The Enchanted World

"Wingardium Leviosa" - in the first few books (dont quite remember which book exactly), that was the spell that left me enchanted. And through the seven books that is one spell that has permanently attached itself to my memory. The other i guess is "Patronus".

Both the spells, primarily because of the connotations they have.The first because it lifts things up into the air.The second coz it drives dementors away. The second one i find particularly interesting.Dementors are these faceless, soul-less, creatures that bring with them everything thats dark, gloomy and sad.And then they suck your soul out..so you're left a soul-less forever. They take away with their presence everything happy, pleasant and worth looking forward/back in life. So akin to some people we meet in life. "Patromus", now is a very difficult and at the same time powerful charm to produce. One needs to concentrate wholeheartedly on a particularly happy memory and create with the swish of his/her wand a silvery creature that drives away these harbingers of darkness. Again so akin to things we do. Dont we muggles( non-magic, common population of the world) also do the same? Concentrate on the good to block out the not-so-good. 

I've always maintained that the Harry Potter series, inspite of being very magical is not meant only for the 'kids and retired' like someone once said. Throughout the journey, through several complications the magical story draws several parallels to life. One who understands nothing but hatred and victory never in history has understood or overpowered those that understand the powers of love...thats again a basic theme of the series.Though Harry Potter i have lived a major chunk of my childhood. Sirius Black has been my first ever superhero fantasy (though my superhero eventually dies, unlike most traditional ones). The movies i think made an entire mess of the magnanimity of his character. I remember one night when i was in my early teens, my mum rushing to my room at 3:00am because she heard me howling...only to find out that i was reading the chapter where Sirius dies, and hence was (only) lamenting the great loss to the magical population.Sigh...

Harry Potter, in its several magical ways has always been very close to reality for me. Its also been a way of living several fantasies, very contradictorily though :) The bonds, the love, the friendships, the goodness, all hopes of an utopian world that we've all had at some point in life or other, found not only cinematic but also breathing space through the series. I think thats one of the major USPs of the book. Every book comes with some or the other disappointment, both to Potter and to the reader. The books are not  hopelessly optimistic.
But each book in its lill ways, through its victories and disappointments tells the reader that life is not perfect and more essentially leaves the  reader hooked onto hope. Hope for a better situation, better world, better tomorrow; hopes that we all have anchored within us sometime or the other...I do not know if in life magic exists but like Mrs Weasely once said, "It just needs a lill magic"...

To the land of the white sand...

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blurred vision...

I haven't been back in a while, for reasons more than one.Assignments and movies have kept me busy.Thank God for that, for we all know, an idle mind is a Devil's workshop.Several things have been crossing my mind this morning;told you, an idle mind IS a devil's workshop.

Someone once said, " If we peel off enough layers, everyone is the Devil"...and yet again someone else said. "There really isn't any black or white, its all shades of grey"..I guess its only the shade that distinguishes one from the other. The other day i was watching a movie "Seven", and yet another day i was having a conversation about Ram Jethmalani, not only defending, but also vehemently insisting that Manu Sharma deserves a fair trial, in the Jessica Lal murder case.If it were upto me,things would be different. A case where an entire pub witnessed a model being shot by a man, because he was refused drinks past the closing time, should have been crystal clear. I wish it were. Justice. But thats a utopian world that i'm dreaming for. Aparently time has a different tale to tell.Thats when i asked "So are u telling me that anyone with money, who can buy off witnesses and afford a great(read cunning and clever) lawyer, will go scott free, inspite of heinous crimes ? Is justice then only for the ones who cannot afford it?"

The serial killer in the movie Seven, killed people who were, according to him, slave to one of the Seven Deadly Sins.Who gave him the right to? Maybe, the society which needs puritive practices from time to time to wake them up from the perpetual slumber we seem to be in. However in a civilized society again, this is uncalled for.It is acceptable for a man to force sex unto his wife, solely because he is the husband, but its utterly shameful for a couple to be in a live-in relationship. Strange times, stranger society...

Right and Wrong are increasingly becoming difficult to assume.I always thought that life comprised straight lines: and straight lines be it. They are somehow beginning to blur.

mindless ramblings,or maybe not that mindless...

i wonder what is it...i somehow cant put my finger on it...but somehow its making me very unhappy. i made a promise to myself a while back...that i dont deserve to be unhappy, n a very trusted friend had told me that our lives are usually as simple or as complicated as we make them...so it is a matter of choice...but again i think of the 90-10 principle too...is the 10% unhappiness/complications enough incentive to throw away the 90% happiness...maybe not...

I hate being in an emotionally vulnerable situation...especially if my emotionally vulnerable situation is being taken advantage of...suddenly my happiness seems to depend on someone else, n that isnt something i quite approve of,leave alone wanting to be party to such an event...but then again i have never been successfully able to deal with emotional dependence/intervention in my life...be that my parents, my friends, my partner...anyone...i generally tend to close myself in such situations....sarcasm becomes an automatic defense,hence...especially situations where i know i was wrong, accept my mistake n am apologetic for it.I dont like people rubbing it in (tithi, thanks for never doing that, inspite of the numerous chances u had)..we all make mistakes dont we...at least i do.i have always hated anyone telling me "I told you so..."...makes me feel like someone has more control of my life than i would like them to...i agree i've done things i shouldnt have,said things i shouldnt have either, but havent we all??...i have forgiven people...infact if my memory stands by me, i have forgiven every single one who has wronged me ...people who according to humanity standards shouldnt have been forgiven at all..forgiven, but not forgotten !! So i guess, its but natural that i expect similar(if not same) things from others...but i guess it is expectations that fucks things up, n royally too...For all my big talk about not expecting things i do, i very much do...not that i'm too happy about it...and the worst part is that the more comfortable you become in a relation, any relation for that matter, the more are your expectations...again, parents, friends, partners..none escape... the more naked you are in front of people, the more you want them to come cover you up, to come hold you...the fuck up is that if it is one of them you have hurt, they want to get back at you too..perfectly justified...but again, did we all not vouch perpetual love??? so the choice always comes back to either survival of self or self depreciation to let emotions win...difficult choice, but your choice all the same :)

i imagine

and i fly...

i distance myself

and i cry...

the embraces enumerate

what i never said

the tears, the fears

the memory gradually fades

the lights dims

and all the way it seems

another story

another unspoken glory

i turn around and ask

who is it staring back?

who is it wearing the mask?

memories blur...

essentials turn sour

the emotions sway

overtaken by a tranquility of today

i turn back and ask

who is it and what is it that you want

the images turns to me and say

since when did you have the right to betray?

beneath the ruins

the lucidity of thoughts

the necessity of being

an urge that overpowered

that today empowers...

the silence echoing

with sounds unheard

the valley lies uninhabited

like a dead city calling out

the flashes of anger,

of hurt,

of love,

floats amidst the clouds

and disappears

shelled in its cocoon

trapped in its own expanse

the soul that escaped

etched the memoirs of its time

closed are the gates now

the curtains are drawn

what lay beneath the emptiness

was never defined...

tO Be Or NoT tO bE...

I have been wondering what it takes to be yourself... a few disapproving glances, a few shushed whispers and probably risking a few out aloud too. But if that is all that is at stake why are we so often overshadowed by the need for accepatance, the need for approval..from our parents, friends, partners and so on.. some seek acceptance of a much larger group, whilst others choose to be satisfied with smaller groups. However this need for acceptance exists in all..or maybe i'll say in those i have observed, so as to avoid making a very strongly opinionated statement. I think this to a large extent could be attributed to the way one is brought up, the environment and the general mindset of the people he/she has grown up with.I mean, for most of us, being one among the others has been fine tumed into our systems. So very often i remember my mother saying, ' but she did this...'...but is taht enough reason for me to do the same thing too? What scares me is that sometimes this need for being accepted amongst the others becomes so strong that it somehow blocks our vision to such a large extent that we shy away from standing up for what we stand by.Sometimes the pretence become so strong and prolonged that after a while it become difficult to distinguish the 'you' from the 'pretence'.While so many other times, it creates a defence mechanism in people where they shun the crowd, pre-emptively because thats the only way they can avoid the hurt of being shunned. That again is pretence, if i can say so, however this one directed more towards self-preservation and survival(of the fittest).How often has it happned that before raising your hand in confirmation of something, you have looked around to first check how many other hands are up. We humans have a natural tendency of complicaating relations. It would have been so much easier if we just let another person be. That doesnt mean we conform to their views forgoing our own, but all the same can we not accept the perso for who he/she is.We so often try to change our partner's or our friend's behaviour, though we always knew who they were.We so often want to love a person for who he/she could be, though we fell in love with who he/she was.Every person is entitled to their views, to their own lives in the exact way they would like it to be. If someone tried telling me what i should do, n how i should live my life i would tell them what to do with their 'piece' of advice, then i wonder why would i want to impose my way? Each one of us has the right to like/dislike things/people around us. then why this need for political correctness? Again this question brings me back to my original question of the need for acceptance.But again, does the ability to look yourself in the eye and smile, not mean more than anything in the world ?

wayward thoughts...

Random thoughts, often clutter my thinking space...the necessisty of being comes very essentially in that.however as it usually is like with me, taht too doesnt come baggage-free...it brings along with it several contradictions in me.Like my immense necessity to have as well as to crave. The need to be completely in control at times, whilst at others to let my hair down like nobody's business.Like the fierce need for independence alongwith the intense desire to belong. Like the need to be kind coupled with an overpowering need to be a bitch.Contradictions that often freak me out. Contradictions which tell me that the deeper i delve into me i find a new unexplored horizon of existence altogether.But it wasnt designed to be taht way, or was it? well again, you wouldn't expect any better from a complete narcissist, would you?
But keeping the self reprimands for later,aren't contradictions inherent in every existence? On one thought i want to pour my heart out, on second thoughts i do not want to become so vulnerable that one can use that against me.So one is on the guard agin, but sometimes, being on the guard do we also miss out on things that could have been worth-a-while? Do we sometimes miss out on people, because we were too busy being guarded ? Another question that immediately follows suite is , well if we are doing that, isnt that solely to protect oneself from getting hurt? Or is it that in our need to not get hurt, to survive and to survive happily we persuade ourselves to believe who we are not? But then again how do we decide how much to open up and who to open up to? who to give a chance to and who not to..Answering these questions wouldnt be all that difficult for you, if you were Tithi, but then again, it is me, so you can well imagine why the prolonged expression of utter confusion. Well i guess with time we all learn, but how do we learn to tell when it is time...One may say its important to maintain a balance, a suitable, convenient balance.But isn't this very definition of balance very relative too?

Saluting the rootlessness...

I've been down and
I'm wondering why
These little black clouds
Keep walking around
With me
With me

It wastes time
And I'd rather be high
Think I'll walk me outside
And buy a rainbow smile
But be free
They're all free

So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home
So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home

I look around at a beautiful life
Been the upperside of down
Been the inside of out
But we breathe
We breathe

I wanna breeze and an open mind
I wanna swim in the ocean
Wanna take my time for me
All me

So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home
So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home

So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home
So maybe tomorrow
I'll find my way home...

Maybe tomorrow, maybe day after, i WILL find my way home...

Changing times

Haven't been back blogging in quite a while now.Finally, like zoe's blogs, mine too start with the same line. each one of them in fact...well a lot has been going on....

I sometimes wonder how easy and difficult it is to make connections...with people, with objects, with things so very much at random...u see a painting , and u instantly know taht it is what u were looking for...on the other hand you may know people for ages, you may have grown up with them, but after a while you just know that connection doesnt exist any more... and tahts what gets me wondering...if its so easy to lose that thread that connected you to another soul, to any random object , to an abstract idea, then how do we explain the attachment which comes so naturally as a part of the liking?

Is all attachment temporary ? I've heard, and am sure, so have you, that Change is the only thing constant, but do we ever set ourselves by that? If we do, then why do we resist change so much?One possibility is probably that we get so accustomed to what we have, so comfortable around it...that we sometimes refuse to open up and see what lies beyond that, or maybe after that...With a very pragmatic view to what is, what has been, and what will be, the lesser we expect out of life, out of ourselves, and out of others, the easier and the more adaptable our existence becomes...and so it continues to be.What will all highs and lows life shows us, within the span of a single day, its strange and sometimes amusing too (i.e. if you are not subjectively involved) to see the way we react to the unexpected..be it good or bad...but who said life was a bed of roses..guess we just always want/expect the best/better/good things...well where do all the bad/worse/worst things go then???

And what does not kill you, only makes you stronger... :)

Bombay beginnings

Bombay isn't treating me too well...this is the third day that i was travelling alone after mum left, n i already have taken the wrong train twice!!! plus i have a very very hard time figuring out where the ladies first class is going to be.Plus theres the rain.Its been raining continuously ever since i came here. It rains every waking moment.It rains every fucking time i decide to step out.Its really ridiculous.Now i'd heard a lot of things about the Mumbai rains!!! good things really...things like oh! its so very romantic...Yes, if you are sitting by the sea, at Marine drive and have no worries about travelling in the locals with the vile people around you,for an hour, before you get home...Yes, it certainly is a very romantic thing. But not all that great a thing when you are stuck in between ten thousand other people, pushing and shoving to breathe peacefully, on a dirty slippery platform/train...whatever!!! I was just telling someone today that if it rained like this back home, in kolkata, for two days at a stretch all activities would come to a standstill, schools, colleges, n even offices at times...!!! People here though really seen completely undettered by it. n by that i mean completely! But its also nice in a way to see how life goes on, undaunted, despite everything in Bombay.Probably thats why people say the Bombay spirit!!! am still to catch a hang of that spirit.Hope it doesnt take me too long

i am returning for my second post after a day's absense. one would be wondering that someone who has so recently created her blog, n her first one at should should be a lill more excited than that. trust me, i am...just that yesterday was a long long day...had classes from 10 in the morning, so had to wake up at like 8.. and not being a complete night person that i am you can imagine what a feat it must have been.Anyway, the day at XIC was really interesting...am glad i chose to come here.Our first class was on the basics of radio...quite interesting actually.By the end of the month we have to make our own radio show...should be fun!!! that apart we had a class on presentation skills. a vey fruitful day indeed. by the end of the day, our group won in an activity conducted n i think all 6 of us in the group realized we are perfect ekta kapoor's "saans bahu" material...ar at least good at creating such matertial :P Anyway mum had to leave after that, but her train got cancelled....thanks to the maoists...!!! so we did a lot of shit and finallly got her up on another train later that night... i hope she reaches home safe :) Was a lill down after that, coz from here own i am completely on my own here, with not too many friends to brag about.Lets see how it goes n from here. Wish me luck

New beginnings

This is my very first post, of my very first blog, in a new city...also wrote my very first article today. am glad :) Am starting classes at XIC tomorrow... looks like this new city has brought with it many new beginnings... looking forward to more of this newness...