Random Thoughts at work

• I want to chuck my job and travel through Japan with a backpack
• I want to go back to Chandigarh and see the new house
• I want to have paranthas with home made butter
• I want to go to my favourite cafe;sit cross legged on their comfy sofas and eat cheesecake with coffee while I read a good book
• I am fed up of working with unprofessional people and want to tell them so
• I am tired of motivating others when I don’t feel too motivated myself
• I want to ask some people if they have ever heard of the terms "Schedule management" and "Contingency Planning" ?
  

Its not such a good day at work people !

Friends, Shopping and Rajma Chawal

I’ve been meeting a lot of old friends lately. Met A last weekend in Yokohama and yesterday met S. She was in shizuoka for a week which is quite a distance from Tokyo and I had almost despaired of meeting her, but the great pal that she is she delayed her flight to Sunday so she cld spend Saturday with me.We had the most glorious time. We shopped till we dropped and talked about how life had treated us since we met last. The weather gods were kind - for a change the day was cloudy so we spent most of it walking ard Tokyo and by 6 in the evening we were just about ready to collapse.S is a pure veg and not the kind who drink - so I couldn't take her to a Japanese restaurant or a pub without getting disapproving looks and a lecture about the sins of drinking and eating non veg.
Actually S is so shockingly different from the other people I know. She doesn't drink, eat non veg and likes to stay at home with her yr old son and spend time with only good frnds or family. She loves to shop but will shop for bangles and traditional salwar kamizees where as I wld go for silver jewelery and ethnic kurtis and jeans and short tops. As personalities we are poles apart - she is a bit conservative and doesnt adjust to modern ideas fast. - I am the one with the modern outlook who can do anything live anywhere and off course eat anything !
But what is similar is our values and beliefs in life and that goes beyond being modern or conservative- Under all my veneer of modernity I am a person to whom spirituality means a lot - In fact that is the one common factor that brought us together.She understands that part of me so well.Like her I stick to my few friends and will only spent time with like minded people and wld rather spent my time alone than in company of people I dont agree with or enjoy much.
And so we had coffee al fresco and gorged on the snacks she brought from home. Her mom makes all sorts of fabulous namkeens imaginable and I guess she knew that for all my talk about “I love Japanese food and I cant understand why people have to eat Indian even in Japan” I wld be dying for some Indian food so she brought it along all for me.
Then in the evening we had to go to a old colleagues place .. apparently his wife had cooked dinner for us and we are sort of fond of his wife so off we went The wife made us good adarak chai Indian style and then we had rajma chawal for dinner.Rajma Chawal is something I can die for so I really hogged and hogged.
On Sunday - I went shopping to Tokyo hands and lazona in Kawasaki and bought everything from books to hair clips to perfumes to foot creams. I also wanted to buy a very lovely peasant blouse but then off course they didn't have my size - no one in japan has my size - it really doesn't help to be 5 feet 9 inches in a land of tiny people with no busts or behinds to speaks of !
So that's how I spent my weekend ...

P.S
Have I been giving an impression of “poor me I am so lonely in Tokyo”?? coz There was a comment on my last post .Some smart fella wrote about how he pitied me coz I was supposedly friendless in Tokyo and how he was having so much fun coz he had a lot of friends there – dude – first of all this is someone who has been coming to Japan almost every year for the past I don’t know how many yrs now and something I can never get in this city is lonely. And then that post was just a nostalgic bit about how nice it feels to catch up with good frnds you haven’t met in ages. OK !

The company of Friends

What do you do when a dear friend calls to say he will be in town soon and will meet you ? You hop skip and jump around the room like a five year old and start counting the days till he comes. Meanwhile you call your mother, his mother and a hundred people in between pestering them to tell you his exact schedule. And when he does land in Tokyo you call him a thousand times a day when he is in very important meetings with very important people demanding to know when he will meet you.
And when you do meet,the feeling is like coming home. The best thing that can happen to you when you are in an alien city suffering from the blues is to meet someone from home.
And so as the ice tinkles in the glasses and you munch on the chicken wings, the conversation spirals and rambles into everything from philosphical discussions on life to hilarious anecdotes about the people back home to crazy inane happenings. And as you laugh and talk and laugh some more,you realize how much you had missed being with people with whom you can really and truly be yourself without putting on any pretenses.
Then suddenly you realize only five minutes remain till the last train home and you gulp down the last of your drink and hug him and hug him and make your self seem like a little lost kid in a big bad city and extract a thousand promises from him to see you when he is in town again.
And on your way back in the train,as you smile thinking about the conversations and the laughter;you realize that life's finest moments are those that we spend in the company of friends.

So - Here's to the time very well spent in TGIF Yokohama and here to many more such rendezvous in the future !