Zindagi..

Har daur main ek kask
Har daur main ek tarana ,
Jitna tujhe dekha,
Har vaqt naya paaya,

Kabhi ithlati muskati khud par madmati..
Kabhi bhigi sahmi khamosh nazar aati..

Pal main gumsum, phir khil khila uthi,
Umeedain bikharthi phir bandhati,

Har mod pe ek nayi rah nikal aati,
Har raha pe khadi ek aarzo nazar aati,

Tu na thami na ruki na thaki,
Mujhe pakde bahon se,
Tu smatal,pathreeli,manbhati, rahon pe,
Chalti rahi..

Shades of personality..

Its been a long time I visited my scratch pad..may be I let myself have reasons or may be I did really have some..Inanycase, the quiver of thoughts had been ever swamped. This time I was almost certain I would pen down at the first available slot..So here I seat the time with me, to avoid it running out while I word the experience…

After a good talky-talky session yesterday between gang of girls J , I walked back home with even more thoughts than I had heard or spilled. It amazed me that all of us had so many things to send across and this night gave us a wonderful platform for doing the same.

It was a friend’s birthday party, after which it was decided to stay overnight n have some fun. With 3 Moms comes a good package. And each of us knew how exactly to handle it.Aki, being the youngest, slept early, more for the fact he is now in mode of sleeping early.
The other two kids( Reet n Vivan) were more like self indulgent, so didn’t need much of mamma’s intervention. While some of them were drawn to pack of cards, the chatty ladies snuggled close. There were few lingering thoughts in some of our minds, and others budded from that. So we some how sprang on the personality, self-identity, motherhood and career kind of topics. Yeah, we didn’t indulge much into gossip or MIL talks, may be we found this more inviting than the beaten ones..

We all agree self-identity is alter ego for existence, although our measure and yardsticks vary. I would not fall short of admitting, that working women have easy path here. They get benefit of mere working, to set their identify. And most of the people around do see that as only thing which makes identity for women. For women who are home-makers (wouldn’t call house wives as we all are house wives :J ) have a tougher route to not only set but maintain their identity and very few, that I know of are able to do this job well. More often than not, giving into pressing demands from all sides, being docile and trying to keep every one happy, swipes you away from your own thoughts, your inputs into situations and over a time, the boundaries begin to fade. And there are times, when most of us get up one day in horror of ‘I have lost my individuality’, or ‘I have become assumed’. SO where is that drawing line? Is revolting the way for establishing identity, is it at the cost of happy family with not having independent identiy? Each of us ofcourse had different situations back home, and different aproaches..bt the question kept lurking.. How important the independent self-identity may be to one person, and how insignificant it might be to other person..

Some where in the midst of tempest, we hit the yet another well debated, working women kids ,topic. It was good to see that few of us had stands ,strong enough, on the topic, and equally good justifications. While it does make perfect sense for one to stay back home, enjoy and nurture the kid, and the kid is ready for school, work on their career ambitions. To others, their approach of handling work, baby n home was best, where they spend god quality time with kid and did justices to their career for which they all the money n educational efforts. The viewpoints on this topic were poles apart, but we conceded on the fact the kid comes first. If you had to work at cost of your baby, being picked by friends, spending time waiting for mom in different houses, then it is not worth the effort or growth. Although, your kid going to professional day care, getting the huge exposure, learning things with other kids and finding mom available once he is done, is the best I guess a kid can get.
I am sure each of us still in heart of hearts feel, mine is the best way to do it in my situation..and that possibly is true also..this was particularly good as it did really help understand who really thinks what, and how justified you might look to her ..I do not like borrowing someone else’s impression, nor do I appreciate those who do that. And a good number of people, do love to borrow someone else’s impression of a person, cling to it, and would never give a chance to the person to show if its true or not. That is the person cares to..

If it weren’t the dawn, we would have probably explored many other topics. Knowing more about how one thinks and how you can afford to have different routes n yet appreciate the others..The last I remember I had such talks was before my marriage at my room, with my friends. we 3 roommates and other friends and ended up greeting the morning light without a nap…but that did tell a lot about individuals and then you can relate and predict to some extent how a person would think, how far and what kind of reaction he/she would actually have..stated or not..

How would it feel, if you were granted a re-live of your few early marriage years?

After 4 years of marriage and a kid, there is very little left un-understood between the partners. The way of life and routine almost sets in leaving behind little to be worked on.

Way back in India, we had a comfortable life with a maid, baby sitter, cook, car etc. We would come back from work at 6 or 9,and then spend time with our son, with parents we would take a brisk walk or just talk on how the day was, then there was dinner and in some time a good sleep.

Coming to UK was a paradigm shift.
To start with, there is no maid to walk in house early in morning and get everything in place in couple of hours, like a magic stick make it house again. So that leaves you to do dishes, laundry, cleaning and then setting things back to their respective places, which by the way, is many time more than just writing them down!!

The next big thing is there is no cook. Who you can tell what you would take for breakfast or dinner and be done with the worry of chores. So, now you realize day has 3 big meals with snacks in between and moreover deciding on what they would be everyday.

But there is one more difference in these two lives. And this is the one that makes everything else fall in place. The difference is in the partners. There is a change in the way partners think and care for each other. I do not mean they don’t care way back home- no offense.

But the life here necessitates the two work hand in glove. While on does cooking the other stands shoulder to shoulder doing dishes. When one is busy with Hoover, the other does the laundry. This involvement in making n keeping of house, unknowingly brings a new charm to the relation. Each of you so aware that the other is there for you. Each one takes equal responsibility of nourishing the relationship. You are well aware each is tired after a long day at work and both of you really look forward to doing special things/surprises for each other to pamper them in your own way.

A bunch of flowers on your way back home, a box of chocolates or special snack preparations so on n on .. fills it with all so ‘early marriage charm’ ..something that seems to have sunk under the sands of time. I mean.. there is no feeling as good as getting a cup of tea in bed on a weekend..only to make it special.
You look forward to spending some quality time together,taking off on working day once in a while,going around palces just by the two of you,short n quick coffee catch-ups..its all so much how it used to be..when – in UK terms- we were datingJ

I think everything comes with a cost.. and this cost is worth paying :) .I guess there is more than just the standard of living ,amenities or freedom that I love this place for…its takes us back to where and why we started this journey:)

My Experiments with UK

With the limited exposure that I have had with this country, there are few things that really make you think your taxes are not going to dogs.

The first visible thing you notice is there is clear and raised pedestrian area. There are proper places from where you can cross the road from. Now these like our Zebra crossing are not the directive principle which people follow if they like, nor is it that people here are extremely humanitarian and stop the car at sight of a walker. There are proper signal boxes fitted at crossing. You push the button and you would see the green light for crossing. The traffic has an obligation and not choice to stop.Importanty, they are there every 100m so you don’t have to walk lengths to get one.


Most of the time when you go around, you would have to take the baby along, if you don’t have a day care to drop him at. For some time before Aki went to day care and even now on times after office hours, I travel with Aki, alone or with Ashish for day to day stuff .Now here, due to unpredictable weather there is a concept of buggy or a stroller, as we know it. It usually comes with a foot rest , a comforter(like a seeping bag) which gets chained around the kid covering the toe to waist n hands if needed/There is a hood to avoid things falling on kid’s head and a mandatory wind sheet or rain/snow sheet. The buggy has usually very steardy handles as I pace almost all my shopping bags on them (learnt from mom’s around)

So, with this entire possible thing about the buggy, pushing it around the roads n shops is an event. Specially when you climb the road or in shop or in mall ,with all your shopping hanging on it, n god bless if you are without a partner, it could be freaking experience.Thoughfuly, the roads here at the crossing area have a yellow painted patch ,done with some different stone to avoid slipping, which merges into the road. So it gradually takes u in and out of the road. Similarly, every shop. Mall, nursery, hospital anything.. Has an entrance similar to this. You will not find a singe shop which has only stairs and no path for buggy transit.
In the trams, there are special places to stand with buggie.That has a cushion at level of your back and open area for buggy to be parked. And this place is there in every coach, so don’t have to rush to get into any specific one.

For those who travel by car, there is, like I mentioned parking on road itself. But nothing comes as free lunch. You need to take a parking ticket before you leave your vehicle on the road. Now you don’t have to run around to find where to get tickets. There are machine on the roads and directions provided on how to reach it. So pretty self managed, yet accountable. Imagine something like this happening in jayanagar nt sure if we would want to empty our pockets at one more place By the way there are road cameras to track the movement and fine receipt reaches directly to your address.

Transportation is made easy with both busses and trams running from almost every locality to the other. With a walking distance of 15 min (from my house to NHS) there are 2 tram stops. There are tram that stop rt in front of railways, so almost no walk to get into rail or tube, for those who have long journey’s to do.
At the railways or even in grocery malls, there is option to help yoursef.There are machines from which you can get you ticket, recharge your travel card or make your own billing and payment etc or if you are lazy enough, Ike me, there are traditional counters as well.


Kids are a valuable possession to this government. There are consultation charges and subsidized prescription changes for them. There are free government day cares(of course after age of 5 years).Although I have little faith in their diagnosis, more comfortable with my Indian pediatrician.Most of the times I see single moms here..And with 3-4 kids.Unlike India, where we are getting to max 2 kids, almost every 2nd person has 4 or more kids..

Almost all the services facilities are directed towards making you Zero dependency person.

But if there is some place where it hurts, specially for those who come from India or other Asian countries, is the fact the at the age of 60 ,with you barely skinned hands n legs, and in this extreme cold weather, you got to go out to get bread n butter for your daily chores. If any of our parents have to do this, we would die of shame n disgust. Am not saying they are compelled to do this or they detest this, not at all. This is how they saw their life n their parents n their expectations are set. This is where our culture sets in. With all possible shortcomings, it would never teach us to leave our parents like this to fend for themselves.