Colours of the female shopper..

For better part of my last seven years I've come across more females than males as  acquaintances and friends. Seven years is a really long time. But if you think I have understood the female psyche by now.Then you are gravely mistaken.There is no manual for that. They are as unique or quaint as they come.However I'm no expert on that topic either and neither do I have any intention to delve into it. But among the many things uniquely female like their elephantine memory for dates , events anniversaries ,and remembering slights of yesteryears which have been long forgotten, among others. A couple of things that stands out is their vast vocabulary of colours  and then there is their insatiable desire for shopping , it's almost frightening.

It just amazes me as to the vast array of colours they have, which for me is blue , red , green , yellow , orange ,purple and yea pink too. And additional names of colours that I know of is violet and indigo from VIBGYOR the colours of rainbow.And even then I think violet and indigo are purple.( hang on ' while I ask google. )And so this is how google answers me verbatim, "So in all due respect there is a difference between violet and indigo, violet is purple and indigo is a dark blue."So you get my drift.Consider this example, my uniform for work is a green shirt but my friend,she says it's a mixture of sea green and some other green , whose name escapes me.And here I was thinking the colour of the sea was blue.

I had the misfortune of accompanying a couple of friends( all girls, all crazy , insane shopaholics) to the mall(Big mistake; guys you better go alone with a girl rather than a bunch of girls.Long story maybe, will tell some other time.)however let's return to colours. So as these friends were going gaga over their clothes , one of them asks me ' How's the hot pink dress?'.I was like, Now how do you describe a colour by temperature is beyond me. Hot , lukewarm or cold for that matter. And woe is the man, whose woman sends him on a hunt for finding the matching duppatta, by handing him a piece of cloth ,on his grocery expedition. It's a thankless task, no matter what he does, he'll never be able to make her happy.

While I was accompanying my friends I was just observing how my other male counterparts were faring in the female section as they tagged along their female companion. I could see a couple of unfortunate blokes become a portable hanger as their females delved into pile of clothes talking animatedly to each other , lost in the colours as they made one selection after another and non nonchalantly giving it to their guy to hold , quite oblivious to his discomfort as he tried juggling the clothes on one hand and the kid on the other. And all the snippets of conversations that reached my ears was, I like that mauve jacket and see that midnight black .... Omg! Look at that... And the rest of the conversation was lost as I was pulled out of my reverie by my now maniacally restless company who simply couldn't get enough of this store and now wanted to try the adjacent store.

Over the years ,their shopping has undergone a sea change first it was the local kapde vala ( cloth merchant) ,where they would just keep on asking the shopkeeper to show his stuffs and he tirelessly and enthusiastically meets all their demand, hoping for a jackpot sale but in the end they leave him staring at a heap of clothes to fold and replace.Now with the advent of trial rooms it's simply all too convenient. All they do is just try on the whole store take selfies and leave empty handed at times and at other times two hands are simply not enough.

So all you guys out there I suggest that as for the colours you will probably never remember the whole lot ,no matter how hard you try ,so just go with the flow and translate the colour in the language you understand. But for shopping there is no middle ground either you join them or you don't . As for me I've done the latter and life's been blissful ever since. 

Who's your papa ?

Someone recently came to me introducing a person by telling me to keep in touch with this person as his father is a bigshot.This statement put me into a lot of thinking, and as I observed around, I realized ,how inherent it is, for all of us to to judge a person.To make an opinion even before the other guy even gets a chance. It's like we give undue respect to a person just because his father is a renowned person or a bigshot when on the other hand we ignore someone ,who in other words is a nobody. I heard someone discussing about another person saying he is an interesting person and started narrating the person's  parents and background. Seriously, can you just describe a person as interesting because of his parents.(someone should knock some sense into this someone in the first place ,for talking about someone ,to someone, behind someone .)

We have all become so myopic in viewing people we meet in our daily lives , we tend to see them in the light of their wealth ,position, lineage and ignore what really matters.It's so easy to get lost in the mirage of external trappings of an affluent upbringing as we all swoon with our collective ooohh's and aaahh's. I mean forget the higher echelons in the corridors of power wherein the destiny of a billion people is forged ,where mai baap or mera baap is prevalent and who you are depends on who your parents were,but I am talking about you and me common people or the aam admi.We who distinguish between the privileged and the unprivileged.We go "pata hai uska baap laal batti mein ata hai"(did you know,his dad comes in a red beaconed vehicle; i.e.VIP vehicle ) The reply will usually be,kya baat hai (wow).When in fact he might be be a driver of that vehicle.

I've heard a couple of times people ask a newcomer ,who's your papa?(not necessarily in that manner). Now for me ,that's a moot question. The person is judged either way. He is already labeled from the get go.He has to live up to the expectation of what society thinks should be the appropriate behaviour from a son or daughter of, say a principal of a school.
Similarly it's the reverse too.

However what I have written is just one facet in the uncountable ways we judge people and I'm not writing this to preach to you to do this or that because even I find myself guilty of doing  the same thing.This is what is wrong with us today.We refuse to see you beyond the appearances.It's so entrenched in our collective mindset,that other guy never gets a chance. I know it's hard to break years of habit , something that is second nature to all of us which is, to have an opinion about a person, even before they get an opportunity to prove otherwise , so lets make an effort to give this other guy a break, because more often than not people will surprise you. All you ever have to do is , give them a chance.

What's in a name ?

I have been posted in the OPD(out patient department) for well over six months now and one thing I like is, calling people's names out loud as I sent them to their designated rooms.  Unlike in the inpatients ( i.e. admitted patients) where I usually refer patients by their bed number. So I have come across a cornucopia of names since then.Some name's are intriguing and interesting and some outright puerile and funny.

  Our name's are something that we all identify ourselves with. It's ours and ours alone. It's more than an identity. But what happens when your parents who are supposed to give you names ,bungle up.I mean just imagine if your name is the butt end of everyone's jokes.

I recently came across a name called 'Awake'. Man! imagine that.By the way, who names their kids Awake.  And another kid named 'Frooty '. Yea right! I had actually asked the mother and she confirmed that it's the official name. Sometimes I wonder what were the parents thinking while naming their children.It is a heavy responsibility,and it's repercussions are felt throughout the child's life. I can well imagine the years of teasing and harrying these kids might have to face. Then there are names which are exquisite and recherche` that roll from your tongue, effortlessly and fluently with poetic grace.

On the other hand take my name for example. It's ,Manivarnan Chinnathambi '. Anyone mentioned tongue twisters. Yea try saying my name slowly at first and increase the speed as you go. That'll give you a kick.When people hear my name for the first time , almost every time I'm asked to repeat my name. So there I go gracefully obliging them by repeating my name again slooowly. Then the next question that immediately follows is ,"where are you from?". Actually, I'm from the planet 'Kriptine ' part of the ' Nebula Blue galaxy' ' the planet adjacent to ' Krypton ' (Superman's planet.)

Another thing I come across ,when I tell my name,is that I get to hear an assortment of names as I see people try miserably to get my whole name right in the first go. It's more like a polite name calling. I remember being called 'Manivarium' by a friend as she attempted to speak my name.( I don't fault her though , she is an 'angrez',read British, after all.) Then there is 'Maniva' and my all time favourite is "Manivarachitta  blblba what ... Could you repeat that again."

My 22 alphabets name sometimes runs out of boxes in forms so I always count the boxes before filling them up ,you can't go asking for extra boxes in a form now.Can you? It's even bigger pain if there's a straight line in the name column of a form. On a straight line I go all bold and nice with the first part of my name . Then on coming to second half I realize I am running out of space. So I cramp the letters so closely, they are almost jam packed. It reminds me of the Indian Railways; wherein the first  of my name is like like A/C coach all spacious and beautiful and the second half like the general coach with bodies all cramped together and an arm here and a leg there poking out from the windows.

So for practical purposes I use the name ' Mani ',usually for non official and informal situations. However even then too people write my name as 'Manny ' ,Money and 'Moni' but rarely do they write 'Mani'.So at the end of the day I have come to realize and accept that my name's distortion is here to stay ,maybe will be remain so in the future too.Like the lines from Shakespeare's famous play 'Romeo and Juliet' ,in which Juliet Capulet speaks the following lines to Romeo Montague .
"What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes       
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name...."
So ultimately whether I am called 'Manivarium or Manny or Money it really doesn't matter because who I am as a person will not change with the names that I am called. So all you out there, if people don't call your name correctly, just chill; and join the club of people who oft repeateth Juliet's question"What's in a name ?"

P.S. : So dear readers , How's your experience with your names?

To Her ,With Love

I was in a dilemma for quite sometime.It was about whether I should write on what I just wrote. I was hesitant infact even now I'm not sure how to proceed. I was more concerned as to how my readers (which mainly comprises of friends and well wishers) will perceive me after reading this. But then I see the title of the blog it's ' My Ramblings'. That's what gives me encouragement as I write this out to my girl who I have to yet meet, because these are my thoughts and my ramblings.

Hey/ hi /dear
In this world of chats and SMSes where the English language has been battered beyond recognition and the meaning of conversation just lost with whatsapp,BBM (to name a couple.) Here's me making an attempt to to pen my thoughts in some coherent and 'proper' English I'm not sure how to begin,however let me begin as I tell something about myself.
I don't know who you are ,where you are from ( and no I'm not quoting any song you might have heard of ) but I know you are there.
So going by my looks I won't take your breath away , I'm no Clooney or Ian Sommerhalder for that matter and neither am I as dorky as I look on my blogger profile. (That's a selfie I took out of boredom.) ,but yes; I will surprise so much so , that you will be left catching your breath.You'll be so out of breath that you will become hypoxic and might require oxygen therapy.

They say first impression is the last impression , I'd beg to differ. My friends say I came out as reserved , arrogant and a hard nosed person when they first saw me or rather met me but when they warmed up to me, they say I'm not what they thought I was. Yes I do live up to the above mentioned adjectives occasionally but then name me one person who is perfect. My personality is something that will impress you once you get to know me. So you won't be impressed from the word go like the immediate effect of an anaesthetic drug but I'l be like an antibiotic ,you'll have to take the whole course to see the effect.

Talking of antibiotics reminded me that me being a nurse is an added advantage for you ,I can tell your temperature, pulse by just holding your hands. Now how cool is that !! And God forbid,but if by any chance you fell sick. You will have your own personal nurse to take care of you. Now that's a good deal right. One personal nurse always there for you. Seeing the skyrocketing healthcare costs it will be a win-win situation.Also I don't want appear tooting my own horn here but a few friends can guarantee that I am quite good at what I do. Not that I would ever want you to be sick.

Also you might be a fan of dance shows and dance movies, yea I can watch them. And you might have some of the most graceful dance moves but I dance squat. Picture a guy getting electrocuted,yea that would be me ,while dancing. I have a couple of friends whose dance moves will mesmerize you and they can vouch for me that I have two left feet when it comes to dancing. So what if I can't dance ,you can always teach me and believe me I've always been a good student. But even if you don't dance, we can learn it together.

I am a vociferous reader. I read anything , from coffee table books to fiction even the news that is on the paper bags made of newspaper. So you won't be needing to watch news.As a kid too, I loved reading so much that I had made a slit in my school blazer, adjacent to my inner chest pocket to accommodate an extra book ,as our weekly allowance of one book was insufficient for me. So you can understand my relationship with books.

I can cook a mean dish of chicken sometimes. It's only sometimes as,  it's not always that I make a lip smacking gastronomical delight, it's a series of hits and misses. So hang in there and you might still get something that I call as 'the taste of a lifetime' when I'l reach that zenith in the 'art of cooking.'

Movies ,I rarely miss one. I watch even the boring ones and with fifteen minutes into the movie , me and my crazy friends are raring to leave the theatre. Though for records sake I have left the theatre only once. Also ,to be frank I have to yet watch a horror movie in a theatre. (I watch them in my room on my laptop) Maybe I'm waiting for you so that we'll both watch it together, holding each others hands and getting scared together.

I know I'm not a perfect person.I have a number of quirks and I have no inhibition in telling them. I have anger at the tip of my nose. I am trying to shift it down to my toes though. I laugh at the drop of a hat. Na not really. That's an overstatement. I don't laugh that easily. Just the other day when everyone was guffawing at a joke. I just didn't find it funny. I just smiled. Laughter is rare. Also my friends say that I over think and over react but with you on my mind I'l hardly find time to think of anything else.What say. Also I am directionally challenged. My left is right and right is left and vice versa.And if we ever get lost in the wilderness then ,God help us.  I am also called the Lord of Destruction as I have a penchant for dropping or breaking things. So keep all the fragile things far away. Ask my roommate who is also my very good friend from college he'll give a better description.

As I was reading what I had just written, I realised that I was writing only the negative aspect ,as if I'm trying to pawn off a beaten down car.But that's not the case. I just want you to prepared for the 'not so good facets' as you discover the good aspect. Moreover I also don't expect you to be perfect ,yea I know you will have your own set of quirks and idiosyncrasies ,cause that's who we all humans are. Imperfect beings who are a work in progress. And all I hope is that you are worth the wait.

Hopefully yours .....

The Death Care

Let me at the outset apprise you all that this post is related to death and dead people ,so all who are squeamish, depressed or disgusted ; read no further and the rest of you go ahead and enjoy(If not enjoy,then just read.). Also let me add as an afterthought that I respect the dead and by no means do I intend to disrespect them. So here I go...

Death is something we all have encountered at one point or the other in our lives. For me it's a professional reality, and a hazard for the people I take care of in my professional life. Especially during my time working in the ER (emergency room) . And one thing we do as a nurse after a person dies is death care ,in laymens term 'bag em and tag em'. Well it's not as simple as it sounds.

I still remember as a nervous first year nursing I was called by one of my interns( now you see interns are the super seniors and the rank highest in the student food chain and first years like you all know are the zooplanktons and phytoplanktons of the student world. Yea the lowest. ). Anyway there was this patient that had died and the bed was screened from all sides with curtains. Unfortunately for me I was in the line of sight of the intern ,who called me to help her give the death care. That was probably my first encounter with a dead body of a person who I didn't know ,that too in an enclosed space. (Man !! Having watched so many horror movies , I had a flashback of some of the scary scenes.) I had a tingling sensation at the back of my neck , a chill spread all over my body and the hair on my hand were all upright. I would have died of a heart attack had somebody touched my shoulder at that very moment. However, after the initial shock, there I was warily looking around as I gingerly held the hands and tied the thumbs together over the stomach , then I bound the great toes together. (We do this because the body goes into ' rigor mortis ' ,which means the body becomes stiff after few hours.)The intern on the other side was busy removing the catheters and tubes. Finally we took a white sheet which we called 'mortuary sheet ' or in common parlance shroud and covered the body and secured it firmly by tying the head end and foot end. Then ultimately we 'tagged' the body ; i.e. we wrote the patient's name and number.
Finally it was all done. I returned tired and famished to my room after duty but still I couldn't shake off this weird feeling of being watched by someone, as if someone or something is there behind me, it sort freaked me out. This unexplainable cloud hovered my whole being for quite some time ,something akin to a bad hangover.Thankfully after a couple of days one fine morning all was back to normal.
Well after that experience as long as I was a student nurse I didn't give death care I would just scurry off or appear busy. But that was eons ago almost like a lifetime back when I was a novice and wasn't responsible for some ones life. As  I mentioned earlier that I worked in the emergency and have seen many deaths, I have lost count of since the first one. Many have come and gone whose mortal remains were deftly 'bagged' by my now adept hands as their spirits left their corporeal self for the other realms.

Life is all about hits and misses and so is death you can cheat death once or twice but ultimately it catches up with you. And since we are talking about death and all ,let me narrate an interesting near death incident where this patient came unconscious ,no respiration ,no heart rate , most probably in respiratory arrest. He was immediately intubated ( a tube was placed down a throat connected with a bag to pump air into his lungs.) Then one of the doctors checked the pupils , they were pinpoint,(pinpoint pupils is a classic evidence of opioid poisoning), and the history of the patient also corroborated the fact that he had opium overdose so he was given the antidote 'naloxone' . You won't believe what happened next. Here was this guy with tubes in his mouth , not breathing on his own and unconscious at that. On injecting the the antidote this guys just gets up with a bellow and and pulls out his ET ( endotracheal tube) and the tube in nose ( Ryles Tube) and removes his cannula before anyone could react. You can imagine the shock of all the people in the ER that day. Well ,that guy was darn lucky. I hope he mends his ways or there will be no next time for him. Then there are cases where a person who was just perfect a while ago , is now collapsed . Yea people, the uncertainty of it all. Life's like that.

However, I don't want to end this post with a philosophical thought, or something along those lines because death is something we know and it's a reality we all have to face.But I'd like to add that , Yes , I might have been perturbed and distracted with death in the early phase of my professional life, but as time has passed by I have understood that it's an inherent aspect of my work and I have to do it with the same sincerity and professionalism with which I deal the other aspects. Like they say 'it comes with the territory'.

 

The link for the pic    

http://www.google.co.in/imgres?imgurl=http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02450/PATHWAY2_2450532b.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/elderhealth/9796968/The-Liverpool-Care-Pathway-to-dignity-in-death.html&usg=__aAu-bOz9WhO5zGqb8aT8i-BfPng=&h=387&w=620&sz=52&hl=en&start=7&sig2=HqbdDzTmqjtsWAomA6fWUw&zoom=1&tbnid=q5YmR8_bt6j0oM:&tbnh=85&tbnw=136&ei=NFtrUqiFI7COiAexqoGABw&prev=/search%3Fq%3Ddeath%2Bcare%26safe%3Doff%26sa%3DG%26biw%3D320%26bih%3D496%26tbm%3Disch&itbs=1&sa=X&ved=0CDMQrQMwBg

Follies of a fool!!!

Hey guys this is my first attempt at a poem ,so bear with me. Feedbacks will be appreciated.

            FOLLIES OF A FOOL

There was lonely fool,
He was as lonely as one can be,
He never loved nor was he ever  loved,
And lonely was all he could ever be.

So he sat one day and cried out loud
To the almighty God said he,
'How can I ,O God love thee,
When I don't know what love is,
Show me what love is ,cried he.

The fool searched high and low,
For love that no one did show
And his life seemed bleak,
For love was what he did dearly seek.

So one day after all his search with no success
Just when he thought it was a futile excess
He saw this person who met his eyes.

As time passed by,
Into days and then into months
They became as thick as thieves.
So the fool being the fool he was
Mistook the friendship for something else,
And lost what was something pure and selfless.

So off he ran to places as far off as he could
To seek again in places he thought he should
He went across the seven seas
Braced mighty winds and breeze
And reached a place where all find what they seek.

There he saw a maiden,
Who made his knees lead laden,
She batted her eyelids and shook her hips
And he skipped a heart beat and forgot to breathe.

The fool that he was couldn't stop himself
From doing what came naturally to him
Oh the follies of a fool.

He lost his heart his heart ,
He lost his soul ,
And was on the verge of loosing his sanity,
When out of the blue ,
She left him in a lurch,
And he was left holding an empty heart.

He cried and cried for endless days
Till there no more tears,
He was back on his knees ,
Back to where it all began,
With eyes pointed towards heaven
He cried , ' Oh God !!!
'Where art thou now'.

That's when he heard God say
"You have searched in all places you can,
But never once did you
look right next to you ,
where I was always there,
I loved you even before you were conceived,
I love you , I loved you and I will always love you,
I love you the way you are,
All you have to do is come to me."

Birthday Musings !!!!

I'm 26 years old.Yea right !! 26!!!  
I was painfully reminded of how old I have gotten,when a week before my birthday, it was announced in church that I would be celebrating my birthday in the upcoming week. So after church a couple of people from the youth were sitting together when one of them joked'Everyone is invited to Mani's 35th birthday'. To which I replied 'no it's the 31st'. And guess what? To my horror and dismay one of them (don't know about the others though) actually believed that I was 31 years. Dang man!! I had to spend quite some time after that in front of the mirror assessing my face from different angles.And all I could find were three lines streaked across my forehead(the after- effects of years of useless worries). Then there was this time ,a couple of years back when  one of the patients asked me how many kids I had. I literally laughed out loud. I mean granted I had an overgrown facial hair at that time and presently an invisibly receeding visible hairline but still guys we have to draw a line somewhere!!!
         I'l let you all onto a little secret. My date of birth is not the actual date. The thing is that, there was no official record of my birth. So for many years I had no exact date to celebrate. It was only when I was required to officially have a date of birth for my matriculation exams,that I was given a couple of dates to select from. I guess 8th October was easiest to remember. But that doesn't diminish it's importance as I eventually found out.
      And right from the beginning I had no special attachment to the tradition of celebrating birthday.But all that changed in college. Thanks to my friends ,my birthdays became a special event in my life. One which I could look forward to. It's mine to do what I want to do, regardless of what others have to say. So since then I give myself on this day first priority. But like they say 'excess of anything is bad' , which I found out the hard way when I was almost run over by two cars at two different places on my birthday just because I was giving myself priority or when I almost fell from the escalator being lost in my world of thoughts. But that's just me being me.                          

Anyways having celebrated my 26th birthday a couple of weeks back, made me introspect my life retrospectively. I realized my life has been one hell of a ride ,and not everyone gets to live it. It's been a life worth living,with amazing blessings from above. And I'm thankful for the good as well as the bad pages of my life,because that's what has shaped me into person I am today. But that does not mean, I'm all done with my life and I have reached where I'm supposed to reach. No!! definitely not. There's lot more to come. So life' I have a message for you', " Bring it on"!!!....