When Left is right and Right is inspiring

I stumbled upon this Mercedes Benz’s latest ad on internet and I was floored, so much that I decided to publish it on my blog. Its actually an amazing picture, half greyish and half colourful which captured my attention from the word go and forced me to read more. And what I read was mind-blowing.

They have divided the brain in two halves (that all the scientists have done times immemorial) and have left the left brain for all things logical and right one for the creative streak in a person. Left is what makes sense and right is more inspiring.

Even though Left is just right (read perfect) Right is what I wish should dominate, at least in my case.

Attached is the picture and below mentioned are the words written on the ad.

Left brain: I am the left brain. I am a scientist. A mathematician. I love the familiar. I categorize. I am accurate. Linear. Analytical. Strategic. I am practical. Always in control. A master of words and language. Realistic. I calculate equations and play with numbers. I am order. I am logic. I know exactly who I am.

Right brain: I am the right brain. I am creativity. A free spirit. I am passion. Yearning. Sensuality. I am the sound of roaring laughter. I am taste. The feeling of sand beneath bare feet. I am movement. Vivid colours. I am the urge to paint on an empty canvas. I am boundless imagination. Art. Poetry. I sense. I feel. I am everything I want to be.

A part-time writer or a part-time chef?

I love cooking. And I love writing. As much as I love reading and eating.

There was always ‘something’ I wanted to be when I was growing up. Even when I was ‘something’, I wanted to be something else. After working full-time for seven years, after narrowing down lot of somethings to two, currently on a year long vacation (in Caribbean) I am still contemplating whether I should be a full-time chef and a part-time writer or a part-time chef and a full-time writer.

I keep watching the Food Channel everyday and scream loudly, yes I am going to be there one day presenting my recipes to the rest of the world. And I booked my IELTS examination yesterday so that I can enroll for Creative English post-graduate course next year.

There is every cake in this world that I want to bake. There are so many fashion magazines that I want to edit and write features for.

A restaurant that I want to open where I employ myself as the head-chef. A book I want to publish before I leave this world.

Cordon Le Bleu or Cardiff University? Or the actual question should be which one should I enroll first?

Cuisine and Pâtisserie Certificate or Masters of Arts in Creative English. I guess both, its just that I have to decide which one should happen first!

I guess I will end up taking both part-time or better – two full-time jobs!

Facebook Timeline. I am lovin’ it

Facebook changes. People crib. People still use it. They get used to it. And then…. Facebook changes. People crib. People still use it. They get used to it.. Again…Facebook changed.. People are not cribbing. At least not yet.. Because what a change it is this time! Even though it’s not released yet for everyone, developers have been able to get the Timeline. Including me. And so far I don’t know anyone who has not liked this change. They are bound to like it. FB has nailed it this time.

Cover
To start with your profile page looks so amazing. Now apart from a profile picture that everyone has, you can add a ‘cover’ to your profile. A wide image that can make your page look so attractive. Here is a screen shot of how my page looks after adding a cover:

And then Your Stories:
As FB says, “Share and highlight your most memorable posts, photos and life events on your timeline. This is where you can tell your story from beginning, to middle, to now.”

And it exactly does the same. I scrolled down my timeline and it showed me all the events that have happened. When I got married, when I changed my job (it particularly showed the days when I started working for Herman Miller, when I left AOL) Oh Facebook…you are going to spoil me, I will stop writing my diary now!

I added few of the timelines. Sharing the screen shots. If I explain anything about them, it will beat the purpose of having a timeline.

Now comes Your Apps
The movies you quote. The songs you have on repeat. The activities you love. Now there’s a new class of social apps that let you express who you are through all the things you do.
Oh yes! Install Spotify and your friends can see which song are you listening to. Kobo will tell them the books you recently read. Places show them all the places you have visited recently. The Apps.. The fun.. The possibilities.

I am sure there is much more to it, than I see it now. As I explore I will write more about it. And of course I have to find out how much ‘The Pages’ are going to change. Since most of my work involves around making FB Pages for brands and businesses. Hope I am pleasantly surprised with whatever changes I witness.

Go ahead, use the new Timeline and tell me what you like/hate about it.

Thank you for not smoking…er..ummm…but…

To smoke or not.. the question I am trying to answer from the last two years. A battle I am losing with myself (surprisingly somewhere I want to be lost)

Of course like all smokers, even I do realise the ill-effects of smoking, especially among women. Like every smoker I ask these questions to myself and I guess most of us give ourselves more or less the same answers:

Q: Will I really get cancer if I keep smoking like this?
Ans: No, you won’t. That happens to people who smoke like 20 a day. You are restricted to 4. On weekends 8-9 per day.

Q: But what if I am diagnosed with a lung cancer or serious throat problem?
Ans: Well everyone has to die. Better live your life than regret at end.

Q. Ok, how about I smoke only on weekends? Just when I am drinking and partying.
Ans (on a weekday) One cigarette a day won’t harm me much. (BTW, it all starts with smoking only on weekends, before you realise you have been gripped)

And so, my cigarette quitting dates kept getting delayed and delayed. And it definitely not helps at all, when you stay with 2 smokers, you will be tempted to smoke and your garbage bin will be well fed with cigarette butts everyday. And that’s exactly how my life is going until today. I read about this ‘Master Cleanser’. No, I haven’t started this diet yet, so if you are reading this post to know more about the diet, you will be disappointed. (I will try to write about the diet once I get on to it) Well, so I was smoking till last night and decided to go for the Master Cleanser from the next morning (i.e. today) but then I realised, “Really? Shouldn’t you give your body at least 3 non-drinking-smoking days and then starts off with the cleansing plan to remove toxins from the body”.

So I thought okay I won’t really smoke for the next 3 days. It’s been almost 10 hours that I haven’t smoked and I have asked myself at least 10 times, why am I actually doing this? aaah..those same old questions again.

Now I realise there are two kinds of smokers: People who are physically dependent on it and would actually quit if they are VERY determined AND people who do not want to quit at all, in-spite knowing all the repercussions it brings! I am very ashamed to say, I fall in the second category.

And I guess after my Master Cleanse is finished, I may resume back the smoking. Or if something life-changes happens during the Master Cleanse diet that I would just not put that tempting rolled tobacco in my mouth anymore, I guess I will call it quits!

Have any of you ever tried quitting smoking? Did you succeed? Did you get back? Do you also fall in the same category as me of not really WANTING to quit or do you actually want to quit but are not able to.

Let me know in your comments below

A day in my life without my over smart phone

Little background:Though how much I loved it, I took it for granted (Don’t we all do with the things we love?) and I didn’t even bother to keep it in my water proof bag when it was raining. And when something doesn’t get the attention and care it requires, it decides to teach you a lesson. That’s what my phone did. It just stopped working one fine (actually not so fine) Tuesday morning.

I tried and tried but the touch screen just wouldn’t work. I could see there are few notifications (emails, smses, missed calls) and I was itching to read them, but I couldn’t get pass the security code. Thinking its just putting up its price and it will start working later, I didn’t do much about it.

But when my friend Sudeep who I call my phone doctor gave up too I knew things are not too well Tried to get it repaired but since its not an Indian model it will take a lot of time. And then I realised how much I love my phone, I even refused to put my sim card in any other phone. But after a while I realised I need to have a phone to receive calls and sms at least.

INCOMPLETE: The problem is just receving and making calls is not my definition of phone. If I can’t read emails in it, I can’t access my gtalk, facebook, aol mails, I can’t get directions then its not a complete phone for me.

I couldn’t believe when I got up in the morning there was a puny not so intelligent something on my bed instead of my big (but good looking) heavy device. I couldn’t believe the one which makes me read all my emails, shows me my FB notifications, rings the alarm, connects me to my boyfriend who lives overseas, gets me good music, lets me tweet all day WAS GONE!! Didn’t it also stream the latest videos, told me how many calories I eat in a day, kept a track of my menses cycle, popped up the things to do today. Not only did it click pictures but uploaded them wherever I wanted. Aargh! you get the drift?

And its such a pain when you don’t have all the phone numbers in the sim. If you want to party out, you don’t know how to contact the people! If I had MY phone it would have gotten the ways to contact (though Google or FB). Accessing all those websites is not allowed in my office.

And so here I am feeling so disconnected. I am sure I had a life before this phone came in to my life. Problem is I can’t remember those days. Hoping and trying to get this little piece of intelligence get repaired soon.

Tooth extraction = Louis Vuitton

Me: Doctor said, I have to go through the wisdom tooth extraction or it may result in cutting down my cheek few years later, which may leave a scar.

Vivek: So when is the operation?

Me: Are you mad? For the life of me, I can’t imagine getting injected in my mouth and getting my tooth extracted. NO WAY! I may just prefer to die.

Vivek: You are mad. You are making a big deal out of it.

Me: Oh yes! Doctor. It’s a big deal for me. When I was 8 years old, I had run away from a clinic when doctor was preparing injection for me. I may just run away this time too. Give me any kind of mental pain. But I can’t bear physical pains.

Vivek: You are talking like a kid. Let me handle you like one. I will buy you WHATEVR you want if you undergo this operation.

Me: Whatever, are you sure?

Vivek: Yes, whatever. Say it.

Me: Okay, I want an AMAZING pair of shoes.

Vivek: Ha ha. I know what you want. Louis Vuitton it is. Just get the damn operation done.

Me:

The year that it was…

When 2010 started, I knew this will be the year for me. At the end of the year, I can’t really say if it was, but it definitely was better than the rest. And today on 31st, I have been cerebrating all day my highlights and lowlights of the year and they are:

My first abroad trip: Oh yes! Very, very unexpectedly I went out of India as an adult (well, I am not really counting the Doha stay when I was very young, I don’t really remember any of it)
I went to UK and lived in London and other country side for 20 days. And it was BEAUTIFUL.

I quit AOL: People thought I will stay there for few more years but I had to leave. After six years and three positions in my first job I knew I have to move on. It was difficult to move out of the comfort zones and especially media field, but I did it.

My first tattoo: After pondering over it for years I somehow made up my mind that it’s time to take the pain and get inked permanently. And I am super happy with what I got.

1 promotion and 2 resignations: This was quite an eventful year for my career. After quitting AOL not only I got a promotion within 6 months at my new job but I also decided to quit from that place too.

The big date: Finally, finally ‘the date’ was set which will put a seal on Vivek and my life and let us live together under one roof forever.

My kiddos grew up: As I took my decision to settle down with Vivek and move on with my life, Veena and Rahul suddenly grew up and decided to take my responsibilities. I felt very proud to see the young Gohranis managing all by themselves in the big bad Corporate world.

20 out of 365: Not everything went really well. My beau and my long distance relation became longer and tougher. While he moved countries, it became tougher for us to meet. In fact when I counted today, physically we were together only for 20 days in the whole damn year. Hoping this was the last year we had to bear these distances.

Hoping for an amazing 2011

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Bucket list

So everyone wants to do something or many things before they die. Yeah, even me too. They call it a bucket list, don’t they? And here is a list I have compiled of the things that I want to do, if God gives me enough years to live. So before I kick the bucket, I want to:

1. Live in a third world country or in a remote village of India and serve people for a year.

2. Be able to bake 3-tier fabulous creamy cake.

3. Play guitar for continuous 2 hours. (like some good music which makes sense)

4. Live with my in-laws for a year at least and cook three meals for them everyday.

5. Visit all seven continents (preferably few countries of each)
Two down, five more to go

6. Publish one book written by me.

7. Publish my mom’s cookbook.

8. Live in Paris for one year. And few other cities like Mumbai, London, NewYork, Delhi too.

9. Adopt at least one child. Plan is to adopt 4-6.

10. Dance with a good-looking man (or woman) (could be Salsa, Jazz or just anything) on a stage or just a performance anywhere.

11. Cook exotic three course meal for at least 25 people at a time.

12. Do my masters from Oxford or Cambridge university in UK and live a student life for one year.

13. Work as a bartender.

14. Speak French fluently.

15. Build a beautiful house with a bar by swimming pool and a library.

16. Go scuba diving.

17. Kiss a dolphin.

18. Do a diploma course from Le Cordon Bleu.

19. Assist a baker or work in a bakery for some time. (Man, I am so much about cooking)

20. Take Vivek to Spain (or its likes) to watch a live football match.

(Not in any particular order)

Let’s talk about Facebook Etiquettes, eh?

Almost all the people you know in your world have succumbed to the charm of Facebook. Everyone seems to prefer a virtual social life than a real one. You meet a new person at a lunch gathering and before you sit at dining table for dinner, you have a Facebook friend request by the same person. And damn yeah, it’s really very addictive. Checking your friend’s statuses, pictures, links and whatever they publish on their Facebook wall has become as necessary as brushing your teeth (if brushing your teeth is actually something you do everyday)

Me being one more FB addictive person, love this social networking site and really believe that it’s one of the best things ever happened to internet. But I also sometimes wonder what if there were few things people will keep in mind while using this site. No strict army-kind-regulations, but simple rules if people follow, will not really irritate me a lot. So they are:-

Don’t add people for the sake of collecting friends
228 friend requests and counting. Do you realise how irritating this is! One guy sent me a friend request today just because his and mine birth dates are same. I couldn’t help but send out a rude note to him asking him to get some life. If you ignore a friend request, you get the same request by the same person after a few days. Finally I have left a note in the box (on the left hand side below picture) telling people not to send me a friend request if I don’t know them. I am really not on this site to collect random people as friends.

Also, if you are adding an acquaintance as friend on the site, would it not be good to go to their wall and leave a hello note. Sometimes you add people you haven’t seen in years, wouldn’t it be nice to ask them how and where have they been all these years? Why would you add someone if you actually don’t intent to keep in touch?

Add a message while sending a friend request
Facebook gives you this decent option to add a message while you are sending the friend request. If you are adding a person you have not seen in years or have met just once or twice, it always helps to tell them who really you are.

Tagging the pictures
My friend gets an email attachment of some really cool pictures, he/she likes it, which is perfect, posts it to his/her FB wall, which is again cool, but tags me and 54 other friends also on it, which is so very uncool. Why dude, I need to get 39 notifications as comments on this silly picture which you have posted? I still don’t get it.

Status
I just woke up.
I am in the toilet.
I am brushing my teeth.
I am taking a shower.
I am getting ready.
Ufff! Isn’t that too much information for your friends that you want to give out? I really love reading status messages but not exactly 60 statuses from one person in a day. Keep it limited and interesting.

Also, if you love posting so many status, twitter is the place for you really, but but but please don’t link your twitter to your FB then.

Pictures in albums
The best thing about FB is you can share pictures with your friends about a vacation that you took, a party you attended, a luncheon at home or just general stuff. It will be really nice if you don’t really upload 167 pictures in the album. One same picture of the similar shot is just not done! Choose the pictures and then upload, it will keep your friends interested too and they will see the whole album. Trust me, sweets!

Try not to defeat the purpose why you are there
Keep in touch man! If someone has posted ‘something’ on your wall (as FB says) try to reply them. Not exactly on FB if you are not too comfortable, but later by IM, phone, email. You choose!

Do you also get annoyed by things which happen on the social networking site? Let me know in comments.

PS By the time I finished writing this blog, I had one more email from the guy who shares same birthdate with me. The mail read like this: i knw just same bday u dn ad me as frd i too agre til u wont knw me dn ad me in ur frd list tak ur tim
Aaargggh! Kill me someone.

Oh Africa! Let’s wave to the tunes of Waka Waka!

I hear it as caller/hello tunes of all my friends, I hear it in the gym, and clubs play it in every party. And instead of getting bored, I am totally loving it. Yes! That’s the magic of the FIFA songs. While there are many songs released by many artists, Shakira’s ‘Waka waka’ and K’naan’s ‘Waving flag’ have made the most noise across the world. I also like Akon’s ‘Oh Africa’. The magic of these songs is so intense that it wants me to go crazy about the game, but then I realise I am actually not crazy about it.

Oh yes, if you thought that I am writing a blog about the game, I must be a football frenzy. Let me correct you here, I love the ‘Football world cup’ songs that come out every year and of course the good-looking players, not much the game. Though I do realise, it is the biggest and the most anticipated show on the planet. Players who do well in this competition go down in the history books as legends. It is after all THE Football World Cup.

World cup 2010 is no different and equally special if not more. This is the first ever world cup to be held in Africa and it holds a very special meaning to the people and teams of this continent. And the African artists are more than willing to share their joy with the rest of the world. One such artist, K’naan’ whose original song Wavin’ Flag is quite different from (The Celebration Mix) because it is a recast version. If you have heard the original version, it has many darker lyrics denoting ‘a violent prone, poor people zone’ and people ‘struggling, fighting to eat’. Although the new version features elements of the original song, it includes a new pre-chorus that sets the uplifting, unified tone of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, turning the song into one that is more open, more inviting, more celebratory.

Shakira’s ‘Waka Waka’ has got mixed critical responses even though it’s a big hit in many countries. While many feel that the Cambodian singer has taken the FIFA music to new level, some South Africans complained that she is not the ideal person to represent Africa’s first world cup tournament. Shakira has also been accused of reinterpreting the famous song, ‘Zangalewa’ without taking the band’s permission. If that wasn’t shock enough for me, I occasionally saw the first few matches and was more surprised. The likes of England, Portugal, Spain, France and the defending champions Italy have either managed only draws or even worse, faced defeats against the so called ‘under dogs’ (like Switzerland, USA, Mexico) of this competition.

The game has become more planned-organised-controlled rather than the good old flamboyant aggressive football. Even Brazil seems to have lost that old touch and is managing the game than playing it. So far only Argentina has come out as the big bully in the competition. It would be very interesting to see how the ‘cup of life’ unfolds in 2010.

Controversies and compliments will always be a part of game so huge. For now, let’s plug in the headphones and wave to the tunes of FIFA music in the day and take control of the remote and take pleasure in watching the matches in the night! Ole, ole!