Feeling wanted!

This morning, mom-in-law said something very sweet to me.

It's our first wedding anniversary in a few days time.

So aunty said that she gave away her 'bangaram' and brought home another 'bangaram' on our wedding day.

Bangaram is something very precious, gold...

I felt very touched, being told that am a piece of gold, just like her son is the gold of her life.

It made me smile throughout the day... My husband was asking me why I was smiling as we were in the subway trains... It's because I felt very wanted, I felt precious, the feeling was infectious, refusing to die down...

I wish all human beings peace and dignity, I pray to God to make people feel wanted, loved, respected, cherished.

Especially being a woman, I can say, material gifts given don't touch our hearts as much as some such small sincere statements made from heart.

Nobody's ever given me a gift that made me think & smile the whole day, as did this sweet little sentence.

Appreciation goes a long way, and brings so much warmth into life. It awakened some strength from within me, made me feel closer to God, it was conveyed by a human, but feels like God's communicated with me!

I felt especially touched since the words came from my mother-in-law. From a parent to a child, love is assumed to exist even if never formally vocalized. But from my in-laws, it feels very good when such thoughts are shared and I am told I am so loved as though I were not a daughter-in-law but a daughter.

:-) :-) :-) :-) :-) 

Bomb blasts & Mother Nature

I read the "In the news" section of wikipedia, and it's full of bomb blasts & suicide bombs... While the rest of the world is going through recession, the ammunition/explosives industry seems to be enjoying a boom period! Somebody must be minting blood soaked millions... It is pretty interesting to note that the recent two years under the Telugu calendar have been "bad" years. One was "Vyaya" (loosely translated as "Expense"), where every horoscope lost more than it gained... The other is "Virodhi" (loosely translated as "Against"), where every horoscope faces problems. No wonder the world is full of natural as well as man made calamities, violence, poverty, hunger, pain, suffering... First mankind forgot the gods in the race for materialistic development, and now Mother Nature has fallen sick from all the neglect & poisoning. I am deviating from the title, but I feel proud of my culture.. How did the people during the vedic age admire nature so much and understand her ability to absorb all abuse, but also understand her very fragile nature... Nature worship is not some stupid ignorant thing, it stems from deep self respect. My father taught us as children, something which I recollect every morning that I wake up, "Karaagre vasate Lakshmi, kara madhye Sarasvati, Kara moole sthita Gauri, prabhaate kara darshanam" and "Samudre vasane Devi, parvatasthana mandale, Vishnu patni namastubhyam, paadasparsha kshamasvame" The first shlokam instills confidence in the self, that we can face the world with our two hands, God gave us these hands which have the potential to give & take so much to/from the world. With these two hands, I can learn, educate myself (attain Sarasvati), I can earn money (Lakshmi), I can earn self-respect & strength (Gauri) with my actions, the first thing that I see when I wake up every morning, are my hands, and in these two hands, I can see the world, based on the choices that I make... The second shlokam preaches humility, personifying mother earth as Vishnu's wife. The oceans are her body, the mountains are her breasts... She is Vishnu's consort, she suckles & nurtures life on her, o mother, the moment I get out of bed, I tread thee with my feet, please forgive me for trampling all over your holy body with my feet. It is amazing that the ancient people, who have been dismissed as blind pagans, knew more about self-respect, they knew that nature is not unlimited, nature is to be respected for what she gives us, we should appreciate how we use her, and ponder on how to minimize damage to her. For if we respect God, how can we not respect His creation, this world.

The Indian media's reporting on Babri masjid, 26/11 etc

It is 17 years since the Babri Masjid incident, the Indian media seems to be very excitedly marking the anniversary, so I thought let me also add to the "party"!

I was very young when it happened, I didnt know anything about the rioting, I just remember school used to remain closed on several days, it was fun for us, though mom must have been very worried about dad travelling in the city buses...

I dont know why our press/media love the Babri Masjid issue! They literally rake up the embers and make sure that the problem doesnt die down! It is shocking, they force lines into people's mouths!

Our media is here to remind us every year, that we need to fight over something!

If we as a people want to move on, we have to stop unnecessary discussions. The judiciary should be allowed to take its course, the relevant parties to the conflict (made up of hardliners, mediators, et al) anyway keep busy about it... But why does our media overdo the coverage, "creating" news in the pursuit of covering it!!

Its almost as if they want something to go wrong on that day, so that they can have things to cover! Its so sad!

Responsible journalism is almost absent, it is their duty to throw light on problems that need to be looked into, but here, they are delighted to create further problems, and blow up existing problems out of proportion! It is not like they are covering anything new, and it is not like there are no other pressing problems that are newsworthy, like the face-off between the Government & maoists.

I actually saw NDTV flashing something like, "Police keeping an eye on problem man Kalyan Singh". But when I watched the interview, I noticed that the interviewer asked the police if they expect trouble from Kalyan Singh, and the police said that they didn't receive any information on his wanting/not wanting to visit Ayodhya, they will act accordingly... So the news flash reads something like, "Police expecting trouble from Kalyan Singh"...

Now that is a case of 'creating' news by putting words into the mouth of the police...

It is sick, they are itching to unearth conflict, and ready to create a non-existent conflict, it almost borders on "celebrating" the anniversary...

I felt the same thing about how 26/11 Mumbai attack was marked, so much coverage, so much PR, such elaborate extravagant display, so much business, almost bordered on "celebration"...

The nail in the coffin would be if the media explicitly gave a vote of thanks, "Thank you Ajmal Kasab for giving us this opportunity, Thanks to Ajmal Kasab without whose effort, this event wouldn't have been taking place"....

Sick....

In a way, I am like them, even I am writing on Babri "anniversary", but I am not 'celebrating' and I am actually criticizing their zeal...

What really takes the cake is the blame game! Blame some politician, instead of facing reality... Blame a bunch of politicians, coolly ignoring the millions of people who make up the conflict... A handful of politicians cant create so much problem, we should have the guts to accept that there is a problem in society, and address the root cause, instead of pursuing the ostrich policy of thinking that all Indian citizens are good boys & good girls, and that a handful of politicians did it all! Duh!!!! This is a vestige of colonial mentality in the colonies... Back then, during any crisis, we blamed the Colonial Government & its officers... Now, we blame our own elected Government & our own elected leaders.

Widows in our culture

There is an issue very special to my heart when I think of my culture/religion/scriptures, and that is the treatment of widows. Hindu widows are traditionally supposed to shave their head, wear white cotton clothes, consume very simple food (they have to fast most of the time), they aren't supposed to wear any jewellery/make up/bright clothes. In other words, it's a very sad colourless life for them... I appreciate the background for this kind of lifestyle. A widow wouldn't want to look attractive because she didn't want any undesirable attention, a widow would be so sad without her husband, that she wouldn't have any interest to take part in any festivities or indulge in anything materialistic (fine clothes, food, jewellery, socializing et al). Being so sad all the time, naturally she will harbour a lot of grief, sorrow, a miserable life, full of negative energy... So that's not very auspicious, she wouldn't want any newly wed girl to have her kind of life, so she really can't bless anybody.. I see a widow as a victim, a victim of terrible fate, she loved somebody all her life, just like I adore my husband, she had wonderful dreams, she feels cheated by fate, she is all alone today, wondering where her husband must be, how he must be, she must be feeling so lonely in life, words cant express the feeling of helplessness & loneliness, her entire life passed like a dream, now she is stuck in a nightmare, all alone.... But in our culture, rather than sympathise with this victim of fate, why did our society start treating them as vermin, treating them as ill omen, treating them worst than animals? Like starving them, forcing them to remain indoors, not letting them take part in society, which is why some of them were forced into prostitution to feed themselves. Especially, what about child widows, little girls whose boy husbands died? The little girl doesnt even know that her parents got her married when she was 1 yr old, and that her supposed boy husband died in his own house when she was 2 yrs old, and now she is a widow, condemned to a life without joy? She is chaste, she knew no love in her life, she didnt even have any relation in life even at an emotional plane! The logic behind not letting such little girls remarry was as follows: a husband-wife are supposed to be married for the coming seven lives, so now that her husband is dead, she should wait to die too, so that they can marry in their next life... But when a woman who has mothered 15 children with a man dies, he is not bound by that husband-wife-have-seven-lives rule, he can remarry soon after the dead body is cremated! Thank God such things like child widows aren't prevalent in main stream Indian society today, thanks to the efforts of some social reformers like C.Rajagopalachari, and Sister Subbalakshmi (who founded the Sharada school in Madras, affiliated to the RamaKrishna Math, I really admire her, she was a child widow, but her father had the dream & courage to educate his girl so that she wouldn't suffer a lonely dependent life, and she went on to start a school for child widows)... But I still dont understand, why is it great in our poojas to pray to "akhanda saubhagyavatis" ( a term that means a woman who dies before her husband), why is it every woman's dream to be a perfect pativrata (doting chaste wife) by dying before her husband? I think such women are selfish, they just want to live a comfortable happy life & die before their husbands. In my eyes, the real heroine is the widow, the widow who loves her husband, who cares for him all her life, who misses him for the rest of her life, and dies a lonely death. She has spared her husband all the misery of a lonely life, a loveless life. There was a gentleman I knew in Delhi in my childhood, a Mr.Rao, a widower, his dead body wasn't noticed for 2 days after he died a lonely man in his flat, he used to always complain that his doting wife made him a 'cripple', he didnt know how to go on with his life after her death, he found it very hard, he missed her terribly, he died a miserable lonely death with failing health, nobody to accompany him to the doctor, noone to cook his food, noone to comfort him, noone to watch him eat, to sleep next to him... God knows where his wife was, perhaps she was waiting for him in heaven, or probably she took birth as a boy (so that Mr.Rao can take birth as a girl, and they can then get married again in the next life as per the seven-lives belief)... But my vote lies with the widow, my heart bleeds for her, she has been wronged by society, she has spared her husband mountains of lonely trauma that she undergoes instead of him, she is by her husband's side until his last breath, and then waits for her own death, while praying that they both be reborn in their next life to be husband-wife again!!! She is the real selfless pativrata deserving to be worshipped, and certainly deserving some compassion if nothing else! She has been wronged by her sisters, other women, who should actually understand her plight better than anyone else, but instead spend their lives ill treating her, aspiring to be akhanda saubhagyavatis. I really feel that women dont have rights because other women dont give them the rights! It's not really a man dominated world, this is a world where women dont have self respect, their hearts are so clouded with aspiring to be the perfect wife, that they dont even realise how they are compromising, how they are throttling their own feelings, how they are promoting a system of self-torture. I gave an example of a lady in Hindu society, but I see this repeated in all societies, and across various spheres of women's rights, thought this article only focused on the theme of widowhood. One very blessed widow I admire, is Mata Sarada devi. After her husband Ramakrishna Paramhamsa died, she continued living life as a married woman, because she said that though her husband had died in the material world, his atma (soul/spirit) lives on, and she is married to him forever, and remains his spiritual bride even beyond his worldly death. That is the beauty of Hindu philosophy, women can generate so much self respect & confidence from within themselves if only they look beyond the cloud of compromise & self-censorship. It is not a crime to want to be happy, it is not a crime to have some feelings, it is not a crime to be yourself, it is certainly not a crime to harbour self-respect inside our heart, not everything needs to be done with a please-the-man, conform-to-the-society attitude of self-censorship & self-throttling.

And O no, we're not doing anything outside of our scriptures, for during the Vedic period, widows were allowed freedom, they were allowed to smile and be happy, it wasn't yet a crime. They were even encouraged to re-marry if they desired, just like men. But somewhere down the line, the culture changed and society reached a dark degraded state of gender inequality. Go back to the Vedas and be proud of yourself Miss, Mrs. or Ms.

Health care in the U.S.: My experiences

After having spent most of my life in India/Kenya, visiting a doctor here in US turned out to be a real eye-opener, an unforgettable experience! I have had an issue with my wisdom teeth for the last 4 years. The two in my lower jaw don't trouble me (as yet), but the two in my upper jaw have been trying to peep out for the last four years. Splitting headaches once in a while, pain in the gum when a tooth is finding its way out, referred pain in my other teeth, I have seen it all. What my dentists in Nairobi/Hyderabad thought about this issue: Wisdom teeth are best left untouched as long as they don't trouble me much. A single Xray in Nairobi in November'08, and my dentist told me to just watch the situation. My headaches reduced, the right side tooth fully erupted without any issue. (The left side one started erupting next.) I was told that in case my teeth supraerupt later & cause any issue, I can opt for extraction. But let them be otherwise! During my stay here in NewYork, over the last few months, I woke up on several nights with a parched mouth, my left wisdom tooth was biting a wound onto the inside of my cheek.. Given how expensive healthcare is here in US, especially dental care, I waited for my upcoming trip to India. My dentist in Hyderabad advised me to get my upper jaw's wisdom teeth extracted because they were biting onto my cheek and creating problems. He opened my mouth wide, examined my teeth, took his own time peering in, and finally announced that they should be extracted (they were fully out and supraerupting). He also looked at the Xray taken in Nairobi in November'08. Teeth extracted in Hyderabad, I was going around with my mouth shut, on painkiller for three days, the pain didn't subside, I was worried about the healing, since my roots were longer/deeper than normal. So my dentist dressed my right side extraction site. It was a pain relief cum disinfectant to promote healing. He also advised me to take antibiotics, since I told him that I will be in big trouble if the pain doesnt subside fast before I leave for US. Ten days after coming to the US, I brushed my finger against my extraction sites. Horror horror, I felt a sharp projection on the right side! O my God, perhaps a piece of tooth broke off inside my mouth!!! That is how my ordeal with the healthcare system in the US began, and that is what this story is all about! I knew I needed to see a dental surgeon (an oral & maxillofacial surgeon), but apparently, they are super-specialists hardpressed for time, and only accept patients by referral! So a maxillofacial surgeon's secretary told me to first book an appointment with a general dentist. My husband called up the general dentist, but his secretary said that a suspected case of broken wisdom tooth falls under oral surgery and refused to book an appointment for me! I was stuck in no man's land!!! Finally, my husband went to the dental practice, and explained the situation to them, that I need to see a surgeon, so either they should let me book directly with a surgeon, or allow me to see a general dentist. So on a wednesday afternoon, I got an appointment with a general dentist for thursday morning, knowing full well that he will in turn refer me to the oral surgeon probably for monday, and that I will have to live with the tooth particle over the weekend! what a time waste, had I been in India, I would have stepped into my dentist's office at any time and he would have extracted the particle in a jiffy, I could feel it with my finger! On Thursday morning, I got an everlasting taste of American healthcare! Even before the dentist saw me, an Xray technician took 18 Xrays of all possible angles of my jaws! EIGHTEEN XRAYS!! MY GOD, I was exposed to SOOOO MUCH radiation, knowing all along that there is a particle in my right side upper jaw! My Indian dentist didnt need one single Xray to even extract the teeth, but here they need 18 Xrays! Apparently, it is a norm for all new patients and the entire set goes on my file, and will be redone every 3 years... Gosh... I come from a land where there is a shortage of funds, where even patients who actually need technology/machines dont find access to them... whereas here, there are plenty of machines, and one way of using them is to make every patient go through the process blindly, as a protocol! Finally, the dentist came into the room to see me. He checked my teeth, asked me when I have last had a dental cleaning done, the nurse gave me a card which specifies my next appointment in six months time for a cleanup. Then we came to the point, I told him about my wisdom teeth extraction, and how I suspected a particle to be lodged in my gums. I told him I had my extracted teeth with me, would he like to have a look, he said no need since he has 18 Xrays! He plucked out one of those 18 Xrays, and told me that yes, there is a dental root left in my mouth! Can I see my left jaw on Xray, it is now empty where the wisdom tooth was, but on the right jaw, there is a clear opaque object, a broken root!!! I can get infected because of it, it is very dangerous, I need to see a surgeon right away. Also, I have two wisdom teeth inside my lower jaw which haven't yet erupted, but they're deep inside my jaw, they need to be surgically removed! He took one quick glance into my mouth and told me, there it is, I can see your white tooth particle! Please wait in the waiting room, you need to see a surgeon right away, there is an oral maxillofical surgeon right across the hall... So my husband & I at last got the chance to see the surgeon, at last reached the point which we wanted all along... After waiting for five minutes in the surgery, I thought over, I know I wont get my lower jaw's wisdom teeth surgically removed, these people here are obsessed about everything to an extreme. I wont get teeth which dont trouble me removed, that itself can cause so many other complications, what if a nerve is touched, why will I go into surgery for issues which dont trouble me.. Also, I know how terribly expensive it will be.. But regarding the particle lodged in my right upper jaw, will I really get infected? But I feel no pain, no swelling 2 weeks after extraction, it might just heal.. Even if I DO really need an extraction, it will be so expensive here in US, most probably cheaper to fly to India, perhaps it's not such an emergency, let me ask my mom, my husband is getting late to work, how long can we wait here, let me take an appointment for tuesday, I know I wont die of infection before tuesday... I came home on thursday afternoon with the particle still in my mouth, with a tuesday appointment for surgical removal... I spoke to mom, being a microbiologist, she said the dentist is right in theory, broken splinters of bone/cartilage/dental roots do cause infection.. But in practicality, if I dont feel any pain/swelling/discomfort 2 weeks after extraction, it might heal in all probability... She gave me one sterling piece of advice, to call up my dentist in India... I called him up and told him, I feel a sharp protrusion in my upper right jaw... With great confidence, he brushed me off, "Dont touch it, it will pain for sometime, it's a bony protrusion, it is not a broken piece of tooth, it will get ground down with time".... But I told him about the distinct shadow in the Xray... Once again with great confidence, "There is no question of a broken tooth root, the protrusion you feel is a bone outgrowth which shouldn't be tampered with until it has healed. I dressed your extraction site with a compound that contains metallic oxides, it will show up on the XRay as a distinct shadow."... I told him I had no discomfort, no pain, no swelling, I was fine, I just cancelled my tuesday appointment and ended the story there... My Indian dentist explained his understanding of American doctors, even if they see a small black spot, they will begin digging everything up, at any cost, even if it doesnt interfere or trouble... Lessons I learnt from that, I am a layman, I can't know that metallic oxides show up on Xray, but how could the general dentist mistake that for a dental root? He actually didn't bother to look into my mouth, he took a very quick peek in and announced that he can see my "white" root, now I know that it was my white "dressing" which subsequently fell out and I preserved it, it is really root shaped... I told him that I feel a protrusion, he didnt bother to feel it, he assumed it to be the shadow showing up on the Xray, he didnt realise that my protrusion was elsewhere, and the so called "dental root"s shadow was elsewhere! I carried my extracted teeth with me to the US, the dentist could have examined them to see if a root had broken off, I know now that they were intact! EIGHTEEN XRays, what is the point of technology/engineering and advances in imaging if a dentist doesnt have the time to look into my real mouth which I can open right there? Perhaps I have a very wrong perception of this whole affair, perhaps I am a stingy person coming from a developing country, since I come from a place where doctors have to think 100 times before prescribing tests, they're too expensive and in shortage... Where I come from, our doctors are soooooo busy dealing with real problems, they dont believe in poking their nose into non-existent problems (like wanting to operate on my teeth which were inside my jaw and not even troubling me)... Where I come from, we may not have the technological know-how to do great fantastic feats in medicine, but our doctors use their God given eyes/ears/hands to make basic common sense diagnosis instead of blindly exposing a patient to unnecessary XRays... Perhaps there are some patients who greatly benefit from 18 dental Xrays, perhaps the doctors here unearth some critical life threatening ailments and prevent them from such routine complete checks... But I didnt have any critical illness, and even my basic problem was misdiagnosed because a doctor relied more on Xrays & ignored the gift of his eyes/hands. Finally, the colossal cost... The Xrays are covered by insurance, couldn't that be one of the reasons doctors blindly prescribe a set of tests to one & all? It could also be because they fear being sued later for negligence... but in my case, 18 Xrays and still negligence (a kind of negligence isn't it?). I still shudder, what if I walked into the surgeon's room, would he have been blind like the general dentist and tried to wrench off my bone? Or would he have made an incision to remove my tooth particle but instead removed my dressing? Subsequently, I came to know of a case where a dental surgeon damaged a patient's nerve, he cant taste food for life, he feels numb in his mouth forever... Another relative of mine was similarly suffering from wisdom teeth headaches, his dentist here advised him to go for surgery to remove the teeth because they were close to a nerve... The relative very wisely flew to India, where the dentist simply extracted them neatly without surgery, and he is fine now... I dont understand the system here, perhaps it is great in that it helps patients who have some mysterious big time illnesses... but what about routine illnesses/health issues, is it necessary to blow them up this way? Too much focus on bigtime illness is ok, but is it necessary to complicate & magnify small issues? Coming to super-specialists & their precious time, I saved that surgeon's time, my own teeth, my own time, my own money and a lot of pain by just calling up my Indian dentist, he understood the situation better on phone, which even 18 Xrays cant provide... What is the point of a general dentist being in such a hurry, he didnt save the superspecialist's time, he didnt save my time, he is the one who should have dismissed my case.. Thank God for everything, Thank God for the final outcome... It has been three weeks since this episode, I am alive and kicking, I didnt die of septicaemia, I live with my lower wisdom teeth still inside my jaw, but I have the unique privilege of having been exposed to EIGHTEEN shots of Xrays like a photoshoot, for no reason at all.... And my file doesnt belong to me, I will have to pay and buy my own copy of Xrays from the dental firm if I ever want to show them to my doctor in India... I know India or Kenya are full of quacks, perhaps I was never exposed to them because I am a doctor's daughter, I know private practicians all over the world over prescribe unnecessary tests and may be incompetent, but it is especially appalling to see such things here in U.S. where the entire system (doctors & insurance) is organized & tracked.....

Things They Don't Tell You About America

It has been over 8 months since I am living here in New York City, I have come across lots of positive things to appreciate about life here, but every immigrant has something positive to say, and hence I decided to take a different route...

One of these days, I can publish a book, "Things they don't tell you about America"... Wait a minute, I can publish my thoughts just now in the form of a blog! :-)

The "They" in the title stands for "Immigrants from developing countries".

I have seen soooo many cousins, friends, relatives migrating to the US, they come back to India/Kenya and complain about all bad things in India/Kenya and talk only of the great things in America...

But I was surprised to know that nobody ever told me about the problems I could face here!!!

Life was fine for the first 2 months... Then I developed a mild itch. Next the itch turned soooo severe, I rushed to a dermatologist expecting a severe allergy problem (I attributed it to carpets, since I am asthmatic) or a skin infection of some bizarre kind... It reached a stage when I couldn't sleep, I used to keep itching throughout the night, literally like an animal, I had bleeding wounds all over my body... Thank God I speak English & could communicate with everyone, otherwise someone could have mistaken me as a victim of Asian domestic abuse & put my poor darling husband behind bars ;-)

The dermatologist took one quick look at me, and told me that this is a typical condition, called "Winter eczema", associated with immigrants from warmer climates! Apparently, my body is not used to severe cold, nor is it used to the intense heat generated by the apartment heaters, so my skin dried up from within over two months until I developed a severe itch. The dermatologist said she sees cases like me ALL THE TIME, and that I needn't worry. I was prescribed some anti-histamines, some strong moisturizers, steroid ointments, with itch relief medication. In the waiting room, I saw so many patients from the Indian subcontinent, all of them new to USA. I went for a follow up twice, my medicine dosage was increased, I was prescribed stronger corticosteroid ointments to heal my skin.. The moment I told my cousin about my skin problem, she said she too has it, only that her skin is okay but her nose bleeds in winter!! Yet another cousin said his skin literally turned black because of pigmentation... Another friend said his nose bleeds... Then one of them announced, every state in the USA has its own version of severe weather, stretching from severe snow to regular tectonic tremors to hurricanes, tornadoes etc...

It's okay, I take such things in stride, thank God I didn't have a serious medical condition like a fungal infection or allergy.

It was my husband's turn next! He started complaining of a feeling of obstruction down his throat, it was finally diagnosed as another version of winter dryness, his mucus membranes dried up... :-D

Then I wondered, how come "They" told us wonderful things about America all these years, but "They" didnt bother to tell us about how irritating the weather/lifestyle here can be??? How come "They" are ready to complain about power cuts/bad roads/pollution/congestion in India, but don't tell us about how difficult life can be here?

And all this 'hulchul' in my life over nothing, there wasn't one single bug in our apartment!

I just knew that I need to write on this topic, because it keeps running through my mind all the time... I don't like people who unnecessarily criticize one country while endlessly praising another one. Nor do I like blind Indian patriots, they are another extreme in that they hate everything about NRIs until they have the oppurtunity to be an NRI themselves ;-)

The point of my writeup is, no place is perfect, every place has its own list of conveniences & drawbacks, and most important of all, we should learn to respect the place where we were brought up, as well as the place where we live currently, because we owe our past, present and future to where we lived/live...

My story doesn't end here, I have another topic on my mind that I am itching to write about, but it is not "Things They Don't Tell about America", it is a much discussed topic, and it deserves a blog entry of its own! Its about my limited experiences with the health-care system, something that really deserves a lot of sonch vichaar!

Blogpravesh: My First Blog

It has been 8 months since I lost my diary, I have stopped writing ever since... I didnt feel the need, I now live with my best friend, so I eat his head instantly whenever I want to contemplate/share/speak out/discuss... I dont want to write into a diary ever again, I accumulated my thoughts into the lost diary for over 8 years, I felt really bad losing it, and dont have the heart to spend all my time on beginning a new one... I miss my old diary, I used to feel amused going over my old entries, its like the Me-of-now, peeping into the heart/mind of Me-from-back-then., I miss that.. But all is not lost, somethings are intentionally collected in life, somethings get collected inadvertently... Looking back, I realize that I have the most amazing collection of my thoughts in the form of long chains of gmails exchanged with my best friend ever since late 2004, when we both signed up for gmail (it was a relatively new phenomenon back then)... In those gmails, we discussed student life, our own versions of philosophy, religion, culture, people, relations, emotions, places, accounting, economics, foreign exchange, economy, society, Hinduism, feelings, family, values, social causes, movies, books, complaints, recommendations, suggestions, all kinds of things that we came across in life... :-) That's when I gradually stopped making entries into my diary.. My paper diary only swallowed my own thoughts, more like a repository... But this E-diary (or rather, should I call it the G-diary, G for Google) was a chain of emails, whatever I put into it, I got a reply, it was much more exciting, made me feel wanted, somebody somewhere watched out for my gmail, and I looked forward to his reply from across continents... I do miss my old physical diary, it had my handwriting, it had much more of a personal touch than a collection of emails... But starting from 2004, more of my life is chronicled in gmails rather than the diary.. As I begin on this blog diary, this time I know it cant get lost, its the omnipresent kind, it'll follow me everywhere, and I can follow it everywhere, as long as I have access to the internet ;-)))) But its very different, in that my physical diary was private, I was its author & audience, whereas this blog is for an open audience... :-) Sometimes I miss writing, espcially when I want to vent out my frustrations about a system, express my views on some organizations/people/customs... Here begins this blog, with a prayer to Vighna Vinayaka, please grant me the patience & interest to continue blogging, I've been meaning to write into a blog for quite sometime, but I never get around to doing it, at last I've started on this auspicious moment ;-) :-P I took the help of Orkut to type out in Devanagari, but since Hindi doesnt use "Halant", the Samskrut shlokam below is kind of wrong, I couldn't produce the halants..

हरि हरि गजमुख विघ्नविनायक

शुक्लाम्बरधरम विष्णुम शशिवर्णं चतुर्भुजं प्रसन्नवदनं ध्यायेत सर्वविघ्नोप शान्तये

Could I call this a Blogpravesham, a Blogwarming ceremony? :-D O God, please look after this blog, bless its blogger and its blogger's family :-)