The Itch….

Some people are born to be astronauts, scientists or teachers.

I was born to be a traveler.

Hello everyone! My name is Priyanka and I am a thwarter traveler.

I have been not allowed to make my dream come true due to a problem of cosmic proportion – myself

When I was young all I wanted to be was Indiana Jones. While other kids looked at Boris Becker or Sunita Williams, I wanted to sashay over to Nepal and taste the pine scented air in my lungs and drink butter tea, while twirling my whip around and rescuing damsels (or in my case knights) in distress.

However life caught me unawares and a 6 year college education, 5 years of work and 4 years of marriage and 1 year of bliss with my beautiful bonny little son all made my travel dreams something to be postponed for time indefinite. I always had an excuse – when I have more money, when I settle down career wise, when my baby is older.

But now as I sit on the cusp of being 3 decades old and look at my friends pictures and statuses all over the world, I wonder when am I gonna get there and see their homes or stare at that scene on their car trip.

It suddenly dawned upon me that the only person stopping me was I! I was either scared or just happy to dwell in dreams unfulfilled rather than face a few knocks.

And I thought to myself – will I be sitting down staring hungrily at national geographic pictures in another 3 decades as well?

Frustration and unfulfilled dreams are not what I want my epitaph to read!

So now I will set forth where no man has landed before (theoretically)…misty Bhutan, freezing Lochs, emerald Sri Lanka …here I come.

All I want from you is a decent place to rest my head, new friends (oh I pray so!) and to assimilate your language and culture.

All in all I want to come there to become myself. Can I?

Motherhood:A constant guilt trip...

I truly used to believe that all the mothers who used to spend hours talking gibberish to their 4 month old babies on the phone while also typing out a corporate report were slightly maniacal...until i had my own baby a year ago...

suddenly i tune off writing an email with profound thoughts of diaper rashes and baby formula techniques..proceeding to then check it out with the worlds best childcare expert - Google!

Most women when asked to describe the condition of motherhood would say bliss or profound happiness..I would sum it up in one word- sheer unadulterated guilt!

all mums whether working or stay at home face the same old symptoms..while at work i wonder whether he wil be emotionally devastated sans mommy at home. when at home i desperately try to spend as much time with him to make up..and proceed to bore him with 'developmental games' and 'sing alongs' till he wants to stuff that rubik cube down the nearest drain or my throat (nyone who has to hear me warbling soon wants to throw up)!.

sometimes i chase him around the house pleading with him to play blocks with me (ensure motor eye coordination as per the box) as he toddles away as fast as his chubby legs can take him away from his maniacal mommy

i realized that guilt is a purely mom centric thing the other day when i saw my husband spend time with him playing and then calmly fix football game appointments or watch his fav tv shows post work..the only way i let myself out solo now is when im threatened with a axe and pried away from home with a crowbar!

so iv decided to be a cool and calm mommy..join that arabic/french class i wanna join..go out for romantic dates with hubby n keep friends by not talking about baby eczema..

now i can start all this as soon as i finish googling for 'cure to baby eczema'.....

urs guiltingly pp

AHH solitude!

Sometimes it’s important to be alone.

I am an eclectic mix of a total loner and a complete extrovert – I teeter between “I can’t breathe without people around me” to “I need my space”. I know most people want their solitude and people time both..But in my case I can take this to the extreme in a span of a few minutes.

In other words I’m a hostess’ nightmare !! My family organized a party when I was down in India. I spent the day hiding behind closets and mountains of food, ducking people I don’t know who were coming to smooch me on my cheeks and exclaim “ How thin/fat/old/young/weird you look now?” I even had a nice little lady ask me if Ive become taller this past year! I mean at 29 that would be a medical miracle or perhaps she thought I regularly hang out of windows!

So back to the party, I volunteered to make sandwiches till I discovered that those sandwiches don’t just involve spreading innocent pastes onto bread, but grating a humongous cabbage, boiling n shredding numerous chickens and then mixing the whole things into a mayonaisy sludge, which was to be inserted precisely into a teensy roll which had to be cut exactly 2.25 cms.

Needless to say the sandwiches were the only thing that people did not touch that day! In fact I went around n gently nudged people to try em at the table, but all these ladies started looking panicked and made ridiculous excuses of bread allergies and hearing non-existent children call. I guess my loudly exclaiming in public that I misplaced the face cream while making sandwiches didn’t help. Well I guess alls well that ends well as I’m not actually covered for comprehensive party insurance!
Ladies of all descriptions who were making all sorts of food in the kitchen gave me dirty looks, so I trudged sadly outside and decided to help make a nice lettered background for the party.

One person who walked by the house asked whose funeral was being conducted, as I had made the whole thing in black stating “God will hold you in his hands” – PS it was a 90th birthday! Hey we could have had a Goth themed birthday rite?!! I would have been willing to wear leather in artistic support of anyone …but all my ideas were met with cold deathly silence..Believe me people there is nothing more scary than being at the center of a circle of silent women.. I then fled to the upper levels while some ladies desperately sprinkled gold dust on the sheet to look more festive!

So I spent most of the event in the upper levels – shamed and named. Im sure the people below who heard thumps on their ceiling (hey in my defence I was practicing my swing on the Wii) would shake their heads disapprovingly and pityingly saying “ Aah that one is above” – just like an old batty relative who is relegated to the upper reaches, away from the rest of the sane population !

Beach bums

Its been a year since my last post! God im getting more n more narcissistic and have forgotten the more imp things in life i.e. dumping kiddo with hubby and foregoing the great decision of whether to paint my toes trampy red or virginal pink. having done the former n left my toenails to peel (half n half is the new french manicure) iv sat myslf down to rejoin the world of blogging

now the funny thing about dubai summers is that it gets so hot here that all one can do is mall trawl..add one whiny husband and infant who acts like he has been put in his stroller as an act of inhumane cruelty n u have an exploding mommy a la eyjafjallajokull

having lived in the hawaii of india - goa was always being jaded by the notion of going to beaches..however desperation found me tramping down to jumeirah beach with a baby on my hip, hubby trailing submerged undr a mountain of baby stuff and a giant yellow baby float, all the while grinning shamefacedly thinking 'oh lawd is this me on a beach'

jumeriah is no hawaii ..i leapfrogged over the gazillion people who littered the beach..dodged the smooching couple, leaped over the arab family sitting on chairs bbqing their kababs away, ignored the customary men slinking around trying to see some booty and finally after setting up our stuff under the 1x1ft of space of beach left...we zigzaged our way to the water

now the water was best tepid with chunks of concrete on the seabed along wth strange arab men floating around n screaming 'yalla samer' or ' taal ahmed' i honestly didnt know whether id had to break up a few fights or be witness to a long time family reunion!..so i just put baby in the strange yellow float left him wt the gang n then swam like an eel to the open seas..by eel i mean literally as had to avoid all the floating bodies.. i mean it looked like ww2 had been fought on the 1km shallows

so me n our pals swam out to the deeper end (translation in jumeirah beach terms its anything more than 4 ft deep) to catch some free space

swam out deeper..choosing solitude over hideous beach games ..n presumed to float staring at the sun..thinking aah this is y i was born!

stayed in dreamland till hubby called out askin if i ws trying to travel cheap to india n whether he could have my side of the bed if i didnt return

so naturally i turned back (my side gets the stronger ac breeze - something i never want him to figure out ) so i started swimming here n there like an aimless turtle..keeping a sharp ear out for the jaws theme song..planning to leg it out pronto post hearing that..u know song then shark then helpless surfer (as there werent ny surfers i could be the sharks option of a quick n easy take away meal a la quick chicken mc grill)

aah i have been born again - converted into a beach bum , will be haunting dubai beaches catchin a summer tan n developing swimmers hair

god this is great ..i finally have the solid excuse for a summer beach wardrobe (i already bought my summer wardrobe but then this is v v diffrent) to give my hubby while i snatch his credit card on my way out mall trawling to be a good beach fashionista

toodles babies Im back!!