Quite A Wonderful Day

Well, I sure as hell did not do any shopping today nor did I get much work done. At this rate, this break would seem like a total waste of time, if not for the meet-ups I have had with people and the little on and off cooking I have done. That is not quite the break I wanted or envisioned, it is most definitely not the kind of productive I wanted it to be. But I am not going to beat myself over that, I guess. It is a pit too deep, one I have had multiple experiences falling into. And in all of those experiences, finding the way back up the surface from that pit is an all-new ball game altogether, one I don’t want to be playing, especially since my mental state is probably at a much better state than it has been a long time. I am in a great mood even now because I met up with two of my friends after a long while and we went out for dinner, we went to three different places, eating different things everywhere and it was delicious food, great company, and extremely cost-effective. In short, it was my ideal date.

I will be travelling tomorrow morning, my train is at 6am and that means that I have to wake up at 4:30. That means that I shall have to sleep by now so I get a decent amount of sleep. I need that quite desperately. It also means that I get to charge my phone and other gadgets tonight so that I am not stuck in the station without my gadgets. I also need to figure out what to wear for the train journey because it is going to be hot (even though I am travelling in an AC compartment), so there’s quite a lot of logistics I have to work out. I also had to pack, but packing this time genuinely did not take more than 15/20 minutes. I think, overall, my packing skills have increased. I still hate to do it, because it means work but I am much faster and precise about it. For me, that’s a great thing to feel proud of. Well, of course, I still have some last minute things I shall be chucking into my bag tomorrow morning, but that’s the whole point. It is for tomorrow morning, not tonight and so I can leave those worries aside for the moment.

I also put myself mehendi today–mehendi is something I have always loved. Even as a child, I would be extremely captivated by how people could hold that cone so effortlessly and make beautiful designs across someone’s palm. My hands have always been tiny so there was a point of time in a life, actually it quite a long period of time, when I would shy away from putting mehendi. I always felt that my hands were too small to make any worthwhile design on them at all. I think, after so long, I finally got myself a mehendi cone and put it on for myself. I don’t possess the skill and talent that a lot of my friends do when it comes to mehendi. But I surely possess the enthusiasm and a willingness to get better and well, remembering my TA’s words (even though she was speaking to me about English Literature, her advice is universal in that it can be applied across contexts), I think this is not some inane skill that cannot be learnt. I only believe that as I try more and more, experiment more and more, there will come a time when my designs shall look great. Until then, I am quite content with my mediocrity–I am here for the experience and the smell, oh god yes, the smell. The smell of mehendi is probably one of my most favourite smells in the world. Well, it is getting late and I shall be travelling by train alone for the first time in my life. I shall have fun, right?

And that’s my memory for the day.

PS: There are also a few questions I have about a few things, but I think I need to introspect before I feel like they can be written about. A few things have been plaguing me, a few worries, a few insecurities, a few problems–the usual.

Slight Disappointments

Today was the perfect example of a lazy day, a guilt-free lazy day. I did not get anything done today, I had nothing to get done and it felt great to not have any expectations resting on my shoulders. I mean, I do have quite a few expectations for myself but I shall get to them soon, just not today. There was dinner, a movie, a teeny tiny bit of shopping, I shall shop more tomorrow hopefully. I have plans to buy some new clothes because I feel my wardrobe needs a little something new in it. But knowing me, and my general miserliness, I will probably buy very little and call it a successful trip. Or better yet, buy nothing at all and come back.

I came back from a movie only half an hour back and I am completely exhausted from the day. I slept a lot even during the day, but a whole lot of good that did me because I am still sleepy now. The movie was slightly disappointing, I was expecting more, I guess, but it wasn’t bad. I am generally quite shit at reviewing movies, and to add to my already mediocre capabilities, I am also extremely sleepy and tired. So it probably is not a good time to type out my opinions on the movie, because my vocabulary seems quite limited to good/bad/nice. But it was a movie people had told me was wonderful and so I dragged my father along. He didn’t like the movie at all, though, while I don’t hold such an extreme view (in retrospect, I don’t hold extreme views in almost everything)

I also bought myself a mehendi cone, I love mehendi and I used to love putting it for other people and for myself. I was not great at it, but I still enjoyed it because I found the exercise very comforting a lot of the time. It made me happy and seeing the colour always made my day. I loved seeing the mehendi turn darker after the first day, I loved the smell of it that would linger for at least a day after I put it. If it was marudhaani, the smell would last for a few days, even with the perfume from soaps. But mehendi cones don’t do that, but that is not a failing, to be honest, because mehendi cones allow me an insane level of creative freedom that marudhaani can only dream of. I am most definitely doing my sleep blabber right now, so I am going to call it a night and get to sleep. Tomorrow shall be more productive, right?

And that’s my memory for the day.

Trip Day 3

I hate the inevitable exhaustion and pain and suffering that travel entails, my feet are aching and no amount of pressing or massaging does anything for it. My head is aching, in fact, my whole body aches from the exhaustion and I am so close to completely collapsing and falling asleep. Of course, this is where my blog comes into the picture and I am sitting here, in Paris, at 1:50am at night, having just come to our accommodation from an exhausting day trip, ready to sleep. In fact, I am going to stop this blog post right here and update it later. I will, won’t I?

I did, I have come back to edit this post today, it is 12 am and I am as exhausted as can be. But today’s experiences are for another blog post altogether. I need to finish this post first. But before that, I feel the need to share a beautiful picture of the Eiffel Tower. Well, it is by no means a great picture probably, but the beauty of the tower should hopefully make up for my non-existent photography skills. The tower is marvellous, it completely had me under its spell, I could not take my eyes off it, or off the view that it provided me. I got the opportunity to go to the summit and even though I froze because of the cold, fast wind that blew up there, and there were too many people and too little space, I still would consider it the highlight of my trip. After all, it is not very often that people get to visit the Eiffel Tower (except maybe if you lived in Paris, but then, why would you want to go there every day? The cost would be insane)

The day started when we left the house in the morning to drive to Paris. I had course registration that morning, but I could not do it. Instead, I had asked a senior to do it for me and he did it, even though I did not exactly get my first preference in one course. But that doesn’t matter because I got a place with another professor offering the same course, and well, my friends also moved here because of a multitude of reasons (one of them could have been yours truly), so I have my fingers crossed for a good semester. The course I am most excited for though is this course on Language politics and linguistic anthropology in South Asia, with a professor I adored last semester. Now I get to have another class with her, in a very small capacity (only 16 people in the course). She is brilliant and well, I cannot wait for the class. She is a visiting professor and her return this semester had been quite a question mark until recently, but I am glad (super happy) that she is back. This time, my week is slightly better distributed, with a little more breathing time than usual. All my courses are intensive though, more intensive than the last semester, so I only hope this semester goes well.

Back to the trip, we went to Paris and my uncle dropped us off at the Louvre Museum. And what a museum it was! Humongous, filled with artistic treasures from as early as 4000 BC, it was the one museum that I shall not forget for a very long time. Of course, the Mona Lisa is there but I actually did not spend much time near it, nor did I take any photos. It was quite weird for my parents who didn’t really see the point of the museum, “it’s all only pictures and statues,” they said. But I did not know how to explain it to them, in a way they could comprehend, that I found meaning and joy in looking at those pictures and sculptures. I tried though, I made sure to tell them stories from the Roman and Greek mythology that were being depicted in some sculptures, the Biblical stories (even though I myself know VERY LITTLE) that inspired some paintings, etc. I think, compared to the last time they had been here (alone, for an exam my mother had to give in France), this time they were able to better appreciate the artistic genius they were witnessing. And well, even if they don’t really get why I was so excited about the museum, at least they were able to enjoy parts of it because I was there.

Tired, after nearly 5.5 hours walking around the museum (my feet had died and been resurrected so many times, they deserved a few paintings of their own), we made our way to the metro station to get tickets to go to the Arc de Triomphe. It was a station called Charles de Gaulle (I simply don’t know how to pronounce these things) that we had to get down at, from the station near the museum (I forgot its name and don’t really want to google it at the middle of the night, I have another post to write). After a brief struggle trying to explain to the ticket guy what we wanted tickets for, we finally got our tickets (even the ones to get to our accommodation) and boarded the metro. For someone who had really seen quite a lot of the London Underground, this metro was way different. From the seats, to the setting, to the languages spoken, to the announcements (or their non-existence), everything was a brand new experience. I think I prefer the London Underground though. When we did get to the Arc de Triomphe, we did not climb up because the queue was too long and we also wanted to get to the Eiffel Tower. Moreover, there was a parade at the foot of the arch, so we turned tail (after a few photographs, of course) and made our way to the station to get to Bir Hakeim, the station for the Eiffel Tower.

There were some issues with the train tickets, I might have experienced a mild form of racism at the enquiry counter, and a few other things happened. But I don’t really see the point of letting those minor things get in the way of the ultimate beauty and brilliance of the tower and my experience of it. I got the opportunity to eat a pain au chocolat (it was super nice, fluffy and soft and flaky all together) and that was a good experience too (though I wish I could have had the opportunity and the culinary tolerance to try different other things from French cuisine). The line at the tower was too long though, my already dead legs put up a very brave fight until the very end, but they died as soon as I could get back to where we were staying. We went to the summit, taking two lifts to get there, but on the way down, we got down to the second floor and climbed down on foot. This was a very interesting experience and I am sure I would have enjoyed it better had my legs not been that close to giving way. In fact, the last few steps, I nearly collapsed because my legs did give way. When I finally got to the place we were staying (the train back to the accommodation place was beautiful!), I collapsed. That was the end and that’s when I started this post. Now I have another post to write for today, I shall be able to do that, won’t I?

And that’s my memory for the day.

The Traps of Lazy Hypocrisy

Today was quite a lazy day that I have absolutely no idea for the blog post. My brain cells are fried, I am as uninspired as can be and I am also frustrated because I am not able to watch a few videos I wanted to because they don’t open here in the UK. I have been googling for alternative links but no, I have been unsuccessful so far. It is extremely frustrating, and I feel like throwing something (which is quite rare since I don’t normally resort to such violent displays of frustration). I am a woman of words, I will swear and curse inside my head and sometimes out loud too, but I don’t generally resort to physical violence.

Today, I had gone to the shop, and I had quite a fun time with the old manager. We were joking, talking and generally having fun on a hot, lazy day. I was teasing him quite a bit, he showed me some game he plays with dinosaurs and stuff, and we were generally bonding. I have grown to like him the best of all the managers, it is much easier to talk and be with him than with the others. In many ways, I like to think he has a soft spot for me and treats me like my grandfather does. It is quite heartwarming and he is a jolly good fellow and a great sport,, has troubles with technology, grumbles lowly to himself from time to time, and is generally just funny to observe. I think he is super cool.

But as it was a lazy day, I decided to doodle (much to his amusement) and I drew the picture on top on a piece of card I found. Now, I am not exactly an artist. I generally don’t do art, I don’t paint or sketch or draw (though I really want to). But I have them convinced that I am artistic, and for me, that’s a huge compliment and success. I like drawing with ball-point pens on rough surfaces like these, they add some kind of texture. The uneven strokes turn out looking quite good, I like doodling these types of designs. It was a peacock, and people could recognise that it was one. The many times I have tried drawing something while I was in school, my friends would complain and tell me that they can’t recognise it at all. But this time, I also casually drew animal figures, a duck, a swan, a fish, an elephant, and also a lotus and people were able to recognise. I felt much validated than I have in a long long time.

I opened the story I have been writing slowly. I still have absolutely no idea how the story is going to progress, how it will end, what will happen. It is written in a way and tone that I have never seen before in any novel I have read. It is almost as if it is me speaking, except living a completely different life. I can hear and see myself in everything my protagonist says and does. That’s actually a weird thing to say when you think about it. We cannot see ourselves ever in our lives, we cannot hear ourselves truly either because of internal vibrations which make us hear ourselves differently from what others do. So when I say I hear and see myself in that character, I think that the character portrays characteristics that I think I have, that I hope I have, that I believe I have.

There’s something about the story, it seems to be quite keen on going on and on. I remember how a friend of mine wrote a novella and had sent it to me. It had been beautiful, and in my head, I cannot help but compare what I have written to that. The thing is, when I do that, I can help but feel a crushing sense of disappointment, when I realise what I have written is nowhere as beautiful, as complete, as that one. I mean, I believe that whenever one compares oneself with another, they are setting themselves up for a kind of humiliating and crushing defeat. Comparisons can ruin lives, friendships, self-confidence, and a thousand other things. But here’s the thing, while I believe in all of this and carefully dispense this life advice to every friend of mine, to aid them in their growth and survival, I fail to implement it in my own life. Practising what I preach is, unfortunately, such a huge problem for me because, while I think comparisons should not exist in this world, it is precisely what I end up doing all the time (much to my disappointment and frustration, nonetheless).

I need to be getting awards for the numbers of times I have shown my hypocritical behaviour. The hypocritical behaviour, for me, comes with the curse of self-awareness. I cannot be ignorant of my own hypocrisy, I am almost always aware of it as soon as the deed is done. It adds to my misery because I know what an arse I have made of myself. Ignorance is bliss, they say. While I don’t really know the scope of that statement, I know that for me, ignorance in these kinds of issues would truly be bliss. Just wishing for ignorance is an example of my own hypocrisy. The realisation of that hypocrisy is an example of my self-awareness. Do you understand this trap now? It is like I can never triumph, and that is not a very satisfying thought, is it?

And that’s my memory for the day.