Sunday 31 May 2015

Young stories: The Heavenly Island

Wrote this descriptive in 6th grade. Enjoy!

At a snail’s pace, I opened my eyes. I had been in a terrible storm yesterday night. I was thrown overboard by the raging waves. They had leapt up as high as a 20-storey building. The last thing I heard was a frightful and hopeless voice calling to me “Captain, Swim! Swim!” before the angry waves almost drowned me. I had lost everything: my clothes, food and above all, my crew members.

Now, after an exhausted and death-like slumber, I awoke and looked around. I was stranded at what looked like a small but perfect island. It looked natural. There were a couple of coconut trees which bore ripe coconuts. Still tired, I lied down on the warm and golden sand. I limped over to the sea slowly and sat just where the waves died down on the shore.

The crystal clear water projected the colourful, exotic and harmless marine creature that swam along the coast. Far out in the distance, beautiful white horses swam gracefully through the waves. Ahhh…the ocean looked so inviting. The gentle breeze was as soothing as any other mother and touched me delicately. I felt cool and relaxed after what seemed like ages. A colourful arc adorned the blue sky.

After some time, I felt too hungry to enjoy the nature. I climb up a coconut tree that had some fine and nectarous coconuts. With great difficulty (and slipping down lots of times), I managed to climb up and pluck them, breaking them against a rock.

I decided to explore the thick forest that stood in the middle of the heavenly island. As I entered it, I saw some scrumptious fruits hanging from every branch. Apples as red as ruby, tangy oranges, bright yellow mangoes - they seem to just slide down my throat.

I ventured further to find a sparkling waterfall and I quickly quenched my thirst with it. The waterfall continued to flow and gradually became a river that was as long as a snake. Suddenly, I heard a flapping sound that was so scary it made me jump out of my skin. I ran as fast as my legs could carry me and flopped on the shore. I turned around to see what has chased me and I burst out laughing. It was a screeching parrot!

The island was so heavenly and fun that I promised I would never leave it.


Sasha and her "When will it end?"

This one was written somewhere between late 2013 and early 2014. The prompt: The weather plays a large part in our life. Write a story where the weather changes a secure friendly setting and atmosphere into a worrying setting and atmosphere. Try to show how the emotions and feelings of your charcters change as the conditions you describe change.

Sasha spun around, her pink skirt floating. There were smiles everywhere; people dancing; the greedy animals sneaking out and gobbling food and the children running around and riding astraddle on the horses. It had been a golden harvest this year and people were rich with crops. All around, tables were lined with various foods and the numerous games were packed with little kids. Stacks of crops were laid out on the ground. Sasha was brimming with happiness. There was absolutely no possibility that something destructive could happen. Never!

But nature was different; it had laid out plans for the little village of Rampapart. Mother Nature thought of giving a little and a turn to the villagers; life does need ups and downs, after all!

So, the party lasted for many moons until one day it all changed. As Sasha went to the corner of the area to grab some cake, the sky suddenly darkened and dense black clouds gathered in the sky, directly above the village. In a blink, Zeus sent a lightning bolt from the sky and burnt a table filled with ice cream to crisps. The children and animals joined into a groaning farmyard chorus. The village head, Misanikao, urged everyone to go to his house, the only brick house in the village while all the others were either mud or straw houses.

The panicked villagers raced to his house as Sasha stood, staring into the sky. Her mother pulled an dragged her into the house though. When she reached the house, all she could hear was the crying and shrieking of the people and the animals (who also seemed to be dragged into the house). Sasha dashed over to the window and stared outside as she felt her heart sinking!

A sudden clap of thunder and a lightning bolt, the rain started. It started to rain cats and dogs and soon a storm started. Big, huge gusts of wind blew across the village and seemed to rampage about with glee. Sasha couldn’t bear it; so couldn’t the other kids staring out the window. Just a few days back , Sasha had thought nothing destructive could ever happen but now…Mother Nature is cruel, she thought as another opinion formed in her mind. She went back to the room where everyone was sitting.

Everyone was groaning; but for different reasons. The children wanted food and Mrs. Misanikao tried her best to give them biscuits but in vain. The women wanted to change their dirty, murky clothes and the men wanted the money they had kept buried in a pot underground at home. Mr. and Mrs. Misanikao tried their best to serve everyone. Sasha closed her eyes and thought, when will this end?



Thursday 28 May 2015

When I go into a library, I find myself inhaling deeply as I browse through the shelves because the books always smell like magic.


- Someone on Pinterest
Sometimes human systems become so large that they hurt people, not by design, but by inertia.
--Mark Manson


Tuesday 19 May 2015

The One You Cannot Have, by Preeti Shenoy

Hey guys! I had disappeared for a while and I know all of you missed me... :D No worries, I’m back! On 18/5/2015, I finished my first book for this summer, Preeti Shenoy's The One You Cannot Have, the story of a great star-crossed love set mainly in Bangalore. The story circles around Aman, Anjali and Shruti - roughly a love triangle. Aman wants Shruti but Anjali wants Aman. Shruti, however, wants Aman too, but is forced to marry Rishabh instead.  That’s essentially the whole story: who ends up with who?

One good thing I enjoyed about this book was Anjali’s indirect characterization, which I thing was done particularly well. The description of Aman and Shruti’s old times was also very admirable and the author connects their seemingly irreconcilable lives together expertly. The quotes was notably articulate!

However, I personally didn't enjoy the story very much. I was even hoping the story would end soon at a few points. John Green's The Fault in Our Stars makes any story of the same genre seem too trivial and easy-on-the-heart in comparison. I also didn't like any of the characters and found the book quite tedious and very similar to Indian cinema. The opinions of the Indian characters don’t seem very contemporary and all the chapters end with the common, general sentence: Will you be able to forget him? At some points, I feel like even the author hasn’t understood her characters very well – the same character seems different at different perspectives.