The blue sky

Recently, I heard a very different rendition of my favorite song, 'tujhe sab pata hai na ma' from the movie 'Taare zameen par' and it yet again brought tears to me. A group of school children have formed a choir with the help of a Korean person and they sung it with much gusto and power. I do not remember how many times, I have heard this song and was moved to tears. Shankar Mahadevan has sung it extremely well. There's no doubt that the lyrics are so soulful and heartfelt that every person who loves his/her mother would have a knot/lump feeling in the stomach and throat. If you have seen the movie, you would know it's background. It talks of a gifted child who is not able to assimilate himself in the mainstream studies which measures intelligence only on the basis of marks, grades, learning by heart and putting it on paper, rather than really understanding and enjoying it while learning. His mother has no say though she understands his difficulties, she agrees...

On Sunday, our group of girls met over lunch at an Indian restaurant and celebrated the traditional haldi-kunku ceremony. Let me give you a little background of this: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:- Makara Sankranti is a Hindu festival celebrated in almost all parts of India and Nepal in a myriad of cultural forms. It is a harvest festival . Makar Sankranti marks the transition of the Sun into the zodiac sign of Makara rashi (Capricorn) on its celestial path. The day is also believed to mark the arrival of spring in India and is a traditional. Makara Sankranti is a solar event making one of the few Indian festivals which fall on the same date in the Gregorian Calender every year: 14 January, with some exceptions when the festival is celebrated on 13 or 15 January. In Maharashtra on the Makara Sankranti (मकर संक्रान्ति) day people exchange multi-coloured halwa(sugar granules coated in sugar syrup) and til-gul ladoos (sweetmeats made from sesame seeds...