Baby Doll

At seventeen, all I did was pray. Pray that I pass my 12th standard board exam. Between the revision tests ,tuitions and study groups, life was a mass of maths and tea. But today I read this story and shocked was an understatement.

These 17 year old girls at Gloucester High have made a pact to get pregnant ,so they can raise children together. The worst part is girls have just tried every male available to get there and one of the dads is a homeless man!!!. They have had their share of sex education, know about the problems of teenage pregnancy yet made this lovely little pact. There seems a huge blame settling on the school and parents. The school because they tried to dole out the contraceptives, with parental consent and make the school friendly for teen mothers. The parents because these teenagers are supposedly not loved enough ,so they need unconditional love provided by a child.
I have to say that even though I’m sure that these played a part in the whole scheme of things, the blame squarely rests on these teenagers and the media.

It’s now glamorous to be pregnant. Every channel on TV, covers pregnancies from Angelina Jolie to Jamie lynn Spears.They all talk about their baby showers and fancy maternity gowns, but none of them tell us about the truckload of nannies and help that these famous people employ to get them through the sleepless nights and midnight food runs. Even in soaps or serials nowadays on TV, its perfectly ok to be a young mother. They kind of forget to mention that its an average of $1000 a year to raise a child. Currently its “In” to be pregnant. If the celebrities talks about the problems with having a child, maybe these teenagers will think twice before making a pact.

I think the teenagers are responsible to a large extent for their current situation. Today the kids are intelligent and worldly wise. When they can reach for the computer to download the latest songs, I am sure, they can check out the difficulties associated with a teenage pregnancy. When they can complain about getting limited minutes for $50 of charge on cell phone bill, I’m sure they can figure out how much baby monitors and car seats costs. I am sure these teenagers are preparing for their baby shower and thinking of all things they can get right now. But what about after that? Are they so sure that their parents, who it seems are already suffering from the recession in the fishing industry will support them?
These girls think of a child as an usable commodity.I am not saying that the child is just wanted for its cuteness, but to bring another human life into this world requires experience and responsibility. Clearly these teenagers are deficient in both .

I know the stigma attached to an unwed mother in the Indian culture, is horrific with the way unwed women are treated in current society . But on the same vein, it’s the same stigma which ensures that young girls think twice before venturing into an unknown territory. The moral values and culture play a huge part in every decision, but it in the end I think it comes down to the individual thinking. Nowadays, I feel that mass thinking is the code of the day, the time when your parents said be unique is long past. My dad used to keep saying “Yellarum kennarula kudicha , neeyum kudipiya (If everyone jumps into the well, will you do it too? ) “?

I feel these girls are taking tickets to jump into that well. We can try to keep them away from the edge but the final step in , is that of the girl. And if she can think for herself , I'm sure she wouldn’t be one who’s crying out for help in the end.

For the smile

A woman went to the doctor's office. She was seen by one of the new doctors, but after about four minutes in the examination room, she burst out, screaming as she ran down the hall. An older doctor stopped and asked her what the problem was, and she explained. He had her sit down and relax in another room.
The older doctor marched back to the first and demanded, "What's the matter with you? Mrs. Terry is 63 years old, she has four grown children and seven grandchildren, and you told her she was PREGNANT?"
The new doctor smiled smugly as he continued to write on his clipboard."Cured her hiccups though, didn't it?"

Keep Smiling ppl

Anu

Tagged!

Uma tagged me. I approached this post, first with apprehension and then with a growing thankfulness. I haven’t put in this much introspection about my life in recent times

6 Whatever’s about me

1.I love music of the past –50’s -70s (Hindi, English) , but an ardent admirer of A R. Rahman’s music
2.Strongly believe in God, but never am one for long drawn rituals. I also believe in Karma, what you give, definitely comes back to either bite you or do you good.
3.I love having a large group of friends. Different personalities, attitudes and thoughts are so much fun to assimilate into daily life.
4.Avid reader, but love history. Give me a book on the rise of the Roman Empire or Hitler or even History channel, and I’m content to just be in one place for ever.
5.From being short tempered and the first to jump to talk, I have become a lot calmer and a decent listener, but people still cant get me to shut up once I start talking
6.I take after my dad. We are totally laid back about work and life . But if something got to get done, you can count on us get it done on time and right (Well most of the time :) ) .

5 Things I miss in my life right now

1. I miss India, so much sometimes it hurts. I miss my parents and friends. And most of all I miss the hustle and bustle of Chennai. I also really miss hearing Tamil on a daily basis. Mylapore on a Saturday afternoon (sigh!)
2. I miss the really good Gobi Manchurian and Dal Makhani. Like the kind you get in the dhaba’s off Koramangala road, in Bangalore
3. I miss the free life of school and college . Age and responsibility seem to grow incrementally together , I wish sometimes they had a converse relationship
4. I miss office cafeterias. Ok that’s a weird one. But I work from home and its easy to be attached to your laptop all the time. In office, you always have an hour or less, to walk with your friends to the coffee room or even grab a bite to eat.
5. On the same note I miss my commute to office. I had an hour to read the paper or listen to music undisturbed on the light rail .Nowadays I log in by 8am and log off by 6pm, stuck to my laptop all the 10 hours.

10 Things I wanna achieve within a decade

1. Travel through Europe. Going back to my history roots, I would love to touch the ruins at Delphi, walk through the volcano covered statues in Pompeii , stare at Stonehenge and try to understand it
2. Learn to swim. I hyperventilate in cold water, so this one for me is the most challenging
3. Write a book. I have atleast started with my fiction blog, but I want to take my writing a few levels higher
4. Teach. My mom being a professor, this was something I wanted to be when I grew up. Writing this post I just realized, I had grown up :-D!
5. Finish one more education level. Hopefully this will help me with whole the teaching aim
6.Learn a musical instrument either guitar or piano. Though for this one I’m sure K or my mom will prefer to be in another room
7.Help set up a school for kids back home in India. I hate child labor or a child not able to exploit their full potential, because of financial situation or home conditions.
8.Set up my own garden. Right now in a apartment, I try my best, but I would love a garden like I had when I was young. Have an acre filled with vegetables and flowers (not forgetting the snails and squirrels)
9.Watch a play on Broadway
10. Become a parent , whom I hope is half as good at parenting as my or K’s parents


The Book Tag
**Pick up the nearest book.Open to page 123.Find the fifth sentence.Post the next three sentences.

Considering I haven’t been to the library for sometime, I picked up one of my favorites!


“Ma, can you stop boring my friend,” Alok said
“No,its fine,” I said reaching for more daal.
Actually the life Alok’s mother led at home intrigued me.

- Five point someone, Chetan Bhagat


Tag Five people

http://keshigirl.blogspot.com/ - Keshi
http://basicallythejobless.blogspot.com/ - Barath
http://viewsnmuse.blogspot.com/ - Ani
http://world-ani.blogspot.com/ - Ani Dundee
http://castelgard.wordpress.com/- Castlegard

And I’m tagging anyone else reading this post, I’ve learnt from this experience that sometime what’s in your head seems a lot clearer when you type it out

For the joke of the day

The Preacher Golf

There was this preacher who was an avid golfer. Every chance he got, he could be found on the golf course swinging away. It was an obsession. One Sunday was a picture-perfect day for golfing. The sun was out, no clouds in the sky, and the temperature was just right. The preacher was in a quandary as to what to do. The urge to play golf overcame him. He called an assistant and told him that he was sick and could not attend church. Then he packed up the car, and drove three hours to a golf course where no one would recognize him.
Happily, he began to play the course.
An angel up above was watching the preacher and was quite perturbed. He went to God and said, "Look at the preacher. He should be punished for what he's doing." God nodded in agreement.
The preacher teed up on the first hole. He swung, and the ball sailed effortlessly through the air and landed right in the cup three hundred and fifty yards away. A perfect hole-in-one. The preacher was amazed and excited. The angel was a little shocked. He turned to God and said, "Begging Your pardon, but I thought you were going to punish him."
God smiled. "Think about it -- who can he tell?"

Keep Smilin ppl
Anu

Just Listen

Ever had a really bad day, but heard or saw something which made you think that
“Wow , my life isn’t bad after all!!”

Randy Pausch’s story is known to many I’m sure. A professor of Computer Science in Carnegie Mellon University was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, with a couple of months to live. “The Last Lecture” ,is a talk he gave at the university, has the ability to pull at your funny bone, but at the same time hit you in the gut with a couple of universal truths. I’m sure many of us have seen this or had it forwarded to us. But for those who haven’t, sit back, clear an hour and fifteen minutes of your time and listen. Because this lecture is from the heart.



And for the smile
An engineer died and reported to the pearly gates. An intern angel, filling in for St. Peter, checked his dossier and grimly said, "Ah, you're an engineer; you're in the wrong place."

So the engineer was cast down to the gates of hell and was let in. Pretty soon, the engineer became gravely dissatisfied with the level of comfort in hell, and began designing and building improvements. After a while, the underworld had air conditioning, flush toilets, and escalators, and the engineer was becoming a pretty popular guy among the demons.

One day, God called Satan up on the telephone and asked with a sneer, "So, how's it going down there in hell?"

Satan laughed and replied, "Hey, things are going great. We've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and there's no telling what this engineer is going to come up with next."

God's face clouded over and he exploded, "What? You've got an engineer? That's a mistake; he should never have gotten down there; send him up here."

Satan shook his head, "No way. I like having an engineer on the staff, and I'm keeping him."

God was as mad as he had ever been, "This is not the way things are supposed to work and you know it. Send him back up here or I'll sue."

Satan laughed uproariously, "Yeah, right. And just where are YOU going to get a lawyer?"

Keep Smiling people
Anu