The Sentimental Idiot !

Bangalore is a beautiful city to be in around Christmas. The air tastes better,the people seem to be a little kinder, the sunshine is just enough to keep me warm and maybe it’s just a subjective feeling, but I find that  there seems to be a little red in everything I see in December. Winter Wonderland at the Phoenix Mall in Bangalore Almost everyone I know has a Christmas and New Year tradition that’s close to their heart, something they do very year to make the season all the more special. Lighting the stars, decorating the tree, writing letters to Santa, family vacations, shopping, baking, wine making, caroling, reaching out to loved ones living far away, midnight mass, exchanging gifts, the list goes on and on and on. Christmas tree O Christmas tree  I too have one tradition that is very close to my heart, something I do every year; this month’s blog post is about how it all began. 2000 AD was a landmark year, I consider myself very lucky to have been aroun

The world around us is constantly changing. We are regularly introduced to newer ways of doing things. From more efficient ways to communicate & faster means of travel to innovative styles of clothing & fresh genres of music we are witnessing revolutionary advances in almost every avenue of life. Our environment seems to be in a perpetual state of remodeling and even though we adapt and re adapt in order to survive, how much do you think these changes really affect the real person inside us all. Can we as human beings really change who we are? If we can, what brings about that change? Smoking is an awful habit. The WHO once released a report which referred to it as “the single most preventable cause of death in the world today” Ever since I was a child, I have seen people around me struggle with it. Over the years the general attitude towards smoking has changed, awareness has increased, advertisements appear on television and radio from

You can be anything you want in this world. Growing up as children this was something every single teacher told us at some point of time or the other, I always thought that it was one of those common cliches that adults used while talking to kids such as - ‘You’re too young to understand’ , or ‘I’m not angry….Just disappointed’ &  my favorite ‘You’re Grounded’ !!! I never gave it much thought till an orthopedics theory class in the final year of my study at medical school. No, my professor didn’t actually say ‘You can be anything you want in this world’, and yes, now that I think of it, at that point of time it had been years since anyone had said those exact words to me. Post lunch theory classes in any professional college are a kaleidoscope of every possible sleep state imaginable, in this regard it was slightly more difficult for us because our classroom was a mini auditorium in the basement floor of the hospital, sitting there on a full belly with the a/c

Silver linings playbook was one of the best reviewed films of the year 2012. Produced on a shoe string budget, not only did the movie gross over 230 million dollars worldwide, it also brought Jenny Lawrence her first academy award while simultaneously catapulting Bradley Cooper to the status of an Oscar nominated actor. I love the movie for many reasons, in the backdrop of an unconventional romance between two adults battling demons from their past the film also deals with the intricacies of the father-son relationship while portraying the challenges and difficulties of people dealing with mental illnesses in the most delicate and honest manner possible. It is also a story of redemption. The film starts by introducing us to Pat, the story's male protagonist. He is reluctantly undergoing court mandated treatment for bipolar disorder at a facility, out of a job, forced to live at his parents place trying desperately to reconnect with his estranged wife who has a r