (70 minutes).

Hmmm...looks like we can't live without them. Can't live with them either!
So I've decided to go without it atleast one day a week. What about you?

360

Life truly goes on a full circle. I was going on with my chores today and I couldn’t help notice how life changed for me n my parents in these 21 years… and I found myself smiling… J

Earlier, when I was a kid, my parents used to help me get ready for school… Now, I do the same thing for their offices…

Earlier, my mum used to pack my lunch… Now, I do the same thing for them…

Earlier, she wouldn’t let me go without finishing my breakfast… Now, I do the same thing to her…

Earlier, my dad used to drive me places… Now, I drive him around…

Earlier, my mum used to pick up all the things I left in a hurry to school… Now, I do the same after she leaves…

Earlier, she used to make refreshments for when we got home… Now, I make them…

Earlier, I used to sleep early… Now, they sleep early… J

Little things like these are all it takes sometimes to bring up that beautiful smile on our faces… J

Hachiko

I've never really been a pet person. I felt like having a pet few times but the feeling wasn't too strong coz the inspiration always evaporated even before the time i gave it a serious thought. But lately I've taken a liking towards dogs in particular and today this liking turned into something more than just that.


The reason?... well today's the day i came to know about Hachiko through the movie Hachiko: A Dog's Story... 
And if you ask what's so special about this movie... I guess I would just ask you to watch it in case you haven't had the chance to watch it till now. It's based on the true story of a dog named Hachiko ... a name today synonymous with loyalty. It's the tale of a dog which never ceased waiting for its deceased master (or friend i would say). 

Dogs are known for their loyalty: This I heard. A Dog waiting its entire life (nearly 10 years) for a master that was never going to come back: This I never thought I would hear leave alone believing...

HACHIKO ( November 10, 1923 -- March 8, 1935)

But after watching the movie I was astounded and deeply moved emotionally. Made me wish too badly for such a dog... Being able to have such pure a relationship is nothing short of ecstasy. 


I usually believe tears to be very precious ...I shed them very seldom in my life and this happens to be the only movie till now that made me literally unable to fight back my tears... dint find any point in trying to fight them back. 

And yet again...It's easy to miss something you're not looking out for

Some time earlier, I was on this southern India tour and Kerala was one of the places that I happened to have fortunately visited. It's one of the few never-to-miss-out on things in your life. The beauty of the place is truly breath-taking. Every place is an exotic scenery of its own kind. And the best thing is you don't have to travel a lot to find that picture perfect scenery.  Just a peep through your home's window or a casual evening walk to the end of the lane in which your house is located would suffice.

These were a few such picture perfect moments of nature during my stay there...

The last place we visited was the beautiful temple of Sri Anantha Padmanabha Swamy in tiruvananthapuram.

 This temple had a history dating back to early medieval times. The temple gave its name to Kerala’s state capital Thiruvananthapuram. ‘Thiru’ ‘Anantha’ ‘Puram’ means Sacred Abode of Lord Anantha Padmanabha. It was an enormously magnificent temple full of exquisite granite pillars and erotic sculptures. The main idol of the padmanabha swamy looks something like the one below except there are three doors separating the view into three parts:  Face of the Lord and Siva Linga underneath his hand in the first door, Brahma seated on lotus emanating from the Lord's navel along with the "Utsava moorthi" and deities of Lord MahaVishnu, Sreedevi and Bhoodevi in the second door and the Lord's feet in the third door.

But the most amazingly hidden fact all this time since many hundreds of years was that there were six secret chambers underneath the temple that held highly unimaginable amounts of precious stones and ornaments. An excerpt  on the actual findings goes...

  " Archeologists say the current estimation of the value of the articles found in the temple vaults may not be realistic as they could fetch fancy prices in auctioning. The search yielded gold idols, golden crowns, 1,200 gold chains, numerous golden staffs, golden plates, sacks of gold coins of 1732 vintage, diamonds, including Belgium diamonds, and precious stones, rubies and emeralds. It turned out to be a virtual treasure trove with gold coins dating back thousands of years, gold necklaces as long as 18 feet and weighing about 10 kg, about one tonne of the yellow metal in the shape of rice trinkets. 536 kh gold coins, 16 kg of gold coins dating back to the East India Company period, three kg coins from Napoleon's era, 16 kg Travancore gold coins, precious stones wrapped in silk bundles besides small elephants made of the yellow metal, rare sapphire stones and more than 2000 rubies. Coins from other princely states like Vijayanagar Empire and European countries have also been found which might be part of the gifts received by the rulers of the time. The coins also reflect on the revenue received by the royal state through its maritime spice trade. Besides there were heap of ornaments, stone-studded crowns, vessels, platters, lamps, solid gold objects and a wide range of other curios of immense heritage and intrinsic value were found out."


It was said that these treasures were stored in the secret chambers by the then Maharaja of the travancore empire, Sri Marthanda Varma in order to meet the contingency plans and disaster recovery in case Tipu Sultan proved to be an imminent threat to the kingdom. It was a well known fact that Tipu Sultan had already been raiding many of the northern kerala temples by then.

Raja Marthanda Varma

Not for one second did anyone of us, who were there in that temple that day, imagine that we were standing right above all those precious things at that very moment. True, that treasures have been found through out history, but to be there at the very place and to not realize that sometime down the future that would be the exact same place where enormous treasures would be found... is something incredible!

Pencil???... Paper???

And I always thought I knew everything about the innocent-looking pencil...
Well turns out I was wrong. Initially It sure was surprising to find out there are numerous varieties of pencils but never really thought I would use most of them ever in my life. But Whoa!... varieties of paper??? okay, agreed they look and feel different but never knew that would effect the overall texture of the portrait in a dramatic way. Apparently, the more the so called 'tooth' a paper has, the more rougher the paper is. It is this tooth that catch the graphite or charcoal particles and give the portrait that amazing texture.
Things are going great as far as the portraits are concerned. Learned a good deal of stuff through each of the portraits that I've sketched. It's an art that requires a lot of inspiration and a great deal of concentration to get that photo-realism. So it's like getting better at two things at the same time... for one, you get to improve your concentration levels and for other, you get to learn a lot of small things that make a great deal of difference to the realism of the portrait.

Here are the recent ones...

Sketched one of my sis :)... this was the first one with people i knew 

And i got around to using charcoal for one of them and the outcome was quite surprisingly good actually,...

The Life Altering Day

One day… just one small day left of my college days… and along with me, it’s the same last day for a bunch of others who attended the same college I did… And as I sat thinking about tomorrow… the day that’ll mark the change in each of our lives, it struck me like a thunderbolt: Perhaps this’ll be the last chance I’ll ever get to say all those things I’ve been meaning to say…

Everything will change as we take the last step towards the end of this journey and the beginning of a new destination. Lots of uncertainty will surround each of the decisions we’ll take from tomorrow. But no matter what, the decision lies in our own hands… whether we chose to continue along the same way we travelled, or to take a newer path. No one can guarantee how that path’s gonna be… we’ll have to experience it for ourselves, just like we experienced these 4 years.

Many things happened these 4 years which moulded our personalities in ways we can never imagine. Be it a friendly chat with our adorable friends; a boring class that we attended but managed to entertain ourselves by making fun of others (well, generally the person who stood on the dais! J ) ; a new opportunity that we dared to explore for the first time (the fest); the smiles on our faces when we successfully managed to have our lunch when a serious class was going on; the many hours we kept staring at our watches during the never ending classes to while away the time, somehow wishing it were 2.40 :p ; the sense of excitement we felt at the sound of a bunk; or even a heated argument with our classmates,…

All these did have an effect on us in some way or the other… they managed to change our attitudes and our perspectives in ways we can never imagine coz none of us can believe what we have become at the end of this 4 year long journey. We have all lived so many experiences together, learning about each other… exploring the many different personalities we came across along this path.

I may have seemed different to different people, but all I would like to say is that I never meant to hurt anyone’s feelings. Maybe I’m not like everyone, but I’m grateful for what I’ve become because of the various experiences I got to encounter these 4 years. All I can wish for now is for all of you to have bright and brilliant futures. Hope each one of you fulfils your dream. And finally hope you all FARE WELL in your lives!

ALL THE VERY BEST!

Second Chance

"Life is always about getting up one more time than you are knocked down."

Things happen... things always do happen... while some things make you feel good, some others don't. Well, some others may even crumple you, send ripples through your heart, hurt you or even tear you apart.
No matter how much you may wish with all your heart that those pages don't ever appear in your life's book, they are what they are: an inherent part of your amazing life's journey that have hidden lessons to learn from. Sometimes, the flowing gust of wind may accidentally flip the pages back to those that hurt you the most.
We may very much wish to hide those pages by dismantling them... but there'll always be a counterfoil left out somewhere which acts as a painful reminder of the past. One thing is crystal clear for sure: what already happened cannot be undone. There may be hell lot of people who say that everything happens for a reason...blah blah blah... but you know clearly well that they are just tryin to make you feel better coz even they cannot undo the past,...n it isn't wrong to have a feel good factor in troubled times...But why bother about why it happened when nothing can be done even after knowing the reason?

So once you've accepted that fact, the next thing to do would be to grab that second chance that life offers once in a while. There's a reason why 10:10 (or any other time in the day as a matter of fact) appears twice on the clock everyday: it's life's way of showing that there is a second chance for everyone.
It is how we use that rare second chance to mold the future that really does matter the most,- that chance to start over all over again, that chance to show that you've learnt life's lessons, that chance to do things right this time.
And everyone should grab this second chance not just to show others, but to show themselves of what they are capable of doing, to prove to their own selves that given a second chance they would never commit the same mistakes again.
But taking second chances means taking the path less trodden, but once you risk taking it, u'll never regret your choice again. I'm already on this path and am finding it quite amazing myself, starting over again, and doing all the things that i alwaaayz wished i would do. And for this I should say that you need people who support you and respect your decisions n this post'll be incomplete without thanking alll my friends from the bottom of my heart. I can't tell you how much of a help you guys have been to me in the most difficult of times: u r d best!