Happiness Matters

 Krishanur ping deke Mayurakkir anondo dorena. Sei kobe theke tinder e cheleta k follow krce, eto mas pore cheleta sudu je or request accept korece tai na, ok dateo dakche. Mayurakki to bondhu mohole wats app gruper madyame khoborta panchkan korlo. Etto handsome chele jodi date dake sei khoborta ki chepe raka jae. Nana bondur nanan advice - kon dress porbe, kivabe sajbe ityadi ityadi. Oneke je hingse korcena erkmo na. Mayurakki seta bes upovog korce, hingse na korle ar sobai k janie moja ta ki kre hbe. Joluk ora - Mayurakki vabe. Jak ge seje guje seto gelo Krishanur bari, coronar jnyo baire ar kthae jbe, tai baritei dekeche. Mayurakki vabe valoi holo, ei sujoge or ma babar sathe alap tao sara jbe. Doorbell bajatei sathe sathe dorja kullo, jeno odhir agrohe opekka krcilo. Jothakrome golpo suru hlo, onk interest nie Mayur er byapare khutinati prosno krlo Krish. Olpokkoner modyaei kokn je ora oder valo nam chere eke opor k Mayur ar Krish ble dakte laglo seta nijerai keyal krlona. Dinn...

Dear Readers, During pregnancy, we didnt stop going out on dates. Mental happiness of the mother is the most important for a healthy baby. We focussed on that mainly.  We went out to movie dates mostly as eating out was limited option for me.Once we booked a 4d movie and when we reached there came to know that pregnant women are not allowed in a 4d hall. Phew!!! This is what happens when you are young and excited parents! I remember in my 3rd trimester once we went to Pizza Hut to satiate my pizza craving, found a couple whispering at my baby bump and yes from their expression you could clearly guess that they were wondering how come I went out with that huge baby bump of mine! I felt amused. This might be because with age I have become immune to "log kya kehenge" - I have learnt to ignore what people think. This has helped me a lot in staying positive and also in my self growth and happiness. Whenever my baby moved inside me or responded to my touch I felt happy and good tha...

Dear Readers, "Motherhood is a different ballgame altogether!" Whenever my mother watsapps me or calls me, she asks - Did you eat? Probably this is the universal question of all mothers. And like all other children I get irritated by this question. I used to wonder all these years why is she after my food intake. Another equally irritating behaviour of her is hypertension. Now that I stay miles apart from her, phone and wats app are the medium of contact. If I do not answer her calls or if the last seen of my wats app is several hours ago she starts panicking. I wonder why is she like this when it comes to me. Because otherwise she is a very cool headed person. Ironically today I am equally uncool, hypertensed, all time freaking out mother just like my own Mom who's only motive in life is to feed her daughter properly and who always finds her daughter to be thin each time she sees her! Lol! I am aware that I have this problem but I dont wanna solve it. Strange?! Isnt it? ...

Dear Diary, "Pregnancy is over hyped but motherhood is not" By the word "over hyped" I mean once you are pregnant so much thought and panic is created by the people around you that at the end of the day you also tend to think only about pregnancy all the day. Thankfully, I didnt indulge myself in this overthinking process. For me pregnancy for a woman is a natural process just like physical changes for a girl when she enters her teenage life. So, I continued the normal activities in my entire pregnancy period starting from doing all household chores to attending office physically. Since covid episode and lock-down started in my 3rd trimester and there was no maid in the house, I did clean utensils and did cook. In pregnancy you are not supposed to lift heavy weight or bend and pick things from floor - I followed these. The thing which kept me physically active till my delivery time was exercise and walk- every day I used to walk (of course slow walk) for 1hour and I...

Hello Maa. Hello bol kmn achs? Valo aci. Tomar bazar esce to online theke? Ha esece. Tor baba ki krche? Ei to ekanei ace. Phone speaker ace kotha bolo. Hago tumi keyecho? Ha keyechi. Tumi ekn bazar dorona jeno. Na dorini. Dorjar kache roeche. Ha ekn thak 24 ghonta. Kal nun jole dubie rode sukie tule reko. Achha sei valo. Tumi mone kore tomar osud gulo kheo. Ha khabo. Ei deko Bouma ki bolbe. Ha Bouma bolo. Maa, bolcilm je tomar hater muri ghonto ta ki sundor hoe, tomar chele khabe bolcilo. Lockdown kobe je kulbe. Tumi barite eka atke porle ar amra sobai ekane. Sei to. Amaro ki mon ta kharap lagche Babu. Kobe je toder dekte pabo. Tomake bollm video call ta sikie dicchi phone, tumito bolle parbena. Ami ki osob pari re, sekele manus. Oto bujte parbona. Achha Maa recipie ta patio to muri ghontor. Ha patachhi. Amr diary te lekha ache. Chobi tule patachhi phone ta reke. Ok. Sabdane theko. Dorkar lagle phone koro. Ha re Babu. Torao valo thakis. Keye nis time moton. Phone ta reke ekta sostir ni...

Dear Diary, This is Dec 2019. Just now I saw my anomaly scan report. I not only have completed 20weeks of pregnancy but also have a good news, the anomaly report looks fine. Never have I ever waited so eagerly for the result of my medical reports. Exactly 1 year before I lost my first baby. On Dec 2018 I had miscarriage. The reason - the foetus stopped growing, only the sac inside which the foetus stays was growing. This is what medical report says. But for a mother that was not just a foetus but her child. When doctor showed me my child on the screen while conducting the anomaly scan my eyes became wet. Each time my usg happened and I saw my baby growing inside me tears used to come out- tears of happiness. Now I realise why mothers are so sensitive towards their children and from where do their tears come. A baby is not only the dearest one for a mother but the baby is a part of her body. For the ones who do not know, anomaly scan is done at 20th week of pregnancy to check if there i...

Mumbai city is called "City of Dreams". It's not just the city or the ample of opportunities that make this a dreamland for many, but the people and their attitude towards life make this the "Business Capital of India". People here understand one thing "To work". So if you want to work this city will provide you what you seek for. It is said once someone comes here, the city engulfs that person and it becomes very difficult for that person to leave this city. Well this is true! And what is the secret? No not the vada pav or the pav bhaji, not the Bollywood glamour, not the Marine Drive, not the high end lifestyle but the right attitude of the people who live here. Here you will not only get whatever you seek but you can lead a life without being judged and stay focused on your goal. I came here 3 years ago, but now I just don't stay here, I live here! Mumbai life is incomplete without its weekend hotspots. Weekend destinations are so many. F...

Covid 19 has disrupted our lives. Govt has ordered supply of only the necessary/ basic items i.e grocery and medicines would be there. But the irony is that the idea of basic need is different for different sets of people. Let's look at the following set of grievances: A: "My maid is on leave. Thank God I have my house keeper who works here for 24*7. But how much can she take up the work! I have to help her in pulling curtains sometimes. Struggle phase for me, phewwww!!!" B:  "Parlors are closed. Oh God! Why they had to close the parlors! Are these not essential? Plus now I have to help my Mom in daily chores! I hate Corona!" C: "No maid in the house plus we are working from home. Double work for us. Over and above this since, we are staying at home all the time due to lack of physical activity we do not feel hungry. God knows when this phase will end!" D: "So much pressure now what to post on social media, as I cannot hang out with...

When the biggest doubt is "Will you survive?" then why not make use of the time that you have. Think these 21 days in this way - what is it that one thing you wanted to do provided you had time. If this is the last few days of your life how you want to spend these days without going out of your home. What is it that makes you happy, actual happiness, bring joy to your soul, may be tears in your eyes! Each of us will have different answers. After reading these many of you would think "Where is the time for all these, Boss? We are working from home plus since there is no maid we have to do the household stuffs on our own. Double work for us!" But I am sure amidst the schedule you get sometime in a day to look through the news update on Corona Virus or Covid 19, you surely take out time to browse through Amazon Prime or Netflix, you surely browse for one or two innovative cooking recipes in the internet. So why not think about that one thing which has kept you...

There are two disappointments about Mumbai: 1. The crazy traffic 2. Mumbai flood During office time an half an hour distance will take 1.5hours to cover. Yes, the traffic is that frustrating. No wonder why the Mumbai residents are used to walking. That's because you can easily cover half an hour car distance in 90 minutes by walking. But walking is not easy when there is knee deep water. Why even I am talking about knee deep water? That's because Mumbai floods are famous in the country or should I say infamous. Here, during rainy season it rains very heavily and continuously for days and you would suddenly find this city has turned into Venice- there is knee deep water everywhere resulting into, yes, resulting into definitely more traffic!!! Sometimes the only commuting medium in the rainy season are the local trains, which, of course, have to be stopped for half a day because of water logging. Talking about trains in Mumbai, you simple cannot avoid the trains if you a...

Mumbai is the India's most expensive city to live in. Mercer's  25th Annual Cost of Living Survey (Mercer is American HR Consulting firm) indicates Mumbai is among the top 20th most expensive cities in Asia. Just to give you an idea - here a maid servant earns 25k on an average per month, also these people have their own flats in this city. After knowing this I was wondering why do at West Bengal we have so many engineering colleges. For those who are not able to connect between engineering college and the income level of the Mumbai maids, let me tell you an engineering fresher earns less than 25k in hand per month. I was not only shocked but also in awe after listening to their stories.  The secret to their wealth is: In Mumbai, probably the easiest way to get ownership of a real estate is to live in a chawl. The reason being, a construction developer would evacuate the chawls for the purpose of building flats. Usually the developers come up with two types of f...

I was born and brought up in West Bengal. My entire education and initial part of career was spent in Kolkata. It's only after marriage that I came to Mumbai. Before this I spent 2 years in Mangalore and 3 months at Indore for study and work purpose, respectively. Hence you can clearly understand I didnt have much cultural exposure. Before relocation to Mumbai, my interaction with this city had been just with its airport - due to connecting flight. There were no direct flight from Mangalore, hence every time I traveled between  Kolkata & Mangalore my connecting flight was at Mumbai. The first time I actually landed here at Mumbai to stay and the moment I was on my way to my new home, the first thing that struck me were not the high rise buildings of the city, nor the auto rickshaws which flooded the roads, but the dish tv antennas at every house or rather at every "chawl" on the roadside. Chawl is the other name of the slum houses of Mumbai. In my opinion dish ...

When you are at 30, you realize that you have already built up your own choices, When you are at 30, you realize that you have your own preferences, set of beliefs, When you are at 30, you probably are very sure how you want to live the rest of your life, That''s because you probably have spent the 29 years of life either experimenting, or, Have taken so many risks that now you know exactly how things work with you. At 30, you tend to enjoy more the real things rather than the artificial ones, At 30, you probably enjoy more at the houseparties and not at pubs, At 30, that rebellious teenager inside you vanishes and now you probably Try to observe more and understand better your parents, Thats because you know some day later in your life you would be in their place. At 30, when you look around you suddenly find you are no more wearing the latest trendy clothes You would find several younger people wearing far better fashionable clothes Thats because now you tr...