this is how i look

when I am about to have a good cry!

with all those lovely comments all you people leave talking about my smile, I ofcos feel very flattered! But then I am fairly normal and cry pretty easily! I remember most of my friends were clearly shocked when they saw me crying for the first time! "You cry??!" isn't the first question you expect when you are shedding tears. C'est la vie.

So here's once in a lifetime opportunity of seeing me cry. Till you meet me actually. Once you know me, then it won't be a rare occurrence.

This is in Lucknow. Had got out for sight seeing with M and mama and realized had forgotten to take the camera - one job M had given me! He got really upset and thats all it takes for me to start sniffling and then bawling! :p

Thankfully it was a bright and sunny day and the camera in M's N72 was almost as good.

The smile that was begged for. Still not sure if it was OK to smile!





A girl always needs some retail therapy!




And if its shoes all the more better! (totally cute miniature jootis i picked for everyone at work)





And the smile will definitely start coming back!




Add a fun tanga ride to the entire equation




and we are back to being the lovin couple!


How do you guys patao each other after a fight?! :D

20 mahine baad! :D

So Cubby turned 20months (1yr & 8mths if you please!) on 20th Mar 2009. And this time I am seriously lost. There are just so many things that he does now that it's becoming impossible to remember and classify anymore. I think I have to stop doing monthly updates and just keep making daily notes instead! :)

Here goes what you have been upto last month my darling son.

Your vocabulary is growing at an amazing speed. You now don't just repeat stuff, but also understand the context in which a word is being used and then use it again in just the right way. So if i tell you you will hurt your head if you don't lie down properly when I have to put on the diaper, you go down gingerly. And you say Sar Pe everytime you do that! :D


You remember the weirdest stuff and have a brilliant observation power. That day you shocked me completely by pointing to the lights in the park and saying "laaamp-post". I was seriously stunned! You were sitting in the balcony every morning with your daadu observing as the world goes by and making notes. Now rarely do the squirrel, crow (kauaa) or kabootam (pigeon) miss your sharp eyes. You even might notice Eagen (eagle) at time, though we are not sure whether its one or its one of similar ones like hawk or a kite.


Your father can never doubt my fidelity. You have inherited his funny bone is full measure. You keep doing crazy stuff KNOWING well that it will make us laugh. I mean you have already mastered toiler humour by making weird potty faces when trying to do the big job! Gross l'il fellow, you are! I really cannot put in words exactly what it is you do, but it's like we want to have you under cameras at all hours to capture the subtle stuff you keep doing. Here's how you keep driving us nuts! (partial nudity!:p)


You love your books, though sometimes, I have to keep reminding you not to stomp on them, That they are bhagwaaniji. More often than not you will pick it up and keep it saying "jagah pe!". You love pointing to stuff and telling us what it is. We also play this new game where either you or me pick one thing in the book and then look for it. So you might say "Camen" (camel) and then we will keep turning pages saying "camen aa jao" and you will point it to it with flourish when we reach the right page! And off we go looking for next object that catches your fancy! SEE HERE!


Your love for Hemme now called Hemmet which seemed to be in control is a full blown obsession again! It was cemented by your Daadu while he was here and who used its power on you in full measure to serve as distraction from any situation. You would wake up every morning and just walk to his room and wake him up saying "Hemmet dekhenge!'


You are indeed a creature of habit and routine. If last month the dialoguebaazi went on for bath, now it's for everything we do. I mean you repeat our dialogues even. So when I am making you wear shorts, you will first say shoulder and hold on to it, then you will put your leg in and then you rush the second one in and i say "ek second" and now you say that too! :p


You are turning out to be quite a helpful little fella. You bring our phones to us, throw your diaper in the dustbin, put clothes in the bucket as well as washing machine. You were even taking a plate with apple slices to daadu everyday and mostly without dropping anything. Seeing you get to the task with so much concentration was just too much. You help in clearing your books and toys and give me katori to pour milk into. You would help your daadu take biscuit dabbas everyday and even move the small table in front of the sofa where he sits to have his chai! You will do just about anything you CAN when requested to. Thanks sweets! :)


Like your mommy proudly declared few posts ago, you are potty trained for the day. Of course there are accidents and we are long way away from going ghummi diaperless, but no taking away credit from you. I think you learnt much faster than we ever expected and one wet pair of shorts during the day is totally cool! :)


You actually get hassled by big crowds now. There was a time you believed more the merrier and didn't care if we were around. But not anymore. Whenever we are in a big group you want one of us around you at all times. The smiles don't come as easily either. Guess it's a phase.


While you had started sharing stuff a bit, you again seem to be hesitant doing it. You are not used to being with other kids and that shows. You still don't know how to deal with aggression of other kids and mostly resort to crying! You Will learn it eventually i guess. So that you get to be with other kids at least sometime, we hope to start you off on play school this June! Hope you will have fun! :) That said, you share your chocolates easily giving them to everyone around when requested.


You have quite a temper dude! I know Papa is fan of the angry young man, but your tantrums... are they gonna get worse?! :p


You still prefer playing with stuff your way. Mummy enthusiastically bought you some play doh! First you decided to get scared of it, then throw it under the sofa the moment I rolled it into a ball and then just kept putting the smaller play doh containers in the bigger jar! Your papa made your fav dog with it and now you coolly handover the dabba to him and say "Bhoo banayenge!". You now like playing with car, aeroplane and motorcycle and like to see them zoom as you push them away.


Last month you used "what this is?" purely as a repetition exercise. Now you have started asking it as an actual question. So often we get to see you point to something and asking "What is this?" in your cute l'il way! :)


You love walking and rarely ask for godi unless really tired or just feel like getting carried. It's difficult to believe that it's the same kid who took his first doddering steps some 7months ago!


You understand the concept of ownership now. We ask you holding my book "Yeh book kiski hai?" and your voice pipes up saying "Mummy ka hai!" Or pick up a toy and he will say Cubby Ka hai.


The charm of TV is slowly getting there, but it's still very rare. We recently showed you a bit of tarzan and for a few days everytime I turned on the TV, you would demand "Gonilla" (gorilla). You like watching animated flicks with animals! :)


Oh yeah. You can say the 'L' sounds and say "N" instead. Same goes for R sound too sometimes. Its all adorable to hear anyway! :D


You love trying to say difficult words. Be it Pomegrenate (which only I undetstand when you say it) or staberry (strawberry), Pineapple (pine-eyepple), Rinoceras (Rhino) or repeating Diggly Bug Cub (Wriggly Bug Club) that is written on your tee.


Summer has finally seen you embrace water with gutso. You keep asking for it saying "Paani"and we give you about a sipful at a time in the small silver glass your daadi has given you. You hold it in two little hands and drink it up. If you want more you either say "Mo", "Oar chaaiyee" (aur chahiye) or "some mo". Ofcos I wish you had a better way of telling us you have had enough. You just pour the l'il water left in the glass wherever you are standing! Just say "bass" dude! :)


I have officially outsourced your khaana feeding to Amma and now feel no shame in accepting my defeat. That way both of us are happy. Since you like doodh, feeding that is pretty easy. On rare occasions that I need to feed, I use Amma's trick of making you stand in the balcony and feed as we differentiate between "good boy" and "bad boy" depending on whether they have worn helmet while riding ou non. The scuffles have come down drastically since this method has come in practice. Phew! and TOUCHWOOD!


If it was steps that you wanted to climb last month, now its every surface that can be climbed up on that you look to conquer. You finally climbed all the steps of the big slide too, though you did get scared to slide down and a kind hearted bhaiyya got you down with him!


All in all you are the official joker in the family! :D The amount of laughter that rings loud around the house thanks to you is unending. God bless you for that.

Thank you for being the sunshine kid! :)


Love ya lots! Uggie to you, my love!


Keep rocking!


ps: The GREEN phrases are links to his latest videos! To make up for lack of photos! :p

for those who got tired reading about me (et tu Suma & Avanti), here is a bit of Cubby!

anyway, his 20month update should be here soon hoping that I don't delay it much! Till then, please to adjust with this! Thankoo muches!

Please to ignore messy house and don't miss the Hemme on the floor and ofcos a new style of taking off the shoes! ;)

Shoe fetish, anyone?! :D

Tag - O - Mania!

It looks like the season of tags! First the 50 questions, then the pregnancy tag (I loved doing that one!) and now this verry secretive tag!



~uh~ aka as Udtahaathi has tagged me to tell you guys 25things about me that you didn't know. His post makes a very interesting read indeed. Mine, i am guessing is gonna be really banal!



1. I am not a very secretive person at all. (consider this as a disclaimer!). That doesn't mean that I can't keep other people's secrets. I am actually very good at keeping them.



2. I have no trust issues. I would rather trust and get heart-broken occassionally than never trust at all.



3. You may not believe it, but I am a fairly philosophical person. Yet, that doesn't mean I am NOT practical. And just because I am practical, doesn't mean I am not impulsive! :p



4. I cannot apply make-up. Except lipstick. That too i do just about OK job. I get a pedicure done so that I can get nailpolish applied! :p Eyeliner type things I cannot even dream of!



5. I shocked my sasural post-shaadi. No my sari didn't come off (though it almost did)! I danced till I would drop at post shaadi sangeet and apparently thats not how new bahus of northie families behave. What do i know. I love to dance! :D



6. M and me used to make out in cabs in Bombay! :p And for those who are wondering the driver and rear view mirror stop mattering pretty quick once hormones take charge! ;)



7. I rode a two-wheeler for 10 years without license and never got caught even once. Ofcos, I have a license now. M made sure I was legally documented post shaadi.



8. I got a pink slip in my very first job. The whole department shut down and it was really horrid. Only solace was it was not performance based.



9. My first crush is even now a very good buddy. He recently got married and his wife is really sweet! :)



10. M was the ONLY boyfriend I had (crushes were all one-sided) and he eventually became the husband! What a dull life, eh?! ;)



11. I still like reading Tinkle. We have some 15 volumes of 10 Tinkles each at my parent's place! I can't wait to share it with Cubby.



12. I went on my first blind date (a yahoo chat pal) sometime in 2001. He was a really cute Sardar doctor. And awfully smart too.



13. I once got 7/100 in a Vidyapeeth maths exam. Thankfully it had nothing to do with school marks. But i have always hated that subject and am really bad at it. Thank god for calculators and excel sheets!



14. I cannot draw to save my life. I got my craft work and biology diagrams done from my friends in school. God bless em wherever they are. Or like Cubby says God Blass You!

15. I am not much of a hoarder. I do keep things for memories sake, but once I put my mind to it things get thrown mercilessly.

16. I have 4 pairs of sandals from Bata of sizes 4, 5, 6 & 7. Go figure! (and no pun intended!)


17. I used to love collecting miniature stuff. I have a small auto (cubby broke it recently), a small atta chakki, a metal coal iron, a set of wooden tables and chair and a small hawkins pressure cooker now being used to store rubber bands!


18. I hate the house looking the same for too long. Since it's a rented ghar and no major changes can be sone, I change curtains anytime between 6months - 1year. I also get matching sofa and cushion covers done along with it and voila for a few days its a new look again. And ofcos I buy cheap 150rs cotton curtains, so that it doesn't hurt our pocket much. Nice raw silk curtains will have to wait! :p


19. My parents have hit me only twice. Once in around 5th standard when I went for a school friend's birthday party and disappeared way beyond curfew time. And another time much later, still in school when I hid the exam papers I had fared badly in and they found em in my bag. I was othawise a very good kid.


20. I went for music classes in primary school. I was AHEM! chosen by my teacher because she thought I had potential. I even gave one exam. For the next exam, folks gave me choice between matheran during exam time or exam and i obviously chose Matheran. Singing never happened again except in Antakshari and the world might have lost a great talent! :p


21. I regret not doing a single ladka dekhna thing before I got married. I told my parents honestly that i was seeing M when they asked me at age 23 and then eventually married him at almost 26. Since I had nothing to lose, I wish I had done of those and known what it is like.


22. I have never been proposed to! :( Not even by M. Most of our courtship was me trying to convince him it will work and him trying to tell me otherwise. The closest I came to being pataoed was the Sardar doc (refer No.12) who told me I was like a breath of fresh air! :D


23. I love swings! Love Love Love em. I had even done a post on it! I love rollercoasters and have never been scared. Anything that attempts to defy gravity for some time and then gives in along with a pit in your tummy, I am game.


24. I love wearing shorts at home. Been wearing em for past 10 years and even after being teased with the song "Jungle Jungle Pata Chala Hai, Chaddi Pehen Ke Phool Khila Hai!".


25. I Give up. Here's an old tag where I had talked about 10 random things me thinks. So add that to this one! :p There might be some repeats since my past or current life has been anyyhing but juicy.


Am not tagging anyone least I get banned for it! :p Anyone who thinks this can be fun, feel free.


ps: All those green bits are links to posts!

meri kahaani, meri hi zubaani!

So, Munckin's mom tagged me to do this one and seemed like a great way to relive the preggers days and first few days after! :) Yes, I plan to add pictures because there isn't much readership for non-photo posts of mine. Ofcos, i doubt how putting pictures of BIG me will help. But what the heck. No walk in the memory lane is complete without some photos! :)






Completely unaware of pregnancy, happily doing a chhaiya chaiyya on TOP of the bus at Hampi!


1. WAS YOUR FIRST PREGNANCY PLANNED?

Yes. But we didn't expect it. I was on medication thanks to PCO's and was told it could take quite some time. It worked in first shot. I think it was because it was our anniversary! :) And we were to go on a trip up north a day after we found out. Yup. we did go and had a blast! :)

Yup, we went to Agra to meet our favourite chacha who takes awesome pictures!

Pregnant, in love and at at Taj. can it get cornier?!

2. WERE YOU MARRIED AT THE TIME?

YES! It was our wedding anniversary(the day Cubby got conceived me thinks!). 2nd to be precise!


3. WHAT WERE YOUR REACTIONS?

I went in the bathroom anxious. Then came out with a BIG smile!



This is me at Cafe Noorani, haji Ali, Mumbai ready to gorge on some of the best rolls and biryaani ever made. Sometime in last few weeks of pregnancy! :)



4. WAS ABORTION AN OPTION FOR YOU?

Nope. This was a wanted pregnancy!



Trying to show the tummy! Sometime in first few months me thinks! :)



5. HOW OLD WERE YOU?

28yrs. Now I wish it was little earlier.



6. HOW DID YOU FIND OUT YOU WERE PREGNANT?

By peeing on a stick.



7. WHO DID YOU TELL FIRST?

M ofcos! I came out, jumped on the bed waving the stick and singing "Samjho ho hi gaya!" hehe. M was quite expecting the coy "Hamaare ghar ek nanha mehmaan aane waala hai" line! :p


8. DUE DATE?

21st July



At Nasik with my adorable niece. This is April 2007. 3 months to go!



9. DID YOU HAVE MORNING SICKNESS?

Nope. My doc kept asking me saying it would help me lose some weight! :p Apparently lucky 5% women don't get morning sickness. Good to NOT be a part of the majority. I did puke in last trimester thanks to reflux. But once found out the tabs took care of that.





Exercising in our terrace in Bombay. M used to accompany whenever he was there!



10. WHAT DID YOU CRAVE?

Nothing really. I was actually pretty much on a strict diet. My doc was a monster and expected me to LOSE weight during pregnancy. So I would eat apples and sprouts. I can't eat apple even now. As an afterthought, I am thankful to the doc! Without him cracking the whip I would have been VERY fat rather than just overweight! :p



Eating chat at Atria Mall few days before the D-day! :)


11. WHO/WHAT IRRITATED YOU THE MOST?

Nothing really. I had a happy pregnancy throughout almost. It was post partum breast feeding trouble that made life hell for me!



At Cinemax for FDFS - Harry Potter movie! Oh! I miss those days!



12. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CHILD’S SEX?

It's a BOY! :)




Cubby as l'il bunny at 8 weeks in Pune (Daadi-daadu's house)



13. DID YOU WISH YOU HAD THE OPPOSITE SEX OF WHAT YOU WERE GETTING?

Yes. A girl. There are no girls in the family. Ofcos, everyone was quite sure it would be a boy. Now i know it doesn't matter! :)



14. HOW MANY POUNDS DID YOU GAIN THROUGHOUT THE PREGNANCY?

14kgs





Can you see how BIG I am? At Shivaji Park.




I was okie with the whole Flower Girl thing till they even made me hold a basket and take pictures! Gee!



15. DID YOU HAVE A BABY SHOWER?

Yes! The traditional Maharashtrain Dohal-jevan that my mom and kaku arranged. M was sadly not there.





See that horrid blouse? I had opened the katori that had Gulab Jamun in it which meant it would be a boy! :)


16. WAS IT A SURPRISE OR DID YOU KNOW?

I knew. Even had to wear a horrid ready made blouse in golden colour 'coz nothing would fit me.



At my biggest me thinks! This was before M and me went to Mocha to meet a close buddy and hubby. Imagine the scene when she turned up wearing the same thing in kurti style!




17. DID YOU HAVE ANY COMPLICATIONS DURING YOUR PREGNANCY?

Nope. Was hospitalised once for BP trouble. And yeah, the anomaly scan to check if Cubby was a "normal" baby 'coz he didnt move that much. That scan was the worst 45mins of my life me thinks. But very cool othawise.




My FAVOURITE pregnancy in picture in FAVOURITE tee! :) At Worli Seaface.




18. WHERE DID YOU GIVE BIRTH?

Bombay


19. HOW MANY HOURS WERE YOU IN LABOR?

About two hours. It was induced. The lady said since it was my first delivery I won't go into labour for 7-8 hrs least. This was at 230am. By 530am i was calling M and hollering asking em "WTF are you!" By 7 i was completely dilated!



At the hospital the previous night with my packed bag et al.



20. WHO DROVE YOU TO THE HOSPITAL/BIRTH CENTER?

My parents and M in a taxi.




Mom & Dad waiting anxiously as I was wheeled into the OT! Cant even imagine how worried they must have been! Love ya both!



21. WHO WATCHED YOU GIVE BIRTH?

Doc and his team!


22. WAS IT NATURAL OR C-SECTION?

C-Section. After i went into labour and was taken into OT. I was doing the pushing business when Cubby's heart rate started dropping. So an emergency c-sec was done! Either ways it was the happy beginning that mattered! :D



23. DID YOU TAKE MEDICINE TO EASE THE PAIN?

Yes.I was conscious throughout the operation.




Cubby at home few days later. Yes, M got the last harry Potter book to the hospital on 21st July, the day it released! I forced him to! :p



24. HOW MUCH DID YOUR CHILD WEIGH?

3.3 kgs. The scan were showing 4kgs plus baby!



Cubby on the hospital bed! :) Thank God they look human eventually!



25. WHEN WAS YOUR CHILD ACTUALLY BORN ?

20th July 2007. We were so hoping he would crossover and be a LEO kid! :p



26. WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION WHEN THE DOCTOR ANNOUNCED THE SEX OF THE BABY?

I seriously don't remember!



Holding Cubby for the first time two days after birth!



27. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST REACTION ON SEEING THE BABY?


I couldn't properly see or hold Cubby for about 2 days. I wasn't allowed to get up. So when i first held him, i was crying!



28. DID YOU CRY?

Yup. Look above!



No29. WHAT DID YOU NAME HIM/HER?

Kabir - got lotsa gyaan about how it's a Muslim name and bs llike that, But once we decided on this one, we couldnt imagine anything else.



30. HOW OLD IS YOUR FIRST BORN TODAY

I am bad at Maths. So i will just say 19months and some days!


Oh! It's over already! This was fun.



With my in-laws in Pune exactly 3months before the birth!


And i also realised I had written quite a few posts during pregnancy and it was fun reading them.



My pregnancy was one of the funnest times of my life. The attention, pampering and love was so addictive. Add to that the bloody hormones make your skin and hair look so much nicer! M kept asking if we can bottle it up for later! :)


Thanks Mom, Dad and M for showing me a great time through the pregnancy and later. For accepting my tantroms and tears. For hugging me and supporting me through them. For letting me be! :)

And all the happiness, am sure reached Cubby too. He is one helluva sunshine kid. Since the day he was born.

I think almost all mommies I know have been tagged. So I will ask Suma (yes again! lets see how much you remember!), Puja, Lijy, Namesake, Art, Angie and IHM.

No separate wash for Cubby's clothes now!

Wondering about the title?


You remember I mentioned in his 19months post that we are trying to potty train him little more earnestly now? That he has started telling us about the big job often enough, but pee training seemed quite some time away!


I am back to bite my own words. Past one week Cubby has been consistently telling us he wants to pee during his waking hours! And yup, I am mighty thrilled and terribly proud! Ofcos, we are still not confident enough to go diaperless while going out(too early for that!), but I have a feeling the day wont be too far! Yaayyyy!


The things motherhood can make you jump around about. Even my colleagues haven't been spared from sharing the happy news!


So now that there are no su-su and potty nappies and shorts, we don't need a separate dettol laden machine for wash for Cubby's clothes. Today was Day 1 they got washed with our clothes itself!


Another big yay to saving of paani and electricity! :p


Night training we shall start when we ready to sacrifice our sleep! Till then a diaper day suits us just fine. Amma was heart broken to throw an almost perfect nappy pad we use post bath. Ofcos that is just a matter of pure luck if he doesn't pee during his afternoon nap. All in good time.


Weird things is that the dude calls both the things potty, so am trying to teach him to say su-su for the peeing. Lets see when he figures that out!


Potty training was one the things that was getting me very worked up. I had heard of friends whose kids got trained before they even turned one. I tried even at 4months me thinks inspired by a relative. Obviously it was extremely boring to hold the kid on basin and go sssss forever!


Tried again at about 1 year and he refused to sit on the potty. Would want to run away everywhere. We stopped again. Then started at around 18months. WE tried to give him paani and just make him sit. A whole cheer leading routine was done for every success with back patting and good job thrown in. In a very generous measure actually! Oh and book reading definitely helped! :p


Within 10days he was telling us when he wanted to do potty. We kept taking him for su-su every sometime when we were at home. Sometimes I would spend 10mins in the bathroom doing very variation of sssss and sshhhh sound and coming out tired. Then the kid would pee within two mins of coming out! Or I would be thinking I will take him in 5mins and he would pee right then making me say Close! :p


Ofcos everytime he did su-su in nappy we would tell him that he should tell us and perhaps that helped too.


The thing I also realised is that I cannot make him stand still in one place in the bathroom. So I just let him be. Walk around, explore the taps, buckets and mugs and have fun. It didn't matter if he peed in that particular corner ONLY. There is plenty of time to teach him that. This bit worked much better than holding him tight in one corner of the bathroom.


Plus I wasn't sure if Amma was taking him regularly during the day when we were at work. I guess she was, at least every now and then. Now after a l'il over a month he is day time trained and it's quite a relief.


I have a feeling that by delaying it to an age where he is able to understand instructions and is eager to learn, our job became easier.


Or chances, we just got plain lucky. It also helps that its summer time and we can Cubby in just shorts without having to make him wear pajamas to avoid cold and all that. The frequency of peeing is also lesser because of all the sweat.


Whatever it is, you are seeing a proud mommy here! :D


So my darling son, Good Job! Or Goobjaab as you say it! :) (its sounds like Boob Job most of the times!;)


ps: Touchwood and hope the dream run continues! :D

SaAp SeEdY - oF hiSsInG and mOuNtiNg

Read THIS post by Suma a few days ago. Ofcourse her's is a very sensible and warm post. The only similarity is that my post is about games too. THis one was written on another website I used to write previously on before blogger snatched me away. I thought I might as well share my pearls of wit and wisdom (AHEM!) here as well. That also means I can do sixty posts by just copy pasting the stuff written there!


The idea came from the VERY brilliant and solliidd funny buddy called Udtahaathi! Must read for laughs! Especially This one!


Most of us here are familiar with Sridevi dressed in white, writhing and wriggling in the song “Main teri dushman, dushman tu mera. Main naagin tu sapera” from the classic Nagina.


Somewhere you must have heard this classic dialogue too. "Tumne jisko doodh pilaya ma, woh aasteen ka saanp nikla!"


And it was a snake that got Adam and Eve chucked to Earth from Paradise.


Snakes always make me think of something nasty and evil. Something that looks so slimy can hardly be trustworthy. Add to that some of its species are poisonous to boot and I think all of em bite anyway.


Yet with all these “qualities” these reptiles play starring role in one of the most popular childhood games (that I still LOVE) called Snakes and Ladders. Of course here too Snakes are the villains, so no surprises there.


I tried googling the history of Snakes and Ladders but couldn’t come up with much. Wikipedia says that the western form of the game was invented in Victorian England possible by John Jacques and was apparently adapted from ancient Indian game Dasapada dating back to 2nd century BC. These claims however have not been verified.


Since not much is known about the history, cut to present or recent past or whatever and let me tell you what this game all about.


Snakes and Ladders is basically a board game played between two or more players with a block grid on the board. These blocks have numbers 1-100 on them. Some of these have a ladder or a snake on them. The intention is to reach to the topmost block saying 100, your starting point being One!


You roll the dice and move the pawn as per the number you get on the dice. If you get six you enjoy another turn. Yiippppeee!! So all the players take turns rolling the dice and keep moving ahead. If you come on a block that has the beginning of ladder on it, you get a shortcut up the ladder. For eg. You reach 8 and it has ladder that reaches up to 23, you jump up to 23 in that same turn! Whatte fun! :p The same way some blocks have snake mouths on them. If you get into one of THOSE blocks then you slip down the slippery snake right to the block where the tail is, losing all the lead you might have gained!


So you basically keep on rolling the dice and keep moving up and down depending on your luck till you finally reach the century number 100!


The winning or losing depends on sheer dumb luck which is why I just love this game! If you are the type who is good at rolling dice and getting the number you want a la Shakuni Mama, you will not be wasting that precious talent trying it on Snakes and Ladders! Hehe!


Snakes and ladders is available almost everywhere – starting from local trains and streets in Mumbai to every toy shop worth its salt. It should cost you anywhere between 15bucks to maybe maximum of Rs.100 which will be one of those 5 in 1 kind of boards.


It’s difficult to NOT enjoy the game even today (a reflection on my IQ I guess!), but its sheer simplicity makes it so enjoyable just for a few real laughs and fake groans when you go down the snake!


It is usually a big hit with kids because it’s so easy to learn and can be played with lots of friends as long as you have those different coloured pawns to differentiate between players. If not anything else, they are sure to learn their numbers to 100 and to win and lose in turns.


This may sound farfetched, but isn’t our life a lot like Snakes Ladders too? WE roll the dice (do what we should) and then move. Sometimes it takes us to unexpectedly quick success… that elusive ladder we get. At times, a sudden fall because of circumstances… the snake that pushed you down. Most other times we just keep moving at our own pace without any major hurdles. Eventually we reach our destination through all the Snakes and Ladders and those plain blocks.


Of course, in our life luck plays a smaller role I guess, yet the similarity is uncanny, won’t you agree?


On a lighter note I wish I could dance like Sridevi in Nagina! Anyone game to play the music??!! :p