The Wedding

Pics from Our Big Day - The Wedding!

ASWIN & SUSAN

23rd Jan, 2016
St. George Orthodox Church, Puthuppally

Betrothal

Few pics from my betrothal 

Aswin & Me

17th Jan, 2016 

Contour Backwaters

THE WEDDING TOAST

THE TOAST (Teri keh ke lenge)
Title: ONE STEP AHEAD

Dear Aswin,
I graced this earth one year before you did. That is perhaps the only event in which I stood ahead of you. And surprisingly, I had very little contribution in that mega event.
You quickly won the hearts of our sisters while I was busy thrashing them. You stood one step ahead.
In school you spent hours working hard while I got busy loitering the streets. You became the model student while I did time outside the Principal's office. You stood one step ahead. 
You topped the state in Class 10, becoming a perennial headache to cousins older and younger. You stood one step ahead and without knowing it pushed us all out of our comfort zones to strive for excellence. 

YES I DO!

He'd been facebook stalking me for the past 4 months, he blurted out.
I rolled my eyes and told him that was too much information for our first coffee date.

I told him his smile was cute.
"Yeah, of that I am aware", he replied.

Later he declared his love for me.
"You mean lust?" I offered.

"Yeah", he shrugged, "But that doesn't sound very gentlemanly".
"Hmm... no, I guess not.
Fyi  I do too".

THE PROVERBIAL LEMON

Whoever came up with the saying "When life gives you lemons, make lemonades" was one lucky.. um.. Man! I mean if life throws at you rotten eggs or tomatoes, then you have a problem. With lemons, fresh ones, you have the option of making lemonades, lime pickles or use it as an all purpose cosmetic solution for tan, oily skin, dandruff and what not. Or like someone wise guy observed add salt and tequila to it!

MONDAY : JUST ANOTHER DAY

Its too early for me to form an opinion about my work and workplace. But things are so cool over here that I just can't not write about it. My own job will be all finance related and I am likely to learn a lot of new work related things here. But that's not why I find the place cool. Being a publishing house I will be surrounded on all sides, at all times by highly spirited and creative people of all ages and sizes. There is also this humongous library with all sorts of books stacked up for the editors to refer and by all sorts I mean vanity magazines, the informational how-to books, the classics and the other day I even found a starwars storybook! Can you, seriously, believe my luck!

50 DAYS OF ABSOLUTE INDULGENCE

      The fussy eater that I have grown up to be, I fit into my skinny jeans once again since the lent. Helloo sexy butt! But rather than joining in on my excitement everybody at home keep bombarding me all the time with sage words on how to fatten up and regain my lost healthy complexion which I never knew I had to begin with.

     I totally hate being tricked and bullied into doing something, but chech's promised me that all the guys are for sure going to turn me down coz of the sickly mess she claims I am beginning to look now... No offense to Phoebe, but I can't stand smelly cats, so aging into that old maid who lives in her smelly apartment with a dozen smelly cats is out of question. And if I am growing out of my skinny jeans I might as well do that in style. That's why against my better judgement I've decided on following up on fifty days of lent with fifty days of indulgence. So off I go, to cook me some real nice food and stuff my face with it.

WHATSAPPED

Unlimited wifi and WhatsApp is not an ideal combo to opt for if you plan on reaching places in life. (I should know. I still live at my parent's place) I keep forgetting it every few months and end up reinstalling the App only to get reminded why I uninstalled it in the first place.

Unintelligible conversations all day long. Thats why.

But lets just focus on its benefits right now, shall we?

So here goes.

THERAPY ADVICED?

Do cats have an impressionable mind?

If a cute little kitten came to me playfully and I jump up from my seat and try to frighten and drive it away because of the dog-person that I am who stand firmly rooted in my belief that the whole cat family is universally without exception selfish. Wonder what might go on in that little kitty's head. 

SHOW OFF

Look what I found when I was cleaning my room! :-)))))

I feel so proud B-) and so sad at the same time that I had to quit on art after school. :-/

STUFF I DID

FROM EIGTH TO TWELFTH STD

1. Got shifted to Kottayam.
2. Cursed the place and all Achayan Achayathis from here.
3. Got closer to some of my Achayan-cousins and learned to play cricket better from them.
4. Watched a horror movie in full (Jeepers Creepers), with them my cousins. Begged my sister to let me sleep in her room for the next few days.
5. Taught my younger sister to cycle.
6. Went on a cycling trip with her and after watching her come down the slope loosing balance, head straight for the gutter, realised that I forgot to mention the use of Brakes.

WORLDCUP, SONGWRITING & OTHER MADNESS

As soon as I decide "Susan Sajan, it's high time that you put all your focus into your studies", the whole universe starts its conspiracy toward Mission-Distracting-Susan. And it happens every single time, without fail. Recently about 3 months ago, after spending the appropriate number of days mourning over my results I'd made such a decision and to give my studies a kick start I went and joined a crash-course at Ernakulam. The plan was to put my most serious face forward, keep a low profile, attend it with utmost sincerity and return home with one subject less to prepare. And then the conspiracy hit me in the form of one Pramod and one Midhun. Till then everything was going on as per my plan i.e. I was able to follow most of what the faculty was teaching, my note taking was quite satisfactory and somehow suprisingly my usual tendency to sleep during the most important areas of the lecture was gone too and now and then, when I did get a little bored, before I could start the cycle of shitbored-chronicyawning-can'tstopfallingdeadonthedeskasleep, Jithu my old friend would make some wise crack about something and I'd get all fresh and back to being all attentive.

SUNDAY SERMONS

A six-day week school followed by The Sabbath didn't help my case of love for sleeping in. Needless to say 'the church-aunties', whose favorite time pass involved correcting other's children, were never too pleased in me. (Nor was I with their preaching and their butting in, but that somehow is not a good enough reason for some to abstain from doing the right thing.) So a couple of years ago, on one of those days when I had turned up late to church (as usual), just as I was getting out after the service, the heaviest and most virtuous of the church aunties came up to me and asked "What made you late today?" blocking my way to the door.

SPOTLIGHT ISSUES

SPOTLIGHT ISSUE Part I:

When I was born, Chech was having a nice 'me-time' (getting thoroughly spoilt and having her favorite yellow gems, I suppose) here at my grandparent's place in Kottayam and showed up with them at the hospital, like some casual visitor to see me.

This is how our first meeting went...
Chech (in her hoity-toity tone): "Chechiya!" - Hi! I am your elder sister!
"UKG-A yil padikua!" - Studying in UKG-A!
"Ist Rank'aa!" - I am the Ist ranker!
I have a feeling that was followed by collective "Aaaww...!'s"
and that-was-a-smart-&-mature-thing-to-say looks by everyone, i.e. everyone except me,

HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER

(HIMYM - appa&amma's story)

This Sunday for our Easter special breakfast, it was me who made the 'Palappams' from scratch (Okay, so the chicken stew was all Amma's work, but  I am telling you, that anybody can make!) Now, about my palappams, they came out quite decently for an amateur like myself and Appa did a good job of praising me lavishly on a full stomach, sitting in front of his emptied plate. I know he did that to just to inspire me to get involved in the kitchen-front more often (thanks to my mother, who always gives these biased reports of 'me and Kitchen' much like that Zyed Khan's 'temple/library scene' in Mein Hoon Na.)

Now, Amma being a rather hard one to please or get appreciation from, it was always better to take a direct aporoach regarding these matters.
"So Amma, you didn't like them?"
No response.
Pause. "Amma?"
"Do you know how old you are?"
("Yep I do..but I am sure you are not interested in my answer, so how about you simply get to the point? huh..")
"If your Father's Mother was alive today.." she resumed "she would have told you how she managed her 5 kids, the household and all the labourers at your age."
"Hmm..." (so no compliments today!)
Amma continued, this time looking at Appa "You are the one, spoiling these brats!" pointing at me and Babes.
He just gave his guilty-but-I-thought-I-was-helping-your-cause look.
"But you got married when you were 24, no? So its not like you were some superwomen at my age either, you were also simply fooling around till then no?." I retorted.
("Hah! Tit for tat, yeah!")
"Are you even listening? I am talking about your total incapacity to........."

"Mmhnhhrem.." Appa interrupted, clearing his throat ".....And she was the most beautiful 24 year old bride too, your mother!" slowly turning from me to looking in Amma's direction
(Ahaa.. trying to win back her confidence in response to her 'you-are-the-one spoiling...-attack', Appa you clever you!)

SPARES

I think its only fair (now, don't ask 'to who?') that I start from the very beginning.  It was in the middle of my 1st standard that Amma got transfered to Kochi. So the whole family, Appa Amma and us kids (I am the middle child, I have two sisters) had to get relocated. I dont' remember the date or month, I don't remember much of my old school (at Trivandrum) either, or of the year and the next at the new school, Err.. better I skip to standard-3. That year D and S were my bench-mates, about them, they were both good kids. They didn't have the habit of pinching or poking you during the class, when they bought chocolates to school; they shared and most importantly we used to watch the same cartoons on Doordarshan (remember He-man, Flintstones, Duck tales, Chip and Dale? Ah good old days!) so we could gossip like grown-ups about important issues featured in them, over food, during our lunch breaks. (We were a pretty evolved group, you see.) That year was a good one.

The next year though, things changed, our seating arrangements changed. Our new classroom had this slightly different type of tables and chairs which were taller than our old ones but not much wide i.e. they wouldn't accomodate us all three.. and that was not a welcome change, (infact that was to me, what acorn was to Chicken Little, a sky-is-falling-moment!) but then D offered to go sit with a new kid 'A' (or maybe she wasn't new and I just saw her that day, coz very few people existed in my perfect little world those days!) who used to ride the same school bus as her, thereby depriving me of some drama.

THE SCOURGE OF ARTICLESHIP

Oh! the infernal hell you go through in the name of articleship
Still better is the life of a cattle which walks in the fear of a whip
and whose freewill let me remind you, is only as free as the length of its rope
To rush through the coming years as an invisible is then your only hope

What chance do you have with this fat man who comes in his crisp black jacket
who pockets the money in his fat pocket
which you earned him for finishing in two days, a work of two months worth
and when he sees you are in a hurry to leave for home, calls you for a review-meeting and so forth

At the month end with great ceremony he will reward you with some change
Which had he given to an office boy would have earned him a black-eye  for his wit
'Fetch the mail and post these', 'type this fast and make photocopies of these',
'file them quick and stand on your head' he'll order and when you've done it still brand you unfit

And all this while there is a file in his safe
paper work similar to yours, enrolling his pink-cheeked daughter

GET OVER OR DO NOT, THERE IS NO TRY!

When Yoda said "Do or do not, there is no Try", he didn't say anything that we didn't know already. He put into words the reason why the Jedi kept failing, a simple but harsh truth delivered in great style and hence the profound impact. Like young Skywalker, we use and sometimes abuse the term 'trying to do' whenever we are too lazy to bother doing it or put in more effort. Assuming this line of thought to be right, it then should be safe to make a statement like 'one is either in love or not in love, there is no middle stage', ergo, someone saying she is somewhere in between, must be understood as merely excusing herself, (but is it?)

ARRANGED LOVE

Sure, instilling good values and giving decent education to their child is what parenting is all about. Right. Right? You wish! Our Indian (especially the mallu*) parents take this job a little bit more seriously than that. Seeing to it that this child does not fall in love with anyone and then marrying her off to a perfect stranger with a reputed profession from some respectable family forms very much a vital part of their job. 

AMEN

At school they taught me that all of us evolved from apes.

And at home, how God breathed life into a sand sculpture of Adam.

I chose to believe that I was a descendant of Adam. It was the first ever chance I got, to make a choice regarding family (You only get to choose your friends. Family, you are born into. Stuck with.) I could not picture an ape for a greatgranddaddy.