Monday, November 29, 2010

Impress Me!

I have decided and braces it will be!!!
Today I found an orthodontist who promised to do the same job for half the price. His clinic is also easily accessible from a geographic point of view. He was very friendly and did not seem to be all mercenary.
He promised to do his best to complete my treatment in a year because I might have to travel for my higher studies. Extractions, however, seem to be inevitable. But he did promise me that the gaps will close because my teeth are anyway too big for my jaws.
I am going on Saturday for impressions. Yes, they will try and impress me. The procedure sounds simple enough-
  • A viscous liquid will be placed in my mouth and within minutes it will set to form a rubbery solid imprint of my teeth. This will be used to make a cast, a model of my jaws and teeth. 
And that goes in the living room cabinet!

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Wires, Screws and Power Chains- Say CHEESE!

wikipedia.org
"Look at the wall, keep your head straight and smile", says my orthodontist as he tries to measure my teeth with a metal ruler and I try not to LOL. Well, for those of you who are not familiar with this rather obscure profession, he is a dentist who has been specially trained to straighten and correct, hence the prefix ortho-, teeth. Wires, screws, power chains and cement are his tools of trade. He will twist your smile, pulling you teeth this way and that, for a period no less than a year or two. All with good intentions- he has been trained to turn werewolves and vampires, bunnies and bull dogs into beautiful Cinderellas and Prince Charmings.
I think I fall under the bunny category- my front teeth, my incisors, are prominent. I also have some major misalignments.
I must say this doc was a pleasing gentleman. Or was he just a good marketeer? He asked me what changes I want and how these little wires might possibly entangle with my life. I told him I like my bunny teeth and he gave me an astonished look. Either he found my idea very queer or he just did not know what bunny teeth are. I am sure his orthodontics textbooks contain nothing about bunny teeth.
Well, tonight I'm trying to make a big decision. Should I make this sacrifice for vanity?

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Bathing in Liquid Sunshine...

by Victor Eredel
When the monsoons arrive, heralding rains from across the oceans, our little city, Colombo, a speck of dust in Nature's eyes, surrenders. People look to the skies, suspecting, knowing what is to come. Raising their trousers and sarees by an inch or two, they demand protection from their, nylon canopies of black, holding them rigidly against the gusts of wind, they scatter about in the streets, jumping over a ditch here and hopping over a puddle there. They walk briskly, water dripping from their backs. Even the mightiest trees are brought to submission, bowing to the will of the winds. Flashes of white light dissect the skies.

In homes, children are overjoyed at the prospect of water falling, just falling from the skies. Falling on tin roofs and pouring from the gutters out on to the roads. They poke their fingers into the gurgling streams and open their mouths to catch a drop before a mother comes to drag them back inside, to the warmth of a mug of milk tea.

Not far way the ocean sleeps, swelling and churning, in the falling rain.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

If You Were Coming In The Fall...

by Ben Harrison
Poem #529

If you were coming in the fall,
I'd brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.

If I could see you in a year,
I'd wind the months in balls,
And put them each in separate drawers,
Until their time befalls.

If only centuries delayed,
I'd count them on my hand,
Subtracting till my fingers dropped
Into Van Diemen's land.

If certain, when this life was out,
That yours and mine should be,
I'd toss it yonder like a rind,
And taste eternity.

But now, all ignorant of the length
Of time's uncertain wing,
It goads me, like the goblin bee,
That will not state its sting.


This is one of my favorite poems by Emily Dickinson. It is a simple love poem that envelops a deep meaning.

Is it about an unrequited love? Or about two lovers who have been separated?

Dickinson speaks with such optimism throughout the first four stanzas, that it warms the heart of the reader. She uses absurd metaphors to describe the insignificance of time. We are enlightened by her undying resolve. The rhythm of the poem itself is one of positivity. It seems as if Dickinson carries us with her into a dream world, where the fourth dimension is negligible.
However, the bitterness of reality dawns upon her in the last stanza. She describes how "all ignorant of the length of time's uncertain wing" a lover is left, hanging in a vacuum of loneliness.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

A Twisted Enigma... A Pale View of Hills...


Kazuo Ishiguro's first novel, A Pale View of Hills (1982) is told by Etsuko, a woman who has left behind the remains of the destructed city of Hiroshima and settled in the quiet English countryside. She brought with her fragmented memories of Japan, of mosquito infested ditches left behind by bombs, of people adjusting to the ways of the enemy, of a nation gazing towards the horizon. She is haunted by the recent suicide of her older daughter, Keiko. The story unfolds when her younger daughter, Niki comes to visit her mother and, in spite of her absence at her half sister's funeral, makes an attempt to be 'there for her' through her recent tragedy. Etsuko finds herself reminiscing a friend she knew during the summer she was pregnant with her first child.
This friend, Sachiko appears as a strong and independent widow who has been reduced to poverty in the aftermath of the war. She is plagued by her ambivalence, sometimes determined that her lover Frank will take to America, sometimes, disappointed by his failing promises, deciding that she does not need him anyway. Sachiko's young daughter, Mariko is caught in her mother's irresponsible tangle of life. She grows up on her own, running along the river banks and ditches of the fallen city. She leads a strange life of solitude, distancing herself from others. She carries the reader with her, into a silent world of her own.
Etsuko attempts to build a friendship with this strange child, but Sachiko says she should ignore her daughter's eccentricity as it is only the way of children. Sachiko is inconsiderate of her child's emotions but claims to think of the girl's future, insisting that she will have a better life in America and that she can become a 'business girl' one day.
Reflecting on her own life, Etsuko attempts to understand the perplexity of her own daughter's suicide. I found it difficult to determine her feelings towards her older daughter. Through the fragments of her story, we understand that her daughter had spent her initial years in Japan, and that Etsuko had left her first husband, Keiko's father, and come with her daughter to England. It seemed to me that Etsuko had long since accepted her daughter's life of solitude could never have a happy ending. Discussing Keiko's life with her younger daughter Niki, Etsuko says, "But you see, Niki, I knew all along. I knew all along she wouldn't be happy over here."
Apart from the haunting characters, the enigma of this story lies in the parallels between Etsuko's and Sachiko's stories. Their daughters, strange girls of solitude, seem to depict the beginning and the end of the same life story.
A Pale View of Hills also serves as a shred of history, depicting the physical and ideological reconstruction of Japan following the Second World War. Etsuko's relationship with her hardworking yet emotionally-absent first husband Jiro and affectionate father-in-law Ogata reflect the changing views of people. On her trip to the city of Hiroshima, Etsuko, for the first time in her life, with much astonishment, sees couples holding hands in public.
A Pale View of Hills, like Kazuo Ishiguro's other novels The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go, is a story that will tarry within the realms of your mind, attempting to define the line between destiny and volition.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Can't Get My Eyes Off You...



Often time I find myself simply unable to get my eyes off you. I don't care for food, I don't care for sleep- all I want to do is read another page, another chapter. I want to know how you will end, yet I don't want you to end.

I read every page with such consciousness, overcome with empathy- never have I been a better listener.

Running, running with you, gnawing at drying bone. You whisper in my ear and bring me to climax.

Literature noun /ˈlɪt.ər.ɪ.tʃər/: pain and suffering recorded in written media, especially with a high and lasting artistic value.

Sometimes I wonder if it is the masochist within me who is so eagerly absorbing the brutality unleashed before my eyes. For few are the stories that end in happiness, with heroes, or heroine for that matter, triumphs and the villains are punished or may be even humanely forgiven. No, those are but fairy tales.

What about Real stories?
  • Real stories end in violence/ murder/ suicide.
  • Real stories end with dreams lost/ wings broken.
  • Real stories make you whither from within/temporarily perplexed ie paralyzed/ make your skin scaly
  • etc. etc. etc.
Because that is the way it is, Reality.

The End

And when I do reach that final page, I stop, take a deep breath and allow you to enter my reverie. Honestly, I think about you all the time. Well, at least until I find someone else. And may be, just may be, if you were really any good I might remember you for the rest of my life.

Want to know what sorta writing makes me dizzy and giddy? Stay tuned for my personal book reviews. Nothing fancy- just a rambling about what I do and do not like about books and their authors.