Petals!

Remember, waiting for the postman to deliver that one letter that sets your heart racing like a galloping horse? Remember, reading the words and savoring the words, knowing they were written only for you?  Bring back the memories of love When you pick up Jojo Moyes' novel, The Last Letter from Your Lover , you open yourself to a lot of memories in your life. Sometimes, a handful of words can bring back treasured moments of words back to your heart's nest. At other times, words can hurt. We know that when some one's words hurt us but we don't always realize that our words hurt others too. This book isn't preachy but it makes us wish that we could begin writing those letters all over again. Make our hearts rhyme and be young again. The best part of the book is that the beginning of each chapter is headed by a real life message/update/sms that one lover sent the other while breaking up. It's touching at times, funny and mean at other times and then, overall, am ...

  I enjoyed watching this movie, that is based on Brian Friel's play, Dancing at Lughnasa. Of course, the fact that I love Meryl Streep and her performances is the real reason I picked up the DVD of this movie to watch. SIBLINGS: THEIR CONFLICTS & IDEALS It's hard not to feel warmly towards the five lonely unmarried Mundy sisters, with Meryl Streep in the role of the strict school teacher named Kate, Catherine McCormack playing the role of Christina, Kathy Burke playing Maggie, Sophie Thompson acting as Rose and Brid Brennan playing her role as Agnes. Their moments of conflict, nostalgia and love are beautifully portrayed through this movie despite its lack luster script and dialogues. Each sister has a definite sense of what's right and that's so natural in a family where siblings are likely to feel that way. However, even when such conflicts are not resolved, they learn to love and accept each other's shortcomings. STORY OF THE MUNDY SISTERS The sisters...

Yesterday, I decided to stop blogging. It was a decision that was not taken in haste. But I found myself totally miserable and upset with myself after deciding so. This place, Petals!, is my home, where my dreams, aspirations and thoughts fly around like kites in the sky. I couldn't simply walk off. No.  This morning, I was still unsure. I felt that maybe I should simply let go and then deep within, I knew that I couldn't. A tweet that I saw from a dear friend on Twitter, You-know-whu, inspired me deeply and  made me make up my mind, his tweet goes like this "There comes a point in your life when you realize who really matters, who never did and who always will." I know that Petals! is one of the things that matters a lot to my happiness of being in this world and I decided that I'd come back and be here no matter what. It's my home and this is where I belong. And yes, I deleted my previous post because I don't ever want to be reminded of it.

I never thought seriously about this - how to eat and savour food till I read "Guess what we are eating..." by Vasundhara Chauhan (published in The Hindu, Sunday Supplement, "Gourmet Files", June 12, 2011.) The writer confesses that she loves to probe into the food she eats because it makes it so much more interesting. She cites boredom and ego as a reason for contemporary styles of cooking such as making garlic payasam instead of the conventional rice kheer. Today's hostesses need to prove to their guests that they are creative and not boring enough to plate up what's been known and tasted many times before. That got me thinking. I enjoy making food that tastes new. The ordinary cheese sandwich tastes yummier with an additional layer - dash of salad cream, mustard, olives and jalapenos. I am the one who's having it and it's not really about my ego but I just want to eat something other than the ordinary sandwich. Same goes with pasta. I love to...

Here are some pics that I clicked when I went to see an Indian cultural festival called JayaUtsav in New Delhi that showcased Indian art, craft, dance, story telling and music from different states.  Artisans from different states showcased their work.                                                      Here, you can find artists at work.                                                        I wish they smiled though. This lady in the green saree was an amaz...

“A little grain of sand has mass. A very small mass but mass nonetheless, and because this grain of sand has mass, it therefore exerts gravity. Again, too small to feel, but there…a thought too is an actual thing, a measurable entity with a measurable mass…If a thought has mass, then it can exert gravity and pull things towards it. If enough people begin thinking the same thing, then the gravitational force of that thought becomes tangible and it exerts actual force. And it can have a measurable effect in our physical world.” -  Dan Brown (The Lost Symbol) MY BELOVED Pranams at your lotus feet. Thank you, Swami, for everything. I seek the blessings of my beloved uncle, Shri Shiva Dathan Menon and my mother’s mother, Meenakshi Amma. I believe they are always watching over me and protecting me from another world. MY FAMILY Our happiness is enclosed in a glass case, so fragile that it seems it can shatter at a touch of the fears that surround it. – Shashi Deshpande (Small Rem...