The Rebelle blog

Suddenly I've started feeling envious of all the 24 year-old youngsters. Not that I'm old compared to them, but I wish I WERE 24 today to possess the same energy, liveliness and excitement to do things. With these thoughts I was reeking in a wee bit misery last night, when I decided to install the Amazon Kindle app on my phone. It asked me a few preferences and rate some books for further reading suggestions. To my utter surprise, I saw books by Cheryl Strayed on the list. I had read about Strayed's WILD because of the movie promotions. So, I started off by reading Brave Enough: A mini instruction manual for the soul, intrigued by its title. The book consists of Quotes that helped Cheryl (forgive my first name calling, but I feel like she is my soul sister after reading the book), go through stressful times in her life while growing up. She writes about noting quotes that inspired her, everywhere in her house and places where she could read them always. I instantly knew w...

This story was an entry for a nation wide short story contest organised by Times of India as part of their Write India Campaign. Acclaimed authors in India gave a passage prompt and readers had to incorporate it in their stories. The story that I wrote was to have an intonation of loss in it. Since the competition is over now and the winners have also been declared, I can publish it here. I wrote it in April and the results were announced in last week of May. This was my very first attempt at writing a short story based on an outline. Here's hoping I did a fair job at it. The author prompt is the first paragraph of this story. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ It was the first thought that came to her as she woke up. He was gone. And, soon, this bedroom, the house in whose eastern corner it sat, and the tiny garden outside with its gnarle...

While talking to a friend and a regular reader of this blog last night, I realised how we constantly deal with jargon in our lives. On social media websites which cease to become a healthy platform for debate and discussion, instead we come across abusive language usage by many users who are often prejudiced with gender and religious hatred. To people who are new to this medium, it becomes increasingly a mentally exhaustive and painful routine to take a stand against such troublemakers. How did we come till this point? The evolution of technology especially the easy access in the last five-six years, which means anybody with internet on a mobile phone has been connected with the web world has meant that now the privilege has extended beyond the urban areas. The ICT(Information & Communications Technology) has proven to be a boon for many as it has also exposed the lurking dangers that lay within the tech world. As we move more towards Internet accessibility and availability, we a...

I sniffed Jasmine fragrance while rummaging through my mother’s beautiful sarees. I took it in and immediately a series of images floated through my mind like those childhood days when we had lots of flowering plants in our house garden. I called a friend to share this memory and she asked me about the things that make me smile. I kept thinking later and here’s a small list of happiness that I will probably read again in the future and see if the reasons that make me smile have remain unchanged. - A random pleasant memory - Remembering my Dad’s jokes - My mom’s childhood memories she sometimes shares with me - Getting hold of a book when I am not looking for it - A phone call from a long lost friend - My handwritten notes from school/college days - Rereading letters from my uncle and grandpa - Looking at kid photographs from my grandpa’s collection - Fragrance of Fresh Flowers while passing through the market - Rereading excerpts from some be...

कॅशिअस क्ले अर्थात मुहम्मद अली. लहान असतांना वडिलांनी ज्या व्यक्तींबद्दल अगदी भरभरून मला कहाण्या ऐकवल्या त्यात मुहम्मद अली फार वरच्या क्रमांकावर. वर्णभेद चळवळ आणि संघर्षाबद्दल मला खूप लहानपणीच वडिलांकडून बरंच काही ऐकायला मिळालं. जातिव्यवस्थेबद्दल जसं तसंच नेल्सन मंडेला तथा माल्कम एक्स यांच्याबद्दल, त्यांनी सुरु केलेल्या चळवळी, त्यांचा मानवी समानतेसाठी प्रदीर्घ लढा, सारं काही खूप लहान वयापासूनच ऐकत आले वडिलांकडून. काल मुहम्मद अली यांच्या निधनाची वार्ता ऐकल्यावर वाटलं आपण ह्या सर्व जगज्जेत्यांना अमर समजत रहातो. त्यांची कीर्ती अजरामर असतेच पण ते स्वतः  देखील, अशी भावना कुठेतरी खोल दडलेली असते आपल्यात. मला आठवतं जेव्हा मुहम्मद अलींच्या मुलीने, लैला अली हिने जागतिक मुष्टीयोद्धा स्पर्धा जिंकली होती, तेव्हा त्यांची प्रतिक्रिया एक अत्यंत अभिमानी वडील या भूमिकेतून टीव्ही वर मी ऐकली होती. ते बघून आपण सुद्धा आपल्या वडिलांना अभिमान वाटेल अशी कामगिरी करून दाखवण्याचा उत्साह माझ्यात संचारला होता. ते चेहऱ्यावरून मला कधीच एक मुष्टीयोद्धा वाटले नाहीत. एखाद्या मुष्टीयोद्ध्याची रागीट मुद्रा किंवा...

I don't know what made me come up with this title but there's something that's going on in the back of my mind that I haven't given enough thought. I read about being two people at once in our brain while we are really struggling to emote ourselves into the world to other people and perhaps, to ourselves too. I have been visiting a place that has a lot of full-length floor-to-ceiling mirrors and I think they are making me very conscious of the images that keep relayed on all walls because everywhere I look, I see myself looking back with different eyes. It's very creepy to feel my own eyes on myself through these mirrors. I don't know how and when mirrors became an integral part of our human existence since I cannot recollect what our ancestors did without mirrors back then. But then we forget that the standards of beauty were yet to be defined back then. This post is not about body images/ beauty/ physical perfection or the likes but more about delving into t...