The Puja Diaries

day five - nabami

woke up to the dulcet tones of my cell phone - titan's own strident tones followed thereafter, peremptorily ordering me down for the Spot Quiz. therefore i rushed down in an Olympic record of shower-and-change-in-ten-minutes, and within fifteen minutes acquired a gift voucher for answering the question (in which of shakespeare's plays is the heroine called Hero?) duh- much ado about nothing - and thus won the right to squander 75 bucks of corporate money on formidable guzzling at monginis. sidenote - hehehehe...........

in the evening i wore my new black glitterati top with (heaven forgive me) d's HUGE red bracelet (that everyone but me was freshly astounded by, in a good way, i hope) and then taira di, mitu, titan, raju, ayan da, me and akash da made the tour of the housing pujas in our areas (smirks derisively) and endured simmering jealousy at the sight of manjulika a's fantastic turnout this time. on our return, well, i got some bad news about a friend (there is nothing to discuss) and was later cheered up by naughty story games and an impromptu backstage dance around and after midnight. an extremely fun day it was, all round, and am already anticipating going for the bhashan.
anyway. i returned to the parental abode after one in the morning, took a bath, and then settled down to wait for d to call for our usual midnight chat. he obliged within ten seconds of my "i'm free now" missed call and he kept me up until two fifteen giggling at his extended family's antics. after making him promise to wake me up at ten this morning with an elongated call, i flipped over in bed and FINALLY finished Richard Bach's Curious Lives. must've been the adrenalin rush keeping me awake. anyway, gotta rush to go shower, change, and go downstairs to hang out friends. already missed calls and 'whr r u' messages abound. ciao all. stay tuned for the grand finale of the puja diaries,

much love,

trisha
(~_~)

The Puja Diaries

day four - ashtami

my grandparents came to visit today, after a hiatus of two years of illness, operations and stress. my grandma watched speilberg's AI in the afternoon with me doing the verbal subtitling for her and cried, bless her. my grandfather snored gently beside me for most of the day.
later i went down to the community pandal, hung out with friends, watched the antakshari, etc. high point of the evening - i debuted in the most expensive ensemble i possess, an ethnic mishmash of gold and sunset colours.will upload pix later.
stayed up quite late, first in the pandal with friends, and then a delicious dinner at home, followed by a quick midnight chat with d before bunking down. not a very spectacular day, unless you count the ensemble, which i don't.
night all.
god, my feet are killing me. why are beautiful shoes always the most painful?

The Puja Diaries - Photographic Evidence-II

THE BOSEPUKUR THAKUR


akash da, taira di, me

The Puja Diaries - Photographic Evidence

alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254151609285296338" />

The Puja Diaries

day three - saptami

woke up relatively early for the three-minutes-to-fame hosting gig, which turned out to be exhausting, drainingly heating my skin for what felt like hours as i tried to find new contestants to perform (although titan and i were told later that we did a good job). suki di and pal turned up, letting me know only in the morning, thus catching me off-guard and effectively blindsiding any sophisticated hospitality plans i may ever have harboured. we had fun, though. even my uncle and aunt found time to drop by during lunch........
later, i went to meet d at the crossroads, while suki di and pal tagged along, got introduced, passed lifted-eyebrow-judgements (as usual) as we all took a patuli bus. d got the tickets, thus (hopefully) impressing the heck out of my friends with his generous notions of male chivalry -lol- and he and pal and i roamed around hiland park for a bit - suki di had to go meet her Baby (!!)- until about 4, when we bundled pal on to a bus back home, and then went off to watch drona. although we laughed or gaped unbelievingly through most of the movie, it was still fun, if only for the almost skeletal script and storyline. the special effects were stunning, though, much like the silver bracelet with the enormous red stone that d thought fit to bestow on me today.
and although part of me appreciates the fact that he remembered that we went into a shop the previous week and i wistfully stared at the blue version of the same bracelet and told him about looking for the red in my spare time, thus leading him to scour malls near and far till he found the right one, perhaps this is after all a case of too fast, too furious, too much.............even though i do, too, like him a sizeable lot. wondering now what i should get him in return. perhaps a faux leather belt with a wrestlers' tag, hehe....
anyway, i even won a 300 buck gift voucher for longhorns' for being the first person to get the middle row struck out in housie this morning, despite (nearly) getting into hot water regarding the planned Great Indian Pen Hijack Heist (concerned parties and common friends will know what i mean - and by the way, i replaced that pen with a brand new one of the same color ink), and then photographed well tonight in my new white shirt-jeans-black-waistcoat-silver shoes-pearl drops-ensemble (smirks, bows), so all in all, a very positively memorable day of the pujas. long rule the goddess. ended it by playing silly singing games in the park with a bunch of nice friends close to midnight. irresponsibility is such bliss.

P.S.- am uploading pics of the last few puja days here, tonight. feel free to comment and link up!

patiently yours,

trisha

!!!!!!!!

The Puja Diaries

day two - shashthi

slept HUMUNGOUSLY late - until after noon (!!!!) and then took my time with a leisurely bath and a cup of chocolate milk, waiting for my favorite uncle-who-is-not-my-uncle (actually just a very old and very loved family friend) to turn up with his beautiful wife, his extravagant gifts, and sizeable offerings of delicious food. the aforementioned individual arrived two hours late, filled to the brim with funny quips about the Universe (as usual) and a classy white top for me, as well as assorted gifts for my parents, grandparents, cousins, and himself (i kid thee not- the man opened up a pack of chocolate he had had gift-wrapped for himself).
later, i went down to attend the para stage performances for shashthi, braving the not-so-kind and rather unfunny digs that most teenage males think it's cool to inflict on one another, and watching what was surely one of the most inefficient, boring and puerile magic shows i've endured, worse than even david blaine's freezing-himself-in-ice escapade (magician or stuntman, david?????? make up your ******* mind!!!!!), preceded by some extremely nervous toddlers charming the audience with their lisped versions of classic bangali songs and poems........
i am supposed to be hosting the telegraph-sponsored three minutes to fame contest tomorrow at 11 am with a friend. i suspect pre-stage nerves are the reason i'm up past the witching hour typing away for my blog...........
on the up side, community lunch tomorrow, followed by a date (^_^) at hiland park with (*******) so yay for that, i guess.
am still waiting on uploading the pictures, principally because the data cable's gone bonkers on me tonight. watch this space for the remainder of this festival's chronicles! g'nite, world. happy dreaming

yawningly yours

trisha

[*_*]

The Puja Diaries

day one - panchami

slept late. went out pandal hopping with para friends. ekdalia, singhi park, bosepukur...what an extravagant, thriftless, over-the-top, exquisitely beautiful waste of the city's resources! my head aches from the crowds, the heat, the lights, the countless cold drinks. spent some time helping to make a photo gallery to put up tomorrow in our very own pandal. composed a poem to act as the captions (takes a bow). even managed to keep myself on calorie control to a certain extent. will upload photos tomorrow night. am too bushed to type anymore........c y'all later. goodnite, kolkata.

p.s.-of all the pandals we saw today, our own modestly beautiful one appealed to me the most. i wonder what this means on my subconscious level of thinking. perhaps i'm finally beginning to feel comfortable with this whole ornate-religious-festival-thing without letting my own atheism colour my perceptions of it all. who knows? am too dazed with incipient sleep to self-analyze anymore. see you in the morning........

[*_*]