happy birthday, india!
the 15th of august is always a special day. it gives you that familiar warm, fuzzy feeling within about being indian.
i woke up listening to the pm's speech in red fort. no i didn't wake up in red fort, though i had wanted to go to the red fort, in fact. but dad said it would be really hot and crowded, with much walking to do and security all over. so i slept in, instead. woke up to the sound of mr. singh giving his speech - focused on agriculture and education. heard it not once, in fact, but several times - in the hindi news, the english news, and the urdu news. (i don't understand any other languages.) (correction: i do understand german, but german news in india is hard to come by.)
i wanted to take pictures, dearly. of the flag in all its glory. of women wearing orange, white, and green bangles (like in the tv functions). of balloons in orange, white and green (owg)... i wanted to capture the i-day spirit on camera. so we decided, dad and i, that we'd go to india gate/raj path, and take some pictures. dad had to go to rashtrapati bhavan for the "high tea" function hosted by the president. we found that i couldn't go, because the invite was solely for mr. and mrs. and they would check id. so we decided i'd drop dad instead, just to catch a glimpse of the proceedings outside the bhavan, in the parking lot (which, as you'd expect, is uber-grand).
we started out early, and headed to india gate. nothing in owg except for some lowly kites here and there. raj path was blocked out to all traffic - stiff security. sigh. no luck there. so we headed directly to rashtrapati bhavan. but there was a security guard per square foot. taking out my camera with its telephoto lens could have served only to embarrass dad. so i didn't take it out until he left. then the driver and i tried to figure out a way for me to sneak out and take some pictures of the guards on horseback. couldn't sneak out at all :(. interestingly, we couldn't even leave the premises in disappointment. the security was so stiff, there was only one one-way passage open to the world, and all the cars were coming to the bhavan on it. so i was stuck in the parking lot, inside the car, with guards giving me dirty looks wondering what i was doing there. hmph.
although i didn't get out of the car, i did manage to take some shots from it. they weren't great, but good enough. enough to remind me of my almost close encounter with the president of india. boy, was i happy to get out of there! the sight of all those cars belonging to the diplomats, the bureaucrats, and the politicians was suffocating. all in all, it did (admittedly) feel like i-day though.
i went from there to km, only to discover that it was (for the most part) closed. duh. it's a dry day after all. i was meeting r, d and t - r&d for the first time after their wedding, so i was excited! we went to ccd and chatted for a while. took some photos and giggled a lot. gosh, it felt so teeny. i guess that's how we used to be though. meeting again always brings us back to that state. the other day, a's dad was talking about how, when we were school-girls, we were such a noisy, giggly bunch, that no corner of the house was safe/silent while we were around. and when uncle would finally figure we had vacated the living room, so he could sit in some peace and quiet, someone would invariably appear from behind a curtain or a door. sounds hilarious, but i bet it's true :D.
r also used the word "grubby". she asked me if i felt grubby. apparently it meant hungry. how interesting, but how unpleasant-sounding. it would seem to imply i was in need of a shower, don't you think?
after my daily swim, i called it a day. it wasn't just any old day, but it wasn't very indiaful either (just how a birthday should be). there were interesting articles in the paper - by aruna roy, sunil mittal, and amitabh bachchan - that were worth a read (google for them if you have the time).
india, indeed, is a special place to be on the 15th. or any other day for that matter.
i woke up listening to the pm's speech in red fort. no i didn't wake up in red fort, though i had wanted to go to the red fort, in fact. but dad said it would be really hot and crowded, with much walking to do and security all over. so i slept in, instead. woke up to the sound of mr. singh giving his speech - focused on agriculture and education. heard it not once, in fact, but several times - in the hindi news, the english news, and the urdu news. (i don't understand any other languages.) (correction: i do understand german, but german news in india is hard to come by.)
i wanted to take pictures, dearly. of the flag in all its glory. of women wearing orange, white, and green bangles (like in the tv functions). of balloons in orange, white and green (owg)... i wanted to capture the i-day spirit on camera. so we decided, dad and i, that we'd go to india gate/raj path, and take some pictures. dad had to go to rashtrapati bhavan for the "high tea" function hosted by the president. we found that i couldn't go, because the invite was solely for mr. and mrs. and they would check id. so we decided i'd drop dad instead, just to catch a glimpse of the proceedings outside the bhavan, in the parking lot (which, as you'd expect, is uber-grand).
we started out early, and headed to india gate. nothing in owg except for some lowly kites here and there. raj path was blocked out to all traffic - stiff security. sigh. no luck there. so we headed directly to rashtrapati bhavan. but there was a security guard per square foot. taking out my camera with its telephoto lens could have served only to embarrass dad. so i didn't take it out until he left. then the driver and i tried to figure out a way for me to sneak out and take some pictures of the guards on horseback. couldn't sneak out at all :(. interestingly, we couldn't even leave the premises in disappointment. the security was so stiff, there was only one one-way passage open to the world, and all the cars were coming to the bhavan on it. so i was stuck in the parking lot, inside the car, with guards giving me dirty looks wondering what i was doing there. hmph.
although i didn't get out of the car, i did manage to take some shots from it. they weren't great, but good enough. enough to remind me of my almost close encounter with the president of india. boy, was i happy to get out of there! the sight of all those cars belonging to the diplomats, the bureaucrats, and the politicians was suffocating. all in all, it did (admittedly) feel like i-day though.
i went from there to km, only to discover that it was (for the most part) closed. duh. it's a dry day after all. i was meeting r, d and t - r&d for the first time after their wedding, so i was excited! we went to ccd and chatted for a while. took some photos and giggled a lot. gosh, it felt so teeny. i guess that's how we used to be though. meeting again always brings us back to that state. the other day, a's dad was talking about how, when we were school-girls, we were such a noisy, giggly bunch, that no corner of the house was safe/silent while we were around. and when uncle would finally figure we had vacated the living room, so he could sit in some peace and quiet, someone would invariably appear from behind a curtain or a door. sounds hilarious, but i bet it's true :D.
r also used the word "grubby". she asked me if i felt grubby. apparently it meant hungry. how interesting, but how unpleasant-sounding. it would seem to imply i was in need of a shower, don't you think?
after my daily swim, i called it a day. it wasn't just any old day, but it wasn't very indiaful either (just how a birthday should be). there were interesting articles in the paper - by aruna roy, sunil mittal, and amitabh bachchan - that were worth a read (google for them if you have the time).
india, indeed, is a special place to be on the 15th. or any other day for that matter.
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