Paris ..again

An evening in Paris.. again

by Manila Chhotray on Thursday, April 28, 2011 at 7:40pm

Revisited Paris yesterday. ... though just a walk by the river Seine from Place de Concorde to Eiffel Tower. The bridges were lovely and the river looked mellow in the soft mild pink sky. The fresh greenery added to the landscape made the city looked like repainted. I tried my hands on my DSLR. I was lucky enough to get a handful of shots appropriate.. though they did not match the camera of my eyes. That always happens. The camera is not as intelligent as my eyes... ;). I had a hearty dinner of Crepe ,popular in Paris with a combination of eggs, chicken and cheese with a taste of aromatic fennel. Discovered a few more monuments than before and a few art peices thrown here and there. I crossed the Bateau de Paris and loved the hustle bustle of the crowd of tourists. On the way back, the whole city was dazzling over the river. There were projected illluminations every where. The city of light looked new and old at the same time and appeared quite illusive and warm. ...today I am spending my evening at the silicon valley of Paris "Ici c,est Issy" because of the dullest weather so far during my stay in Paris and writing this note. ... Aller !!! bon voyage a tous...

Manila

Am in Geneva...really?

Again summer showers..I love it in Europe too after a sweaty walk from the station to home... trying to be a sport! It's hot in Geneva.. except the sunny lake side.. I miss my camera to capture the the spectacular show of clouds in sky.... :( Yesterday I tried a delicious crepe named été (summer in french) with spinach, ratatoui sauce, cheese and hard boiled eggs in the old city of Geneva, near cathedral. It looked familiar ... like having Dosas hot, in a cool summer evening. The strange thing is that the flag flying on the top of the cathedral was of Unicef. I also relished a street side jazz in the hustle bustles of the people in the city center. ... Geneva... a busy and small city... with trams over crowded in the morning, reminding me of Indian trains and people speaking English to you normally though a french suisse City....is still unknown to me.... I ignored Geneva, just to run home close by the mountains... the... ragged,long weathered, old and like walls ... I still can't imagine my day when I will have to say my final good bye to the mountains who I call " Budha Pahadi "...My immidiate list for travel is "Geneva and the french swiss"
I am adding a few ipod clips of Geneva ..

Back to blogging

It's an ungoing thirst from a long time to scribble on my blog. Things blank, things coloured , things black and white or things like "mountains verses ocean, what do I prefer !!!" kept hitting me , pushing me to write something. I stood still as no string of coherent thoughts welcome me. I stood still amidst of all the random thoughts like faster reeling of movie clips . I guess , I am trapped in the fast moving world now. We are overloaded with things, overloaded with information , overloaded with gadgets, overloaded with variety of jobs at works. Well, I am contradicting "variety is the spice of life" but quite on contrary on the variety in excess. This is an age of over-doables. People like me who can be good at monologues, sometimes stand isolated, overwhelmed or just like the reference point to watch all around stumped under the overload of things. No fixed thoughts.. but floating around ....

I will wait for a retreat sometimes to write again... This is the shortest span of my blog so far. I do not need to summerise any more.

Now a little longer retirement--depuis 3 mois

Bonjour!!!

Voila... again at a point where my heart and mind are aligned together to draw some sketches of my retirement--a state of joblessness..Oofs !!! now I am missing my job a bit..

I am at the end of the winter..but still it is cold and sometimes windy with tiny suspending particles..called snow..though a bit, but give chilled spine. I am no more scared of the winter horrors but almost used and indifferent to it. I enjoy it in fact, sometimes with hot pakodas and chai.. that's where my "being Indian" reflects..cold weather means pakodas, samosas and many more hot delicacies !!!

My life is broadening but, with the international neighborhood. Now I am learned of the unheard countries like Cyria, Indonesia, Iran, Egypt and Algeria. I was lucky to get to a cous-cous party, a mouth watering delicacy of Algeria. Sometimes I am offered different Arabian sweets or bakeries , some exotic herbal tea from my Cyrian neighbors. They are no more my neighbors, but friends now. I made french friends who are extremely in love with Indian culture, music , art and of course about the loving people. I am back in school, to a school to learn french .

Last but not the least, I am on the way of fulfilling my dream of learning painting in France. I always thought that I should learn fine arts in Italy or France..and voila !!! that's a blessing in disguise.

Learning painting, meeting people from far off countries and beautiful landscapes and my music class on skype !!! what else I want from life..of course.. hummm may be a bit of working ..... IT labor...

J'aime bien de la vie en France... but still missing India...its diversity, and Hyderabadi Biryani..

Au revoir !! a bientot !!!

Again your crystal thinker!!

My retirement again !!!!

Retirement!! how does the word sound to youngsters? People like us who are yet to gain the ultimate height in their career? Why career again? My life is half obsessed with career and half obsessed with the thing called beauty..art, photography, traveling, music and crafting out the scrap pieces together at home. Again you must be wondering of my monologues..huh !!! Well ..guess if I start monologues, then it surely means I am open to the world just through the window of internet. Oh yes I am back to my shorter retirement...well I say it because I am also obsessed with my career. Staying at home will be boring for anyone,but for me and for people like me , its again a blessing in disguise. I can watch snow fall endlessly. I can arrange my kitchen cup board endlessly or I can become a good weather spectator. I have a huge pile of plans to get them fulfilled or start something new like becoming a free lancer for all my life.

I have now developed a new hobby, snow photography. I call it snowgraphy. Yes this is the most easy way of snapping at the ultimate white , the heavenly blessings. And my speciality is to search leaves draped in ice and go on clicking. I am least concerned about the huge technicalities that goes around photography. I believe, women are driven by intuitive photography than technical photography.

What you people are doing now? Gazing at software wirings and endless calender entries with clients? Oh yes !!! but that brings you the basic luxury of life to take a short retirement at an alpy hill side too...

Bon weekend !!

Again your crystal thinker !!!

A blank out

I am struggling , striving to put in a few words of original thoughts on my blog, but I am in a state of blank out . This happens to me often from last few years , when I am no more in touch with the tranquility of mind to write or do or perform something creative. I guess this happens when our life is too much in routine, procedure oriented and our work has become only a mean to earn our bread and butter. So I went on to embrace my dusty diaries in search of my little creative notes or poems. I found one..and it was liked by my college hostel inmates who gathered to form a community for literature and eventually I became one of the main coordinators after the recital of this poem. I recited a few of my oriya poems too..

=================================================================================

There
I stayed beyond your touch
beyond your eyes could see
my tears;

Amidst of the zigzag motion of
my life,
I pray to jot you my ups and downs
Alas!! you could have an address
to rest upon,

How amusingly I console myself,
To read my emotions
on plain and white surfaces,
Walls begin to laugh at me
as the boom-e-rang inflict me
day and night;

Alas! I could be a pigeon
could fly and see you at some
corner,
and snap your smiling eyes
and serious looks,

All I need is your signature
on my go-on;
========================================================
Another one from my diary....

===============================================

For the person who will be my true friend forever..( Long before I got married... long long ago....)
==============================================================
An unknown distance sometimes seems to be mingling the way you look as a child,
with a twinkle in your eyes and a clear expression of what you reflect to the life itself.

It is a kind of love you replicate like.. a man in his sainthood and as a mother to her children.

Your eyes are so full of life like it is ready to embrace the whole world unhesitating... and the same moment it says " I am your friend and I am very happy to be your friend". This is the very thing that acclaims my presence so near to you.

==================================================================

Back to my old friends

Hi,
I am back again to my virtual diary of monologues.Things are quite feasting at my end. What can be better for an IT professional than to get a chance to write a blog? I am blogging because I am not working seriously on any technology front from a week. Yes , a bit relaxed at my end. Time to look back, gazing endlessly at my own uploaded picassa photos or orkutting. Well..I am going to stop at orkut now..this very word which has added flavor to my daily routine life....

Orkut world was used to be an obsolete and obscure world for me. I never tried to be connected to my friends. I hated whenever I saw my brother did nothing , but orkutting day and night on the computer. I thought orkut is nothing but a honey pot for vulnerable attacks. My husband who is a computer security researcher, always disliked it and never encouraged me to explore Orkut.

Despite all presumptions, apprehension, I crept in orkut silently. Only my profile was updated as a matter of having google account. Other than that, I did nothing. My friend Devan who is at a far off place now , one day while chatting with me told me to login to orkut and add him as a friend. I never did that too..... I ignored, avoided and my more engrossed activities in weekends kept me aloof of my beautiful orkut world as it appears now.Thanks to Deb , who posted me the first scrap in orkut asking my wherebouts. Then I started searching for any known face.. there I was there with a couple of my old friends to start with.

I went a little back ... a handful of x-colleagues and then KIITians(my classmates) and then my school friends. What surprised me most when I was contacted by Guddi, a very dear school friend with whom I lost in touch for almost 10 long years. It was surprising to be connected to her. I felt as if connecting to them is getting connected to my childhood and it's vibrancy. I can't say how happy I am to see some of my friend's kids photos and amazing achievement they have in their lives.

One of my friend at college, with whom I was not really very much close, is now a days everyday in touch. In college, I never had really very good chance to know him, but now I guess I know that he loves Oriya poetries. That's an amazing fact about reknowing my friends.

Again I am in touch with a childhood friend Asima. We used to write letters to each other in our so called random poetic ways even being in the same town. We also used to meet each other and review each others letters.. :) that was pretty funny. We were not in touch for a meer ego clash we had ... but voila!!! she is again there,though at a far off coast but scrapping and snapping at my profile almost regularly.

Now I can see Aparna, adding everyday a new photo of her baby and Abhir his best photgraphy. I am also in touch with Nishans's recently uploaded amazing Rockeys's (Nishans's son) photos. Nishan is Sanju's friend and Sanju is the security researcher( my husband) who hates to be in Orkut .He also peeps into my Orkut frame to see Rocky's new photos added at Nishan's site.

Really there is so much happening in my friend's world and now I am happy to be aware of that. Some of the friends are silent and may be busy in their own world. At least I guess there is a hide and seek kind of activities of friends happening and I can watch them for that.

Now I can realise that the world is a small place. I believe we are all connected now despite of our squeezed life style and pressurized schedule.

Back on track I am now! music , friends , childhood , beginning of monsoon and Sea of Poppies...Life is beautiful again ...