Suchi fell in love with the hotel room instantly. The glazed window overlooking a lush garden and the skyline filled with high-rise apartments gave her a sense of liberty.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
Taking out her mobile, she saw that there was no message from her husband Subhash.
She brought out the most cherished possession of her life – a pair of ghungroos from the bag.
‘Girls of respected families don’t become dancers.’ Her father had thrown away her ghungroos after she turned fifteen. She was married into an equally conservative family who didn’t consider dance to befit their families daughter-in-law.
It was her teenager son Trihan who had discovered Suchi’s passion. Last month, he had sent across a video of Suchi’s dance to a national level dancing competition. Suchi made it to the list of twenty-five shortlisted candidates.
Both the families refused to support her decision. But it was Trihan who stood by her like a rock. He didn’t want his mother to give up another dream for her family. She smiled at the message that he had sent her,
“I believe in you. Win the competition and make me proud.”
Her upbringing had managed to bring a crack in the walls of patriarchy.
(200 words)
This is the 8th post written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign as per my theme ‘Shades of Perception’. You can read the other piece of fiction based on the same photo prompt here and the first six posts here.
For this challenge, I am using four photos as prompts to weave two flash fiction stories and one real story behind the picture. This is my second picture prompt.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter
Tanu checked into the thirteenth floor of the hotel in the city of her birth. She had found love here. They been best friends in school and moved on to different streams in college. Eventually, they had accepted and acknowledged their feelings for each other.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
But like most of the love stories, she had been left heartbroken. Her lover had married someone else under pressure from the family. Tanu remembered the nights of tears and pain. She had left the city thinking it would help her move on. But with time, Tanu had realized that loving someone else was never going to be an option in her life.
Last week she had received a mail. It read,
“Tanu,
Section 377 has been scrapped. I know it’s been eighteen years since we last spoke but do you think we have a chance now?
Sudha”
She didn’t know if there was a future but what she understood was that Sudha also still loved her. Tanu had decided to give it a chance.
Looking at the skyline from the glazed window of her room, her heart thumped loudly as she waited for the bell to ring. Sudha was due to arrive anytime now.
(199 words)
This is the 7th post written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign as per my theme ‘Shades of Perception’. You can read the first six here.
For this challenge, I am using four photos as prompts to weave two flash fiction stories and one real story behind the picture. This is my third picture prompt. Stay tuned to read the second flash fiction that I will write around the same picture in my next post. You could also consider subscribing to my blog if you like reading my stories.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter
The incident dates back to July 2011. I was heading a Bank branch in Mysore at that time. It was the first month after marriage and my husband had just relocated from Kolkata. I had a strange obsession with finding an accommodation near my office. Thus with every transfer or job switch, my address kept changing. The house where we resided as tenants were barely two kms from my Bank. Mysore was a town that thrived on human interactions, so almost everyone in the neighborhood knew about my doctor husband and his banker wife.
As per our daily schedule, my husband had to leave quite early in the morning while 8:45am was when I usually took an auto to the Bank. This made locking the house my responsibility. We occupied the first floor of the house and it had two open balconies. The front one led to the main entrance and the one at the back faced an area designated for a park. It had a large number of trees. My house owner had warned me about rechecking the locked status of both the balcony doors before leaving the house. It was for our own safety, he had wisely said. Unfortunately, I neither had a chance nor considered this piece of advice important enough to pass on to my husband.
I ran to him anyway – Blogadda.com WOW prompt
It so happened that on a particular morning in July, I had to leave the house much before my usual time to attend a meeting. I had wrongly assumed that he would check and lock both the doors before moving out. The meeting had been a full day event and I returned home directly from the venue quite early in the evening. My house owner, who was generally a pleasant man had a very disapproving look on his face. Without thinking much, I walked up the stairs to open the door.
The word ‘shock’ would be a very mild term to express my reaction next. For every nook and corner of my apartment was occupied by a bunch of monkeys. They seemed to have had a satisfying meal of fruits, chips, biscuits and whatever they could lay their hands on. The flat resembled a house struck by a tornado. I let out a scream while wondering how to get rid of the monkeys. In a while, there were neighbors from the surrounding areas near my apartment churning out ideas about how to chase the monkeys away. Some of these ideas were so bizarre that they could put the word ‘innovation’ to shame. To anyone willing to lend an ear, my owner kept talking about how he had cautioned me about the danger of keeping balcony doors open. I honestly had no clue that when he spoke of how unsafe it was, he had monkeys instead of humans in mind.
Half an hour had passed and the monkeys couldn’t care less. They had comfortably settled in. I was getting worried about the uncertainty of being a resident here anymore. Suddenly I spotted my husband getting out of an auto downstairs. I started rushing down the stairs. Mysore was still considered as a conservative city with a good percentage of my neighbors falling in the category of senior citizens. I knew that at that moment they were looking, but I didn’t care. I ran to him anyway just like Kajol in the climax of the Bollywood movie DDLJ. I couldn’t resist myself from hugging him tight though I knew we were in the streets and all pairs of eyes were on us. My husband was still not sure why there was a crowd in front of our house and my sudden public display of affection but the actions of newly marrieds are rarely justified. He had attributed it to my overflowing love for him while in reality, I was breathing a sigh of relief that I finally had someone who would probably be a little less scared than me.
Finally one of my office boys arrived with a group of people who managed to drive away the monkeys out of the house. They grudgingly left but not before eating away all possibly edible items, throwing away quite a few things including one of my oldest mobile phone sets and creating havoc in the house to such an extent that the effort required in fixing it led to a slipped disc injury in less than two weeks. But that’s a story for another day.
My son has been traveling since he was 1.5 months old. We have taken him to various beach destinations. But I have always loved mountains a little more than the sea. Last October, after he turned two, my husband and I came up with the idea of a vacation to Shillong and Cherrapunji. Our memorable stay at Ri Kynjai resort, opposite Umiam Lake was followed up by the experience of walking among the clouds in Cherrapunji. The boy loved everything about the trip.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
This picture was taken on the way during our road trip from Shillong to Cherrapunji. The windswept Kansh grass caught my attention. I stopped the car and walked outside to get soaked in the beauty of nature. A small house surrounded by hills and slopes was a soothing sight. I stood transfixed for a while before capturing this moment through my lens. This picture is no less than frozen memories of witnessing nature’s beauty at its best for me.
(161 words)
This is the sixth post (nonfiction) written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign on the theme ‘Shades of Perception’. You can read the fourth flash fiction around this picture prompt hereand the fifth one here. For the first three posts, you can click here.
Linking up with Wordless Wednesday created by Esha and Natasha.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter
Amay inhaled the fresh air with a feeling of nostalgia. Looking at the hills through the window, his eyes brimmed with tears. He was back home. He remembered his childhood spent amidst luxuries in a plush Government bungalow. But his father had died of lung cancer when Amay was barely five.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
His mother had been employed by the same organization on sympathetic grounds but they had to vacate the bungalow. With the meager salary, they could only afford this small house on rent. Amay had grown to love the slopes, hills, and fields in the surrounding. He kept excelling in academics and his school supported him through scholarship.
Seven years back, he had made it to one of the top medical colleges. Despite some earnings through private tuitions, financial constraints would have shattered his dreams hadn’t his mother taken up odd jobs to support him.
Dr. Amay Mhatre had returned as a doctor in this town hospital. He recollected the stunned looks of the interviewing panel when he had asked for a posting here instead of a metro city. But Amay knew that his mother felt a sense of belonging here and for him, her happiness was the biggest priority.
(200 words)
This is the 5th post written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign as per my theme ‘Shades of Perception’. You can read the other piece of fiction based on the same photo prompt here and the first three posts here.
For this challenge, I am using four photos as prompts to weave two flash fiction stories and one real story behind the picture. This is my second picture prompt.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter.
On 13th Sep last year, when I took the plunge to switch my career choice from being a corporate employee to a solopreneur with this blog, I honestly hadn’t expected this journey to be one of the best experiences in my life. After moving back to Kolkata in 2016, I had decided to take a sabbatical. The purpose was to step back from the jazz of being a high-profile Banker and analyze what made me the happiest. Between being a hands-on mother to an infant and reading every single book that I could lay my hands on, I realized that I looked forward to the quiet time every night when I gave a structure to my thoughts by writing them down in my diary. This had become my coping mechanism to deal with my mother’s sudden demise and then a routine that I enjoyed the most.
The logo of soniasmusings.com
I also have an honest confession to make here. I doubt if I could have broken the mold and ventured into this new territory hadn’t I taken some time off to get used to the phase of salary credit messages not arriving every month end and rewards and recognition parties not happening every quarter. Also becoming a mother had suddenly brought about a spectrum of change in my priorities.
I really didn’t have a plan when I started out. I wrote on topics that I was fond of like food, travel, movies, and books. Either the narrative was based on my personal experiences or it was of the nature of a review. It felt great when celebrities, authors and restaurant management appreciated the efforts through a message or a re-tweet. The personal journey category came next and it is still one of my favorite corners of the blog. Just before my toddler started his preschool, I decided to write about parenting based on the current stage in my life. It took me a while to write about topics closest to my heart like normalizing breastfeeding, the taboo associated with menstruation and gender stereotyping as part of my social issues column. They were all based on my perspective and experience. My confidence got a boost when multiple articles were featured and trended on portals like Women’s web, Youth Ki Awaaz, Momspresso among others.
Deal of Death
Until this period, I rarely read or interacted with other bloggers. I realized my approach was incorrect at different levels I participated in the Blogchatter A2Z challenge in April. It involved a lot of dialogues and suddenly I was exposed to a wonderful community of bloggers and their fabulous work. My blog had started receiving a good number of visitors as well. This was also the period when I heard of other blogging communities like Indiblogger and BlogAdda.
The next best thing happened in May when I turned an author with my debut Detective novella ‘Deal of Death’ as part of the Blogchatter Ebook carnival. From a blogger, I had transitioned into a published author. June brought along the Write Tribe festival of words followed by Bar-A-Thon in July. I had finally discovered my love for writing fiction and flash fiction posts. It was thrilling to weave a story around a prompt in a restricted number of words. Quite a number of posts made it to the featured section and the top posts in Indiblogger. August brought in a pack of surprises. All the posts written on WOW prompts won the WOW badge by BlogAdda. But the best was when one of my stories made it to the nine winning stories in the Lights, camera, Chatter contest by Blogchatter and I went on to narrate it live on FB. I wrapped up the month winning the Muse of the Month contest by Women’s Web.
Awards and recognition
September began with a positive note as I won the first prize in a blogging contest. But what I really look forward to is the new journey that I am about to begin as I take on the role of an invited speaker guest at the Women’s web Breaking Barriers event in Kolkata this weekend.
Overall, the experience has been extremely satisfying and humbling. Summarizing my learnings in just six points, I would say –
1. Read, reciprocate and engage – I would call this my biggest takeaway for the first year. When I started out, I would publish my post and wait to be discovered. I rarely visited or read others. It is essential to understand that without engaging in a meaningful conversation with others, there’s very little that we can achieve in the blog-o-sphere. Do note the word ‘meaningful’ here. It goes beyond the great post, well written, nice story kind of comments.
2. Optimum utilization of social media for promotions – As much as it is necessary to write, it is also important to promote it on social media for wider reach. However, I would suggest not to overdo it. I have received good response using FB and Twitter as a medium. It is only recently that I have started focusing on Instagram and Pinterest still seems like a far-fetched dream. Having said that, I would emphasize the fact that great content definitely gets rewarded eventually.
3. Do not hesitate to seek help – During the initial months of blogging, I had been snubbed by a senior blogger for asking some ‘frivolous’ questions. We have definitely moved beyond that incident today but this bitter experience conditioned my mindset in a way that I stopped seeking out help. It was only after I met Maya, my closest friend in the virtual world that I realized the technicalities of blogging isn’t so difficult. I will also be eternally grateful to another close friend of mine Ashvini for being a great support and introducing me to the wonder-woman of the blogging world Shailaja. It is really difficult to meet a person as helpful and knowledgeable as her. I have met so many amazing bloggers and writers of late that I realized how vibrant the blogging community is.
4. Take your time to find your niche – Despite the fact that I got a lot of appreciation for my movie reviews and recognition for my articles on other portals, it was only after ‘Deal of Death’ released that I figured out where my heart lay. I started putting my heart and soul into my stories as I transitioned into a fiction writer. In the near future, I have plans of starting a YouTube channel dedicated to the art of storytelling and narration camera.
Breaking Barriers by Women’s Web
5. Explore other possibilities in the same domain – I always prefer to call myself a writer because that covers both aspects of being a blogger and a published author. Now I also add the term storyteller to describe my profession and I am looking forward to donning the cap of a speaker next. I have grabbed every relevant opportunity to explore something new and it has turned out to be beneficial.
6. The long-term vision of sustainability – When I started out, my tagline read ‘Embarking on a new journey’ because that described my state. With time, I realized that my blog was basically very high on emotions. Recently, I redefined the tagline as ‘Words, photos & emotions’ summarizing what this blog is all about. Whether blogging is a hobby or a full-time profession, there needs to be a purpose of its existence. As a matter of principle, I don’t do promotions irrelevant to my blog. I have lost out on the financial gains but it makes me happy.
It has been a great year with the booming stats, awards, and recognition. I hope to work harder and bring in stories of wider variety in the future. Thank you for the continued support and love. I’m planning a surprise as part of the birthday celebration very soon, so stay tuned for further details.
The girl looked out of the one-roomed house at the dark clouds. The breeze sweeping through the Kans grass smelt of Durga Puja. A year back, she had celebrated their biggest festival with her parents in Bengal. Now she didn’t even know which part of the country they had kept her hidden.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
She had been kidnapped on the way to school. The kidnapper had gagged, blindfolded and sexually abused her. He had sold her at a brothel in a faraway hill station. She had been shocked to see his familiar face by chance.
Night after night, she bared her body to strangers as they raided it to satisfy their lust. She cried for the first few weeks and then converted her soul to stone. Last night she had spotted her kidnapper. She had covered her face and lured him into the room for the final act.
She turned to look at the brothel women watching the TV. The inspector spoke, “The man, stabbed to death has been identified as the maternal uncle of the girl who had sold the teenager for money. She lost her life due to strangulation during the struggle.”
But she had succeeded in seeking her revenge.
(200 words)
This is the 4th post written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign as per my theme ‘Shades of Perception’. You can read the first three here.
For this challenge, I am using four photos as prompts to weave two flash fiction stories and one real story behind the picture. This is my second picture prompt. Stay tuned to read the second flash fiction that I will write around the same picture in my next post. You could also consider subscribing to my blog if you like reading my stories.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter
This year, T and I completed two decades of being friends. This is inclusive of the few years of dating and seven years of being married. I had written a post some time back describing how it took us a decade, a broken relationship each and three cities to realize that we were destined to be together. This time, I thought of writing about the fate of romance post marriage.
We were married in June 2011. During that period, my Banking job had me posted in Mysore and T relocated from Kolkata to enroll in an M. D. course there. The initial few months were filled with fun, frolic, and food. We realized that we had so many things in common. We loved movies, experimenting with food and traveling. While I loved the mountains, he preferred the sea but we considered that to be an opportunity to explore different locations together. If there was one area that we never wanted to visit, it had to be the Forests. That is why despite being so near, we never planned a trip to Bandipur or Masinagudi. Truth is that I’m actually scared of any creature bigger than a cockroach. So from lizards to elephants, I would not want any kind of rendezvous with them.
Romantic story – forest, envelope, burglar, balloon
Birthdays and special occasions meant grand celebration with cakes, flowers, balloons, and gifts. Life couldn’t have been more perfect.
Mir Rehman walked inside his office room in the palace.
The rumors about the palace being haunted had led to a decline in visitors. But having worked as a Diwan for 38 years here, Mir rubbished such claims.
Of late his relation with Amir Ali, the last Nawab had become sour. Amir’s obsession with alcohol and women had been eating into the palace’s revenues.
Photo prompt – copyright@soniasmusings
The creaking of the door made Mir observe Amir’s entry with another man.
“Anjan, finalize the hotel deal and give me the money.”
Anjan said, “What did you do to Mir who had threatened to inform the local police about your unlawful activities?”
“I killed him in his sleep and rolled his dead body down the stairs outside. The police and the local doctor helped me cover it up as an accident from tripping.”
But Anjan had turned pale on spotting a ledger in the air, held without any support.
Next morning, the newspapers carried details of Nawab Amir Ali and liquor baron Anjan Seth’s demises. Amir had a fatal fall from the stairs while Anjan had passed away from a heart attack.
For Mir Rehman, it was work as usual in his corner office room.
(199 words)
This is the first post written as part of the #MyfriendAlexa campaign as per my theme ‘Shades of Perception’.
For this challenge, I will be using four photos as prompts to weave two flash fiction stories and one real story behind the picture. Stay tuned to read the second flash fiction that I will write around the same picture in my next post. You could also consider subscribing to my blog if you like reading my stories.
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with Blogchatter
This is the last week of the Weekly Photo Challenge and there couldn’t have been a better signing off than through the theme of an all time favorite photo. On the personal front, last two months had been extremely hectic with the A2Z challenge in April and the launch of my first e-book ‘Deal of Death’ in May. However the topic for WPC was enough to evoke the feeling of homecoming in me. Here’s a personal favorite capture of the city I call home now – Kolkata, India.
I wasn’t born here. In fact I barely stayed here for three years during the course of my graduation before hopping onto other places for higher studies and professional commitments. Except an apartment, nothing in the city felt close to my heart until my son was born here in 2015. Over the last few years, I have learnt to embrace the city as my own as my preschooler goes around creating memories in it. While Kolkata is usually represented in the pictures through its old world charm, here’s a snap taken from the terrace of our high-rise building capturing its new essence of life.
soniasmusings 