P as in Pneumonia...

Disclaimer: No offense meant to anyone, no intention of mocking anyone.

A credit card company representative calls me to sell a card. Lets name this person A. This is the conversation that goes on:

A: 'Hallo Maam, naynu XXXXXX Bank nundi call chaysthunnaa....'

ME: (In my mind) XXXXXX bank is the keyword. I snap: 'ok hang on, English or Hindi please, I dont know Telugu.'

A: 'okaaay.' Silence, some fumbling, and then again 'maam, I'm calling from XXXXXX Bank credit card division. Do you have a credit card maam?'

ME irritated: 'Yes, I already have a few credit cards, I dont want any more please, thank you.'

A: 'But maam, do you have XXXXXX bank credit card? We have a good credit balance for you maam.'

ME getting super irritated, more so at the 100 'maams' in a sentence, and gearing up for some mischief: 'Okay I'd be interested. What info will you need?'

A Sounding very happy at getting a lead: 'Okaaay maam, we will send our representative at your home or office and you will have to fill out a form. Can I get your name and address please?'

Me: 'Yes yes, sure, that sounds good. Why dont you send your representative to my office on Monday while I give you my name and address now.'

A super happy : 'Oh yes maam, that will be okaay. Tell me your name.'

Me: 'Ok, my name is Phebe Kynx.'

A: 'What is it maam?'

Me: 'P-h-e-b-e K-y-n-x. Do you want me to spell it out for you?

A: 'Yes maam.'

Me: 'Ok, here you go.
P as in Pneumonia, H as in Hour, E as in escherichia coli, B as in Buttercups-butterflies-dot-blogspot...

A: 'The first letter is T maam?'

Me: 'No no, P, P as in Pneumonia.'

A: 'D maam?'

Me growling at her 'I said Ppppppp, P as in Psychiatrist'

A: A little confused and relieved at the same time, 'okaay maam, I got you. Then maam?'

Me: 'H as in hour'

A: 'R maam?'

Me: 'No, its H, H as in Hour.' I went on 'E as in Escherichia, did you get that?'

Silence. Some fumbling again. I realized she was getting super confused and nervous. Guessed 3/4 minutes may have passed and it wasnt worth wasting her or my time.

Me: 'Listen, I dont want to waste time. Call me later.' Click-I hang up.

I'm sure she would never call me.

More on Rains

Okay, so I am so excited to see, hear, and feel the rains today after a long time, I thought of writing another post. That's because on my way to office, I had a lot of nostalgic thoughts about a rainy day and I'm sure most of you have at least a few similar thoughts.

The first thought that refreshed my mind was a rainy day at school. All of us have had days when we were pulled out of the bed on a rainy morning by our parents or siblings and asked to get ready for school. I too have had similar experiences. I'd be a little grumpy to be out of bed at first, but I loved school. I'd never never want to miss school a single day of life, even if the Arctics melted and washed away the world or even if a volcano blew up near my school. So, I'd actually be quite upset if my school declared a 'rainy day' off for us, and I'd feel a little alienated from my friends who'd be so happy to get the day off!

Strange enough, things were different for college. I'd be immensely happy if my college would declare a holiday for the rains, though it never did. However, I remember my first year of college when Kolkata had been almost submerged, and I almost swam to college. It was the last day of my final exams and nobody had answered the numerous phone calls I made to college. I was waist deep in water and braved it quite well when suddenly I lost the elevated pavement I was walking on because I didnt know where it ended on the road and splash! I was down in the water! I saw my bag floating away. I got up all drenched and feeling heavier than I ever was and grabbed the bag. Thankfully, a gentleman and his daughter had seen my plight and rushed through the water to help me. They led me by the hand and all three of us walked through the water only to find my college had declared a holiday! Phew!

That was my happy-sad nostalgia. Today, my facebook homepage is full of rainy day updates, and how people got stuck on the roads. I'm sure the home-birds are having a great day, but those out on the roads are going to have a tough time.

Cheers!

Rains

Yes, it finally rained heavily in Hyderabad. The entire rainy season until last week went dry with constant fears of drought in the state. The truant nimbus clouds finally came back from their vacation last week, and it rained heavily last week and today too.

Today morning was awesome with heavy rains and a great cool air all over. However, for me (and a lot of you), the only spoilsport was having to go to office. You know right how it feels when its raining heavily outside, and the morning at 7 looks dark and gloomy like its just 5:30, and you are all wrapped up in thick blankets on the warm-cold bed! Aah, its just awesome. I'm a light sleeper, and so I woke up at 3 am at the pitter-patter of rains on my window. Slowly, I heard the rain intensify and growl, and the pitter-patter transformed into a heavy splash of water on the window panes. The rains continued alternating between heavy to moderate, while I alternated between sleep and half-sleep. I had the fan on and drew a blanket to enjoy the warmth of the cold. I think I dozed back at around 5 am when my alarm went off. I keep the first alarm at 5 am on weekdays. I usually love to keep it snoozing until 6:30. Every time it snoozes, I enjoy the thought of getting some more time to sleep until the next snooze. It continues until its time for me to finally leave bed at close to 7 am. Today was different. I dozed off at the first ring and slept undisturbed until I realized my cab would be waiting for me soon.

I woke up to see the nearby gulmohar tree wet and dripping. The dripping dark green leaves looked amazing in the not-so-bright cold morning. I loved the scene for a minute and hated office for another. Sad and heavy-hearted at having to get up early on a cosy morning, I was also happy to have enjoyed the beautiful morning weather.

Plastic Surgeons Have Lost an ATM

Well, I see marks of interrogation on your faces. Yep, if you guess who/what I'm talking of, I'll get you a pizza, and I'm sure you can't guess. :)

I'm talking of MJ. Well, he deserves a mention at least once in my blog. :) Dont gimme that look, you! I'm nonchalant to MJ's music, neither a fan, nor a hater (I know its a strong word).

What is striking is the media hoopla we have been noticing since his death. It's almost 2 months that the person has died, and people have been trying to get famous by supposedly seeing him here and there. TRP(television rating points) hungry news channels have tried to create a spooky air by showing a shadow of MJ walking in his home. Apparently he has been seen enjoying with his friends by his pool side. Friends, err...u mean souls or humans, I'd love to know! Or is that what we mean by soulmates?

The latest from the media stable is that MJ was supposedly a reincarnation of an Egyptian Princess. A statue of an ancient Egyptian Princess kept in Chicago's Field Museum has all of a sudden started making news from August 8, 2009. There are suppositions, ideas, thoughts that MJ was a reincarnation of this Princess. I wonder why it didnt make any noise when the supposed reincarnation was alive? MJ died on June 26, 2009. Was this Egyptian Princess excavated after this date? Or was the Chicago museum built between June 26 and August 8?

I fail to understand why the media has created this story after MJ's death. I'm sure had this story been unraveled earlier, the museum would've got a lot of coverage. A lot of people would've made tonnes of moolah too, keeping aside the plastic surgeons. A pic of this princess for your hungry curiosity:

Phew! My first Wedding Anniversary

Rolling back to July 9, 2008, Wednesday.
Sravani Saha and Sandeep Giri are married at Arya Samaj Mandir, Kolkata.

Fast forward (a little faster, please) to July 9, 2009, Thursday.
Sandeep Giri and Sravani Saha are still wonderstruck how one year has passed by. Nevertheless, now that it has already passed off, no use thinking how.

No, no, thats not how I (Sravani) am. I really traced back to find out that I spent 6 months with books, 2 months cooking, 1.5 months talking on the phone, 1.5 months fulfilling my basic human needs, and probably the remaining 1 month with Sandeep undisturbed. I still have to ask Sandeep about his breakup of the 12 months.

Now, Sandeep and I were okay-ish excited about our first anniversary. We didn't really plan anything though. I think that's why we were given a surprise by life :)

At 12 am, July 9, we cut a huge, cherry-rich, yummy black forest (yes, the pic you see up there).

Next morning, Sandeep took an off from work. I had already taken one. :)
We were tossing ideas at each other as to how we could spend the day together, and finally decided to take a long ride to Shamirpet Lake close to Hyderabad. The lake is 30 kms from our home, and both of us absolutely love long rides on our two-wheeler. I packed off some crunchy apples, some sweets, and a bottle of water for a small afternoon together. The lake was beautiful. We saw a few men fishing. When we asked about their catch, all of them said with pride: 'Pomfret.' Later, I came to know the black-skinned fish were nowhere close to pomfrets. Probably thats the one word that could make jeans-clad people feel proud about those fishing!

Cool lake with a cooler breeze, lots of rocks and very few people were the highlights of the place. We toured the entire place, climbed all the rocks we could, Sandeep even pulled me into the water to a distance, we clicked pics, munched on apples, I slipped on two slippery rocks in the water, Sandeep happily and bravely stood on one though. Some happy pics here.



After about 4 hours, we decided to make a move. We had another cake to cut when we'd get back home.

Since we had to take NH9, we came across lots of roadside eateries (dhabas). We had a spicy meal and started back. We had almost started to see civilization (yes, all this while we hadn't) when a three-wheeler overtook us from the left. Imagine, from the left! Simultaneously, there was a big SUV that overtook us from the right and hit our two-wheeler! I just had a glimpse of Sandeep falling, and before I could realize anything else, I found myself on the ground, and being pulled up by Sandeep. Standing on my feet, I could feel myself very dizzy, and suddenly our eyes fell on the blood all around me on the road. My eyes immediately darted towards Sandeep, fearing him injured. However, I hadn't realized it was my own right thumb that had got crushed with the skin, nail, and underlying tissue hanging from the rest of the finger. Soon, I realized something warm tricking behind my ears. I touched it with my left hand to see blood flowing from somewhere in my head. I looked at Sandeep and found him limping. He was injured in his knee and in his left hand. I then looked at my left hand and saw a huge bruise that was bleeding too. Sandeep seemed very tensed with the uncontrollable bleeding all over, and I tried to tell him that we'd be fine. All we wanted to do was rush to a hospital.

One helpful guy offered to drop us at the nearest hospital because Sandeep could hardly stand straight, leave aside riding. I tried to keep my hand raised to keep the rest of the thumb intact and also to reduce bleeding. We got to a hospital after around 3 kms, received first aid, only to know that I'd need an immediate surgery in my hand. Unfortunately, the two surgeons in the hospital were out. So, we had to rush to another hospital, where I had a plastic surgery in my thumb, a stitch-up of my head injury and other medications for 45 hours. I was almost immobile with my right hand in a cast, and my left with cuts and bruises. Sandeep didnt sleep a wink in those 45 hours, attending to all my needs and looking after me, and without seeing a doctor for his injuries! He turned absolutely immune to himself and his injuries, and I feared the injuries would harm him. However, he seemed absolutely nonchalant about himself. I still don't know how he could tolerate the pain!

We came back on Saturday evening. Sandeep was limping, and I was all in a cast and bruises. We finally cut the cake that we were to cut on Thursday. :) I felt so happy to come back home.

Its been 33 days, and Im still healing. I'm yet to resume work after all these days. Sandeep is still feeding me, helping me change, and helping me with everything. His injuries too haven't healed completely, but he hardly bothers. I'm completely in awe of this guy who has been doing so so much for me. Thank you dear, and love you immensely.
Some happy sad pics here:





We had not realized when we spent one whole year together, however, we'll forever remember how we spent the first day of the second year together. :)

Back after a Hiatus

Finally, I'm back after a hiatus. My last post was in May, 09. June whizzed past through a-better-not-talked-about-exam. Come July, and I was exhilarated and damaged the same day! Damaged? Sounds like a motor part. Yes, but Yes.

Will talk about it tomorrow in my next post.