The Truth About Me-self

Ah! I had my much awaited review of my official performance today. I've been waiting for this since the past two weeks. Today I just walked into my boss' room and said I need to be given a feed back on my performance till date. He said ok and asked me to bring the copies of everything I did till date. I had to my credit 7 print ads, three invites, one brochure and a few odd and other write-ups, the copies of which he splayed on the desk in front of him. A few minutes of going through it and he said just what I long expected to hear -  "not good". He said the work that I've done since I joined this company in June is nothing short of "zilch". And I couldn't agree with him more. I have been reviewing my own work and found out that I have got nothing substantial to my credit yet! Now, isn't that bad? Yes it is, and very much so. And why couldn't I give my best till now? The reasons are umpteen and yet, they're only reasons. The fact rema...

My last post was about me-self getting enchanted by Celtic music and the magical voice of Loreena McKennitt. And I was honest in telling you all that I found it difficult to concentrate on anything else including my work. Whenever I get a minute's break or whenever I forcefully pulled me-self out of the routine events in my life, I found listening to her songs over and over again. But most of your responses rather confuse me. There were many of you who said, I'm "in love"! Yes. That's true. I fell in love with Celtic music and Loreena's voice. Is that what all of you were referring to? Or were you telling me about something else? The more people who commented that I was in Love, I got more and more confused. And now, I've reached a point where all my thoughts are getting mixed up! Am I in love? I mean, am I really in love with something, someone else and I didn't realise it? Did that Stupid, Careless Cupid send another one of his god forsaken arrows ...

Oh! This is unbelievable. 3 days back I stumbled upon a piece of music in Joanne May's blog . It was the video of a live performance by Loreena McKennitt. And... And... I've been listening to her songs ever since then! I simply can't get the music out of my head. Her enchanting voice and the utter magic of Celtic music has caught me in a spell! I'm unable to think about anything else; unable to concentrate on my work; unable to do just anything. I FELL IN LOVE WITH IT!!! My ears are always plugged and with the music playing inside my head. Oh! The rumbling timbrels, the haunting pipes, the mournful violin, the harp, the tabala... The experience is just haunting and so enchanting! And Loreena... Oh! She just sounds like an enchantress invoking a 1000 ghosts from their graves with her songs... Besides all this I observe an uncanny similarity between Celtic music and Indian Hindustani music. But as I realize it now, though the Hindustani music is pursued largely in In...

Hi folks, I just finished giving the final touches to a short story that I've been trying to write since I was in college. I did write it then and got it published in our department's manuscript magazine. But it never got the response I expected and I knew why. 'coz it was too obscure and full of personal elements and could never reach to the reader. Ever since then I wanted to improvise it and give it one more shot. And after almost 6 years, I got the old manuscript out of my shelf and dusted it and went through it again. I sat staring at the ceiling of my room and listening to Loreena McKennitt's 'Mummer's Dance'. Maybe that her magical and mystical voice and the pipes and timbrels of the Scandinavian music inspired me, I sat down and reworked on the whole story and there I'm, I could finally give it a form and shape that could take it to a reader! The story is titled 'Silhouette'. I request everyone of your attention to that story and leav...

Ahem! This is funny, I know. But here onwards you'll find this regular but very irregular column in my blog. I think the name has it all - 'Ekan dabbles with cooking'. Ye! "Dabbles with cooking". And that's 'coz I have no more than a passing fancy for cooking. To say that I'm "no good at it" would be an exaggeration. I'm bad, really bad at it!!! Having said that, I do get into the kitchen and try my luck at cooking once in a blue moon day. The result? God's grace, I've still not been sued of setting ablaze a kitchen! The best dish I've made so far is the Egg-Noodles and (hi!) I'm an expert in that! Anyone who has had the misadventure of sharing my culinary skills has agreed to that! In fact, when I was living with room mates (12 of us) in Bangalore, it was almost a routine to have Egg-Noodles prepared by Master Chef Ekan and Chicken Curry made by a less popular but my assistant Chef Sadique Ali for dinners on Satu...

I know, I said I'd be taking a "short non-commercial break" for a few days. But I have to share this with you. This is extra ordinary! I don't know what came over me today. Never have I experienced such a thing before in my life. The day had been very hectic at the office. But I was this super human finishing one task after another. Usually it takes me at least two days to figure out a good line for an ad or half a day to conceptualise an invite or other stuff. But today turned out to be something extra ordinary. I churned up lines for two ads and was done with other lighter tasks like copy correction and stuff. Whether the lines for the ads would get a green signal from the client is something yet to be seen. But the good sport I'm, I'm not too bothered about the result as long as I'm satisfied with my attempt. Besides these nerve crunching and hair pulling jobs, I found time to pen down three poems, one in Malayalam (my mother tongue), which I also t...

Dear all, I'm taking a short non-commercial break for a few days from blogging. I may not be able to post on a regular basis or visit your blogs. No. I've got no brain tumour or anything and I'm not being rushed to the hospital. Neither am I leaving you all to go for a honeymoon to  Mauritius so un-announced. I've two major things coming my way this week and I need to put in my maximum effort in there. 1. My Creative Director said he'd review me on all the work that I've done do far. And that means I might be confirmed and given a pay-hike this month. It also means, he's going to screw my happiness and say I'm not creative enough or worse even, worthy enough to continue working, which in other words means, I'll have to continue as a trainee Copy Writer for another few months. My knees are going weak and I feel a lump in my throat. Am I falling sick? 2. This is something more important - I've been contemplating on raising a social issue t...

First of all, thank you all for stopping by my last post and encouraging me with your kind-kindest words. It did it's part in curing me. I'll ever be grateful to all of you for that. And for burdening up your mind I'm back again, feeling all relaxed and pepped up with a real fun post. This was an older post which I put in before anyone of you started following me. I'm deleting that post and reposting it here. So here is another leaf out of my crazy life for you all to read and discover another face of the brooding, sulking Ekan that I was in my last post. This happened to me almost a couple of years back when I was working in Bangalore. As is my very nature, I did not fail to befriend a few dogs in Shantinagar (I lived with room mates for an year there) and this particular black beauty was my favourite because she was the only one who used to welcome me without a fail every evening when I returned from work. I don't know from where, but she always used to come a...

This might be a complete shock to many of you who have been following me for a while now. I usually try to be very happy and happening, else very mushy and touchy in my posts. And I was never trying to pretend too. I was trying to build a person in me who can face the world with a smile even at the eve of dooms day. But I think I'm not that. It's not there in me to keep fighting, fighting and fighting with me-self all my life and all alone. After a long while I ventured to stray into boundaries that was once closed for me. I visited the blog of my "lost-love". And why did I do that? Heaven knows why? It was like some unknown force was leading me there without my will. But unlike before and for the first time ever, I read what she had to say about her life without any pre-conditioned mind set. Usually whenever I visit her blog I dig out a lot of stuff from there to offend me and feel bad and miserable about. But today, I read and re-read a few of her posts and I s...

Today I spend a rather dull, uneventful Saturday. The only productive thing that I did today was visiting all my blog friends that I missed out last week and go through their posts. Though some of their posts did have things to cheer me up, the day couldn't be saved. It was rather doomed to be dull. And you know what happens when my mind becomes empty? Mr. Devil wakes up and makes me write stories and very descriptive ones that is. So get those coke cans out'a your fridge and what ever you'd like to munch on when you get ready for a long read. This story is about a 12 years old, very naive and a quite little boy who was always alone in a world of his own and his dad. The boy had not many friends and was not in good terms with his mom and his 9 years old sister whom he considered a terror 'coz she always bet him to pulp in a fist fight and the mom always took the side of the victimiser. Though the young boy was a habitual brooder, his dad had imparted in him enough of...

Now, this has been a topic debated for ages. Does our star sign tell what we are? Is there any truth in star signs and the characters attributed to each zodiac? I, for one, started off being very cynical about this subject. How can all the people born in one zodiac sign be the same? If that is the case then why my dad who was a Capricon and my sister who is also a Capricon are different in their tastes, their thoughts, their reaction to things etc. etc. etc. This question bothered me for a long time. And then one fine day I realized that the issue need to be approached in a different way. I read up on star signs and approached the subject with an open mind, all ready to accept it as a big sham or see if it can convince my rational intellect.  As a first step, I read up on Cancer 'coz that's my star sign and to my surprise most of the things said about a Cancer was very true about me. Here, I scratched my head and started thinking again. How can thi...

I have many things to share with you. But let me take this chance to share with you something that grabbed my attention recently. This was a mail forwarded to me by my sister and believe me I was more than astonished! This is no fairytale. This is a true life story. I request all of your attention to this. Please read through carefully. 'I don't feed beggars. They can look after themselves. The mentally ill won't ask anyone for food or money,' says N Krishnan who has been feeding them thrice a day for the past seven years. He left his bow-tie high paying 5-star job to feed the mentally ill. N Krishnan feeds 400 mentally ill people on the streets of Madurai (A district in Tamil Nadu, India) three times a day, every day, all 365 days of the year. The 28-year-old has been doing this for seven years via a charity called the Akshaya Trust. A look into the kitchen reveals a spotlessly clean room. Sparkling vessels stacked neatly, groceries and provisions all lined u...

"Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love." "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." "A person starts to live when he can live outside himself." What say people? Do you think this funny looking man is all that funny about what he says?

A few days back I watched the movie, ' Casablanca ' for the seventh time. I always prefer a good romantic comedy or a classy love story over any other type of movies. And that 'coz watching a romantic comedy gives me an insight into one of my favourite subjects - Relationships. Needless to say, 'Casablanca' tells one of the best love stories ever portrayed on screen and I hope there are no arguments to that. But that's not the reason I watch it over and over again. It's for the sheer pleasure of watching Ingrid Bergman , one of the most beautiful ladies ever to have appeared on screen. I know there could be arguments to that statement. But when has beauty been a constant or universal factor, especially when it comes to the beauty of a woman? Perceptions differ and I consider Ingrid to be the epitome of feminine beauty. Now, I'm not going to fill this post describing the beauty of Ingrid. I already did that in a poem that I wrote on the same day of watch...

I'm out and out an animal person and my most favoured pet is a dog. And I got my first dog, Tasha, just a few months back. People who have been following my blog for a while might know this about me already. But for those who are new to my blog and to my existing readers who have missed out on some of my earlier posts, here's a list of my earlier posts you might like to take a peek at: 1.  The Rescue 2.  OMG! I've sinned! 3.  My new Pup - Tasha 4.  Baby = Puppy??? 5.  Why is it better 2 have a dog than a b'friend/g'friend? 6.  The ride 7.  Dog Vs Cat 8.  Tasha'a Day Out 9.  OMG! I have PMS??? And all this is an evidence for how excited I was about my new pup. And in that excitement, I ignored my cat which has been around our family since 3 years now. I realised it only when someone mentioned my cat in her comment for my last post.  And I'm so thoroughly ashamed about this. Before Tasha came into my life, I come back fro...