Moved

I have moved my blog to here. Wordpress gives me more options to play around with my blog, and seeing as I have little else to do with my time these days, I like having those options. 

Now here is one random Facebook test (right, like YOU'VE never taken any) that I completely agree with. Except the agreeableness part, maybe. I'd say I am almost 80% agreeable.

Oh I love this Joseph. And I love you.

Carpets

After a series of completely avoidable flight-related mishaps, I decided to not let Murphy get the better of me on my flight back to Madrid from Amsterdam. Frustratingly enough, Murphy knew my game, and the ONE flight in years that I decided to arrive a whole 2 hours early for has gotten delayed by 5 hours. Which means here I am, at the Amsterdam airport, with 7 hours to kill and not a clue about how to kill it. The floor I am sitting on is cold from the snowy chill that is creeping in from under the doors and windows at the airport, rendering the central heating somewhat ineffective. Due to an utter lack of foresight, I decided not to carry my notebook charger in my hand bag, which means in about 2 hours I won't have this notebook for company anymore. 

Some time back, I had written a post about how starved I was for a good conversation. I enjoy talking, and I enjoy listening - which is why few things give me as much joy as a good conversation. Our minds are a jumbled mess of hundreds of thoughts triggered by thousands of seemingly insignificant moments. Like right now, the clicking of a woman's heels as she walks past me has made me wonder why women associate this wearing of heels, this voluntary sacrifice of balance, with sexiness.Why is their precariousness their source of confidence?

A good conversation helps to untangle this giant ball of many colored thought strings. It helps me pull out my favorite colored strings, and weave a carpet of conversation. This untangling, this choosing, this weaving, is the magic of a conversation - I can see my own thoughts laid out in front of me, in a geometrically shaped fabric of different colored hues. And more often than not, I experience moments of awe and surprise at the beauty of my own thoughts.

 

I have recently had the pleasure of having several long, interesting conversations with someone I know. I wove my conversation carpets with gay abandon, and he wove his, and we spent hours like this, weaving and being woven for. 

And now a lot of my thoughts, and some of his, are lying in my head, neatly rolled and stacked one upon the other. And just like that time when you found yourself in a busy marketplace in Istanbul, maybe the next time you meet me, I'll ask you excitedly, " Carpets, do you want carpets? I give you very good price."

Pictures

Thank you, Ru, for this post. For months, I have grappled with the frustration of wanting to capture a perfect moment on my camera, but being able to capture neither the moment, nor the perfection, and then not being able to articulate this frustration. I have blamed the camera, the light, the subject, and sometimes myself. But it was mostly not being able to talk about my frustration that was driving me batty. My happiness with this post then is on two levels : a) that I am not alone in this frustration b) that Ru did such a damn fine job with the expression of this frustration.

Since my entire vocabulary is about 300-odd words, notice that I have used the word "frustration" around a dozen times. No, online thesaurus wasn't of much help.

List of Things to Do - II

The reason why I put these lists on my blog is because I hope someone other than me will read them and maybe remind me about them when they see me ( Hey Rohini, so did you end up doing the Mt Faber trail that you mentioned in your to-do list?)

1. Learn to cook the perfect pasta (Grazie for the inspiration N.S, G.A, M.B - I won't let you down, I promise)

2. Become a coffee connoisseur

3. Clean up my Ipod ---> this is on an ASAP basis.

4. Watch an animated movie, preferably in 3D. I need to regain my sense of wonder.

5. Stop planning trip to Disneyland, Orlando. Disneyland is lame, and I have to get over it.

6. Save money to buy bridge camera. Also throw present excuse for a digital camera off the Vidyasaagar Setu (Oh Calcutta, you always have the right infrastructure for me.)

7. Stop saying Další zastávka. It's getting tiring now.

8. Make a to-do list for the new year (will include learning how to drive a car, how to play a violin/guitar, getting that bungee jump out of the way, traveling to China)

9. Wear my hairband with the giant reindeer horns to the supermarket (it is the season to be jolly, no?)

10. Read poetry

Is That Too Much to Ask For?

I don't want comfortable silence, I don't want polite chitchat, I want one interesting conversation. Yes, just one.

I don't care who you are, or where you come from. I don't want to know what kind of pets you had when you were growing up, or how many times you have watched Citizen Kane. I don't have to know what kind of music you like, or where you vacationed last.

Come now, engage me, intrigue me. Make me forget to look at my watch, stop my eyes from wandering. Cause the waiter to politely remind us, for the fourth time, that the place is closing . Make me wish we were walking away from the street I live on, instead of towards it. Tell me things I didn't know, ask me questions I had never thought of.

And when it's finally time to say our goodbyes, make sure it's the best time I ever had, just talking to someone.

Is that too much to ask for?