Tag: dailyprompt

Posted in Random Thoughts

Google Play Books

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal
Daily writing prompt
What app eats up most of your screen time — and do you even feel bad about it?
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Being a Bookaholic, Google Play Books is my fix and my bane. I keep removing it from my phone when I realise I had been going too long without sleep to fit in all the books, and then reinstalling it with the promise to myself that I would read only one in a month–a promise I keep for a few months before falling back into old habits.

While reading a book never hurt anyone, my eyes complain of the long hours spent in reading,

Both my book-hater husband and my book-lover daughter hate it because it takes me away from them–my imaginary friends become their personal enemies. So, my love for Google Play Books is a balancing act I have not mastered yet.

It is my guilty pleasure, and I often feel bad about it but not enough to give it up. I just need the balance…Someday! Sigh!

What about you?

Posted in Poetry, Random Thoughts

The Shine

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal
Daily writing prompt
Do you think we’re shaped more by our experiences or by who we are?
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I was a leaf;

A new one;

Soft and small;

Nobody, I believed, could

Take away my shine.

.

The Draught did it though.

I tried hard to fight back;

Clinging to the Tree

As it tried to shake me off;

Fighting to nurture myself;

Trying to the keep the shine.

.

I survived.

When it rained finally,

I was still clinging to the Tree;

Still somewhat green.

I couldn’t wait for the shine to return.

.

It didn’t.

.

But I was

Harder, thicker, sturdier;

I survived.

In the end,

It is all that matters.

Posted in Random Thoughts

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal
Daily writing prompt
Which book have you read more than any other?
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I am what you would call a “compulsive reader”. I have read enough books to build a public library. Unfortunately, I never had enough money to buy all of them. So, most of them were borrowed from friends, various public libraries and, lately, online libraries (Project Gutenberg Library {Link: Free eBooks | Project Gutenberg} is my favourite since it offers a lot of classics.)

And if I like a book, I read them over and over. I have read Harry Potter and Twlight Part 1 and 2 seven or eight times already. The one book I have read even more often than that is Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome (a gift from a dear friend, Megha).

The book was supposed to be a travel guide on a boat journey on River Thames. It ended being the most humourous book ever, filled to brim with anecdotes by an idle mind…something that is only possible when someone is floating slowly down the river. In fact the book is so humourous that when the writer actually begins describing the beauty of the river in a particular spot with a serious tone, you can’t wait for it to get over so that he can move on to his next anecdote.

There are tales of doctors and shipmen and boatmen and train drivers and bank clerks and people feigning to be cooks and churchyard visitors…

The book starts with small smiles, turning into occasional chuckles until you are having a full-belly laugh. The best part is that you don’t need to look at the storyline at all–you can start from any page and you will still be laughing full out half an hour later.

It is as much a book to carry on a journey on a subway and as it is one for fireside. I assure you, you can read it fifty times and still laugh on the same jokes over and over. Definitely a keeper!

Posted in Random Thoughts

Villain with a good point: Duryodhan (Mahabharat)

Posted on by Shaily Agrawal
Daily writing prompt
What villain actually had a good point?
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Every great and memorable villain, if considered closely, had a good point. That is the beauty of great writing–the writers make sure that the villains truly believe in their purpose and find strength in their calling.

For example, Duryodhan in the Sanskrit epic Mahabharat actually had a good point.

Plot: It was written at a time when kingship was decided by birth (the oldest son would be the king) and not by who deserved it. Duryodhan had conspired to send the sons of his younger uncle (Pandu), the Pandavas, on 13 years of exile and, upon their return after 13 years, declined to return their share of kingdom. It lead to a bloody war involving all the countries and it ended the age of heroes.

His point: He and his brothers were the actual sons of their father (Dhritarashtra) who was also the oldest son of the former king. By that logic, he was more deserving of the massive kingdom than his Pandava cousin, Yudhishthira, because:

1. Yudhishthira was the son of his younger uncle (not the first born).

2. His younger uncle, Pandu, was unable to sire children and all his cousins, the five Pandavas, were born through Niyog, an ancient practice of getting a child through another man. Hence, they were not their father’s children.

So, even though he was evil, arrogant, malicious and vile, and de-robed women publicly, Duryodhan had a point–He shouldn’t have to split the kingdom with his lesser cousins. He was considered as a villain for simply trying to get back what he truly considered as his birthright.