Monday, September 26, 2005

Sonia goes to Gitex

Went to Gitex. What an absolute waste of time!

The place is HUGE, so I just got to cover just one hall.
Got loads of brochures, several bags to carry it all in, a few dozen business cards, hundreds of enthusiastic handshakes, and a million plastic smiles to boot!
I went with this colleague of mine, (let’s call him J) who has been going for years and loves it (he’s really weird, and not just cos he likes Gitex)!

We’re walking together, and I’m asking him something and suddenly I see him smile like he’s discovered his long-lost brother and he runs to this guy.

Hey yar Srikanth!!! How’re things?
Slow man, slow! It’s been a slow start.
Yeah?
Yeah man, slow! Slow!
Slow huh?
Yup, slow!


Just I start to tune off this scintillating conversation, Srikanth suddenly notices me standing beside J. “Heyyy! Is this...” he says, with a (un)knowing smile.
(OH Noooooo! Don’t tell me he’s actually linking me & J romantically! Yeeeeeeeeeeeeuuuuccckkk!!)

Arrhem, this is my colleague, Sonia, J corrects him, before he can put his STOOPID thoughts into words.
Thanx for the intro J, about time!

Enter me, with bright plastic smile on my face and murder in my eyes.

Howdedoo? My handshake has an extra firm grip to it.

Err…sorry…err... fine! Kinda slow actually!
(Yeah, I see that, but I wasn’t asking about your mental capabilities, numbskull!)


I saw two Filipino dancers doing a promotional dance for Canon (wonder if they come free with the purchase!) and also a fake David & Victoria Beckham (you know, the look-alikes). Duplicate David (DD) could have made a more authentic Moose Miller (from Archie comics). And Vicky-wannabe was wearing a pair of sunglasses (yeah, inside the building) that covered half her face, so you couldn’t make out who she was supposed to be anyway. She might as well have claimed to be a Britney Spears look-alike!
Wonder what they were doing there!
Canon needs a new marketing manager!

Three excruciatingly boring hours later, we headed back to the office. We had to wait for awhile for the taxi, cos everyone wanted one, and there was this looong line. We finally got a cab, but we got a maniac of a cabdriver (what were the odds of that happening to me?!!) who kept banging the window cos he couldn’t close it!! I had made the mistake of asking the man (who seemed perfectly sane till then) if he could switch on the AC. That’s when I realised that the AC was already on, but his window was open. He blamed it on the circuit, tried ALL the buttons, making all the other windows open and close, and even opened the car door (I’m NOT making this up) and kept banging the door and window with all his might to get the damn window to close. No luck! Obviously.Damn window wouldn’t close! All this when we were stuck in traffic! I watched as signals turned from red to green and back to red! Cabby was oblivious to all of it and totally frustrated with the window not closing. And the window remained stubbornly stuck, until he gave up! Then when we were driving along at snail’s pace (traffic was BAD), the window suddenly closed, on its own!!
Sheesh! Me thinks teenage ghost has haunted that car!
We finally got back to the office an HOUR later (the ride usually takes 15 mins).I got home late & with a killer headache! :o(

Can’t believe I’m going to have to do this AGAIN tomorrow!

Oh yeah! I forgot to mention, it wasn’t all bad.
I got a job offer! :o)

Thursday, September 22, 2005

still...

I’d always wanted a younger sister.
I still remember I used to have an imaginary sister I used to play with when I was 4 years old!
And finally, finally after waiting for three looong years (time goes slower when you’re a kid), I got my wish when I was seven. I got my sister.

I remember when mama brought her into the house, she was sleeping. Mama laid her on the bed and left the room and I was all alone with my baby sister. She was so small! So small and so pink! She looked so delicate, and she was too! I couldn’t help but kiss her, ever so gently, on her forehead. Just a touch of my lips, that was it. But her forehead turned red, like a bruise! I got so scared! I thought I had hurt her. And I panicked and when mama came I denied everything.
I didn’t do anything mama, not a thing!
I didn’t even touch her!
Mama laughed and said it’s ok to kiss her, just that she’s delicate, so be careful!
I loved her so much! I was so damn proud of her! And she admired me so much! I was her chechi (elder sister) whom she loved and adored.

I left when she was 10. But even when she turned 15, she still loved me and valued my take on things. She loved hearing me talk about college and work and all. She used to call me and tell me she missed me.

But all that’s changed.
Now, she’s this self-assured female, 17 going on 25, who has no idea where she’s going, but makes sure it’s wherever she not supposed to go!
Now I’ve been shortened to chech, (when she’s in a good mood).
The look of adoration has been replaced with scorn.
The family is an embarrassment to her.
She only wants her ‘friends’.

I know it’s cos she’s at that age.
I know she doesn’t mean it.
I know she still cares.
I know!

But it just hurts so damn much when she says “I hate you”.

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Mere Soundarya ka Raaz??

I hate lux. I’ve never bought it and I never will. It’s too harsh on my skin.
But it’s been there for 75 years and if they need to hire the likes of Aishwarya Rai , I guess they’re doing pretty well on sales too.

That’s why I don’t understand why they’re doing this !
I mean, the product is famous enough as it is, it doesn’t need more publicity by having to resort to desperate measures like this!

I doubt the people who don’t buy the product when Aishwarya endorses it gonna be swayed by Shah Rukh Khan thrashing in the tub.
I mean, come ON! Would women prefer to have skin like

Monday, September 12, 2005

Sometimes...

I'm so tired of being here
Suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
'Cause your presence still lingers here
And it won't leave me alone

These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase…


I was listening to this song (by Evanescense, My Immortal) as I drove to work today.

And I relate to it so much that I just hate myself.

Friday, September 09, 2005

Any Comments ?

I thought it best to explain things in another post rather than reply to comments. I had wanted to explain more about what happened in the last post itself, but thought it would be way too long. So here goes.

V: :o)actually he (apparantly 'it' was a guy from Korea) seemed more angry than attracted to Indu. Dunno why though, and everything was ok till then. It didn't seem angry till Indu came into the room, but after she came in the coin was fairly flying from one letter to another. And we could somehow feel the anger, which is why we got scared. Indu actually got a fever that night, but she was okay in the morning. And we never did another seance in my room again!

Zerish: no it wasn’t. the temperature remained the same. We didn’t notice anything.

Silverine: 1) we cut up paper into bits and wrote the alphabets and numbers on them and arranged them in a circle. We also wrote the words ‘yes’ and ‘no’ , cos it was easier that way. We asked more close-ended questions. And actually you don't even need that. The damn coin is moving by itself right? Ask it to move towards you if the answer is yes or something. You just need the alphabets for more detailed answers.

2) I was told that we need at least 3 people to conduct the session. Initially that was the case with us too. But later on just my friend Sarah and I could do it by ourselves. But only me and Sarah,no one else could do it with just two people.
And also, you can email me now. Check my profile. :o)

Keshi: My friend who had done it before ( but had vowed never to it again, so just instructed us how to do it) told us to concentrate on “ Come holy spirit”. I want to stress on the fact that by “holy spirit” we did NOT mean ‘The’ Holy Spirit, but just any good spirit , preferably from heaven! But ALL of the ones who did come said they were from hell. ALL! We asked about heaven and hell and eerything but got very vague answers.

1. I do NOT have sixth sense, I’m not psychic. Just random things like the ones I told u about which I’m sure pretty much anyone will have. But I did tell you about the freaky connection I had with my friend, well, that friend is Sarah.

3. Yes, we had to maintain the connection all the time. We were pretty worried when Indu knocked on the door. Cos we didn’t wanna be caught by the warden, but we couldn’t break the connection by removing our fingers either. That’s why we asked the ‘spirit’ who was knocking.

And Now I have a question for you. When did you see a spirit? If you’ve written about it, please send me a link. Your archives are way too many for me to search through!


Joker: lol! Nothing to be scared of yar!

Rahul: You can. But I wouldn’t advise it. We stopped doing it cos we couldn’t explain what was happening and we were getting too obsessed with it. Me and Sarah that is. So we thought it best to stop. And we could do it too easily, which freaked us out.

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

Crazy but True

Keshi’s post reminded me of how we had conducted a séance at the hostel. We didn’t have a real ouija board, but we made do with writing the alphabets in a circle and putting the coin in between. The first time we did it, we had to concentrate for about half an hour. And we kept fidgeting and giggling. But finally the 1 rupee coin started shaking.

Now I know that most of you are not gonna believe me, but the coin really did move. I swear! I’m not saying it’s a spirit from the other world or anything. There’s precious little I know about the supernatural. But I know that somehow that coin moved.

We called several ‘spirits’. The first time we did it was during the day, and then cos we were so excited with the results we did it again at night, and it got a bit ugly. We were doing it in my room since my roommate (a Tamilian) had gone to another room. Tamilians have this weird habit (at least the ones in my hostel did) of rolling up their mattresses and placing it in the corner of the bed everyday (yeah, those mattresses were so thin they could be rolled). So her cot was the perfect plain surface where we could all sit comfortably and conduct the séance! We had locked the door and we were all asking all sorts of questions about death and heaven and hell and stuff, when somebody knocked on the door. So we asked the spirit who was knocking. And it spelt out my roommate’s name! I-N-D-U. We opened the door there she was, my roommate! We were amazed. But then suddenly the coin started moving again, really fast this time,

F-U-C-K-I-N-D-U.

That’s when started to get scared.
Indu, poor girl, was terrified. She couldn’t understand what was happening (she didn’t understand English very well), but the fact that there was an angry ghost on her bed was enough! We all got worried and tried to make the spirit go away by chanting “Go Spirit, GO!” After that everyone else left the room except for my friend Sarah and me.
It was all over.
But I looked at the coin, still on the bed, and I don’t know why, but I touched it. And Sarah did it too. And the damn coin started going round in circles! We didn’t know what to do, we just asked it to go away again, and this time round didn’t check to see if it had gone.

We didn’t sleep that night. But the next day, we were still alive and found it all really cool. We did it several times after that. It became easier and easier to make that coin move. Initially 3 people were required, but ( I don’t know if it’s cos we did it so often or not) Sarah and I could do it, just the two of us. But only the two of us. If two other people tried it, then it wouldn’t work. Dunno if all that had anything to do with it, but we just kept doing it all the time, and kept asking silly questions to which we never got straight answers.

We stopped doing it cos we decided that we didn’t understand enough of what was going on. You’re probably sceptical. If the tables were turned, I guess I would be too! But it happened.

Sunday, September 04, 2005

So Tired of Hating.

Hate working just for the money.
Hate smiling just to keep everyone else happy.
Hate living someone else’s dream.
Hate worrying about what’s gonna happen to me.
Hate worrying about what’s gonna happen to my family if I do what I want to do and just leave.

Hate me in Dubai.