The Way I see It # 175

"The World Would be a boring place if
everyone wore a size 2. I love being a
size 22, just like I love a giant cup of hot
chocolate with extra whipped cream.
F.A.T. (Fabulous And Thick) folks know
that it's the extras in life - like pounds,
cash and love - that give us character.
Embrace the pounds baby!"

10 Centuries Later...

Your standing in a crowded beach, facing the setting sun miles away and with every incoming wave you feel the sensation of motion as it leaves you, like you're running on water far from all the noise and shout into a vacuum where all you can hear are your lungs exhaling .....and then you look down and see that your standing in the same spot and realize that it all truly is in the mind.

People often ask me what do you fear the most, and I think it is the fear of losing myself. I don't want to reach a level where I cannot answer the questions my own mind asks. I want to be responsible for my every action, emotion and consequence. Yes people affect you and make you lose control but never ever should you be at the service of someone else's happiness. Depending on my surroundings for my own comfort is not good enough..I want to reach a point of such self content that every emotion - happy or sad - comes from within me and everything outside of me should act as an added incentive. You're happy and the world around you is happy. That is why people get depressed and go and do wrong full things..because for them everything, inside and out has become ugly. But thanks to Einstein, we live in a world of relativity. Relativity. Scientifically and mathematically very sound but I think is the root of all issues and problems. Happiness is relative. How can happiness be relative? Happiness is simply happiness..as humans the same things should make us smile...the same chord should dance our heartbeats. Why then do few find happiness in rivalry, in bombings, in war and others in charity work and humanitarianism. We are all branches of the same root then why do we all blossom different colored flowers.

I am slowly learning how to be happy inside and subsequently making my world outside beautiful. So what if people leave you, so what if you leave people, so what if plans don't fall through, so what if someone does something better than you did, so what if you made mistakes..I believe that if you can wake every morning and look yourself eye to eye in the mirror and not feel the need to look away for even a split second then you are self contained, you are happy.

And so, after completing 10 centuries of miles on my new car - even though cigarettes have become cheaper to buy than gas - after another topsy turvey year in completion, all I can say that it has been good...it has been fulfilling...it has been happy!

Compare & Contrast

For me there exist only two spheres of survival - 1. what i commonly associate with the americas with where the air is filled with politics, race, depressive suicidal teenagers, obese people, technological advancements, inattentive doctors, mcdonalds, student massacres, nursing homes, also referred to as 'assisted living' for the sanity of many, coffee machines, fox news, and the abundance of availability. contrasted then with 2. which i refer to as the easterners where everything is about love, emotion, relationship, drama, more tears than laughter, obnoxious yet very enjoyable songs such as 'dil dance maare' and 'dakku daddy', filmi talent rising from every household, hot bods, days always counting down to the release of some bollywood film, the strict use of hinglish, conversational content more about film stars less about your own family, the oggling over female figures with disregard to the male race and continuously finding fault in every action of another but not ourselves.

Each has its good and bad - the right thing to say of course. But i honestly and truly believe that even the bad of world 2 out ways the goods of world 1. Undoubtedly you would live a fictitious life in world 2 but at least that will give you more reasons to smile than cry. It sorta boils down to the whole population theories of an individualistic society verses a society in actuality. But lets take another step backward - the word society originates from the french and latin which both translate it to companionship or the friendly association with others. This would hold true in world 2. You would find happiness in the happiness of others and would mourn in unity as well. But in world 1, one would live in the same neighborhood with 10 other people for 50 years and still go to their grave lonely.

But the real question is..can world 1 and world 2 coexist...i think not. You cannot make a sunset with blues and blacks, and you cannot make a moonlit night with yellows and reds...they each have their own characteristics and the more you try to mix the colors together, the further away they get from their own. And with this thought, a bollywood songs springs into my head..." khoye khoye chand ki firak mein, talash mein udas hai dil"...clearly indicating my world in me.

Going back to the start

SO it's either that I have nothing to do or too much that I procrastinate and put it aside, that I'm back here again...i would like to believe the former but then I would just be fooling myself. Sometimes I wonder how life would be if all I did was sit at home, cook extensive lavish indian meals, brew tea for the elders only about 8 times a day, clean every nook and cranny in the home and just looked pretty for the rest of the 18 hours that I would then be left with. Not having to touch a single book or memorize any more formulas. And even better, how awesome would it be not to want to check your email (+orkut + facebook) every 20 minutes. These thoughts often times crosses my mind when I come for the weekends and look at my granny and mom racing their weekends away in chores surrounding the stove and sink. Alright, well the entire home as well. But I mean would you be able to wake up every morning and just plan out your day on what meals need to be cooked at which hour and how many loads of laundry need to be done before sunset. I would love to do that if it was just for the weekend...but every weekend for the rest of your lifetime? And it is exactly at this point that I give myself a shake and should finish the rest of those applications and start article searching again once again. Yet I go with this disbelief that, 'that weekend' will surely arrive ...lets just hope this arrival time is much later than anytime soon!

Chinese Talk

Fall seems like it was ages ago - thanks to the wonderful winter season we just survived through. Hence my desire to experiment with the shades of orange. The chinese...just a sprout of my fascination with the language...I wonder how 'chirp chirp' would be written in chinese :)

Dhoop Kinaray

raat yun dil mein teri, khoyi hui yaad laye
jaise veeranein mein, chupkse bahar aajaye
jaise sehraon mein hole se chale baad-e-nasiim
jaise bimar ko bevaja quarar aa jaye

there is always that one thing that can melt your heart no matter how much it is hurting...turn the stormy winds of your pain into a sweet gentle breeze...and transform the screams of the burning hell in you into a melodic symphany...for me, there are these four beautiful lines

the story is like any other love story...boy meets girl, girl is shy, boy is quiet, ankhon hi ankhon mein ishare and all that...but there is something unique about this love story...there is something so genuine in the emotions shown that the dialougues and the performances don't seem like there are staged. the characters deliver with so much sincerity in their roles that the entire time you feel like you're sitting with them in the room and hearing their conversations and playing witness to emotional battle occuring...so real that you can feel the love...so real that you want to fall in love..

The Interview Room

Hair pulled back, the french manicure removed, an off-white turtle neck covered by a gray blazer, black pin-stripped formal pants and my all time favorite, the red anne klein pointy-toed (as I like to call them) shoes....all in the attempt to make a nervous, twenty-one year old, with a master's degree mind you, going for her first medical school interview, to look undoubtedly confident and prepared. and that's what they want. they want you to look invinceable like tom but feel like jerry who's always scurrying around looking for a small hole to hide in. the two DO doctors, the medical administrator, and the 1st year intern. all trying their level best to pivot this practiced and perfected balance by all possible means. MPH, ethics, health care, botswana, MCAT, DO/MD, Orgo twice? , stress management, Lion's club, obama, MPH? and now artciulately putting all these disconnected words systematically and intelligentally enough so the four men sitting across from me can pick me over the other only 50 candidates they're going to subject to this torture for the next 5 weeks.

You know I don't quite understand this whole process of interviewing. I mean wouldn't you rather go on a casual lunch, or coffee meeting, see how the person interacts in a more 'normal' setting...how they communicate with their environment. As opposed to making them sit in a small cubicle and picking them apart piece by piece until they don't fall through. Everyone's going to be at their best behavior then and may say they cope with stress exceptionally...but put um a room with a 65 year old old, stubborn female and a 20 year old overly enthusiastic student intern and then see how their exceptionalism flies.

Sheesh! I'm starting to feel like this is much more stressful than the actually medical education. Either way..wish me luck so they do PICK ME! :D