Manifest Your Dreams

"Dream Big
Start Small
Act Now"

These were the words I heard multiple times by my high school Principal Mr. Hartnett. It was something so inspiring, but I had no idea what it truly meant until recently.Sometimes it takes time to grow into a quote, words of wisdom. The time and circumstances has to be right, otherwise it means nothing.

This is the power of now, being present, and mindful: picture your dream, your goals. What you want to do/be 2 years from now. Imagine it. Let it go.


Start NOW, don't wait till tomorrow! Why would you put off your dreams, or something that leads to your dreams for another day, year? This is why we end up regretting, we live others' dreams, goals, ideas, visions, and advice, and neglect our own. When you believe in your dream it can happen, you just have to act on it, and act right.

The key is starting small. You can't just dream of being a millionaire and expect it to happen, you have to start somewhere. So start small, and in the end as long as you act on it, you will grow closer to your vision.

I tried it and it worked on the small scale, now to manifest it bigger.

Breathe

Song of Ice and Fire: Game of Thrones - Chapter 44 - 57 (Spoiler alert!)

DOMA got dropped yesterday, wow! Well Sansa is betrothed to Joffrey, and she is fully infatuated with the idea, so much that she would sell her own family out. She deserves a prince no matter at what cost, how dare her father, her sister try to take her away from becoming a queen! Being the older daughter she has no idea of what politics can play out between grown ups. She listens to the historical songs, and its like me dreaming about prince charming after watching Disney princess movies, and rom-coms with Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. Oh dear, this child has dug her own grave, blinded by infatuation... not love. She thinks she loves him.

DOMA got dropped but for ages man and wife have killed the "sanctity" of the very marriage DOMA was said to protect. Cersei reveals to Ned that she can't stand King Robert, her husband, and when her brother is inside her, she feels whole. Her brother is her love, and here she is F#$%##@ him. All her children are the offspring of Jaime, her brother and NOT King Robert, thus they are NOT heir to the throne. THIS is the controversy Ned is faced with, and has to expose. He makes arrangements to get the girls back to Winterfell, and of course Sansa goes and taddles and tells on her dads plans. The King dies by a boar, or IS it a boar? Was he poisoned in the wine?

How dare her father send Sansa away! She is to be married to the now king Joffrey, although he is not of age, he assumes the throne, with his mother's help. Since Ned is going to reveal that Joffrey is indeed not the true heir, Ned must be dealt with. He is a traitor, especially since he has a letter with the King's own very last words on it "Ned will be the dude who oversees the kingdom till my HEIR is of age." Ned is captured, with his broken foot et al. and seems like Little Finger has quickly switched sides! Ofcourse he did.

In the mean time Dany upholds her the sanctity of her marriage, and assumes full role of Khaleesi. Unfortunately her brother, impatient, arrogant, stubborn and a complete @$$hole, brings it upon himself. The true death, with no blood letting. They put a hot cauldron upon his head... what a death. Dany realizes this thing was barely her brother anymore, what she doesn't realize is how much he abused her. She is grateful for him, for he taught her about  their family legacy. One day while she is wandering through the market place, the assassin that was sent for her by King Robert, (who on his death bed, recalled, cancelled the assassination plans), attempted killing her through poisoned wine. Ned/Eddard, was against this decision and was at odds with the King since then. This led to the loss of his own men. We are told that Mormont who serves Dany, dislikes Ned, for he took everything that was precious to him. However the other Mormont serves as Captain of the guard at the wall. So there is a story there.

When Khal Drogo hears of this attempt on his unborn child and wife, he is enraged, and promises to take "wooden horses" across the seas and kill everyone. Oh my! Wooden horses = ships. *sigh* I wonder if they will take their actual steeds? Why not build a bridge? He seems like Conan the barbarian in some respects. Dany is pleased at this idea, especially since it was prophesized that her child would mount the world.


The only one who isn't infatuated with wars, becoming king, princess, and love is Arya, yeah she's still running around catching cats, jumping on one leg, practicing her fencing. When the guards come to capture her family (after Joffrey has taken throne, and Ned taken into custody for trying to speak the truth and being a traitor), she manages to escape. It's heart wrenching because her swords-master is probably killed in the process, damn those Lannisters, damn them! So she escapes, I hope she takes to the woods, and is reunited with Nymeria.

Another person wandering through the woods of the Vale, gathering friends, is Tyrion. He by some luck won his freedom thanks to Bron defeating Lady Lyssa's Knight. Although he was Catelyn's prisoner, Lyssa's clearly insane. So Tyrion heads toward King's Landing, but meets his dad's army which was marching North anyway. It was made known that Jaimie had captured Edmure (Catelyn's brother), and the Tyrion's dad (Tywin) had slaughtered everyone else on his way. Tyrion asks for supplies to arm his men, for he has his own business to conduct. I suppose he means to take down the Eyrie, where Lady Lyssa stays.

Catelyn has left the vale, for the really exciting Moat Cailin. She meats Rob there, who has collected men from the North and marched South. A lovely reunion, although brief. He tells her his plans, and although she may be a woman, she has keen strategies for war, and listens  and guides her son accordingly. Catelyn realizes that Sansa is hostage, and being made to send out letters on behest of Cersei.

Jon, in the meanwhile, is at the wall, and the news has reached him that his father is a traitor. Since the last chapter, he has taken his vows of the black. However he is not made a ranger, but he is made steward to the captain. Sam tells him this is to train him to be captain someday. So he slowly agrees to it. All through out the book we are told the Starks pray at the were-trees, which is weird, but it seems to be their religion. It sounds better than whatever the southerners do. Alliser made a rude comment about Jon being a "traitor's bastard" which enraged Jon so much he attacked Alliser. Jon was locked up for a while, until he woke up and found the wight. He killed it with help from Ghost. This is the first we officially meet the wights. Mormont hopes that since they send traitors to take the black, maybe Ned would be made to take the black too. But there is too much a miss, and Jon does not know what's going on even.

At Winterfell, Bran dreams of climbing, and is sitting at the head of the table since Rob has marched South. Rickon is so upset, and things have changed so much from the first days of being at Winterfell. Seems like such a long time ago, they were just children. *sigh*.

Arya is missing.

Ned is being held as a traitor.

Catelyn is on her way to Tully House, and to see Edmure.

Rob is marching South.

Tyrion is marching North with his father.

Dany is preparing to attack King's Landing.

Cersei is ruling through her son Joffrey, the arrogant, entitled brat.

Jon is facing wights.

King Robert dead.

Viserys dead.

Lyssa is stubborn and as crazy as her son.

Bran waiting for everyone's return.

The Kingslayer Jaime, slowly attacking all.


So this is the calm before the storm... or has the storm just begun?

Breathe

Song of Ice and Fire: Game of Thrones - Chapter 22 - 44 (Spoiler alert! More serious analysis)

Wow a lot has happened since chapter 21! I seriously have had a hard time stopping to live life, and not read the book. The story is captivating since it's broken up into MULTIPLE points of view. Like "The Lord of the Rings", and unlike say Harry Potter, Twilight or 50 shades (the first few, top selling books these days that came to mind. I am so sorry to compare it to 50 shades and twilight), it is not written from ONE point of view with one protagonist, ie. Harry, Bella, or whoever the hero is supposed to be in 50 shades. I don't even know who the main protagonist is, but so far there are favorites, and I expect each reader will have his/ her favorites. Favorites will change throughout the book, and books.

There is so much to contemplate in this book: Tyrion tells Bron, a sell-sword (sword for hire, mercenary), that the Starks look for certain qualities in their employees/ men for their guard. The qualities are Honesty, Loyalty and Courage. and Bronn wasn't any of it. However it made me wonder if we look for any of those qualities anymore. DO we just look at education and think "Oh he's from Harvard and has a 4.0, and was on the dean's list. He's hired". What about courage, honesty, loyalty? Good qualities, being a good person doesn't really matter, or maybe cause they (the prospective employers) will snoop and look at your facebook profile anyway and see if you drink or party too much (cause that's a bad quality in most careers). Or what do you think- bravery, Loyalty, Honor something we look for at all these days? What do these words mean now a days compared to back then? Are these still good characteristics?

The quick mouthed Tyrion is quite the "smart ass", he can slight even the king, and get away with it, because of his status as the Queen's Brother, but otherwise he would have had his head chopped off in a jiffy. He does admire, and appreciate good traits and qualities in other people though. It is revealed that his brother and father did something rather mean to him, when he was a child. They tricked him into falling in love and having sex with a woman whom he thought was a young maiden, but was actually a hired virgin (prostitute). He married her, and then they shatter Tyrion's dreams of love, family and life, by passing the girl around in court. I had no idea what the point of it was, or what lesson they were trying to teach Tyrion... other than men can do this to women. Pigs.

Talking about men abusing women: Viserys continues to abuse, belittle, talk down on, emotionally and physically threaten and hurt his little pregnant princess of a sister Dany. She made clothes for him, painstakingly so and he manhandles her, mistreats her and is not gracious at all for what she made for him. He says such awful things, he really needs to be shown his place soon. Previously, Dany had the guts to, when he acted up previously, punish him slightly by making him walk. Her becoming the Khal's wife, has given her confidence. She even took control of her marriage, by taking control during intercourse, so much that 1- her husband doesn't share her with his blood riders,  2- he doesn't take other women (I think that was what it said). She has grown as a character, and I hope she grows even more. She has good teachers, and she analysis with her heart and head, unlike most of the other men in the book. She is almost like Ned.

Speaking of crazy women: we are introduced to Catelyn's sister, Lyssa. Oh boy, what a piece of work. She wasn't always completely nutters, it happened recently when she lost a couple of babies in miscarriages, politics, living in Kings Landing, and losing her husband. She is batty about her son, and her son is a pretty boy - he still suckles from his mother's breast and I am sure he is more than 5 years old, even Catelyn thinks this odd. He shakes at everything, and seems frightened, or flighty about things. In Bengali we would say he was "Nakka". Nakka kids in Bengal are toughened up, by a good tight slap, or something. Basically she has spoiled this kid rotten, and I mean worse than Prince Joffrey.

Ned quit being the King's hand, because the King decided he wanted to send an assassin to kill Dany and her unborn child, because the unborn child would be heir to his throne and thus a threat. New wanted to have nothing to do with this. By this time the news of Catelyn arresting Tyrion and taking him prisoner for him having hired someone to assassinate her son Bran, had reached the Lannisters. So Jaime was out for blood, so he killed some of Ned's closest men.

Arya on the other hand had been taking "dancing lessons" AKA fencing! She was told to catch all the cats at the red keep, but one constantly eluded her. This one cat took her to places of all sorts, until she ended up inadvertently spying on two people! She took the news back to her father, after what I would say was an adventure, but for her it was normal. Of course her father did not believe her. When her father got back wounded due to Jaime Lannister's attack, Arya was livid. Remember her wolf is lost somewhere, and Sansa's wolf is dead...

Jon is out on the wall, helping the weak, and being strong...  the true lord, regardless of his bastard-ness. He is loyal, courageous and honest.


Breathe!

Song of Ice and Fire: Game of Thrones - Chapter 13 - 21 (Spoiler alert and pretty hilarious summary)

So where did I leave off?
Bran? Jon? Oh my...

Let's start with the less scandalous Jon:
Jon is now at the wall, and yes Tyrion had been quite the instigator by telling him the truth about what its like being the bastard. When Jon gets to the wall, they begin calling him "Lord Snow" in mockery of his bastardom. The other guys at the wall are all low-lifes, cause the watch needs ALL the men it can get. These are the men that are being trained. Anyway, Jon's uncle (or half uncle I must say), goes off on a quest or hunt or mission, and Jon is resentful of him, and the whole situation. It's really cold, and some of the other kids (although they are considered men, they are but teenagers) gang up on Jon (he sparred with them really well and beat them, mainly cause he had prior training). Alistair the trainer breaks up the fight, and explains that Jon must learn to be a bit more sympathetic. Jon later hangs out with Tyrion for a bit, and when they got for dinner, he receives some good news (which I shall reveal later). Other than that little tiff, and Tyrion, and Alistair, there isn't too much drama, other than Jon dealing with his feelings inside, feeling cold, missing Winterfell and his siblings.

Catelyn: 
Ned's gone, the girls are gone, Rob stays behind with his mom, the comatose Bran, and Ricken. His mom is in shock since Bran's accident, so Rob has taken charge. Catelyn is by Bran's side, when Rob notices the library on fire, so he sends the guards away to deal with it. In the mean time an old dude comes to assasinate Bran, but holy-moley, Bran's dire-wolf saves the day! This shakes Catelyn out of her shock state, into action state: they look at the knife, and investigate this guy and find out he was paid, and the knife is but royal... cause of the metal it was made from. Catelyn realizes there is a larger plot, someone is trying to hurt her family, and her husband is walking into a trap. She decides to go to King's Landing (where the King lives) and warn her husband. So she prepares for a clandestine journey. She gets there and oh boy Little Finger (Petyr Baelish) and Varys know. They are the Master of Coins and Master of Whispers to the king, respectively so. They are shady and apparently Little Finger has a history with Catelyn. He does seem like a disgusting creep, both of them really. Little finger sounds like he's a round horny conniving swine, and Varys is a skinny sniveling snake. She tells them of her knife theory, and she shows them the knife. It turns out it is Little Finger's Knife. However during some game, he won the knife from Jaime Lannister and lost it to... Tyrion Lannister. OOOOH!

Arya and Sansa:
The chapters aren't combined in the book, but they are sort of intertwined. So Arya is this spunky tom boy and Sansa is this elegant, Miss USA pageant material, who is totally crushing on prince Joffrey right? Well they are invited to the queen's room for tea with the princess and the queen. Oh yay! for Sansa, but Arya is stubborn and says "eff this BS, imma go play with the butcher's boy down the river, ride horses, and play with my wolf!" For some reason she has the sense to brush her wolf Nymeria (gosh I love that name). Sansa is all upset, so she goes to meet the queen, but some knights show up, so Sansa has to hang out with Joffrey for the whole day. Omg! Guess who is overjoyed: Sansa! Yes a whole day with her crush! He asks her what she wants to do, but suggests riding. She lies and says she LOVES riding. She loves needle work sheesh! For some reason Joffrey (although about 15or 16) is riding around in full armor, with a sword. He shows his sword to Sansa to impress her (I would LOVE to perceive this as an innuendo for something else). She is easily impressed. They come upon some noises, and Joffrey sees two kids playing swords. He and his massive ego NEED to go show these kids what real fighting is with a real sword. Ofcourse the kids are Arya and the Butcher's Son (a chubby round fella I'd imagine). So he charges the butchers boy, with his real sword, and the butcher boy had but a stick. So Arya hits Joffrey on the head with her stick. Then he charges Arya with his sword, so Nymeria attacks. Arya tells Nymaria to let go, and then flings Joffrey's impressive sword into the river. Then she rides off.

The repercussions to this are that Joffrey lies and says that Arya and Butcher's kid attacked him. Sansa a witness refuses to speak up. By this time Joffrey hates Sansa and the Starks, oh his poor massive ego. The spoilt rotten brat that he is. Cersei wants the hide of Arya's Wolf. However the wold has gone missing. So they decide to kill Sansa's wolf, Lady, as punishment, and preventative measure. Arya had run away for 3 days, and so she was to be scolded, and grounded. The hunting party had gone out to get food, and they managed to hunt and kill... the butcher's boy. Arya was shocked, and so was Ned. He realized what devils he was working with. The Lannisters Cersei and Joffrey, make me sick. Ned takes Lady's life, and orders her body to be buried at Winterfell. Sansa blames Arya, and says it should have been Nymeria. Arya reels in shock of the death of the butcher's son... honestly who effing kills innocent kids. Such a petty reason too. How have the people not risen up against this dictatorship?

Ned:
Ned is dealing with all this, and now he's the King's new hand. There's a lot of stress/ pressure on him, including his one kid being in Coma, his kids being reprimanded by the king, dealing with the Lannisters, dealing with other council members... it's just gonna get harder. When they reach King's Landing the council needs to meet ASAP, cause they don't wish to let a weary man rest, or they are jerks, or acting on the kings orders. The King wants a some sort of competition in the honor of his new hand- Ned, or so I understood. Which leads to the expose, that the Crown is in MAJOR debt to the Lannisters, and other parties including the "church". Ned is astounded, stupefied, and put his foot down saying, "imma have a chat with the king on his savings account..." Then he is about to head to his room, but Little Finger says "follow me!" and Ned asks where to? Then it is revealed how sarcastic this fella Bailish is "to a ally to slit your throat... " or something. Then he reveals he is taking Ned to his wife, who is being housed in a brothel. Great! Ned has to work with this guy on the council! After much dillydally, walking through alleys he reaches where Catelyn is staying undercover, and he is told about the knife. So they all ask, "why would Tyrion..?" and Bailish (and if you already forgot, Bailish is Little Finger) says "yo fools, he probably isn't acting alone". Deepening the mystery.

Bran:
So after much lucid dreaming in his comatose state, Bran wakes up after talking to a three-eyed wise crow. Yep that's the GOOD news. So everyone rejoice! However, he is probably handicapped. Oh well, he has his wolf, and his bro, Rob. He also is told by the crow in his dream (after being shown what his father, mother, sisters, and brothers, are going through, that "winter is coming", so he needs to wake up and live. He thus names his wolf Summer! Winter signifying something bad.

Oh the mystery thickens... nothing yet on Daenerys Targaryen, but from what I gather King Robert Baratheon, defeated the crazy King Targaryen, who was super rich. They did it all together (Starks, Arryns, Lannisters, and Baratheons... maybe more. There were some of those who fought with Targaryen but they now live quietly under Robert's rule. So here's this thingy, Ned exposes that when they had killed Targaryen, Jaime was the one to have done it, and he sat on the throne. When Ned walked in, Jaime said, "oh I was just keeping the seat warm for Robert, and its not a comfortable seat anyway." Ned found this particularly suspicious... hells ya! Jaime is screwing Robert's wife behind his back... OH NOT TO MENTION HIS OWN TWIN IDENTICAL SISTER. Robert tells Ned, "oh Jaime is harmless, he always play tiddlywinks like that". How naive... *sigh* the saga continues...

Arya and Nymeria

Joffrey, Lady and Sansa... right before the "incident"

Jon at The Wall, with Ghost

Bran and his Direwolf

Jon find the dire-wolf pups

Ned Stark has to kill Lady :-(

Bran and his direwolf

A few Corrections:

1- Alliser is the name of the trainer for Jon Snow at the wall. I thought it was Alistair like from Dragon Age.
2- Benjen had gone off to find Ser Royce beyond the wall.
3- Bailish had grown up with Catelyn and her Sister. He had a crush on Catelyn, but she never liked him back. Who knows he spread rumors about both of the... boys!

Ode to My Father

Me on the, ground, and my sister on my dad's shoulders. Circa 1986, Whippany, New Jersey

His smell, is my strongest memory of him from my childhood. It was a distinct smell, which kind of matched my smell... and I couldn't sleep at night without him cuddling me, and I would feel safe, his smell would tell me so. When he would go away I could not sleep, so my mother would put his under-shirt in my bed. I would clutch onto it, and feel safe smell him there.

He traveled alot, to different parts of the world, and I would miss him, but he always brought back presents for my sister and I. He was and is an expert at 6 year old's shaky tooth extraction. He removed many of my sister's teeth. She decided to be his shadow for some reason, and when we went on family vacations she liked being the "model" and would pose for all the pictures he took. I sometimes would get jealous of their bond, especially since she was his "shadow". She followed him around everywhere. She wanted to be just like him, so they would wake up at 5 am and go to the market, go jogging etc. Looking back it was cute that she was his shadow.


He would take us to the sports fields in various universities (Anna University - Madras, IIT-Madras, Elliot's Beach), and we would play basketball, football (soccer), jog, run, play with our Irish Setter dog - Butch, and enjoy every evening like this. Sometimes when we would get back from someone's house, or a dinner out, he would ask us "who wants to go for a drive at the beach?" and we would all say yes! We would just drive from Kotturpuram, down to Besant Nagar, and drive down the short Elliot's Beach drive. It was nice to just feel the cool ocean air. When we later moved to Besant Nagar, he my sister, and the dog, would all wake up to go see the sunrise on a morning walk. I missed out on these morning walks.

Everything I missed out on, I made up for recently. In 2001 my father came and dropped me off at college. That was the first time I saw him cry; he helped settle me down in my dorm and then he had to leave campus and go to Champagne-Urbana, Illinois, the "international-student orientation", which included parents was over. Our journey together from Chennai to New York, to Chicago, to Calvin College, had helped him slowly learn about me, and me about him. We bonded. I taught him how to use a computer, set up his email, and how to send emails, in the small computer lab in campus. This small act would lead him to learn more on his own, and be able to join this new world of entrepreneurs. He just learnt twitter, but he knows facebook is for social stuff, he's on linkedin, and totally dominates in email sending! He types with chopstick fingers (2 fingers on each hand), but oh what mighty speed!

Once, I was diagnosed with ADHD, (second year of college). My father had not heard of such a thing... "ADHD? What?! You will not take any medication for that. We will combat ADHD with natural solutions, meditation, yoga, gingko biloba, etc." So we began curbing the ADHD, and learning not to go on crazy spending sprees. He taught me how to save, just $5 a week, and slowly increasing it to $20 a week, etc. He also taught me how to take care of my car, work ethics, the good habit of waking up early, how to write good emails... Now I get to work with him, and learn so much. I got to travel the world with him and saw how he can communicate with anyone, how he is energetic even in the face of over-traveling, jet-lag, and being utterly over worked, Superman ain't got nothing... My dad is Superman, and my sis and I might be his kryptonite.

Recently, my father and I were listening to Mahabharata on audio book together, we share great time discussing the wisdom, applying it to our daily lives, and learning new things about ourselves from it. We enjoy lunches watching the news, the stock market and what not, discussing politics, economy and world affairs. We work together as a team in making lunch happen. He always surprises me with jokes, sometimes unintentional, sometimes corny, sometimes hilarious! You may have seen some of my blogs that talk about him!

Babi: We call him Babi, because as a child I couldn't say Baba. It just became Babi. My little sister just followed suit when she had to begin calling him by a name.

Other Nicknames:
We were once playing a game, my sister and I, and we were pretending we were camping in a forest far away. We were hiding from the bad guys at this time, and the leader of the bad guys was the "dirty filthy man". So we were imagining and pretending we were hiding behind a bush, however we were ambushed from the other direction. So we stood up and screamed, turning around pointing the other way "The dirty filthy man!!! Run!!!" For some reason my father was standing exactly where we were facing and pointing, in the distance, so he couldn't hear us. However, this changed things in our game, and we realized he was the bad guy and must run away from him all day. He didn't understand what was going on but when we had dinner together that night, we were still playing that game, and we were thought in our minds, 'the dirty filthy man has now captured us, and forcing us to eat radishes.' It was a random memory, but every now and then we remember it.

He is slightly bald, and actually I found out he has emotions about his lack of hair. He always says when we were born, he gave his hair to us. For that we are thankful. However at some point we joked and said his head was like a Tabla. That got shortened to Tabs and Tabby. We called him Tabby for a while, and ofcourse it morphed most unusually to La Tabs!
Once we were in school in Kolkata, and it was parent-teacher meeting day. Our half yearly results would be shared with only parents. So Babi volunteered to come. We were standing and waiting, and this was the teenage phase when we were both embarrassed by our parents. So we hung back although we saw our dad approaching. There were other random kids waiting for their ride home, or their parents. Some kid behind us commented "hey look at that guy he has a bald head. It's so round!" The two boys chuckled, and the other one commented "Yeah it's so flat and round, we can crack and fry an egg on his head!" They laughed at their joke, and my sis turned around and said "Areeeaaayyeee That's my father! How dare you!" They stopped laughing immediately.

My dad might be bald,
He might be pudgy,
He might have scolded me, lectured me, embarrassed me, annoyed me, frustrated me, angered me...
But in the end, he's my father.
And as much as I have been a delightful daughter, am sure,
I've also been quite the pain in the @$$,
I know he loves me so much.
He loves me so much,
He would move the continents of the earth for me (if he could, and knowing him, he would make it happen).
He's always been on my team,
Bailed me out of the worst situations,
Lifted us up when we were down,
Toughened us up when we were too soft,
Asked us to communicated when he couldn't understand us (women are different than boys).
He is an amazing man, he is my hero,
He is my superstar dad, and am so grateful that HE is my father, (but not limited to).
He is also my teacher, 
My boss, my friend, my supporter, 
My inspiration, my motivator.
He is superman, 
My lunch buddy, my yoga student, 
A colleague, partner in ideas, 
My educator, my benefactor, 
A lecturer.
He is my guru, and my sishya, 
He is also a contributor to many of my genes, 
He is an encourager of me following my dreams,
A simple guy from a village, and a world traveling entrepreneur, 
He is a leader, a soccer coach, 
My business school professor,  and the best every dirty filthy man ever!

 ... So grateful for my father. in my life.




Breathe

Song of Ice and Fire: Game of Thrones - Chapter 1-13 (Spoiler alert and pretty hilarious summary)

Everyone has pretty much heard if not seen the HBO series "Game of Thrones". I heard about it 4 or five years ago, when a friend of mine recommended I read it, along with Ishmael, and a few other books. I bought the first three books, but I didn't really read them, cause the first chapter seemed so dull, out there, and the reader had no idea what was going on. I was confused by all the names that appeared in the first chapter (being the prologue). Also the chapters themselves were broken up by name, for example - Jon 1, Arya 1, Daenerys 2, Jon 2, Ary 2, Eddard Stark 1, Jon 3... and so on. Either way until I saw this movie Eagle Eye, I had a shallow interest in medieval/ dark ages Europe, let a lone England. Although this is considered a fantasy genre, it seemed very different from "The Lord of the Rings", a series which I love. My expectations were crushed.

A word of caution: Do not expect, hobbits, magic, orcs, vampires, or wizards in this book. It is different from most fantasy books... think "Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table" or "Merlin" but even different from those. I haven't seen the show yet, and refuse to until I finish the first book (or finish watching the series Dexter). The prologue is slow, and bland, until the end, which leaves one wondering, unless you've already read the summary of the book. I of course began reading the story with fresh eyes. I had kept myself in a bubble, really sheltering myself from the hype, social/media commentary on the show. So although I was fed up after chapter 1, what kept me going was what happened to Will, a character in the prologue, and was the person who killed Ser Royce a Ice dragon in human form (yes my imagination went wild), and what are these Dire-Wolves that the boys find in the woods? Do they survive? I personally, would love a wolf pup myself.

What I learnt from the first 13 chapters:

There's a girl called  Daenerys, who has an awfully wretched brother, who needed to have died yesterday. He's plotting to wed her off to some guy who is described to be some thug - royalty, in exchange for an army to avenge his family. This brother abuses his sister by saying "you have angered the dragon". I fear he sexually abuses her, and he disgusts me. I want to speculate after she marries the thug-prince Khal Drogo, she gains confidence and power due to her husband, and decides to "off" her brother. By chapter 12 her wedding happens, and her relationship with Khal Drogo unfolds. She gets a house full of wedding presents, it seems, including a few dragon eggs, and a horse that is super special. The newly weds literally ride into the sunset (after her brother, who's name is Viserys, says "please him sister, or else you will anger the dragon very much"... ugh he needs to be b@#$ slapped), and although she is timid at first, the probably end up doing it... consummating the marriage via sex. Yay!

One of the children of the Stark house hold is  Jon Snow, however he is the (let's say this word together) BASTARD son of the Royal dude Eddard Stark, also called Ned. Now Ned's wife is a mean B@#$ to Jon. Ned, however, probably has fond or dear memories of Jon's mother, who is revealed in chapter 13 as Wylla. Jon doesn't know who is mother is, and is treated so badly by Catelyn Stark (stepmother), that it just makes me sad. Jon has a good relationship with his brothers, and his most honorable. He is close to Arya the younger sister, and is tight with Rob, the eldest legitimate son of the Starks. He is the one that finds the direwolves and gives them to all the Stark children, and finally finds a last one for himself. Eventually he is sent away to "the wall". Yes there is an ominous "wall" they talk of, that kind of prevents whatever is on the other side from crossing over. He gets to don the Black, which basically means he becomes a celibate night watchman at the wall. There's not much drama surrounding him yet, other than his stepmother, and his bastardom, Tyrion Lannister (who is the brother-in-law of Robert (the King of the landmass they live on), who is a dwarf, and therefore also a bastard of sorts, gives Jon some advice, on being a bastard. Yay!

Arya Stark is the younger, plainer, more tomboy, daughter of Ned Stark. She is cool, I would totally be her friend. She wants to fight and not freaking do needle work. She names her direwolf after some sort of scandalous warrior woman from history "Nymeria". How lovely is that! Feminist alert! At least I hope so! She is being sent away south with her dad, Ned, who has to follow King Robert. There seems to be a whole bunch of politics, scandals, and trickery down south, because...

Bran the second legitimate son of the Starks is a natural born climber! He overhears the wife of King Robert Baratheon, plotting against the King and Ned, with someone. When Bran peeps through the window (he just happened to be climbing buildings and scouring the rooftops, at the time), and sees the Queen Cersei Lannister, totally getting it on standing up against the wall style with her own very twin brother (ugh threw up in my mouth a little.). Her identical twin brother's name is Jaime, and he pushes Bran to his almost death. Cersei and Jaime seem evil to the bone. Like they need to take over the kingdom cause being Queen and brother of the Queen is not enough for them. This is almost like the Mahabharata, also happens to be based on the War of Roses (the succession story of England)... whoever said they were prudes. The Queen is really mean to her dwarf brother Tyrion, but Jaime isn't so bad to him. Anyway who knows what will happen to Bran, what we do know is his wolf is very very loyal.

So most of the main characters were covered so far, and they are all going down south cause Robert wants it that way, everyone except his wife and Bran. Sansa the older stark daughter is excited to go cause she's totally crushing on Robert's kid - Joffrey, who is a major D-Bag. Robert is clueless about his wife and her brother's affair, and plot. Biggest of all, Ned found out his wife's sister's husband may have been killed by the Lannister twins. Major drama coming up. All this in just 13 chapters, and there are 5 books.


Breathe

This family chart kind of helps keep all the names and characters straight! Just google Game of Thrones - Family Tree

PS: I'm listening to the Audiobook off Audible.com

My Blog Space

Lately, with all the whining and negativity in the world, one tends to seek a place of comfort, a serenity, a safe place... Sometimes even the social networking sites are full of well crap. So I come to my safe place... my blog. I can share here, without feeling judged. I can cultivate my positivity, courage, and passion. I don't have to hear the whining, problems, cursing of others. I actually pledged to myself to not post negative/ complaint-y / whiny stuff anymore.

Curbing one's attitude, emotions, approach, perspective, to something positive over negative, can turn your day around. Just believing in yourself, helps create positive opportunities that will present themselves to you. It takes that small act of changing. Sometimes its tough, but once you make it a habit, it will be your approach in every situation.

Although this is not a real place, its my safe space. It beings out the goodness, the light in me, and helps me shine it everywhere (sure, call me a hippie, I don't mind). Do try it though, when you are feeling down, low, blue, sad, negative, frustrated... take a few deeps breaths close your eyes, and go to YOUR safe/happy place. See how it helps you. It's almost like a gratitude list (which helps us focus on the things we are grateful for during bad days), except this is your place, your space.

:-)

This is my safe, positive space to learn, grow and share... what's yours?

Breathe

Bits of Wisdom: Accept Yourself

Today my sister sent me a text, and how fitting it was. For the last few days I had been struggling with my self image, body, and needing to love myself... my near and dear ones gave me a few words of comfort, but it did not hit the spot until she sent me this timely text:

"We perceive a very distorted view of ourselves. It's like looking into a cracked glass with many cracked pieces. When we accept that everyone we look up to, envy, love, wish we could be like, etc., are those tiny pieces of cracked mirror reflecting something that exists already in YOU, the Mirror will join the larger whole to uncrack and flatten to show the real you, which is all encompassing, infinite and ultra dynamic" - Piyali Banerjie


I asked her why she texted me this, and this is strangely what I had needed to be reminded of. It's like she read my mind.

She replied:
Hi ded,

I was meditating on the train and suddenly that entire visual and understanding came in…and I found so much peace. and then suddenly I had the urge to text it to you so I did.

love you

 She is wise beyond her years, and our bond runs deep...

Breathe