NaBloPoMo Day 17: Doing Less

Just a few days ago, I chanced on this quote on the AdviceToWriters Twitter handle

Before you check #Twitter and #Facebook and do other similar tasks that get in the way of writing, write first.

TERRY McMILLAN

I remember thinking that this may be true for other people, but it won’t affect me.

Today, I realized I was being overconfident.

Today was a holiday for Kanakadasa Jayanthi – the birth anniversary of the saint-poet Kanankadasa. Despite having the entire day to myself, I couldn’t manage to write a decent post to continue those memories of Goa. Besides the usual housework and cooking, I spent some time reading, took a short nap, the usual walk, spent some time on social media, and before I knew it – the day is gone.

Often, I’ve noticed that when I have less time and much work to be done, I manage to get more done than when I have more time. Maybe for someone who’s compulsive about having to fill every moment with something “worthwhile,” learning to relax is what the universe has in store.

Today, I didn’t “do” anything much, but at the end of the day, it does seem like a day well-spent.

NaBloPoMo Day 16 : Memories cont’d…

6. Getting really angry and worked up one day when I was about 7 or 8 and shouting back at Amma. When she tried to calm me down, I ran away from her, still screaming some inanities. She ran behind me and pulled me into the bathroom where there was one copper kudam filled with water. She hefted that over my head and swoosh! The sudden flood of water rendered me speechless, and left me sputtering, and mercifully, quiet. 

7. Hanging around Amma while she washed the clothes and vessels and did the cooking. While all my four older sisters and one younger sister were at college and school, I would be alone at home with Amma because classes for the primary section in St. John of the Cross school in Sankhali were conducted in the afternoon session. Even as she did the household work, she taught me different stotraas, making me repeat each stanza after her. Till today, those are the ones I can recite spontaneously from memory.

8. The heavy, incessant downpour where an umbrella provided little succor from the copious rain. One such dark, grey, rainy evening, I waited and waited for the school bus that never arrived. Someone who knew my parents came by miraculously, took me to their house, gave me some snacks and somehow, in an age where a landline phone was a miracle, managed to convey to my house that I was safe. Somehow my savior also got news that the school bus had broken down, got repaired and would come near the school; he took me there and I reached home much later than usual, but safe. The strangest thing about that memory is my remembrance of how my feet turned totally white and went numb from being ensconced in the wet school shoe for hours together. I enjoyed all the attention, though, as my sisters held my feet in a tub of warm water to get the circulation going and slowly, the feet grew pink and touchy-feely again.

9. Being afraid of crossing paths with drunkards. One lazy Sunday evening, our neighbour’s house jeep driver turned up drunk and tottering outside their house, hurling abuses at them and the world in general. Hearing the commotion, we hurriedly rushed to see what was happening. Uncle was not home, Aunty and her two kids were alone. They just shut all the windows and doors and stayed silent without making any sound, maybe hoping he would go away after some time – which he did. Anna (We call our father Anna, not Appa – many others in our extended family do this too) was not at home either, so we too quickly bolted all the doors and windows. I remember peeping out from the corner of the window curtain, feeling a scary thrill – what if he came to our house and tried to attack us? Years later, someone told me that drunks are generally too unsteady to be able to do much and somehow, visualizing a drunk keeling over with a tiny shove from me, cured my fear of drunks for life.

10. Reading, reading and reading. I had been introduced to reading by a family friend when I was in class 1 or 2 itself. The story of this is matter enough for a separate, stand-alone post, so I won’t talk of it here. The long and short of it – I was reading Five Find Outers and Dog, Famous Five, Mallory Towers, The Secret Seven, Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys by the time I was in Class 4. That is, besides the omnipresent Amar Chitra Katha and Tinkle. To this day, when I remember some of the stories from Indian mythology, the memory comes with the vivid images of how it was depicted in ACK. Many Sundays, late morning and late afternoon would find the entire family in a companionable silence, reading – Anna with his newspaper, all 6 girls with some or the other book and Amma with her stotraa book or stitching something or embroidering a pillow cover.

Some more striking memories of life in Goa are still left – but these are of teenage and young adulthood. I will write about them tomorrow but as I end this post, am left with a realization.

Whether it was Amma’s water-shock treatment of my hysterical behavior or the positivity induced by reciting stotraas everyday, that mad behavior I mentioned at the beginning of this post, never put in an appearance again. Today, the world thinks of me as a calm, quiet person with a penchant for gently helping others sort things out. Of course, that “calm” is overrated, as the two people I live with would readily testify, but their travails are a story for another day!

NaBloPoMo Day 15 : Memories of Childhood in Paradise

My class is an eclectic mix of students from Karnataka as well as from all over the country – Tripura, Assam, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. Sometimes, when either the students or I get bored of the subject, we drift towards other topics. One of my favorites is asking them to share something about the place from where they hail, especially focusing on how that place is different from Bangalore. I have a hidden agenda in this – I hope it will help them stay fond of their roots, without getting carried away by the glitz, glamour and technology they find in this cosmopolitan city.

Sometimes, these students get around to asking me where I am from. They see me speaking Kannada fluently so probably I’m from Karnataka. But then, there is this impression that South Indians don’t speak good Hindi – which I do – and so, they’re a little confused. When I say I was born and brought up in Goa, there is almost always a collective, long-drawn, awestruck “WOOOW” and no matter which state they hail from, they all wear a certain dreamy look on their faces, almost as if they were mentally transported to paradise by my uttering the word GOA.

Different people attach different connotations to this place and the people who come from there.

When I joined my first job in a pharmaceutical company at Bangalore, my colleagues there told me they felt disappointed. Reason? When news had spread that a new girl from Goa is coming, it had led people to harbor fond hopes of having the company of a stylish Goan beauty in a mini-skirt. My arrival was an anti-climax, they said, telling me, “Look at your sober dressing style and your long hair! Ugghh, you’re more South Indian than us!”

That kind of summed up my multi-cultural identity issues – when in Goa, I never thought of myself as South Indian. When transplanted to Bangalore, I couldn’t think of myself as a Goan.

Before beginning this NaBloPoMo, when I asked for suggestions on what they’d like me to write about, a friend wanted me to write about my childhood memories and experiences during my stay in Goa. So, today, I decided to do this post. I have a feeling this may spill over into two posts, but let’s see how things pan out as I write.

Memories I have of Goa

1. The sweet and buttery smell of maskaa paav as it was being made opposite our house when we stayed in Shantinagar – I seem to have no memory of eating it or how it tasted, though.

2. The exotic mesmerizing fragrance of the mogra, jayo, juyo and surnga flowers that were to be found only during specific seasons. Especially the surnga flowers were very rare to come by and it was such a joy to see those flower strings being sold by the roadside in some remote place where you wouldn’t think anyone would pass by to buy them. But we did pass by, and we did buy those flowers. The best part was that they continued to give that penetrating fragrance even after they dried up and even if you let them lie in some unnoticed corner of the house, they would make that place smell so nice.

3. Embarrassment and shame on the only day when I was made to stand on the bench as punishment in class 3 of my convent school because I had worn some flowers in my hair and the stinging comment of the nun saying “Why have you come dressed like a bride.” Surprisingly, even at that age, in those times, somehow, I knew the meaning of the word bride and her using that word had made me cringe.

4. The dark reddish brown, soft mud that was probably left over after extraction of the ore which had been dumped in a corner of the mining colony in Surla where we lived for several years. A few of us kids had made that dust hill into our playing area, competing to see who could slide fastest down the mud. Our clothes must have gotten pretty dirty but strangely, Amma never seemed to complain about it although she washed all our clothes herself.

5. Amma washing clothes in the backyard of our house in Surla where there was a washing stone in the middle of two guava trees. We called the fruits “Peru” not guava, though. One tree bore white fruits and the other one bore red fruits. The white variety gave more fruits and once, there were so many fruits that Amma made several packets of 4 or 5 fruits each and sent me off to distribute it to our neighbours in the colony. I distinctly remember one lady not opening the door when I rang the bell, so that packet returned home undelivered. A few days later, when Amma spoke to her and recounted this incident, she said she had heard the bell ring, but thought it was some Shigmo festival people and therefore, not opened the door. I remember thinking how foolish of her to assume that because Shigmo people always came in a big group and made a lot of noise, so you knew it was them and it was very different from just the bell chiming.

I'm forced to stop here now because its dinner-making time, but will get back to this same topic tomorrow because there are many more memories coming to the fore even as I write.

NaBloPoMo Day 14 : Children's Day Out

I attend a weekly class to learn Sanskrit. Yesterday, during the class, while explaining some concept in a lesson, Vasantha Ma’am spoke of something that I took to be an insightful tip for parents. She was explaining how her father used to take the kids out to Lalbagh or Cubbon Park every Sunday – it was their special day to go out and also spend time with their father whom they otherwise rarely saw because he left early in the morning and returned late in the night. Sounds quite similar to many of the dads today in high-pressure jobs but Vasantha Ma’am is a retired bank official who took to Sanskrit learning and later teaching; so her childhood means we’re talking of around the 1950’s.


When they went to these public gardens, the kids would love to look at the several flowers and one or the other of them would reach out to pluck a flower. Then, their dad would tell them, “Oh yes, go ahead and pick the flower. Now, you will pick one, after sometime someone else will, every day a few people will pick the flowers – so, by next Sunday, there won’t be any flowers left. So, there’s no need for us all to come to this place, let’s just spend the day at home.”


Vasantha Ma’am said that when explained in that way, they would listen to him because for one, it helped them understand that they would destroy the beauty of the garden and also, there would be no Sunday outing. She compared this way of getting kids to listen to you with what some parents tell their kids: “Don’t do xyz because Daddy/Mummy/Aunty/Uncle/Police/some other authority figure will scold you.”


In my own experience too, I’ve found that explaining the logic behind something always ensures my son’s compliance with a regularity that’s missing on the few occasions when I use, “Because I say so.” Of course, now that he’s in his teens, using the latter is a sure shot way to flag rebellion and I don’t bring it out except on the rarest of occasions.

There are many other things I’ve learned from observing other cool parents, my own experience and a study of parenting books. I’ve shared some of those in this talk I presented at the Annual Day Celebrations of a Playschool in Bangalore in February this year. Do check out this video – would be great to hear your thoughts in the comments section. Suggestions, feedback, questions – all welcome!

NaBloPoMo Day 13 : Making Quotes Work for You

Ever since WhatsApp has made its appearance, many of us probably wake up to good morning messages from family and friends. Sometimes, we may receive the same message from many people or through many groups. At other times, a message you sent someone comes back to you from the same person but it’s alright; after all, isn’t it the thought that counts? Besides, if your messages are coming back to you, it’s probably an indication that you share a similar mindset, which again, is cause for joy because like-minded people are not that easy to come by.

But this blog post is not to talk of WhatsApp messages as such. It’s more about what we can do with those positive thought messages and how we can actually harness them for growth.

One thing I’ve found useful is to make one of those image quotes into my display picture. Judging from the response I get, it seems like there are quite a few people who draw inspiration from such pictures. That reminds me – I’ve actually written an entire blog post on this topic.

But what I want to share today is a trick to make those quotes work for you. Pick any one quote that strikes you as relevant to your life. Then go ahead and look for occasions where you can adopt that particular thought in your day. For example, let’s say you have this quote in mind:



That’s easy..the quote itself tells you what to do and when..so watch out for instances when you get angry, or feel stressed, tired or in doubt and then do a simple, slow mental count of 1 to 10. This pause will help you grow calm and give you a better perspective of things. Most of us already know what events cause us to get angry or anxious or stressed. So, all you need to do is tell yourself that when this happens, you are going to pause and count 1 to 10. Act on this decision for a week or so, and you’re bound to notice some tiny level of change in your responses. Keep at it for another week, a month and the changes will be more impactful.

Whichever quote you choose to act upon, make it a point to look at it about 4 or 5 times in a day. This mindful reading will send the message deeper into your subconscious and create a strong impression that prods you to act on the thought.

Say you’ve picked this quote


The gist of the quote is “let things go.” So, whenever you find yourself harping on something, stop. If you catch your mind going over an event that went wrong, stop. You can even visualize that event or thought as a small bubble that you blow gently away saying, “Go, I don’t need you.” Watch that bubble go farther and farther away and finally grow very small and disappear. When you do this repeatedly for a few days, you will notice that the thought has stopped bothering you.

Words and images evoke a strong reaction from our unconscious mind which has a tendency to grip strongly at things. By making our mind intentionally and repeatedly focus on positive thoughts and words, we provide it with an easy means to grow more positive.

NaBloPoMo Day 12 : It's All About Attitude

Take a look at this image. Read it twice if necessary. Let the message of the headline sink in.

Now ask yourself this question. What was the defining factor that pushed one guy into performing a destructive act and another guy born to the same parents to reach out for excellence?

While the nature versus nurture debate rages on, incidents like this go to tilt the scales in favor of the latter. It is reasonable to expect that both guys had the same parents and were nurtured by the same parents, in the same environment (unless there is a back story we don’t know). But what of the mental and emotional environment each one created for himself by his thoughts, words and actions?

The stark contrast in their outcomes drives home an important lesson – that ultimately in life, success is spelled A.T.T.I.T.U.D.E.

People define attitude in different ways. The psychologist Jung calls it “readiness of the psyche to act or react in a certain way.” This is succinct and clear enough for us to understand.

The way we react or respond to situations, events and people is what defines our attitude. Building a positive attitude can make all the difference between achieving what you set out to do and staying stuck in the same place.

If you get into an emotional state that works to keep away the results you desire, you can safely assume that you have an attitude problem.

Remember when you see quotes like this?

• I may be wrong, but I doubt it

• My attitude is based on how you treat me

• I’m not always right, I’m just never wrong

Did you laugh reading them?

I did – because they’re so apt in some cases. 

But I also realize that I cannot let them dictate my responses to every single situation.

When I realize that -

• Maybe I need to evaluate what I’m doing wrong

• Everyone is entitled to having their own opinion even if it doesn’t match mine

• Perhaps I need to re-think on this issue

• When things go wrong, I need to take them in my stride - and move on 

- that is when I’m on my way to developing the right attitude.

NaBloPoMo Day 11 : What Are We Turning into?

A few days ago, traveling by a city bus after long, I was struck by the fact that most of the young people had plugged earphones into their mobiles and were either talking to someone, or listening to music. In the middle of that bundle of humanity within the bus, each was lost in her or his own universe.

In college I notice students reaching for their phones the minute they step out of the classroom or the lab, hurriedly trying to hide it from the view of a teacher who passes by. Suddenly, this tiny little device has become a lifeline to the thrill that was supposed to arise unaided during this exhilarating period of life.

As I walk in the park, I see youngsters relaxing on the benches, in the companionable silence that comes from each one in an almost meditative trance, lost in enjoying the sensations emanating from his or her mobile phone.

Visit some national monument, or a popular public place, the movie multiplex, the shopping mall or even the temple, and you are sure to chance on people more interested in clicking selfies on their phones than in experiencing the beauty of where they are and what they’re doing.

I’ve written about this before (towards the end of this post), and although it’s been more than a year since that, I l find it saddens me just as much.

I’m all for using our mobile phones to make daily life easy – paying bills, booking tickets, ordering food, shopping, communicating with people, working from remote locations, sharing things with the world etc etc. But when our youngsters become inseparable from their phones, feel lost without them, and suffer withdrawal symptoms when they have to exit their virtual world, it indicates a severe malaise of being unequipped to cope with the realities of the actual world.

This image aptly conveys our situation today. However, the quote is wrongly attributed. It was not said by Albert Einstein, but appeared in a 1995 movie called Powder.