Short term goals - to get married

According to Hinduism a man’s life is divided into four stages Childhood , youth where he learns, Adult where he gets married and starts a family of his own and then finally old age when he renounces all the worldly pleasures and places his energy into spirituality and the divine.

On a Saturday, I got this rather heart warming mail from a gentle bloke who practically made me roll me on floor laughing. There was nothing wrong with him and his killer of a photograph showing off his newly purchased Ray-ban glasses I am assuming as the backdrop of the photograph did not indicate that he needed to flaunt shades. Nevertheless, the so called bio-data was very interesting and kept me amused for a long time.

The first thing that caught my attention -

Short Term Goals

To get married

pursue Green Card process

Long Term Goals

Settle in India after 7 or 8 years

I always thought marriage was a life long commitment, didn’t actually realise it was a goal and that to a short term. I kept wondering what he meant by that a short-term goal. At the start he also mentioned that he had won number of prizes for his writing skills. I kept wondering who were the people he was competing against.

He further went on to say:

Outlook/Aspiration in Life

�always happy

never hurt others

be peaceful

successful in all aspects

work hard and take smart decisions

Hmm.. It would have been a perfect brochure for a self help course if he ever chose to start one. I wonder if any of the earthlings wouldn’t want the above mentioned thing. I for once am happy, wonder what about aspiring to be happy and wonder if any one likes to deliberately hurt someone or their feelings. If they did possibly getting in touch with this dude could do them some good.

Something that took the cherry on the cake - reads as follows - “I would like to take care of my life partner very well.” Now now, who would want to marry an abuser who would come drunk home daily or stoned and beat me up.

The mail was signed off with his telephone number and details to get in touch with him. Not to mention there was a miscellaneous section to which reads as follows:

I am very interested in outdoor games, currently I play a lot of Basketball, Shuttle Badminton. Less often - Tennis, Volley ball and Table Tennis.

Know Car driving

can read and write Hindi, can speak a bit too

very inclined to reading books. Used to read lot of novels earlier, currently I spend time reading lot of self help literature

I keep a balance between hard work and relaxation/enjoyment

Well I didn’t end up calling him up nor replying to his mail as he his partner specifications were “Soft Spoken, cheerful, educated(BE or above) and intelligent girl”. I wonder if people think educated only meant doing Engineering. Well I am certainly not anywhere close to being soft spoken and possibly not educated enough for people who send me a bio-data like this.

God God or Human God

On a tiring day after work my cell rings with a weird number on display .

Me: hello xxx speaking

He: Am I speaking to xxx ( my wicked mind - I thought that was my opening line)

Me: Yes it is, who am I speaking to?

He: Hi, my name is yyy and I was asked to contact you.

Me: Oh thanks for the call. How are you doing?

He: I am fine and hope you to are fine ( my wicked mind - I thought those were only written in letters during the 90‘s)

Me: Thanks, I am doing very well ( an awkward silence)

He: So which is your favourite sweet?

Me: I don’t have a sweet tooth however, I do have a fetish for ice-creams and donuts

He: Oh those are not sweets - sweets for eg. - coconut burfi

Me: That way I think cashew sweet popularly known as kaju katli

He: Nice! Mine is coconut barfi and my mom prepares it very well

Me: good to know ( my wicked mind - ask her to send a sample for me to certify please)

He: You know how to make those?

Me: Nopes, unfortunately neither does my mom ( my wicked mind - if you can learn it from your mom maybe I can develop a liking to it when you prepare it for me. I find it very romantic when men cook for their sweethearts)

He: Oh, that’s bad. How are you culinary skills otherwise

Me: I lived myself for 6 years and didn’t manage to loose weight eating the food prepared by me.

He: Oh ok! That’s nice to know.. What all do you cook

Me: A lot of things ( my wicked mind - I hope you are not interviewing me for the post of a chef in your new venture)

He: So who is your favourite God?

Me: Sai Baba of shirdi fame. (jokingly) I consider him my permanent boy friend someone whom I staunchly believe in

He: Oh not those human gods but God God’s you know for Eg. Ganesha or Hanuman

Me: Oh Both, my mom follows lord Ganesh and my dad is a staunch believer in Hanuman and I pray to both. ( my wicked mind - I have just followed the pattern of evolution in my worship and shifted to human God as you may call it lol!!).

He: Nice, I like both to. What is your favourite sports

Me: I like watching tennis and use to play Basket Ball in school and use to follow NBA

He: Oh you like NBA nice its form US you know, which is your favourite team?

Me: Nobody particular. Do you play sports?

He: same pinch ( my wicked mind - didn’t we leave those behind at school??)

Me: Nice, for your records these days I am into boxing too (chuckling childishly)

He: Oh, which category? ( my wicked mind - tell me how much to weigh depends on what it takes to knock you down!!).

Me: (laughing uncontrollably)

He: why you laughing

Me: ( still laughing uncontrollably)

He: What is so funny?

Me: I am watching tom n jerry, I find it very hilarious and its my stress buster

He: Oh, is that you favourite cartoon ( my wicked mind - yes until this call, now I think you are my hero a living cartoon).

Me: Anyway, thanks for your call. I a afraid it is late in my part of the world and I have an early start.

He: Oh, what time do you wake up

Me: At 5:30

He: You start so early to work?

Me: I hit the gym, come back get ready and leave

He: Oh you gym, nice habit

Me: Yes, its an addiction after a point. But my motive is also to loose weight

He: it doesn’t show in your photographs that you gym . But you look cute like a ball of butter,

Me: That’s the reason I need to reduce, if I were thin already why would I want to loose weight

He: Yes, hope you loose weight. I will give you a call next week and will mail you my number

Me: Thanks, sorry to cut your call it was wonderful speaking to you.

I think my job interviews were better than this. I wonder what was with my irrelevant favourites. After the 30+ minute conversation, I realised expect for his name, favourite sweet and God I didn’t get any other relevant information. I didn’t even know where he works or what the hell has he studied and which part of the globe he lives in. I am guessing the US because he was always happy to hear NBA.

My verdict - could have been provided I was into making cartoon movies. Sorry dude, that’s why maybe a course in communication skills might do a bit of help in all walks of your life. Nevertheless , I wish form the bottom of my heart you get someone who makes coconut burfi just the way you like it!

God’s handpicked gift to mankind - An intelligent thinker

For folks like mine who have been living outside our homeland for years and never got the luxury of attending hundreds of weddings of people they didn’t even know existed ( just in case you didn’t know - a lot of Indian matching making goes on at someone else’s wedding), online marriage portals came as a boon (especially when they have looser kids who didn’t manage to find a single person on their own). My folks hopped on the bandwagon when they realised their only daughter has attained what is called ‘The marriageable age’ according to the Indian standards.

One of my first brushes with talking to random potential suitors started with a certain guy, who for some reason thought he was the gift to mankind and an Einstein in making . I wouldn’t be surprised if Einstein himself would feel a little demurred in front of this stud’s so called ‘Wit’. No points for guessing the person was found on the usual suspected place. After doing the horoscope matching bit and other background checks my details were passed on for further interactions (in this case just read as one).

One day I get a random friend request on my gtalk. Since my parents had given me an heads up, I was expecting this. I start chatting with some general questions about what you do your hobbies etc.. All seemed fine initially. Then came a sudden question which is quoted at verbatim “ Do you defy intellectually thinking which made you take up arts?” I said “ I probably enjoy creative thinking as it gives me an edge to think bi-laterally.”

This further turned out to be a heated debate as the person thought this people who couldn’t think logically have no rights to exists as they contribute nothing to ever-growing dependency of humans to technology. Little did the genius realise that it was the people who couldn’t think logically lured the fellow humans to get themselves enslaved to the inventions people sitting in the ivory tower make.

To make things worst he even thought my musical inclinations were a waste of time and my investment of 15 years to learn something that nourishes my soul a waste of my folks resources. I wonder if he actually did his homework right and found out how much a even b-grade singer makes. So much for thinking logically I guess he wouldn’t have had the time or rather invest on time to find out about the same I guess.

After waging a war of words and possibly exhausting my vocabulary on proving to a filtered idiot the importance of a career in media I ended the conversation with a much relieved good-bye and the still optimistic me thanked for my stars that it was not a one-on-one meeting. After all, I didn’t want to end up in jail charged with an attempt to murder a stranger who had the potential of a would be if he could have been a bit less stuck on proving his worth.