blogathon

Inspirations

Posted on by Archana K B / 14 Comments

To be honest, I went completely blank when I saw the prompt for the Festival of words at WriteTribe. There goes all my attempts at taking part in this festival. I can’t make it for Day 5. But my mind had started reeling slowly.

What inspiration should I be blogging about? I am one of those who dig the internet for inspiring articles so that I could pull myself up when I feel low. The newspapers are busy making money with the approaching Women’s Day with articles screaming “inspiration”. But still, there are many. Which one should I choose?

The invisible inspiration from my mother, like many other mothers of the previous generation, a working woman raised up her young girls, without a cook, and some days without maid, and at times being a single parent, when her husband had to work out of station, in the times when there was no security of gated communities and apartments, and when the ladies rarely drove any vehicle?

The house maid who works everyday for a meagre amount, even when her ageing body unable to take the physical strain of the job she does, fails her on some days?

The women who lives on to tell the tale of how life forced them to do the worst jobs in this world?

The stories of how disabled women live life to the fullest, working around all the troubles thrown at them by fate, when compared to the depressing life amid the fortunes by the abled beings?

The inspiration from the day-to-day happenings around me, from the stories of amazing women I hear and read about, and share on social media?

The courage and inner strength of the women portrayed in all those mythological stories?

On second thoughts, I think why should I restrict to women alone. All the above instances would stand true if I replace women with men too. The young toddler in my house inspires me everyday on how to live life the simplest way, by not keeping any grudges, forgiving easily, laughing and loving all the time.

Inspiration comes from all beings. It is always around us. We just have to pick it up.

So nothing special about to write for today. Or did I just write one?

blogathon/books/Reviews

Book Review – When Strangers meet

Posted on by Archana K B / 14 Comments

Though I had registered in GoodReads long before, I had not ever used it much. So when I was struggling to find some book recommendations from Facebook and Twitter for some light Indian fiction, but which is neither chicklit nor IIM romance, I stumbled upon two books. I ordered one of them through Flipkart, and reserved another in the queue. That is how I got to read the book, “When Strangers Meet”.

Apart from Chetan Bhagat and Preeti Shenoy, I was yet to find some author, whose book was so captivating and thrilling to the level of not putting it down before finishing. I started this book without any expectations, since the author was new, and not that quite popular. The ratings in the Goodreads was the only reason I bought it.

And I was not disappointed.

When Strangers meet
When Strangers meet

What happens when an irritating but lovable wise-cracking ‘Stranger’ called Iyer meets a frustrated and arrogant teenager, Jai, on a fateful day in a congested room at the metro station? Catastrophe!!!
Meanwhile, Pathan never had the pleasure of happiness in his life yet he thanked Allah for every second of it…
Abandoned by fate and friends, surrounded by responsibilities and poverty… This hard-coated man from the city of Delhi knew only thing and that was to keep faith in Allah… Now he is set on a journey to turn around his fate…

The tale from the Iyer’s past will change Pathan’s present and Jai’s future… And trust me…
Sometimes all it takes is a stranger’s tale to change the track of your life…

Three Men… One fateful day… and a Story of a Lifetime…

To describe it in one sentence, it was a beautifully written screenplay, in the suspense genre, perfect to be converted to a movie. The scenes were well described and detailed, but very crisp and also to the point. The story swings between various locations which can be bit confusing at first. Initially, the pace seems to be very low when we are introduced to Jai and Pathan, like that of a slow moving train. And then, when the story of Iyer unfolds, you get absorbed into it. The life of Iyer could take you back into old Tamil movies and I could so visualize Tamil movie stars playing the roles of young Iyer and his father.

“Maybe it’s time that you moved on. You know, I believe that someday things will change. Just like the seasons. A lively spring follows the harsh winter. Seasons change Padma, seasons change”

There is a sweet and cute unwritten love story between the young Iyer and his friend, which is not that different from the current generation. The twists and turns in their relationship is very realistic.
The innocence of young age, the dreams which makes us takes absurd decisions, and the bare truths of life sums it all.

Before he could complete his sentence, Jai realized what he was going to do that day! He was indeed in Iyer’s place. He was himself running away from home, away from his dictating father, away from a life dominated by mathematis. He was running towards his dream of becoming a Bollywood actor. His story until now was not very different from Iyer’s.

My rating: 4/5

K.Hari Kumar is the young author of the book, “When Strangers meet”.

He’s also an international award nominated Photographer and independent short-filmmaker who has worked in over twenty television commercials, directed 8 short films and two documentaries. He can be reached on Facebook and Twitter.

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Day 4 – Festival of Words at WriteTribe – Book Review

blogathon/Thoughts

Peek into the mind

Posted on by Archana K B / 16 Comments

I have already written about Free Write in this post. Today I am supposed to write another one for the Festival of Words.

***
“Knock knock”, I knocked on the door of mind.

It opens for me, and I peek inside to see darkness. But I still stumble my way into it. Slowly the atmosphere seems to be a familiar one by now.

There is a table alongside one wall. On it I find some papers. Some scribblings. Someone was penning down vigorously, treasure and hidden in this mind shell. As if taking the cue from the various detective thrillers like Byomkesh Bakshi, Tehkikaat and CID, which I used to view on TV, through the gap between the fingers, while watching my father for reactions and expressions, and keeping my ears open for the warning sounds, I moved across the dark room. The paintings of some unknown people hung on the opposite wall, as if the scene is directly taken from the Manichitrathazhu (remade to Bhool Bhulaiya in Hindi) film.

All the while I think of how to engage the readers to my article when I blog about this new find. I would link to my past posts and also to the Wikipedia mentions of those serials.

Unable to explore into the darkness, I go back to the papers, and start reading them. It seemed to me like some love letters. Letters to mom, letters to God, letters to some special ones, all in the cursive handwriting used in the historical pages. Thin lines and curves made with dark ink, dipped and written using quills.

The history reminded me of the recently done Jaipur visit, where in I was taken to the abode of the royal families. The cries of the womans whose kith and kin died in enraging battles pierces my mind. I shrug the thoughts off, to come back to the present.

I collect all the papers and carry them out. I close the door back and slowly make my way out. I could see nerves and blood vessels flowing around me, but not in a bad way, but instead as a living proof of a real, working mind. Without glancing towards them for a second look, I climb down the stairs reappearing in my room, as in a Sci-fi movie, without any scars or hurt thinking victoriously that I finished writing the piece for today’s writing exercise at the Write Tribe.

***
Day 3 – Free Write – Festival of words at Write Tribe.

blogathon/Links

Some blog love

Posted on by Archana K B / 11 Comments

This March, the love theme has got extended in the Festival of Words, organized by WriteTribe. We were asked to write about the blogs we love, and to spread the wings of love(cliche!!). And it makes my choices hard, as there are so many blogs in my Feedly, which I love. Unfortunately, some of them are not that frequent anymore, but thanks to the renewed interest of blogging, I get to see new set of bloggers too. Following are some of the blogs in no particular order, who I wish really should get more attention, love, inspiration, and popularity.

Pretty pink pebbles – Its a new blog which I came across very recently. She is more into art and paintings, but has a few short stories too. Though I have always been not interested to read the long stories posted in blogs, the stories in this blog had me hooked. The narrative, the vivid descriptions, and the slow style is so captivating that the story has left an imprint in my mind, and I could see it replaying it every now and then. I so wish she would write more fiction.

Maya the eternal dreamer – I stumbled on this blog during the January blogathon. Her blog post on her take on Ramayana and Rama, instantly made me follow her. Through her sense of humor in the posts that followed, she made way into the hardware registers in my mind rather than the volatile virtual memory. Looking forward to more of her personal rants and views in pure South Indian-‘ishtyle’.

Hallucinations – Her works are already published online, some of them in Women’s web, which I subscribe to. One of the few blogs whose posts resonates the personal views and opinions in a straight forward manner. The writing is simple and straight from the heart which touches a chord in mine too.

Happy reading all the blogs!!
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Day 2 – Festival of Words at Write Tribe – Blog love

blogathon/Stories

Reality of the fantasy

Posted on by Archana K B / 16 Comments

It was just another evening, but it was very dark already.
Nevertheless she stepped out of the office, to her PG which was just two stops away.
Three pairs of eyes talked to each other in a language, no one else could understand, before attacking her.

Her eyes were folded with red ribbons symbolizing love and hands tied to the bed posts.
The imagination unleashed with the tingling body senses while he immersed her in the fountain of love.
As the ecstasy led her into a trance, she woke up to come out of the bubble of dreams which burst silently.

Her dreams were ripped apart by the ravishing beasts in the form of human beings.
The reality was not only completely different from the fantasies she had earlier but were also more brutal.
She lay in another fountain of blood, bursting every bubble of future dreams, and carrying the shreds to the after life.

***
Aftermath of the build-up of this post written for yesterday with some inputs from this article on fantasies.
Written for the Write Tribe Festival of Words – Day 1 – 9 sentence fiction.
Writetribe festival of words

Thoughts

The key to the secrets

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

The silence is so monotonous. Among the clouds there is a streak of light. It illuminates the piece of green land. The mountains behind is enormous enough to make the human beings smaller. LIfe is indeed bigger. The rain of thoughts then starts to pour down. Very heavily. The weight of thoughts seems very heavy to the head. The eyes succumb to the pressure of the weight and close the eyelids. The breathing became strong enough like the storm winds blowing on the face.
Sleep beckons.

While struggling to come up with meaningful writings, I found upon ways to discard the laziness in my mind, through the form of writing called Free Write, in which you don’t worry about the rules, norms, regulations, expectations, word count, theme and other things which hamper the creative juices. With the prologue above, the following is just an attempt at the same.

***
key Source

The Wednesday prompt at the Write tribe community of bloggers is “the key to the lock”. And my mind starts the query to the database and brings out the results which I start reading one by one.

The key.

What key can you talk about. I could so vision some of the bloggers in the community doing fiction where in someone opened the drawer like a thief or as opening a chest of gold, key to memories, secrets and all that.My mind brought the random phrases too, but not the storyboard.

It was the after effect of reading the free romantic novels available for free on Kindle, to try experiencing the new and upcoming method of reading through gadgets, in the month of love, February.

For me, the key was to something else. The key to the passion, the key to the love towards a person and definitely in a sensual way. But no way I would want to blog about it. The last time I poured out the descriptions creeping in my mind verbally, the blog was subsequently rejected by an ad company who wanted only “good” blogs to place their ads.

Its strange that something as basic and historical as key to the acts leading to human reproduction needs to be written mostly in double meanings. Though its hideous mostly in repressed societies, the civilized ones too do not appreciate talking about them in a good way.

Few days ago, had stumbled on the Wikipedia on the many rituals in various other religions, and supported by history which considers them as spiritual rather than as worldly pleasures.

And there exists, in the same society, perverts of the malicious kind, causing danger to human beings by bringing in violence on each other.

So they still remain like Pandora’s box which when opened, flows out a plethora of secrets, pleasurable and mysterious, which remains unknown to the majority of the human beings.