You are currently browsing the monthly archive for July, 2008.
Some weeks ago, when we were traveling back to Bangalore from Chennai in our car, I was sitting in front, with Azhaan on my lap. Since it had been around 8 pm when we left Chennai, we were traveling most of the night to reach home. Azhaan was wide awake and he looked at the luminous moon from the windshield. I followed his gaze and told him, ‘Azhaan, that’s a chaand’. He immediately picked it up and started saying, ‘Thaan’. He turned to his father and said,
‘Jaejee thaan’
He turned to Ammi and said,
‘Nanjee thaan’
Turning to Sidra,
‘Yaya thaan’
and finally to Saboor
‘Buaji thaan’
Each time he pointed the moon and I figured he learnt what the moon was called finally.
The next day ammi and I had gone shopping and in the kiddie play area, Azhaan picked up a couple of plastic balls and came back. I pointed at the green ball and said ‘Green’ …he looked at me and said ‘Geem’
Naturally I was elated that he had learnt two new words in the space of just two days. When I got back home, I made him repeat Chaand and Green to everyone, and for some reason he started associating both of them together! Whenever I asked him to say ‘Chaand’, he would grin and say ‘Geem’
A few days ago however, he kept saying ‘Chintam’. I have no idea what that means and probably if he could communicate more properly with us, he would have told me what actually he was trying to say. But since that is not possible, I jokingly asked him, ‘What? Chintamani?’ He grinned once more and said, ‘Chintamayi’.
And now, these three words are his favourites…Green Chand and Chintamani. Although of course, he has started calling me ‘meem’ these days to which I call him my ‘noon’ 
I guess those who don’t know Arabic will be a bit confused…’meem’ is a letter in Arabic, that signifies the sound ‘m’ while ‘noon’ is another that signifies ‘n’.
I know I wont forget all this…but just thought i’d write it down here for posterity! 
I met Kavita (Mandanna of Open Sesame fame) over lunch today. It’s been a couple of years since we’d met and it was really nice to see her again. The last time i’d met her, I was pregnant and she’d brought me some four or five books to read because I was really bored then. I never got around to meeting her after that so it was time to return them today.
Kavita picked me up from office and we were cruising past Indiranagar not sure where to stop for lunch. We thought of trying the cafe at Max Mueller Bhavan and once we reached there, we saw there was a nice continental kinda buffet spread. Both of us dug in, shared stories and snippets of books we’d read. A couple of her old friends also happened to drop by and I came back home after that.
There are some people in your life that you know or expect to enter your life…like friends from college…I mean, that’s a given…everyone knows that they will make friends in college. But Kavita and I met over some of my stories that she’d illustrated for Open Sesame. Way back in 2001 we met for the first time over coffee and found we had a lot in common and she recruited me to write stories for a kiddies portal, maverickids.com that has since then shut down however. Luckily, we continued to be in touch over the phone and the occasional lunch. I also value her opinion highly when it comes to my short stories or my novel and we often discuss things related to our books. She’s a writer too, btw, and one of her books for children was released by Puffin last year.
So, Kavita is one of those friends I never expected to make. Life is full of such unexpected joys!
I know the sky is grey and the clouds are threatening to unload any moment. I know the puddles are icky and the mud is even more so…the auto guy glowered at me as he took the horrible road to office today. And at work people are cribbing about this and that.
But guess what???
It’s one of those days when I am uncharacteristically happy. For some reason, my heart is singing inside, (despite the awful pimple thats erupted on my forehead) and I’m just feeling too good about everything to let anything matter. Ha. I wish all days were like this. But then we wouldn’t get to appreciate it when we did get it once in a while na?
Have a great day folks!!
From the time I first finished writing my novel, back in 2005, it has undergone so many changes and permutations, mostly in reducing its size, that I cannot believe it is the same thing I had worked on. Looking back, I am glad at the changes I have made. Reading the novel today has made me realise that it was not exactly the best of writing and there were plenty of ways I could have made it better.
Of all the rejections letters I got, (most without any feedback) the best response has been from Kavita Bhanot of Osians. They have not rejected me outright but she was the only one who took the trouble and the time to list out three important points she felt about the book. At the moment I can concentrate on only one. Reducing the size.
I had started out Kite Strings with 106, 343 words. After many revisions and editing it, as of today, this very minute, it has come down to 92,818 words. Wow. I am stunned myself. And I am just at page 99, and there’s at least another 150 pages remaining. So, what does that tell me? Well, I am not chopping away left right and center, but I am trying to make the novel less bulky.
Only thing is that after sitting with it for so many days, I dont know if I can recognise whether I have done a good job with it or not! 
So, I’m back to the chopping board now. Cutting away more of the verbosity. And when I resend it to Kavita at Osians, I hope this time they’ll be able to do something for me. It just kills me, when I think of my novel sitting with me, unpublished. Allah sabr de!!
I’ve only lived in three localities in all my life. The first was in Richmond Town, where I lived from 1980 to 1997. I got married and moved to BTM layout then. I didn’t like the move so much because I didn’t like the locality to begin with. And although I am not a snooty, upmarket or downmarket kind of person, I felt that it would be wonderful if we could live in Koramangala.
Then, a couple of years later we moved to BTM IInd stage from first stage and it was like moving to another locality itself. First there was the freedom to move around, and the roads! They were wide and tree lined and Shazu and I enjoyed walking down them whenever we felt the whim. Then came the shops. Slowly, our road started getting all sorts of shops and restaurants and they made the whole place so congested. Moving down the years, I loved the fact that I had to just skip down the road to Sweet Chariot, or hop down to Balaji Veg. Coffee Day was at the end of the road, and my new library, Lipi, was just a little further. We had everything on our road. Right from three medical stores, four pani puri wallas, one ICICI bank, one fantastic ice cream parlour, Gelato Pazzo, plus a myriad other bakeries and that fabulous Chinese restaurant, FOC right below our very house. Only, we didn’t want to live there anymore. BTM, especially my road had become a horror to walk in. The traffic was horrible and noise levels…I think I was progressively going deaf, because I had tuned out all the traffic sounds completely.
We moved to Koramangala and I cannot help but feel lost. First of all the silence here at times in stupefying. That comes from living in a residential area now. I guess I ought to give myself some more time. And yes, I need to get some sort of vehicle to make myself independent. Because nothing here is within walking distance( it is sort of, but well, I am not really in the mood to walk all that way).
And even though I actually lived in Richmond town for the first part of my life, I didnt belong there, because I hardly stepped outside. BTM has been my home all these years, and I am still trying to get my bearings. Still trying to decide where I belong.
Last Friday, I refused to cook dinner. I made Mansoor order something from a restaurant because I didn’t want to miss even one moment of Dus Ka Dum…Aamir and Salman together after what…14 years!?
Andaz Apna Apna is that one movie which I love even today. It’s so silly and the gags maybe very childish, but they make me laugh even now, unlike the so-called comedies of recent years.
Aamir and Imran totally rocked the show. It was great to see the bonhomie between Salman and Aamir and Aamir even mentioned that it would be great to do a sequel of Andaz Apna Apna. Wow. I hope someone wakes up to the potential of that before they both grow too old for such movies!
Salman and Aamir ribbed each other relentlessly and the audience loved every moment of it! For a change, Mansoor was also at home and we sat and watched the whole show together, which is a rare thing, because, a) I dont watch what he usually likes to catch on TV late at night, stuff like Tamil songs and wrestling, WHICH HE WATCHES ON MUTE….and b) I don’t watch much TV at all, so it was a good occasion for us to sit and enjoy something together.
I’m amazed at the transformation in Aamir, he the shunner of all of public appearances is there wherever we see him! Every channel you change and there he is, looking like a penguin, promoting Imran. But its nice to see him out of his shell now and then too.
My favourite part of the show? Well, I can’t really decide. However, I do feel that all these celebrity special episodes are faked…I mean, how could he have guessed that it would be 57% and not any other number?
My favourite scene in the movie? Plenty again…Raveena offering oranges to a severely uncomfortable looking Salman Khan….Aamir painting the cross on Paresh Rawal’s cheek…Salman climbing a rope that is falling down….oh gosh,…..just thinking of that movie is enough to make me smile!!
Here are a few clips of Dus Ka Dum…..
I’ve been unsuccessfully trying to upload some of the clips and its getting late…I got to sleep guys! So, copy-paste this link on your web browser if you want to see this episode, if you haven’t already that is.
I dont know why but no one was able to see the pics I put up of Azhaan so I’m trying once more!
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A few weeks back when I had gone to office I left Azhaan at home with Ammi and Sidra. I got back home and they wanted to show me something on the comp. When they were switching it on, Az looked shy and when Ammi asked him what’s there in the comp, he pulled his shirt and said Inna…I didn’t understand but Ammi and Sid were laughing because obviously they understood what he was trying to say! Here are the pictures…
He hated the frock and the next time Ammi tried to make him wear one, he removed it, took it to papaji’s room and flung it on the other side of the bed so Ammi wouldn’t make him wear it again! He does make a cute girl however!!! And btw, pulling his shirt and saying Inna meant that he was trying to tell me what his nanji and yaya did. He loves jeans by the way, and he calls that also Inna!
Since a few people wanted this recipe, i’m sharing it here with you guys.
The biriyani that we make is essentially made of two things, the akhni and the adann. The akhni is the gravy kind of thing that you cook, and thats what makes the biriyani so special. Adann is also important because that’s where the tricky rice bit comes in and if you’re not careful, the rice could get over or undercooked.
For Akhni
Sliced onions
Chopped tomatoes
Whole garam masala like patta(cinnamon sticks), laung(cloves) and elaichi(cardamom)
Curd
Red chilli powder
Salt
Mutton/Chicke/Vegetables
And that most important ingredient – Adrak Lehsun paste – ginger garlic
Coriander and mint leaves, juice of a lemon
Oil
Method
Put oil in a degchi or deep bottomed vessel and throw in the patta, laung and elaichi.
Add the sliced onions and saute them till onions are translucent and start getting brown.
Add adrak lehsun paste and stir briskly.
Add the mutton/chicken/veggies
Stir fry till the mutton/chicken/veggies are glazed with oil and lose their raw look
Add the red chilli powder and salt.
Stir for some more time and let the mutton/chicken/veggies get coated with the masalas.
Add curd and stir again. Water released from the chicken etc along with water from the curd should be stirred briskly.
Put in the chopped tomatoes and stir them well until they are softened and the mixture starts looking like a gravy.
Put in the coriander and mint leaves, after tearing them roughly.
Add very little water and let the chicken/mutton/veggies cook until they are tender.
When it is tender, then add the lemon juice. Also skim off some of the oil from the top of the akhni and believe me, there will be a lot of oil. Removing this oil is not in deference to any calorie skimping plans you might have. All that went down the drain the moment you thought of making biriyani! Reserve the oil.
Adann
Clean, wash and soak the rice with a few droplets of curd in the water.
In a large pan put water which is double the amount of rice and let it boil.
Drop in some mint leaves with the rice. Gives a lovely smell and flavour to it too.
When the water starts boiling, put the rice with salt and a little haldi.
Do not let the rice get overcooked. This is the crucial part here. Even if the rice is undercooked, it will blossom completely during the final dum procedure.
When the rice starts getting cooked, drain the excess hot water and quickly mix this in the akhni masala. Remember to reduce the akhni masala by keeping it on low fire. There should be very little water in it.
Flatten the top of the rice and pour the reserved oil. Cover with a lid and keep something heavy on top. The dum process begins and this is where the flavours of the rice start mingling with the heavy tastes of the akhni.
When its finished, remove the lid and mix well and serve. Tastes best with dahi chutney, baingan bharta or Kutt!
Happy eating and happy cooking!!!!!
