No Cheese for me Please..

In case I didn't mention earlier, I am a photography enthusiast.

I usually carry my camera to any place that me and my friends are gonna hang out, and yes, we intentionally dress up 'well' since the Camera is gonna be around.

All my friends as well as me, we love to smile. All the more when its for the Camera. :D
What I have learnt from my experience (howsoever short it is ;) ) here's the thing about the Camera is, if you Point and Shoot your target, you kill the smile.

So basically, never say Cheese!
However silly this may sound, we've got the best snaps when they are candid. I am sure we all vouch for that.

For evidence, See one of my latest PRETEND-smile pic.

Now.. here's the real one..

you see what I'm saying.. the first one really doesn't even approve of me being a homo sapien.

So, as I preach, I will try and stick to it too, No more cheese for me please.. :)

Some of the no-cheese I could catch;

The first scratch on my heart

Your first car.. your first assest.. your first pride.
I got mine a month ago. I was too busy horsing around in it.. to even write about it.
A-Star, ZXI. I debated with my brain and bank account to go for the top model coz' lets face it, you don't really buy these babies everyday.

The place where I live, is not exactly an ideal place for new cars.
The small-no-roads, the traffic jams, the U-Turn-railway-gate, the water tankers gushing past everywhere. The water tanker, one of those giants helped me get a nice big scratch right in the front of my new car.

People say, scratch is way better than having your headlight hanging out!! That's true.
I mourned the whole day about this inaugural phase of my car. It moved on fairly quickly from its infancy to adulthood. I like a parent, could only silently watch.

All said and done, now, my car is Bangalore-Road-certified.

A gift with Love..

Sometimes, the biggest of surprises don't really get you going Yipee-Yayii (although we 'do' fake it ;) ). And, sometimes, the smallest of things make you hop around like a two year old.

Today one of my friends got me three dozen colorful sparkly glass bangles.


Now, there. In the beginning of a boring, routine, hectic day. I sat there at my desk, clinking clanking my glass bangles.

You know you don't find glass bangles that easily nowadays, the metal is in. And I have always had a thing for bangles. I myself have a huge collection. Which I rarely wear. But, when I wear them, I like to have my hands drowning in them.



I could picture myself like a little kid who'd been given a noisy toy to play around with, just to keep it engaged. I sat down working, smiling to myself, modelling with my hands as the little round pieces of glass sparkled up my day..

(You may ignore the tanning on the hand, Bangalore sun can even bake a cake nowadays).

Come and join the Joyride..

Cousin sister's engagement ceremony. No leave. No train booking. No bus booking. No stamina.
Yet, its a big day for her, so I gotta be there. We set out on our overnight bus journey to Kerala. Yes, I said bus. It was a Special Bus.


Special Bus; I had never heard of this term before. I assumed a out-of-regular-routine bus that has been scheduled to accomodate the heavy traveller volume on the long weekend.
Yes, you're in for a surprise just like me.



Characteristics of a Special Bus (SB) specimen;

1. Special buses arrive on a special time. This will usually be few hours here and there, yeah, just few hours.

2. Special Buses don't consider filling up petrol before a long journey.

3. SB do not consider checking if their head light is broken. This gets visibility only after it arrives on its 'special time'. ( I thought a broken head light hanging out of the socket is visible right in the front, I could be wrong).

4. SB do not even check if they have a functional Brake System. This too, is left for verification half way through the journey on the hilly areas.

5. SB have a driver who doesn't know the route. ( This one is a classic). The driver asks for directions on the way and infact picks up strangers from highways to guide him through the 'night' journey. ( How safe :) )

6. SB driver doesn't know the local language. ( I guess we can give him a waiver for this one, since he is heavily relying on the ever-helpful hitch-hikers! Come on now. )

7. SB buses reach their destination just around nine-ten hours later. ( Now, you CAN'T blame the poor driver for this one. The hitchhikers took him through the route that landed right in front of their doorstep. Bravo! )

8. SB buses definitly have flat tyre during midnight. This one is almost established as a identifying feature in SB-for-naive-travellers.

9. SB usually has three seater, broken windows, no leg-space and a pregnant-lady-who-throws-up. (No offense for the 4th factor, all sympathy, but yeah, the combination of these factors can be lethal.)

10. You will never believe the Joyride in SB... until you come and join in. :)