Life pre 2003:
Hyderabad, Parental Home:
Standard Dialogues:
1. Vasu, come home by 6:00 ok.
2. I'll pick you up if you're late.
3. I'll pray to God that you get Good marks.
4. Don't fight with your little sister
5. Eat properly
My Reaction: Can I please get my space?
2003-2005
XLRI, Jamshedpur
Scheduled calls back home - daily - 9:00 PM, when std rates are low, from public phone booth, beating long queues with cute smiles to the 'booth uncle'
Standard Dialogues:
1.Take care of yourself beta, eat well.
2. let us know if you need more money.
3. I will make your favourite idlis when you come back home.
My reaction : Wow! Distance really makes you more important!
2005 - 2007
Delhi, New Job
Standard Dialogues:
1. Take care of yourself
2. Eat well
3. I'll make your favourite food when you're here.
4. Why doesn't your company give you leaves?
My Reaction: When can I go home?
2007 - 2009
Post marriage
Standard Dialogues:
1. Take good care of Mapilai (SIL)
2. Prepare good food. I'll tell you the recipe
3. When are you guys coming to Hyderabad?
4. I'll make your favourite dish - tamarind rice - without ground nuts.
My reaction: Wow, now both of us are important
2010
Post Driti
Standard Dialogues:
1. What is Driti doing?
2. I'll make her favuorite food You can pick out the groundnuts and eat.
3. Is she eating well?
4. She is such an angel
My reaction: My baby is really precious. But where on earth did I disappear? :)
2025:
Driti's world:
1. Driti, come home by 10:00 ok?
Ma, my name is 'Sam', can you please not embarrass me with old fashioned names?
2. I'll pick you up if you're late.
Ma, I can drive down.I don't need an escort anymore you know!
3. I'll pray to God that you get Good marks.
Chill Ma! It's not like the end of the world! And we call them 'coolness quotient', 'marks are so 'passe'
4. Eat properly
That reminds me, where's my 'organic' compressed oxygen bundle? I'll be famished by noon!
My reaction: Is this action replay in fast forward??
Feeling the rush - Filing the IT Returns!
Never, Ever, Ever delay the filing of your IT Returns till the last minute - unless ofcourse you are some super whiz and would exactly know what it takes, or your Dad is the IT honcho who can pull strings for you.
I always file mine on time. This time, I just hope I don't miss the deadline. Why you ask? Hmm...a long story.
I was on a break from work for a couple of months, so I lost touch with reality. I used to remind Ady, so... Ady's not to be blamed. FIL retired from work, so ITR was no longer a big deal for him - so he forgot to remind us. Appa gave up following up with me when I was married. There was 'another responsible person' to take care of me. And I hadn't corrected him. He didn't have to know the truth.
Only when I saw all the commotion in office, all the fuss about filing returns on the 26th of July, did I realize there was something that had slipped.
Thankfully I had my ITR handy. So I went to the helpdesk, (thank you Google) and filled in all my details and submitted. Ady's was pending. He was and still is in Seattle. So he'd be losing an additional day. He sent me the details. Since he changed companies, filling his form was a little confusing - even to the consultant - just making it clear before you start judging me. And 27th was Ady's Birthday. I couldn't yell at him for giving the details so late. So like a dutiful wife, I did my best to make the day special for him. So he literally had two days of freedom from the yelling - IST and PST. at 12:02 AM on 28th, i called him "Get the details. Why are you so late? blah blah.." knowing fully well it was all my miss.
Then the consultant sent in some details, home loan, sans home loan... some figures, which I did not like. But I decided to pay. it's better I do it on time and claim later. I'll prolly get the money back in time for Driti's wedding, some 25 years later.
Citibank did not deem it right to tie up with the tax department, and I forgot Ady's ICICI details. So I had to plead with Appa, and he is an SBI loyalist. SBI took a call and scheduled to make the online payment tomorrow. So no challan yet.
I canceled the payment finally. Browsing the unfriendly SBI site - calling the consultant a zillion times in between.
And then I wrote a step by step mail to Ady
1.go to http://www.tin-nsdl.com/
2. click on the 4th bullet: e-payment: pay taxes online
3. choose challan no.ITNS/ 280
4. choose 0021
5. enter your details : your pan is: BLAH23BLAH
6. Fill in address details: HOME YOU STAY IN
7. please give my email id and mobile no. as you wont be able to access yours
8. choose: 300 - self assessment tax
9. bank name - enter your bank icici (if you notice citibank is not listed and hdfc does not have so much money and my login has expired. that's why i cannot pay)
10. enter the characters displayed
11. it will take you to the login page of icici. enter the tax amount. don't enter anything else - surcharge etc. ENTER ONLY TAX AMOUNT. ( whatever the amount you think we should pay. i've given up here)
12. please check the details... does it say payment will be made tomoro, today etc... make sure payment is instantaneous. i got stuck with sbi, because payment was scheduled for tomoro and we did not have the challan no.
13. once you enter, you will get a cin generation (challan identification no) -
14. just send that to me along with all transaction details, like ref no etc.
15. just do a print screen and send everything
16. Also share your icici log in and pwd details, just in case.
17. Relax. I'll do the worrying after that.
18. I've crossed my fingers.
I always file mine on time. This time, I just hope I don't miss the deadline. Why you ask? Hmm...a long story.
I was on a break from work for a couple of months, so I lost touch with reality. I used to remind Ady, so... Ady's not to be blamed. FIL retired from work, so ITR was no longer a big deal for him - so he forgot to remind us. Appa gave up following up with me when I was married. There was 'another responsible person' to take care of me. And I hadn't corrected him. He didn't have to know the truth.
Only when I saw all the commotion in office, all the fuss about filing returns on the 26th of July, did I realize there was something that had slipped.
Thankfully I had my ITR handy. So I went to the helpdesk, (thank you Google) and filled in all my details and submitted. Ady's was pending. He was and still is in Seattle. So he'd be losing an additional day. He sent me the details. Since he changed companies, filling his form was a little confusing - even to the consultant - just making it clear before you start judging me. And 27th was Ady's Birthday. I couldn't yell at him for giving the details so late. So like a dutiful wife, I did my best to make the day special for him. So he literally had two days of freedom from the yelling - IST and PST. at 12:02 AM on 28th, i called him "Get the details. Why are you so late? blah blah.." knowing fully well it was all my miss.
Then the consultant sent in some details, home loan, sans home loan... some figures, which I did not like. But I decided to pay. it's better I do it on time and claim later. I'll prolly get the money back in time for Driti's wedding, some 25 years later.
Citibank did not deem it right to tie up with the tax department, and I forgot Ady's ICICI details. So I had to plead with Appa, and he is an SBI loyalist. SBI took a call and scheduled to make the online payment tomorrow. So no challan yet.
I canceled the payment finally. Browsing the unfriendly SBI site - calling the consultant a zillion times in between.
And then I wrote a step by step mail to Ady
1.go to http://www.tin-nsdl.com/
2. click on the 4th bullet: e-payment: pay taxes online
3. choose challan no.ITNS/ 280
4. choose 0021
5. enter your details : your pan is: BLAH23BLAH
6. Fill in address details: HOME YOU STAY IN
7. please give my email id and mobile no. as you wont be able to access yours
8. choose: 300 - self assessment tax
9. bank name - enter your bank icici (if you notice citibank is not listed and hdfc does not have so much money and my login has expired. that's why i cannot pay)
10. enter the characters displayed
11. it will take you to the login page of icici. enter the tax amount. don't enter anything else - surcharge etc. ENTER ONLY TAX AMOUNT. ( whatever the amount you think we should pay. i've given up here)
12. please check the details... does it say payment will be made tomoro, today etc... make sure payment is instantaneous. i got stuck with sbi, because payment was scheduled for tomoro and we did not have the challan no.
13. once you enter, you will get a cin generation (challan identification no) -
14. just send that to me along with all transaction details, like ref no etc.
15. just do a print screen and send everything
16. Also share your icici log in and pwd details, just in case.
17. Relax. I'll do the worrying after that.
18. I've crossed my fingers.
Of Oysters and Octopuses
A three year old, of a friend visited home last week. He and Driti quite hit it off. Well, she hit and he took off. But somewhere, at some level, some deep level - invisible to the naked eye, I think we saw some friendship brewing, 'cause my baby, did offer her prized 'dancing and noisy Pooh' to him to play with, and he suspiciously took it from her. She loved it that Ishaan was equally in love with her toy.
Ishaan and Driti's dads had gone to get some liquids, if you know what I mean. So,Ishaan's Mom suggested we switched to the Animal Planet, so there's peace and quite in the house. Apparently Ishaan likes to watch animals, and Driti likes to make the sound of animals - so we had reached a neutral ground.
They were showing something about Oysters. Every time they said Oyster, Ishaan said "Ball". Maybe he was referring to the pearl, we assumed. Pearl is also spherical.We corrected him every time -his mom and I - "Pearl baby not ball". But he kept saying ball. We let him be.
So when his father came in, we told him. But he had to hear it to believe it. He waited patiently for his son to prove the allegation. As expected, when the narrator was saying - Oyster, he immediately said, "ball".
"What ball Ishaan?" his father asked apprehensively, another proud parent. "He got up and kicked. "Fooball"
And we put two and two together. Oysters- Octopuses and football!!! He had been watching the game with his dad.
The poor boy was confused between Paul and a nameless Oyster. Who Knows? next time, it could actually be an Oyster! :-)
Ishaan and Driti's dads had gone to get some liquids, if you know what I mean. So,Ishaan's Mom suggested we switched to the Animal Planet, so there's peace and quite in the house. Apparently Ishaan likes to watch animals, and Driti likes to make the sound of animals - so we had reached a neutral ground.
They were showing something about Oysters. Every time they said Oyster, Ishaan said "Ball". Maybe he was referring to the pearl, we assumed. Pearl is also spherical.We corrected him every time -his mom and I - "Pearl baby not ball". But he kept saying ball. We let him be.
So when his father came in, we told him. But he had to hear it to believe it. He waited patiently for his son to prove the allegation. As expected, when the narrator was saying - Oyster, he immediately said, "ball".
"What ball Ishaan?" his father asked apprehensively, another proud parent. "He got up and kicked. "Fooball"
And we put two and two together. Oysters- Octopuses and football!!! He had been watching the game with his dad.
The poor boy was confused between Paul and a nameless Oyster. Who Knows? next time, it could actually be an Oyster! :-)
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