Monday, August 20, 2007
Hi Vinod
She sees he is trying to come back.. Welcome, she sighs, it's her life to do as he pleases. If it gives him a sense of fulfilled power to stomp, so be it.
Monday, August 06, 2007
From Focus on the Family
Something I found online from a group called FoF. It's about the Song of Solomon, the only part of the Bible that I truly love to read. Obviously because it's the sexiest....
"your breasts are like gazelles,
twin deer feeding among lilies..."
"his thighs are columns of alabaster
set in sockets of gold"
Here's what FoF says about the Song:
"My lover is mine and I am his. Song of Songs 2:16
These are words of belonging, words that for an engaged couple can generate tender imagining and anticipation of what life together will be. Lived out by a married couple, these words can hold together in intimacy what much of the world seems to determined to break apart. Intimacy in marriage, sexual and otherwise, was created by God and is to be fought for, delighted in, and fiercely guarded.
To yield to one another sexually in marriage is to step into God-created intimacy that takes us out of ourselves and into places where the walls can crumble and we can be tenderly vulnerable and real. ...
We must be willing to fight for intimacy in our marriages and to fiercely guard it. We fight for it by being attentive to each other’s hearts; by yielding to God in a way that allows us to more easily yield to one another. We guard it by being intentional, considering what pulls us from intimacy and stepping away from those places, considering what brings us life and stepping deliberately into those places.
My lover is mine and I am his; we long to belong. Marriage, as a coming together before God, offers a sense of belonging . While the vulnerability that intimacy brings is sometimes hard or scary to step into, it is such a wonderfully holy place that God gives us, a place of delighting in one another . "
"your breasts are like gazelles,
twin deer feeding among lilies..."
"his thighs are columns of alabaster
set in sockets of gold"
Here's what FoF says about the Song:
"My lover is mine and I am his. Song of Songs 2:16
These are words of belonging, words that for an engaged couple can generate tender imagining and anticipation of what life together will be. Lived out by a married couple, these words can hold together in intimacy what much of the world seems to determined to break apart. Intimacy in marriage, sexual and otherwise, was created by God and is to be fought for, delighted in, and fiercely guarded.
To yield to one another sexually in marriage is to step into God-created intimacy that takes us out of ourselves and into places where the walls can crumble and we can be tenderly vulnerable and real. ...
We must be willing to fight for intimacy in our marriages and to fiercely guard it. We fight for it by being attentive to each other’s hearts; by yielding to God in a way that allows us to more easily yield to one another. We guard it by being intentional, considering what pulls us from intimacy and stepping away from those places, considering what brings us life and stepping deliberately into those places.
My lover is mine and I am his; we long to belong. Marriage, as a coming together before God, offers a sense of belonging . While the vulnerability that intimacy brings is sometimes hard or scary to step into, it is such a wonderfully holy place that God gives us, a place of delighting in one another . "
Thursday, August 02, 2007
rasam reminder
My fave comfort food, best paired with potato roast. Must remember to try this version:
Simple ( no dal) Rasam
Cumin 1 ½ tspCoriander seeds 3/4 tspRed chilli 1Garlic 3 pods crushedBlack peppercorns 3/4 tspTomatoes – 2 ( each cut into 8 pieces)Mustard seeds – 1 tspTamarind ( in the size of one small lime)Curry leaves 5-10nosAsafoetida – 1 pinchJaggery – ¼ tspSalt to tasteOil - 1 ½ tspChopped cilantro 1 tsp
Dry grind Cumin, coriander seeds, black pepper, and chili. Soak tamarind in 1 ½ cups of water. Heat oil in a deep cooking vessel, splutter mustard seeds, add crushed garlic, curry leaves, ground spices, jaggery and Asafoetida. Sauté for a minute, add chopped tomato and stir well to mix. Stir in the tamarind water; add 2 more cups of water. Boil for 8-10 more minutes. Add chopped cilantro. Remove from fire. Keep it warm.
Simple ( no dal) Rasam
Cumin 1 ½ tspCoriander seeds 3/4 tspRed chilli 1Garlic 3 pods crushedBlack peppercorns 3/4 tspTomatoes – 2 ( each cut into 8 pieces)Mustard seeds – 1 tspTamarind ( in the size of one small lime)Curry leaves 5-10nosAsafoetida – 1 pinchJaggery – ¼ tspSalt to tasteOil - 1 ½ tspChopped cilantro 1 tsp
Dry grind Cumin, coriander seeds, black pepper, and chili. Soak tamarind in 1 ½ cups of water. Heat oil in a deep cooking vessel, splutter mustard seeds, add crushed garlic, curry leaves, ground spices, jaggery and Asafoetida. Sauté for a minute, add chopped tomato and stir well to mix. Stir in the tamarind water; add 2 more cups of water. Boil for 8-10 more minutes. Add chopped cilantro. Remove from fire. Keep it warm.
Travel and the human function
I first went to the Southern Hemisphere three years ago.
Two years later, June arrived once more with the school holidays while summer seared the northern hemisphere. Yet in New Zealand, it was the start of winter, neither skiing season nor flowering spring. The airfare matched our alleged third-world budget and covered the country's North and South Islands. So we went south again.
New Zealand is where weary Indians aspire to migrate after American and Australian options close. It is also home to friends who had survived Singapore's pigeon-holes and high road pricing for 12 years. Staying with them would save us motel charges on the Auckland leg.
With borrowed woollies and a pair of jeans, we arrived at Singapore Changi airport, two Indian families who had met a month ago. The children were excited about the kids' meals and I was gathering up all my reserves of sensitivity toward other Indians. I had abandoned those five years ago when we moved out of Delhi.
It's 9 pm and I am warm, blanketed and belted, thinking of nothing but snow.
Then I hear the Air New Zealand steward comment, "Wise choice," when a passenger refuses dinner. Old conversations and comparisons of airline menus are rendered futile in that moment. Why, I wonder, had we all looked forward to in-flight meals when they are plastic caricatures of food? Why did in-flight manuals advise eating light while the steward hands you a tray filled to the brim?
It was wise indeed to avoid it, but the Singapore Girl would never mention it. She is the acquiescent icon of bow-backed SIA service. The Kiwi steward is tall, blond and unafraid to denounce his employer's offering. Did that come in a package?
4 am comes by. I'm awake, straining my neck to watch a grainy Julia Roberts on the wall screen. For all the service, I miss personal screens and remote controls. With kids on either side, I am not sleeping. I imagine that it is blissful to be like Tharun, small enough to sleep flat on one seat, head on my lap. Precocious child with an attitude, he delivers these rare moments when he does not brush me away.
Triya and I need to work on us as well. Perhaps I should apologize for that being an afterthought, if she ever reads this.
The Pacific flanks the runway when we land in Auckland the next morning. Though I had longed for it to be vast, blue and the largest ocean ever, it is muddy with dwarf waves. An atrophied tail of the ocean, says Hyma, our long-lashed hostess.
Friends whom we had no time to meet in Singapore prove to be warm hosts. Father, mother and sons are at the airport to welcome us. My delight at seeing Hyma again is tempered by my sensitivity to Fauzia, our female companion who has never met Hyma but is now her guest.
Auckland disappoints. Like every other city, I want it to be better than the last one I have seen. The immigration officer, Clark, is a bright cheery spot. He chats with Mahesh and Fauzia, our travel mates. When Clark asks him what he would most like to see, I whisper to Mahesh. Mahesh passes on my message that I hope to see some hunky Kiwi men. Clark sings out, "You're cool," while I replayed memories of Aussie cheer three years ago.
Parts of the airport are being renovated and contribute to the congestion. It is a land of few people and large crowds. It's not cold enough for all the layers on the children, though it rains at the drop of a beanie. If only it had been dry, I would have settled for colder.
Clark is the lone New Zealander who shares with us something other than room rates, menus and directions. No one wants to add to our two-family noise.
We seem to be driving the same routes a dozen times. In the days before I started being observant so as not to be caught out by male perfection, I would not have known that. Now I recognize landmarks and remark helpfully, "We're lost. Came this way before."
We pick up the rental car, lunch at our hosts' home and drive out looking for a live volcano at One Tree Hill Park. One Tree Hill is filled with several lush trees, their welcoming arms dripping with all-day downpour. And cows and sheep.
In India, wandering cows signify our blind Eastern tolerance. In Caucasian country, even on exile ground, they are tres pittoresque.
The sheep are sheared and are no fluffy symbols of peace. "Cows! Just like the ones on milk cartons," exults Tharun, "but why are the sheep gray?" We sigh at them all through a miasma of rain.
My soul partner, love of my life, throws up on the side of the car. At the next pump, we re-fuel and the friendly attendant hands Mahesh the hose: "You might want to clean up." Flabbergasted, Mahesh ends up cleaning his friend's puke in a story which he - and I - will tell many times over.
Two years later, June arrived once more with the school holidays while summer seared the northern hemisphere. Yet in New Zealand, it was the start of winter, neither skiing season nor flowering spring. The airfare matched our alleged third-world budget and covered the country's North and South Islands. So we went south again.
New Zealand is where weary Indians aspire to migrate after American and Australian options close. It is also home to friends who had survived Singapore's pigeon-holes and high road pricing for 12 years. Staying with them would save us motel charges on the Auckland leg.
With borrowed woollies and a pair of jeans, we arrived at Singapore Changi airport, two Indian families who had met a month ago. The children were excited about the kids' meals and I was gathering up all my reserves of sensitivity toward other Indians. I had abandoned those five years ago when we moved out of Delhi.
It's 9 pm and I am warm, blanketed and belted, thinking of nothing but snow.
Then I hear the Air New Zealand steward comment, "Wise choice," when a passenger refuses dinner. Old conversations and comparisons of airline menus are rendered futile in that moment. Why, I wonder, had we all looked forward to in-flight meals when they are plastic caricatures of food? Why did in-flight manuals advise eating light while the steward hands you a tray filled to the brim?
It was wise indeed to avoid it, but the Singapore Girl would never mention it. She is the acquiescent icon of bow-backed SIA service. The Kiwi steward is tall, blond and unafraid to denounce his employer's offering. Did that come in a package?
4 am comes by. I'm awake, straining my neck to watch a grainy Julia Roberts on the wall screen. For all the service, I miss personal screens and remote controls. With kids on either side, I am not sleeping. I imagine that it is blissful to be like Tharun, small enough to sleep flat on one seat, head on my lap. Precocious child with an attitude, he delivers these rare moments when he does not brush me away.
Triya and I need to work on us as well. Perhaps I should apologize for that being an afterthought, if she ever reads this.
The Pacific flanks the runway when we land in Auckland the next morning. Though I had longed for it to be vast, blue and the largest ocean ever, it is muddy with dwarf waves. An atrophied tail of the ocean, says Hyma, our long-lashed hostess.
Friends whom we had no time to meet in Singapore prove to be warm hosts. Father, mother and sons are at the airport to welcome us. My delight at seeing Hyma again is tempered by my sensitivity to Fauzia, our female companion who has never met Hyma but is now her guest.
Auckland disappoints. Like every other city, I want it to be better than the last one I have seen. The immigration officer, Clark, is a bright cheery spot. He chats with Mahesh and Fauzia, our travel mates. When Clark asks him what he would most like to see, I whisper to Mahesh. Mahesh passes on my message that I hope to see some hunky Kiwi men. Clark sings out, "You're cool," while I replayed memories of Aussie cheer three years ago.
Parts of the airport are being renovated and contribute to the congestion. It is a land of few people and large crowds. It's not cold enough for all the layers on the children, though it rains at the drop of a beanie. If only it had been dry, I would have settled for colder.
Clark is the lone New Zealander who shares with us something other than room rates, menus and directions. No one wants to add to our two-family noise.
We seem to be driving the same routes a dozen times. In the days before I started being observant so as not to be caught out by male perfection, I would not have known that. Now I recognize landmarks and remark helpfully, "We're lost. Came this way before."
We pick up the rental car, lunch at our hosts' home and drive out looking for a live volcano at One Tree Hill Park. One Tree Hill is filled with several lush trees, their welcoming arms dripping with all-day downpour. And cows and sheep.
In India, wandering cows signify our blind Eastern tolerance. In Caucasian country, even on exile ground, they are tres pittoresque.
The sheep are sheared and are no fluffy symbols of peace. "Cows! Just like the ones on milk cartons," exults Tharun, "but why are the sheep gray?" We sigh at them all through a miasma of rain.
My soul partner, love of my life, throws up on the side of the car. At the next pump, we re-fuel and the friendly attendant hands Mahesh the hose: "You might want to clean up." Flabbergasted, Mahesh ends up cleaning his friend's puke in a story which he - and I - will tell many times over.
The State of Busyness
I began this essay on the assumption that 'business' was the noun form of busy.
It was triggered by a former classmate who alleged that I was accumulating”several new friends and not sparing time to maintain old friendships. To him, I almost said the dreaded words - “I'm busy” - before I remembered my promise never to say them. I have decided that those are the rudest words in the English language. They do not come second to the four-letter words that my nine-year-old has picked up and which I no longer forbid. They are, very simply, the rudest.
Claiming that I am busy implies that I am physically capable of using time, but that time is reserved for issues more important than the person I am speaking with. It is equivalent to saying that the other person is not my priority.
Now this works very well in a taut business relationship where I am itching to put the other person down, step on her and thus climb a few inches higher. That, of course, is the state of global business as we have shaped it. If she and I were humane persons, I would state specifics - whether I will look at her file now, later or never. Everyone is supposed to be busy. Must I state the obvious?
“The world is moving so fast these days that the one who says it can't be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it,” said Harry Emerson Fosdick, an American clergyman. Every professional, entrepreneur and labourer knows that too. Thus they hurtle from deadline to deadline, barely making it home in time for dinner if someone has cooked it. Two software engineers whom I know get home nine hours before I have breakfast. That leaves them enough time to bathe, cook, do laundry and sleep. They also eat, if they can squeeze it in somewhere there.
The cataclysm occurs when those words reach home. I found myself saying them to my older daughter one morning while I was preparing the family breakfast - not instant cereal: we are still simble unprocessed Malayalis - and packing everyone's lunch. She was trying to tell me how she and her friends had started laughing the previous day over something very trivial and they couldn't stop laughing all afternoon. She had not found time to talk to me the previous evening as I chased her through her bath, tea and homework...Then we had had guests and hurried through dinner. She was still laughing at it the next morning but not having prepared for the day as usual, I was frazzled and told her, “I'm busy. Can't you just eat your breakfast and get ready?”
The laughter died out and her lips tightened. That evening, I asked her how her day had been. She shrugged her shoulders and sighed, “It was okay.” That shrug said I had blown my chance. With a pre-teen, it spells conversational disaster.
Bertrand Russell observed that people were working such long hours that they were too tired to enjoy active and civilising leisure pursuits, so they fell into passive forms of recreation - going to the cinema, watching sport or listening to other people play music as opposed to playing it. He suggested more liberal arts education and more leisure for a more creative, fulfilling and contented life. He also suggested a four-hour week, but that was 1932. Saying it now is blasphemy.
Seventy six years later, people say they are concerned about the lack of balance in their lives, but seem powerless to do much about it. For instance, we are usually powerless about switching off the television when a guest has arrived. When we have told the guest on the telephone how busy we are, but he still arrives, we must continue with our busyness.
To those who protest that they are only busy doing useful stuff, I quote Tagore: He who is too busy doing good finds no time to be good.
That reminds me. I don't have time to write more as I'm busy. I apologise for my rudeness.
It was triggered by a former classmate who alleged that I was accumulating”several new friends and not sparing time to maintain old friendships. To him, I almost said the dreaded words - “I'm busy” - before I remembered my promise never to say them. I have decided that those are the rudest words in the English language. They do not come second to the four-letter words that my nine-year-old has picked up and which I no longer forbid. They are, very simply, the rudest.
Claiming that I am busy implies that I am physically capable of using time, but that time is reserved for issues more important than the person I am speaking with. It is equivalent to saying that the other person is not my priority.
Now this works very well in a taut business relationship where I am itching to put the other person down, step on her and thus climb a few inches higher. That, of course, is the state of global business as we have shaped it. If she and I were humane persons, I would state specifics - whether I will look at her file now, later or never. Everyone is supposed to be busy. Must I state the obvious?
“The world is moving so fast these days that the one who says it can't be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it,” said Harry Emerson Fosdick, an American clergyman. Every professional, entrepreneur and labourer knows that too. Thus they hurtle from deadline to deadline, barely making it home in time for dinner if someone has cooked it. Two software engineers whom I know get home nine hours before I have breakfast. That leaves them enough time to bathe, cook, do laundry and sleep. They also eat, if they can squeeze it in somewhere there.
The cataclysm occurs when those words reach home. I found myself saying them to my older daughter one morning while I was preparing the family breakfast - not instant cereal: we are still simble unprocessed Malayalis - and packing everyone's lunch. She was trying to tell me how she and her friends had started laughing the previous day over something very trivial and they couldn't stop laughing all afternoon. She had not found time to talk to me the previous evening as I chased her through her bath, tea and homework...Then we had had guests and hurried through dinner. She was still laughing at it the next morning but not having prepared for the day as usual, I was frazzled and told her, “I'm busy. Can't you just eat your breakfast and get ready?”
The laughter died out and her lips tightened. That evening, I asked her how her day had been. She shrugged her shoulders and sighed, “It was okay.” That shrug said I had blown my chance. With a pre-teen, it spells conversational disaster.
Bertrand Russell observed that people were working such long hours that they were too tired to enjoy active and civilising leisure pursuits, so they fell into passive forms of recreation - going to the cinema, watching sport or listening to other people play music as opposed to playing it. He suggested more liberal arts education and more leisure for a more creative, fulfilling and contented life. He also suggested a four-hour week, but that was 1932. Saying it now is blasphemy.
Seventy six years later, people say they are concerned about the lack of balance in their lives, but seem powerless to do much about it. For instance, we are usually powerless about switching off the television when a guest has arrived. When we have told the guest on the telephone how busy we are, but he still arrives, we must continue with our busyness.
To those who protest that they are only busy doing useful stuff, I quote Tagore: He who is too busy doing good finds no time to be good.
That reminds me. I don't have time to write more as I'm busy. I apologise for my rudeness.
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
It's becoming quite important to feel clean to feel sexy...And it gets harder and harder to feel clean when priorities are to feed, clean and clothe three dependents and the house before doing all that to me. So when I act cold, it means that I'm not feeling cleanly sexy, not that he's unattractive..saying that reminds me, I'm hungry(but I must cook before I eat), I'm dirty(but I first need to clean house before I bathe, I've only cleaned the bird-shitty porches) and before I bathe I have to make papaya-honey scrub for my allergy, and cook dinner..and pasta for tea. So until all that finishes, I'm unlikely to feel sexy...
Friday, February 02, 2007
There's a longing in me, for being with him..just two more hours, but I am restless, though I still have to make rasam, get pretty..just thinking of being with him. Knowing that my time will soon be cluttered with many demands makes it keener. Sometimes I call just to hear his voice, even when I can't talk, like today when I've lost my voice. I tell my niece, it was the deep, deep voice which called me long-distance often that seduced me with its warmth, made me melt in the autorickshaw in which I picked him up from the railway station. Like he was already mine, and I dreaded his going back though he had just come.
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