The weekend is upon us and I hope 🤞 you’re free from all the stresses until Sunday afternoon because that’s when reality hits for the most of us…😔😭
The last thing I did for fun was wake up full rested a few years back when I was travelling with my family, I was actually so tired because during the whole trip I was the only one who was awake idk why am I like this but everyone was asleep but as soon as I reached a place known to me I hit the bed around 8pm at night and woke up at 10 am the next day…😳
It was 14 hours of me just sleeping that’s it, there was nothing that woke me up and no one that disturbed me and after I woke up I remember drinking a pitcher full of water;
A whole 2 liter in a single sitting, it felt like I was in the desert for the past hours and my throat was dry and I was hungry so I just drank my fill and woke up well rested…
ONLY THAT DAY AND NEVER AGAIN…
It was a day and a half of travel and I was awake through the night too…
I remember my family telling me that my eyes were bloodshot like there was literal blood running in them, I had indents of my wired earphone on my face and my phone was at 2 percent…
I wish to get that sleep once again…
Well that was a funny back story isn’t it…?
BUT FOR FUN;
I usually watch plays,
The last one was Khichik,
Where I saw a couple and their parting after finding out that they were involved with other after falling in love with each other and them meeting yet again and completing their final years with each other until the main characters passed away one after another…
A beautiful play written by Shiv Subramanyam called snapshots from an album from the book Irani cafe and other plays..
It was the first time I saw Girija Oak Godbole and Ghanshyam lalsa on screen and it was one of the best performances I’ve witnessed;
The director Divya Jagdale did a great job by making the cast work in such a fluid manner that it was breathtaking;
And a proof that I did, I’m attaching the photo of the performance I witnessed…
(Haha to prove my point…)
Happy weekend to those who are celebrating and remember to drink plenty of water of you plan to binge drink or anything and remember buying recovery shots if you step out fill your groceries…
Cheers 🥂
Love Waakiye 🤍
In the picture Our national crush Girija Oak Godbole on the right and Ghanshyam Lalsa on the left(a few minutes before the play ends)A keepsake I bought after the play ended the actual book that the play was taken from…!
Today’s prompt is a weird one, like what does this even compare to, a few prompts back to back were very serious ones and required thinking on a higher level;
But what would be my top five grocery store items…
Well,
My first would be ready to cook pasta, not any specific type but all of them elbow, penne, fusilli, bow tie, spaghetti and so much more;
They are versatile and go well with anything that you cook and they are easy to snack on and filling if cook properly…
Second thing would be some sort of chicken, maybe it’s kebab or some cold cuts or even packed chicken breasts that can be whipped into some sort of curry or something of a semi dry dish like marry me chicken or even something that can be turned into fried chicken tbh the variety is never ending…
Third thing would be herbs and dried spices, if we are starting from scratch it would mean we need to have all of the things that are required to have a proper grocery run and one time purchase of these things can last a month too;
I mean turmeric, Kashmiri red chilli(for color), standard red chilli which gives it the kick that it needs, cumin seeds, ginger powder, black peppercorns, cinnamon bark, clove, cardamom , mustard seeds, coriander seeds, fennel seeds and lastly star anise;
All of these are a must have if you plan on making a grocery run for the very first time…
Fourth wound be veggies, a staple would be potatoes, onion, ginger and garlic, tomatoes, cabbage, carrots, mushroom(if the price is right) green peas, capsicum, cauliflower and spinach if the seasons are right…(do I need to explain these…?)
The last would be pulses and being from India at least one time of cooked food has some sort of pulse wherever you go, imagine going to eat something South Indian food the staple idli and dosa including sambhar is made using pulses like rice and black gram(called urad dal here in our country…)
Some other would be chickpea, kidney beans red lentil, peas, black eyed peas( called lobiya),split yellow peas, mixed pulses, mung beans, moth beans and so much more…
I forgot to add eggs and that is very shameful for me because I have one every morning and almost forgot about them(P.s. a sixth edition from my side)
With these five((6)) things you can conquer any of these recipe that works for you…
Describe a man who has positively impacted your life.
Hey…
I hope all of you are doing well…
There are a few men in my life who have guided me in a positive direction and given me a way to live this life in a much better way…
The first one would be my late father, who was one of the pillars in my life he shaped my existence (literally) and taught me how to be a better person by just being present in my life and acting like a good father figure to look up to, even though we had limited time with each other,
There are some decisions of his that I question myself but those were taken keeping in mind my future and the future of our family-led business…
But I’m really grateful that whatever time we had together was spent in happiness and neutrality…
The second one would be my father’s brother, my uncle; he is the one who taught me all the business that our family has to date, and he taught me the basics and the complex things of the business that we now run together;
He imparted me the sense of respect and how to please a client and negotiate what feels best for us (margin-wise) without having to cut deep into the pockets of any of our potential client a time of five years under his guidance gave me a different perspective at life also the shoes he had to fill when he was a child forced into this business too…
The last one would be my friends, without them I’m just a wandering soul on this planet, they keep me grounded and also help me achieve what I am capable of there are so many instances that have shaped me that happened just between my friends which gave me a new perspective on life itself;
They are with me when there was no one, and they shall be with me until the end of me…
These were the few men who positively impacted my life…
Have you ever thought about not being alive to see yourself the next year…?
I know it’s a dangerous situation but a lot was going wrong then a bad relationship, not having a sense of direction, spending most of my time tirelessly working and not enjoying it at all, I was stuck in a constant loop of working and working my butt off until I was tired enough to gobble food and drop dead asleep…
A bad time it was,
I also prepared for myself a dream which came to a halt somewhere in the middle of this year because my sister found the right match for herself and we have planned to get her married next year…
So all of my dreams and aspirations that I had for this year, they’ve taken a back seat and other ones have taken their place as priority,
Which will take more time a good half of the year 2026 I assume,
But after that, I’m free to dream and perform according to my aspirations,
(This might be a far-fetched idea because there are a lot of expenses that come after the wedding too, we have to go there they will come here, and many others will stay here for a few days and some will plan to go there too,
A few more rituals and plans will follow…)
Maybe I will be free next year the same time to plan my year 2027…
You’re not gonna believe that I was curled up in my bed, thinking as the clock stuck 00:00 hours, I should read something before going to sleep, (Trying to induce a habit of reading..) As I picked a book from my collection, it was either Khalil Gibran’s collection, or, it was metamorphosis by Kafka which I bought, the night before i.e. Sunday night from a roadside book seller…
Before I could even focus my eyes on the words written on the first page of metamorphosis, It felt blurry, remembering little, the character turned into bug, there was a description, how he looked at himself, who he was, looking at the picture he hung that he cut out of the magazine…
that’s all I could remember, the first page that to barely, I thought to myself, is this the same mind that read pages upon pages during its prime…?
As I put the book in its place, a wall mounted drawer, and tried to fall asleep, but, I couldn’t, I was using 3 devices simultaneously before, my phone checking the messages, getting updates from a brother who’s fighting an addiction, and doing a splendid job keeping at it, Another one, who just came back from giving a competitive exam, and has had a long day, requiring a full day’s sleep to be in working condition again, another one who opened a new office and is dying from traveling as the commute has added 3 hours which he has to steal from these 24 hours…
My laptop for penning down my thoughts and ideas, in the WordPress app, as a few ideas flew by me, one of which I explored last night, and wrote a prose in a language commonly spoken here, about a girl who is held in boundations, and isn’t welcomed by her maternal home, in a setting that is absolutely heartbreaking….
My wireless sound bar, which played one of the favorite playlists that has songs from Panjabi culture, some Hindi songs and Gazals or a collection of old poetry, which brought me immense joy, and every once in a while, a new song would pop in and I’d have to change it, and remove it from my playlist…
Surrounded by these things, I thought of a life before all of this, these devices, these apps, these screens and, it took me back to a time when we had those buttoned phones and nothing more…
I remember, getting bored of playing snake game and then going out to play with my friends in the colony we grew up in, we used to run after each other, play hide and seek, hopscotch because we had these sandstone blocks outside our home, which would make it way easier to prepare and play around, but, those memories were blemishing, maybe I forgot some of it…
We used to wake up early, watch our grandparents light an incense stick in prayer room, after then watching them read the newspaper on the rocking chair, sipping on their piping hot tea, occasionally taking a bite of biscuit or rusk that was kept right next to their cup and saucer…
I remember rushing to take a bath, after that hurriedly chomping down breakfast, it was something light like poha, or a paratha (Indian flatbread with filling), something that we all loved, after that going to school where we used to enjoy our friendship, meeting those who we liked from the bottom of our hearts, some crushes, some whom we adored, and found cute…
Our parents went to their work, father returning home late around 8 or 9, mother returning home early and preparing evening snacks for us kids, and preparing dinner for the people in the house, and finally getting back to bed, late around 11 pm or 23:00 hours…
Occasionally going out to buy sweets like jalebis, or something, never missing the night walk, staring at the starry sky and the moon, as we used to walk back home, tiredness kicking in as soon as we reached home, and falling asleep under, the rotating fan and occasional cooler blowing cold air which turned into hot after it ran out of water, and then replacing it with new water after cleaning it to remove the foul smell…
The respect that we held for our elders and the stories that we heard from their own mouth, that too very keenly, shaping our beliefs and moral compasses, without many distractions, we were able to focus better; and having a genuine relationship because of face-to-face conversations, and learning about our culture and heritage from the word of mouth, rather than having to search google or YouTube just like these…
A time to remember and cherish it was…
Cheers 🥂
Love Waakiye 🤍
Those were the good days, we keep on telling ourselves, as the generation that grew up playing outside, before the technological advancement that made our lives, Easier yet more chaos filled…
Remembering, crying to our parents to play outside, our eyes feel watery this day too, But, seeing the roads empty, break our heart shattering them into little pieces, a history of fun gone, replaced by technology…
That crying before going to school, and the tiredness that surrounded afterwords, that sleeping after coming home, or those time spent, during exam period, cramming everything into this little brain of ours…
Then pouring it all into these exam papers, but, remembering those times brings nostalgia, that keeps us from forgetting those good times…
Going out with our parents after they returned home from work, grabbing ice cream as they talked to each other, worries about our well-being, our school life, and their personal life too, remembering them talking to each other we used to feel happy, that we were blessed with such caring and worried parents,
Waakiye 