Life after death!

I look forward to the last Sunday of every month because I get to meet my best buddies from school… over a meal, movie, bowling or shopping – that is never decided beforehand. We always meet at my place and then decide according to the mood! So there we were, lazing on my couch… chatting about how our lives had turned out, catching up on the new and reminiscing about the old… when I casually asked “What happens when you die?”

Silence prevailed for a few moments. Everyone knows there is heaven and hell, that we are reborn, that we get a human life after many other lives, etc… but we still wanted to know exactly what happens. So we decided to explore… and suddenly became children all over again, dancing with excitement as we had found our agenda for the day!

We jumped into our Tata Safari and set off on our 300 km journey to Souliland. You must be wondering… that if it’s a place accessible to man, the knowledge of life after death must be publicly available. The catch lies here – once you enter Souliland, you become Amir Khan – not literally – but you experience what Amir does in Ghajini. The memory of whatever you see in there is completely erased once you leave. Nevertheless, we wanted to go and get answers to the questions in our minds! 

We reached Souliland at noon. We were very excited! There was a single castle, that looked a little like Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movies. We expected to see something that depicted heaven and hell – may be a sparkling white land on one side and a dark sight on the other. People being treated like kings, with angels all around them... or some being fried in a large cauldron by demons!

I don’t remember what we saw in there, but I do remember what I felt when I came out – as if the Gods had given us a message to take home: These days, both heaven and hell are found on earth itself, you don’t have to wait to die to experience it! If you do good, you get good - you attract good things for yourself for this life and the next… If you do bad, your life will become hell on earth, sooner or later…

We might not have found an answer to our question about what happens when we die… but we did find out how we should live while we are alive… that life is a circle - you will get back what you give :)

Shopping in 2030

I wake up to the sound of my phone buzzing. I have a new notification. ‘Reminder: Alumni meet today.’

Damn, how could I have forgotten the most important event of the year for every girl? A single platform to flaunt your latest size zero figure, your expensive designer outfit, your Gucci’s, your Prada’s, your Jimmy Choo’s and your recent promotion to corporate Vice President. You want to be the envy of every other girl out there, who by the way, is looking to do the same. 

Even though I have a perfectly stocked versatile wardrobe, nothing seems good enough for tonight. I quickly instruct my laptop to switch on; of course it recognizes my voice very well. It springs to life almost instantaneously. 

In this age of electronic cash, all your purchases are made by a single card with a single identity worldwide and webwide. There is a single login ID for every site – your UIDAI number! So eBay knows that you bought a Louis Vuitton from Singapore last month and Flipkart knows that you bought a tee shirt from the store next door last Saturday. More importantly, your purchases over the last decade are no secret! So whenever you login, the stuff that you are most likely to pick is displayed right on top based on your recent purchases from both brick & mortar and online store, worldwide.

So I login to eBay and quickly choose a few outfits. Now I need to decide what looks best on me before I leave for work. How, you ask. With their Virtual trial experience J A 3D representation of the outfit emanates from the screen and you can position yourself in front of the laptop so it looks like you’re wearing the dress. I look at myself on the webcam and I decide that the colour is too dull for me. I pick another outfit and it looks wonderful. 

I purchase it immediately, lest someone else picks it up before I do. It will be delivered by evening. After work, I get dressed and pick out matching accessories. I can’t wait to see everyone’s reaction at the reunion. 

I hear my phone buzzing again. Wait, this time it’s the alarm. It’s 7 am and it’s only 2013! Guess I got confused between thirteen and thirty in my sleep… Right now, the only single identity we have is to login to any site using our Facebook accounts! :D And sssh... no one knows that I splurged on that designer gown even though it was not on sale.. ;)

The perfect moment!

This picture was taken from my office a few days ago. What a beautiful view of the sun setting.. I went back a couple of minutes later and this perfect view was gone. It was still very beautiful, but just not as awesome. Even earlier today, I happened to catch glimpse of the sun just before it set, bright reddish-orange in colour.. glowing! A second later, it was gone!

It just made me think, how important timing is, in our lives. One moment early, or a moment late, and that moment has passed. The effect is just not the same. A word of encouragement said at the right moment is worth more than a few hours' of motivational lectures when it's not needed. A smile or hug from a friend when you're feeling blue, will offer more solace than a river of comforting words later.

Just a thought. :)

Tucked in! :)

The best feeling in the world - being tucked in bed with a rajai early in the morning, not wanting to move at all - even to reach out to the AC remote to switch it off, listening to the rain outside.. The loud thunder, the gentle pitter patter of rain drops.. and the feeling that the weather outside is much better than it actually is, 'cos your room's cold :D Feels like heaven, doesn't it?

Just when you feel like you're in dream land, reality strikes - your alarm rings and you have to wake up and get ready for work. You'd rather go outside and get drenched in the rain!! It's high time the work from home option got introduced! Aah well. At least you had a beautiful start to the day! :)

Interesting phenomenon! :)

You learnt a new word while reading a book. Now, that word seems to appear everywhere!

You randomly read about a certain event last week. Yesterday that very event was the topic of discussion at your team lunch. And today, you've received an email about it from some random source!

You heard about this company that your friend works for, which you had never heard of before. Suddenly, the name of the company seems to be in every article or magazine you read! And to top it all, you realise that you actually cross this company on your way home everyday, but never noticed!

Do these instances sound familiar? Atleast to me, they do! And it's actually a widely discussed phenomenon. (I can't recall the name though!)

Anything new you come across, starts crossing your path again and again! I used to wonder why this happens, and how it's possible! It then struck me, that it's no big deal, it's just got to do with how the human brain works. It's not like you wouldn't have come across the new term earlier, but now that it has come to your notice, you pay attention to it every time you hear or read about it. You would not have spotted it or realised that you had seen it earlier, 'cos you didn't know about it!

The best part about this phenomenon - now that you've read about it, be sure that you'll come across it somewhere else, very soon! ;)

It happens only in India :)

We often complain about a lot of things that aren't alright in India. Sometimes we wish that India was more developed and that things were better or more organised. But behind all the imperfections lie certain experiences that we all truly cherish... some of which make life a little more exciting!

We complain about the bad roads and water logging in the rainy season... but don't we have memories of paper boats, playing in the water and taking a ride on the road just to see the water splish-splash? We complain about not having electricity at times... but do we not have memories of having unexpected candle light dinners with family, making shapes with our hands and projecting them on the wall? Where else can you make a local call for as low as 10p/min? Where else can you still buy a toffee for 50p? Where else can you play cricket on the street and get away with situps for breaking your neighbour's window? We complain about infrastructure... but where else can you find a handy cobbler or tailor right across your house on the street, in every locality? Where else can you say that the yummiest chaat is the roadside chaat? :D And on a lighter note, even if you are late anywhere, you can always blame it on the traffic ;)

We might have a lot of things that need improvement... but there are certain other things that we cannot find anywhere else in the world :) I love my India :)

Names changed on request!

You must've have come across this phrase while reading articles in a magazine or newspaper. Usually, when it is a real life story with certain personal or embarrassing details, the actual name of the person isn't divulged and another random name is used. At the bottom of the article there is one single note for all the changed names as the newspapers have to mention it to ascertain it's genuineness. Hence, when you read the article, you go with the flow and you don't care about the names used, 'cos even if the names are common, in all likelihood you wouldn't know the person mentioned in the article. And you don't care.

That makes sense.

But many a time I come across articles where the sentence goes like this.

"Ramya, an electrical engineering student from BITS (name changed on request), was walking back to her hostel after class when..." This would probably be followed by a few other people whose names had been changed and this would be mentioned in brackets for every name changed, all in the same article.

I find this a little stupid, and frankly I don't understand the purpose of mentioning it every time, instead of just writing it once in small print at the end of the article. Somehow I find myself concentrating more on the names of the people than the incident itself while reading the article. And then I start commenting on why they had to use such a weird name, with a pseudo initial as well! There are so many nice and pleasant names, but no, they find the most obscure names on the planet and print it.

Just a random post - I'm just amused that at times, I concentrate more on the names than the actual important content in the article. ;)