365 days: an epic poem

Goodbye dear Delhi

A to Z

All you children wake up we’ll leave today,

Bags packed before clouds darken sun’s ray.

Cautiously mom completes her cooking,

Danger seems imminent as we were looking.

Evil sights were visible at our front door,

Friends called out, you can’t wait anymore.

Goodbye dear Delhi we softly whispered,

Hey loot this house , man in bicycle uttered.

I was terrified thinking they’ll kill us,

Just like statues we showed no emotion,

Karma can’t be the reason for our condition.

Lord knows how far is my Dad’s office,

Man is making us suffer we have no choice.

Never did we dream one day we’ll be outsiders,

O creatures of God our feet are sore with blisters.

Please let us rest and allow us to hire some taxis,

Quietly we’ll leave this place it’s our promise.

Rest assured we will have good memories of Delhi,

Sadly we’ll leave our abode of several years,

To those who will replace us to you our cheers.

Unable we are to welcome what’s waiting for us,

Vast open land will separate us from our city.

Woe to those who are responsible for this break,

Xylophone alone will never cure our heartache.

Year will pass, nothing will standstill we know,

Zip your tongue mom says and let us go!

William Sisters: Venus and Serena, the best tennis players

World’s best tennis players

Tennis is the only sport I love to watch on TV. I started watching the sport when Chris Evert and Martina were the super stars.

With time younger players took charge such as Steffi Graf and Monica Seles. Monica’s tennis life was cut short by a crazy man. Steffi continued to play and after winning twenty two grand slam championships she called it quits.

After Steffi and Monica there were a few good players, but the eyes of the world was focused on, ‘The Williams Sisters.’

How these two sisters entered the famous courts of Australia, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the United States Open is amazing. Their father one day watched a tennis match, where the champion received thirty thousand dollars. He instantly made up his mind to teach his two daughters how to play tennis.

The girls were doing well. Dad decided to enter them in tennis tournaments, when they were old enough.

When they started their hair tied with beads got unnecessary attention. They were even fined when some of the beads broke loose from their hair and adorned the tennis court. The commentators and the crowd were not being nice.

These two sisters were winning match after match but the accolades were few and far between. Why were they treated so roughly, the only thing comes to mind was they were not like the European, or even the American players, their complexion was not light, it was dark.

Does it make a difference, it seems yes. These two sisters and their parents, helped them the best they can be; they did not disappoint their parents or everyone else who watched their skill.

There are four Grand-Slam tournaments in tennis in a year. The two sisters started winning most of them. Suddenly everyone started rooting for them.

Today it’s fair to say that these two sisters combined have won the most Grand Slam tournaments.

When I started watching them my favourite was Monica. After her I had no one who was my favourite . After years of watching these two sisters, I came to the conclusion, they are in my mind the best tennis players that ever stepped the courts of the world.

I think the credit goes to the father, who worked hard to make his daughters the best players in the world. Kudos to you Richard Williams.

…………………………………………… 🙂

365 days, WordPress Prompt:

There’s no place like home: If I had the opportunity to live a nomadic life, travelling from place to place, would I do it?

I like travelling, I don’t have the kind of temperament one needs to live a nomadic life. I love my family too much. I need a home base. Any place is home to me if I have my family with me.

I had the experience of living in a hostel for continuing my education. I had a hard time dealing with it. I ended up visiting my local guardian every week. I was six hours away by train from my siblings. I felt my local guardian understood the fact I missed my mom and siblings, although he could not fill the gap in my heart, he was able to console me by talking about his friendship with my family, which helped me.

As a student I was ambitious, in my mind I was satisfied with whatever I achieved. I could not continue to live away from my loved ones. I think I’m incapable of living a nomadic life.

365 days: Stranger in a strange land

I always dreamed of visiting London some day, when I was fortunate enough to win a scholarship to study in London University’s school of education, I was delighted . My residence for the year was in William Goodenough House.

As far as food goes I had a difficult time eating anything in the cafeteria, the food had a strange smell. I spent days without eating anything. Finally I bought some food and cooked in the small cooker we had.

My brother lived in London, he noticed I was losing weight, which scared him. He wanted me to stay in his apartment. I could not because the university was too far from where he lived.

I loved the city and visited some of the famous buildings, One of them was Madame Tussauds. I remember climbing the stairs, in the corner I saw two cops. Honestly I thought they were real people, I stopped and was about to ask something, when I heard a loud laughter behind me. ‘these are wax figures, they are not real. I was embarrassed and quietly walked up the stairs, and looked at everything around me.

I also visited the British Museum library. My friend wanted to look up something in the library. We had to get a library card. The librarian asked me why I was there. I just smiled, he then said, ‘O you are here with your friend.’

He gave me a card too. I watched the people in the library, they were so quiet, I was afraid to walk, for fear I will disturb their concentration.

I enjoyed travelling in the tube train, it’s so fast. I had a map which served as a guide if I wanted to visit somewhere other than the university.

I loved the city, there was so much to see and learn. Food was the only thing I did not enjoy.

British Museum Library

……………………………………:)

365 days, July 15th :Far from home

From St. John’s To Dhaka

I was travelling from St. John’s To Dhaka. I started my trip by Air Canada to Toronto. We had a stop for two hours, my brother flew in from Vancouver to join me. We waited for two hours to get the next flight. After two hours we continued our journey. Our stop was at London’s Heathrow airport.

Even though we were in transit we had to go through customs which made little sense.

In London our stop was an hour and a half, it was enough time to go through customs. I don’t mind customs, but there are some weird things the authorities make us do which is take our shoes off.

From Heathrow we changed our airlines, this time it was Qatar airways. the flight took six hours to land in Bahrein and the waiting time at this airport was seven hours. It was midnight, I felt sleepy but they didn’t have any arrangement to sleep, but if we really wanted to we could sit and try to sleep on the benches in the lounge.

When the seven hours were finally over, I couldn’t wait to board the plane, we waited for the call impatiently, there was a long line. We were moving slowly, finally the door of the plane was visible, we reached there got in and took our seats.

Once again we continued our journey by Qatar Airways. We felt happy as the next stop would be our destination, Dhaka city. The plane took off on time, six hours later we landed in Dhaka City, Bangladesh.

Once again we faced customs, we weren’t carrying any gifts we just had our suitcases, where we had our personal things.

It felt good to see our siblings, they had the transportation ready for us. It was a long journey, we were glad when we reached home.

Book Review: Danny the Champion of the World

Author : Roald Dahl, pages: 2014

Roald Dahl’s message to Children Who Have Read This Book, when you grow up and have children of your own, do please remember something important

a stodgy parent is no fun at all

What a child wants and deserves

is a parent who is

SPARKY

While parents of little children are anxious and worried whether or not their kids would be safe to attend school in this year of Pandemic. I’m trying my utmost to present before them this review of Roald Dahl’s book. It may not be an antidote to their fear. But if it diverts their fear for a couple of hours, I consider it worthy of my effort.

This is the story of a kid named Danny and his father.

When Danny was four months old, his mom passed away. He had no siblings nor any other relatives. He grew up an only child and enjoyed the sole attention of his Dad.

The father and child lived in an old gipsy caravan which had roamed around the country side and parts of England. When the caravan was no longer useful to ride on, it came into the hands of Danny’s father, he used it as his house. It was a tiny room, there was a bunkbed which Danny and his father used to sleep.

Danny’s father took the top, while Danny had the lower bunk. Life was going well for the two. When Danny was five, he helped his father in the filling station which his father owned.

The filling station had two pumps and a tiny workshop. In it there was an old table and a cash register. Danny’s father had a number of customers who’d come to get their cars filled and get some small repair done.

Danny learned to fly a kite and loved it. He and his father built it and had a time of their life flying it.

Something strange happened when Danny was nine years old, he went to bed as usual, something woke him up, he looked down from his bunker and found out his father was missing. Where did he go and why, was the question Danny had on his mind.

When he saw his father coming, he asked his father, ‘why did you leave me alone and where did you go?

When his Dad told him, he had a secret. Danny thought adults are complicated people.

What his father told him and what happened next is something, dear readers you have to find out by reading the book. It will also tell you why, Danny was called the champion of the world.

I think it is a book both adults and children would enjoy reading as I did.

365 days, Prompt: State of Your Year

State of My year : The first four months of the new year was uneventful. First month I wasn’t well, it continued for sometime, then my back forced me to stay in bed.

Beginning of June I started reading, Roald Dahl’s, ‘Danny the champion of the world.’ I found the book interesting. I’m thinking of writing a review of the book.

Sometimes I use prompts to write.

I watch TV more than I want to. I’m concerned about COVID- 19. I cannot believe there are people who think it’s a hoax. Thousands of people old and young are dying, this is due to some very important people have put in the minds of regular people that it’s not dangerous, that they can continue to live normal lives. I think it’s an outrageous claim by them.

The state of my year is not looking good. It’s the seventh month, it’s a tragedy that more and more people are getting COVID-19.

WordPress Prompt: Opposite day

A Poem

Writing a poem is not my only option,

I decided to take a different selection.

I sometimes like testing my weary mind,

Will it cooperate and try to be kind.

There are days when it appears stagnant.

Today I wish it’ll try to be brilliant.

Whatever happens I’ll remain an optimist,

It doesn’t do any good to be a pessimist.

………………………………………..:) or 😦

365 days, July 6th : Tables turned

A story of opposites

It’s a story of two sisters who were described by their friends as, Positive and Negative.

Their mom and dad could not understand why they were so different. They were surprised and thought it better not to interfere.

Melissa and Vanessa were two sisters. The former was a half a dozen years older than the latter.

Melissa was studious, liked wearing clothes that enhanced her beauty, she was social, loved going out with her friends.

Vanessa did not spend as much time with her studies as her sister, she had no interest in dressing up and only had one friend.

With so much Contrast the outsiders were sure the older sister was better and smarter.

Vanessa loved watching her mother cook, she spent as much time possible to learn to cook by watching.

One day her mother asked, ‘Melissa I’m inviting some friends, can you make some rasgullas( cheese balls in syrup)?’

‘Allright,’she said.

Vanessa overheard the conversation she was unhappy. ‘Mom,’ she said, ‘Can I make rasgullas (cheese balls) too?’

Mom realized she was wrong asking only Melissa’s help. To normalize the situation, she said, ‘Sure you can make them too, then we’ll see who makes the best dessert.’

The competition began both tried to please mom, but mom felt, she didn’t do the right thing by playing one against the other.

The day of the competition arrived, the cheese balls were floating in the respective sauce pans. They were covered, after cooking for forty minutes, both sisters turned off the stove and placed their dessert on two separate wooden board.

The guests entered, after a few minutes the girls got a serving dish and approached where the dessert was cooling. Melissa confidently opened the cover and screamed, ‘mine are broken.’

It was Vanessa’s turn to remove the cover of her saucepan, she was nervous, with shaking hands she lifted the cover, ‘WOW!’ she exclaimed, ‘mine are perfect.’

The tables turned the guests were in awe, one of them, ‘whispered, how can it be possible!’

…………………………………………. 😦

365 days, July 5th : Mirror

Mirror, mirror

When I look in the mirror, I think of my Dad, how he was troubled because my hair was never combed and I never applied cream on my face.

Dad at times complained and said to my Mom one day, ‘what’s wrong with our middle daughter, she doesn’t look after herself, she doesn’t comb her hair, she refuses to put cream on her face. She wasn’t raised in a village, even the village girls take care of themselves these days.’

When mom told me, I listened with one ear and released the words from the other. Just like the girl in the movie told her uncle, ‘This is why we have two ears one for listening and the other to get rid of words we don’t like.’

Now when I look in the mirror and see my hair combed, and my moist face. I think about my father, he’d probably say, ‘I’m proud of you Ma Ranu.’

It’s too bad I’m incapable of dragging back the years when my Dad was alive.

…………………………………..:(