Just for a drive

Each time I go out for a drive, I have this beautiful feeling of watching the scene outside my car window.  The roads are sparkling clean; there are flowers and plants everywhere.

Tax payers money is well spent beautifying the city. It feels good to admire flowers everywhere. Even the dividers have flowering plants, so while you wait for pedestrians to cross the road, u can stop by and watch the plants.

It is pleasure to walk on clean footpaths, away from the traffic.

The bus stop looks so cosy with proper seats under shade and a big palm tree on the side.

Three clean dustbins at every street corner, yellow for plastic, blue for bottles and green for other garbage, each recycled and put to proper use.

It all the proper planning and organizing it systamatically that makes the town clean and beautiful....

Pictures clicked in Puerto de las Cruz, Tenerife.

Traditional Lace Work of Canary Islands

The first person whom I visit when I return to Tenerife each time is to visit my friend, Ana. She has been a great friend for a long time now and I have always seen her smile, does she frown ever? I doubt. Our mutual interest is Art and handicraft. I have spent many hours in the past making odd and ends creating art work and also painting in oils. She now owns a big store selling all the accessories of handicraft items. 

Ana has an art studio behind her shop, where she holds art classes to those who would be interested. Artists buy all sorts of art stuff from her store and she helps them how to use it. I go crazy when I see all the things at her store, there are paints, unfinished painting, sculptures waiting to be painted, stencils, art books, etc.

Her face brightened up as soon as she saw me. She shows me the latest trend in artwork and I am attracted by the lace work that is stretched tightly on the wooden frame.

Spain is famous for their lace work. Many tourists take back the souvenirs of this laced bed sheets and tablecloth with them. In the villages, lace days take place in the open air from March to December and the women can be seen seated at the tables demonstrating lacemaking techniques to the passerby.

Ana offers to teach me this art. A cloth is stretched on a wooden frame. The method involves drawing out the strings from the cloth in a certain pattern horizontally and vertically. Every lace is made up of lots of stitches, where you need bobbins to create a pattern. The stitch has to be tightened up so that it doesn’t look messy. There is a great sense of achievement when you see the finished product.

There are three main shapes – rectangular, fish or triangular and they are worked mainly in bobbin lace, especially Blonde and Chantilly, which is extremely fine. Motifs are mostly floral but expert make animals and landscape too. This requires lots of patience and concentration but the results are satisfying.

Ana shows me different books on lace making, tempting me to learn this art, I pick up the lace fan from the corner of her store and fan myself.

“If I have time I will come and learn from you” I tell her as I continue to study different designs in her books.

Mentally I make a note of making that beautiful tray from one of my own art work.

Sleepless in Transit

The worst nightmare is when you have to waste time in between the flights. What does one do? You can read a book or work on your computer but when you are very tired all you want to do is to stretch, but where?

Whenever I visit Canary Islands, I am required to change flights and am forced to spend many hours in the transit. There are different routes to reach Canary Islands but go by any route I have to change three flights. This time I chose the route from Mumbai to Zurich to Barcelona by Swiss airlines and from Barcelona to Tenerife by domestic Vuelling airlines.

My flight from Zurich to Barcelona was delayed by over two hours, as the result I missed my connecting flight to Tenerife. For no fault of mine I had to buy a new ticket and catch the next flight that was after six hours.

But what should I do for six hours? Should I call my family in Barcelona to come to fetch me and take me out for lunch and sightseeing? What if they are busy? I looked around, many people were at the airport, some at the coffee shop, some at duty free shops and the most tired ones, sitting uncomfortably on the chairs or sitting on the floor.

There have been times when I have visited a family or whiled away my hours just walking around the airport, visiting duty free stores. I was not aware that anybody could use the VIP lounge for a fee. I was under the impression that such facility was available only for VIP personals, who travelled by business or First class. It was the first time I was to discover that VIP lounge is accessible regardless of class of ticket or airline we are travelling with.

For a fee of just twenty-five euro, I checked in VIP lounge.

It was a different experience all together. I helped myself with handful of assorted candies at the reception and entered a large salon. “All the refreshments and drinks are on the house” said the lady in charge. All that I wanted to do was to stretch on a sofa. My back was hurting bad from sitting at airports and flights for more than seventeen hours. 

 I looked around the lounge. Some people sat comfortable on large sofas, watching TV. There was a magazine rack that had newspapers and books of different publications. Next to the magazine rack was the snack station that contained assorted chips, pickled olives, croissants, biscuits and wine bottles immersed in ice bucket. I helped myself with chips, Olives and glass of wine, entered a rest area that had six cubicles, each with large beds. On the bed I lay, sipping wine and popping olives, flipping through the pages of a magazine till I doused off to sleep.

I slept for three hours.

Completely refreshed, I had shower and helped myself with Coffee and croissants.  It was self service, people picked whatever they wanted from cabinets of drinks, refreshments, packed salads. I walked around to do people watching and view watching till I saw cyber cafe.

Bliss.

The next hour was fruitfully spent checking the email and logging on to Facebook and Twitter account.

Oh, by the way, that six hours wait in the transit was too short, I think……

Tarnished Vices

We alone should be responsible in steering out own path to success. This is very simple if we follow the path avoiding the ugly lanes of seven vices. Pride, Envy, Wrath, Gluttony, Sloth, Greed, Lust.

Wrath is the vice that one needs to control.

Why do we get angry?

 We normally get angry when things don’t go our way; it’s when there is rejection and disappointment.

But yes! This can be avoided if we keep no expectation from our loved ones and take life as it comes along. There should not be any bitterness and hatred in our life. We have no right to dislike people for what they do. We have to understand their priorities and their limitations. The worst thing that we do is to gossip and tarnish people’s image. Talking about people’s character is not our business. There is no right and no wrong. Everybody has a reason for doing the thing they need to do and if they have no time for us, then accept it and move on. We have to respect people’s privacy and be sure that the person will come around when they realize that we need them.

It’s our nagging that spoils our relationship.

Like a fool, we look for happiness everywhere, in material things, and in people around us. Do we find it?

If it was out there, then nobody would complain of discomfort and fears. Maybe we are looking in wrong places.

Of all the vices, I have realized that pride is the last one to go. This is the most difficult vice to give up and exits only when we stop thinking about what people will say.

Today I got this message in my cell that says:

Ask yourself these questions: Who am I around? What are they doing to me? What have they got me reading? What have they got me doing? Where do they have me going? What do they have me thinking? And the most important what do they have me becoming? Then ask yourself a big question, is that okay? Your life does not get better by chance, it gets better by change.

Is this message about being judgmental?

Why should our behavior be based on what others are thinking about us?

We spend too much of our time thinking of the ways to fit into a groove. Join various groups, clubs, kitty parties, spiritual gathering, etc. We are desperate to belong somewhere. We just don’t know how to spend the time with ourselves.

We don't realize that being with one self is the bliss. There is no hatred, no anger and no lust.

There is an inner peace.

 How many times have we heard this cliché: We have come empty handed and shall go empty handed too.

True, we came empty handed but we will not go empty handed. 

Nah!

When we go we shall take our name and our karma with us. It’s the moral values that we have to live by, cleansing ourselves every day, living by our principles and ideology.

Only we alone can make our self happy, rest all is a mirage with which we fool ourselves.

Other bloggers who shared this theme on 7 vices can be traced to GBE2

Kshay

“Want to come for a film called Kshay? 

“Ksay? I have never heard about this film, is this some off-beat film?

“Yah! it’s an art film, running at PVR, I don’t wish to miss,  only last two days left”

“Is it good?”

“I have heard it’s a good film, has refreshing cinematic languages and has won ‘Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature’.

That did it. I have always loved art film but have not visited it for a long time.

My friends and I arrived 15 minutes before the show time. With popcorn and coffee, we sat relaxed in plush comfort of the large soft seats for the movie to start.

The movie, Kshay (made by Karan Gour) moves at its own pace, there is no moment of boredom for us. Black and white, in sharp contrast, the story unfolds

What does an Indian housewife do? She has a routine life that includes prayers, household chores and looking after her husband needs. During her free time, she might have some hobby or may visit her neighbor for a chit chat. That’s a normal life for an Indian housewife.

Chhaya was leading a normal life till one day her eyes chanced upon the serene face of Goddess Laxmi. The price of the unfinished sculpture was Rs15000 which was something beyond her means. Soon her desire turned into obsession and she began to see Goddess of prosperity everywhere. She started relating the solution to all her problems on acquiring and owning the sculpture.

Life changed completely; soon she lost the sense of reasoning, her peace of mind, her moral values. All that mattered was to fulfill her obsession, so severe that it would destroy her, leaving her all alone

Made in black and white, with its own space for innovation, this award winning film sent chill through my spine and sometimes left me feeling sorry for her state of obsession and boredom. The whole focus is on the near-perfect expressions of the protagonist, which fills all the space. I was awed by artistically and poetic performance of Rushika Duggal. There is no distraction as I go along with her through her every emotion of pain, pleasure and her sense of frustrations.

The movie ends, I remain seated, still.

Desire is such a curse, especially if you are poor, it can lead to extreme obsession that can destroy the very existence of peaceful life…….