Ki holo? Kemon achis? B-E-N-G-A-L!

My stay is going to get over very soon here and I would sum it up in one line as "Unusual but refreshing". I travelled to many states in India because of the transferable job of my father, I have experienced the aura of many places but this time it was different and worth explaining. As correctly pointed by Poulomi my friend from Delhi and in Bengal too in the last post, there are really some exclusive and intriguing facts about this place,on the other hand some things are li'l depressing.

Here, I would like to list some common practices prevalent in my hostel-workplace-kharagpur-West Bengal-Bengal!

1. People are Lazy!
2. Marketing skills are poor, they dont like to work hard (Hard? big word!!)
3. Bargaining is a strictly prohibited act!
4. Vegetarian, please turn Non-veg else Die!!
5. Eating habits are pathetic!
6. Working hours are very short.
7. Gain weight upto 5kgs in 5 days.
8. Bengali is the international language.

Lazy people- Now why I say this,well, it seems people here do not like to work, they rather like spending their time talking or eating rasogullas or just doing nothing. For instance, I once went to a bank for some work, the person in-charge was moving his pen so slowly that even ants could crawl faster..They walk slowly,They eat slowly,They work slowly...

Bargaining-an unpunishable offence: I remember my initial days at kgp, when I went to tech market to buy some thing, Out of my usual habit of bargaining that my friends and I used to indulge in back at our places or u can say at other parts of India, bargaining here doesn't exist. To my surprise,I got such a cold response that I stopped doing this practice [which was so enjoyable :( ) When I left the shop to move steps further in hope that the shopkeeper would call me again as it used to be at other places,the shopkeeper dada never called me up :P

'Dada' : Dada is a common term used to call an elder brother here,initially it seemed quite weird to call a young person say a rickshawallah as dada, because people like me understand that dada only meant grand father to us. Once, I called a young man (a rickshawalla) as dada back in Delhi and he turned back at me making an ugly face and said "didi,aapko hum dada lagte hain?"

Veg/Non Veg 1:100 : Yeah, this is the terrible ratio of vegetarians out here so by default at all the places, the vegetarians are least taken care of. Drumstick-sounds like a weapon of mass destruction is a kind of green vegetable that was served in my hostel every other day only to feel pathetic about it.

Table sense : Not at all,I have seen people eating using both of their hands. I think I can better enact but seriously the view is terrible. In a way, it also gives you a good laugh :P

Wanna Gain weight?? Come here : Blame it to the irresistable mouth watering rasgullas(Rashogullas-as they call it!) that you will get in almost all the meals even in the breakfast. Believe me, its irresistible so much so that when you realise u have gained series of tires in your waist seems its too late to be doing something. The usual scene of a sweet shop is line of men taking home bags full of rasogullas every day. Do in our homes we take sweets in such quantity and frequency? I do not remember my papa ever rought sweets just for the desert purpose. The sweets in our home are there in few cases, when some guests bring it or we bring for the guests.

Bong-The International lingo : wtf! you really gonna have tough time if you are a non-bong. I mean, they wont pay heed u getting anything at all or aint. The height sometimes is that even if you are replying in eng/hindi, they continue in Bengali!!! And you go confused whats going on.

Although I have cited some curt truths that may not look nice, but I must appreciate following:

Eve-teasing : eve-teasing cases in Bengal are less. Seems men here are more cultured and well mannered than other places specially of metropolitans. I experience a drastic change of men's attitude towards women when I used to shift from kgp-to-home or home-to-kgp.

Culturally rich: Historically Bengal has a very rich cultural heritage. Bengal is, indeed, noted for its rich culture in songs, music, drama, dances and language. We all know Rabindra Nath Tagore was the first person from India to bag a Nobel Prize in Litreature for "Geetanjali" ( :) )
Bengal has a rich tradition of classical music of the subcontinent. Indeed, Bengal has produced many musicians and maestros of international repute like Ustad Alauddin Khan, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan and Pandit Ravi Shankar who have successfully made sitar and sarode popular all over the world.

• Life expectancy is around 63 years, and are almost same for the men and women.
• West Bengal leads with 69.22% literacy rate.
• Kolkatta Metro was the first underground railway to be built in India, with the first operations commencing in October, 1984.

P.S though it seems I have depicted a bad picture of this state, but I really dont want to offend anybody and if I hurt anybody's feelings I apologise for it.

I know the bong friends of mine would boil up after reading this, but this is purely my personal opinion and blog ;)

My two years @ Bengal

I daily experience many things about this place, about its people, their behaviour,their style, their manners,their lifestyle and what not...I have ample experience to share..most of them if not all are bitter. These days I think I have become li'l frust as the lingo here goes and li'l busy too.. So I am leaving now to promise that soon I will be coming with my new post wherein I will be sharing some facts,secrets and gossip about The Great Bengal..

Till then..take great care of yourself :)
Peace

FIFA, rain & bla bla

Hai peene ka mausam

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Current mood : Contemplative

The latest song "Pee loo" from the movie "Once upon a time in Mumbai" is a beautiful song.Its been romantically picturised so much so that even Emran Hashmi looked a better man. This I realised while sitting cosily in front of the t.v during my short stay at home in Delhi. Adding to my mood, Rain God is on the DUTY. Its raining gracefully. Earlier I used to be one big nuisance who used to curse and scamper for cover when it used to rain but,Now it feels great to go for a walk or look with awe and admiration as droplets of rain hits the face. .Wow..I can spend my whole day just sitting near the window seeing those fresh droplets meeting their end on my hands and leaving a nice simper on my face.. Coming back to the song,the lyrics somehow confuse me..How can one do "Pee loo during peene ka mausam" . Idont understand, Can anyone Throw light?

Honestly telling the lyrics say something else if u concentrate.I mean, "Pee" "Loo".. ? :P

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Does that happen to you?

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The next thing that I m goin to share is something very unfortunate and is silly. Let me do..

See I dont intend to do this but it happens somehow and trust me ther's no fault of mine. Let me explain, it happens at times that if suppose, I m at home; and watching television alone(in the room)..believe me; it could be any music channels or bollywood movies or even english movie channels,everything comes clean. But as soon as somebody enters especially mom, dad OR di..immediately out of nowhere explicit scenes starts playing. They make me feel embarrased and angry that how when I was alone nothing of such sort was there and all hell broke now. why? [ Hey Dont think that I wait for them when I m alone :P (there are many options and not just home's T.v for if somebody really wants to see those) Phew!!! ] I just keep thinking what mom thinks when she turns her face after having a glimpse :P

God ji!! Help..!

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Germany vs Spain

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Last night was some fun. :)

Honestly telling I never saw Spain playing footer before though I have heard it won many matches recently like the Euro cup and etc. And beause Germany is my favourite so I was vouching for it. But dude..got a surprise Spain..O my Gawdd!! The minute they started the game took almost 85% possesion of the ball and played smartly and effortlessly. Short passes,header's,Villa,Iniesta,Xavi,Xabi made German fans chew their nails!! What a team!!

Germany was just a decent defender in the match.The latest global celebrity Mr. Paul's,the Octopus; predictions are also proving to be true. I dont believe but now even Germans are forced to believe who are generally not an ordinary superstitions.

Now I m all for the sunday match between Dutch & Spainards. Hoping this time the Oracle Octopus is wrong.

Yo FIFA..!

Rainy days...

There are some songs that reminds you of something. They may not seem that special to others as they do to you. Here, I will mention one such song that whenever I start to listen fills me with strings of pleasant feelings related to my initial days at kharagpur. kgp becomes a Queen in rainy days. You feel blessed to be present in this placeduring such time. Especially for those who loves rain and nature its a perfect place!

I remember me walking on roads while it was raining. The sight of green wet trees ,branches of which swaying away in wind is what that takes your heart! The feeling is unusual, I can not actually describe what it is of. But i felt great. I felt independent. Now, its the same time in the year, the first rain has already poured down.The weather is pleasant like heaven and I continue to listen the same song...


Rascal Flatts: What hurts the most

owl-virus-sweet bengal-me!!

Now whats this yaar? Its 3 in the night n i m one such owl...m supposed to be doin something which i m certainly not doin rite now..this night was in my wait list. Yup, my mid-sems got over today..after such a hectic week, where I happened to give 2 exams in a day, an afternoon exam n morning exam the next day..I took a breath of relief today.
So what to do? After the exam we headed straight to the Tech market, well ther’s nothing technical about this market still its called so... may be because its a market in IIT . Rofl! n the term must have been coined by a Sweetner (Bengali...No offence please!)

There are many things out here which if I start explaining can make us fall off the chairs laughing. After the lunch i hit the bed to catch up a comfortable nap which lasted till 5:30 when Deepti woke me up. Now, we had planned this visit to watch the Classical dance drama production called UTTARAYAN to be hosted in Netaji audi at 6pm sharp, something.. planned 2 weeks before..so we ( deepti,suman n myself) scurried to the said place.

Well we forgot about the IST.. i mean Indian Standard Time..so instead of 6 the show started at 7:30. Meanwhile we went to hijli n had “Jhalmuri”... one of the most popular and iconic snack foods from Bengal made from [puffed rice n had fun. The show started n we enjoyed to the core. It was very good to see performing very young intelligent people work of such level. Missed our dinners, back to hostel had maggi in the canteen, tried to watch T.V but Mosquitoes gave us no respite n kicked me back to my room. O yeah,.. Deepti n I had planned to watch a horror movie together, but later on dropped the idea riskin our lives :P n better watch tomoro in a big group because some of them still havin that 1 last exam :D

So I m here again in my room. I was expecting somewhat more fun. But why its only during the exams that we get all the nicest ideas in the world to do excitin things which we certainly become tied in chains to do at that point of time n postpone it for post-exam timings. But see here, thar time has come, but I aint havin fun. Leave fun, atleast I can have a good sleep. Alas, neither ...


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Dunno what is the connection between me n virus..when I was back home Delhi , every other day my bro used to scold me for spoiling the system with viruses ( I still believe I was never at fault :( )and here again the same story, n this time its my cell phone. I never knew even cell phone can catch bugs. But now I have all the reasons to believe. The condition of my phone is such that my all Inbox messeages are deleted, my ph. Gallery is empty, it doesn’t show sent messeges either. Its screwd up! Who to go help for? :(


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THE GREAT BENGAL n me !

When I was in Delhi i used to weigh a good 51 kgs :)
But ever since I have arrived here in kgp, the graph is catching up exponentially :( how to type(it hurts :( ) but I used to weigh 51 kgs..but the story is different now. I am a fat ass of 58 kgs n after 2 days gap I m being shown 60 kgs in a (faulty x-( acc. to me) weighing machine. I don’t believe! I don’t believe! These are erroneous results. But when i recapitulate.. being served sweets in every damn meal over here, even in snacks..(how can u eat samosas with rasogullas? Ewww.... or again rasogullas in dinner) I re-think n nw planning ..better to start running from tomorrow.

Not only sweets, overall the food is so oily sometimes that once when I was served Beguni( Brinjal ke pakore :P )i thought I can squeeze oil n prepare an omelette from the same!


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P.S: pata nahi what all crap i wrote without giving a second thought about editing. Read kar lena :P

Rathore: Protector turned Predator

19 years have passed by. And here comes the Justice- six-month jail sentence awarded to former-DGP S.P.S for molesting a then 14 year girl Ruchika who later commited suicide. It’s like a daily affair now. Lots of Jessica’s and Ruchika’s are losing their lives and we Just wait for our Beloved Court to come up with a punishment .

I was taken aback when I saw in the news how the prime convict in Ruchika’s molestation case walked out with a shameless-smile on his face after hearing his punishment from the court. He easily made a mockery of our judicial system. Ruchika was 14 years when she was molested and when she protested, she was caught in a dirty political game where big names were involved including ex-CM of Haryana. Three years later, expelled from school, her brother was regularly tortured and was framed in more than 11 false cases. In short, her life was made hell by Mr. Rathore who was holding a big rank at that time which he had got for definitely not doing what he was doing. Overwhelmed by what her family was going through, she committed suicide… In spite of all that, he grew from height to height and retired as a respectable police officer...

What a shame Mr. Rathore!!

But the sad part is that he had no sign of remorse on his bloody face when he heard about his conviction. Instead he was smiling. I felt like slapping him. I just want to ask him how he would have felt had the same thing happened with his daughter or daughter-in-law if he has any? Would he still be smiling?

You know, actually we are expecting for no reasons. We know he’s the culprit, We know he has cost the life of a budding tennis player, leave all that, he, who has seen all the wealthy (and sexual) pleasures of life had scourged the life of a 14 year child who had seen nothing in her life. But the Indian Law thinks molesting somebody is not a crime of that level which we are expecting. Nobody knows, had Ruchika not complained about him, he could have even raped her. Given the lust he was having, too weak to control himself, that old dumbshit Rathore could have done anything.

Actually,the law gives so much respect to old age, that even the molestation of a kid forcing her into suicide becomes a little scar that would heal in time and therefore Rathore was reported saying, “It's a very old issue. Forget about it now”.

I m feeling so bad. Its like loosing your trust on everything. How long will we continue believing “ Bhagwan ke ghar der hain magar andher nahi”
A 'der’ of 19 years is too much.


C’mon we can hear some stricter punishment…

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How I missed my train...

It's been over four months since my last detailed post. Life as I knew it has changed dramatically. I do get computer time, in fact all the time in here I haven't been blogging at all. I'm still not writing it off or anything, in fact, there have been many things I've thought about posting about. It just never seems to materialize.
I had booked my seat in Puri New Delhi Express for 10th Dec in the month of November only. Going home after so many days and after successfully completing the first semester was a reason to be excited. Our exams got over on 26th November Everybody was going home daily.. Well, I could have left on 27th Nov only but I decided to go on 10th Dec because of friends (:P), Grades that were scheduled to out on 5th Dec and project allotment thereafter.

The day came eventually, that evening of 10th I can not just forget. I was happy and excited, to the degree that when my friend told the train is late for 11 hours I dint listen to him. Though I wasn’t wrong on my part because in one of the website which I tried to look for train timings it was showing me it to be late by 1.5 hours and frankly telling I never knew trains can get late by 11 hours. :O
So, I bid adieu to everyone and left for railway station. I remember, when I was half way through I was praying to God that the news about train delay must turn out as false because I had to answer my friend... but when I enquired at the counter, it was indeed late for good damn 12 hours. Holy shit! Now that meant, I had to then board the train at 6 in the morning. Came back to hostel with a low face. Next morning, was finally the day to go home. So I put my phone alarm to 3:20 am so as to get ready by 4 to leave for railway station.


But ..."The alarm didn't go off!" Damnnn...what to do now? I yelled as I flung the covers off and flew out of bed. It was 10 minutes to 6 in the morning and I had to be at the station by 6. Frantically brushing teeths grabbed the luggage and ran out of the door to the main gate. Immediately Called up friend and both of us just ran to railway station. I remember, how in rickshaw I was praying to my God....Reached station, platform no.6..... when asked a tea stall owner, bloody crackpot told the train has yet not arrived... took a deep relief and I turned bubbly , but when on the second time, asked another tea stall man, he told my train had JUST left kharagpur.. I must have looked so funny fumbling around trying to catch the already-left train. I literally broke into tears..the moment was awful, dint wanted to go back to the campus again 2nd time or for that matter at all, since I was all so ready to go home. Cried a lot...and was angry at myself for not telling anyone to wake me up at that time.

As they say, everything happens for something good. Let’s take the good thing out of this episode and be careful the next time :)

But why it happened , I will reach home AFTER 3 days now :( :( :(