I am a record holder of riding in the tallest and fastest Roller Coaster on Earth. Yess "Kingda Ka", a Steel roller coaster at the Six Flags adventure park in Jackson, NJ is the Tallest and fastest roller coaster known on earth with a height of 456 Feet and a 90 degree drop of 418 Feet at a speed of 128 mph!! The ride catapults you to a 456 Feet height by reaching a speed of 128 mph from 0 mph in just 3.5 seconds! When i first saw the green tower of the kingda Ka even before entering inside the park, i was so sure i will not be doing this one, but with the long long queue of people waiting to get a ride on this one made me jus too elated to miss this one. The park opens at 10:30 in the morning but i was so excited about the rides that me and my friend reached at 10:00 am itself. Couldnt wait to start our adventure at the Six Flags. We started with a mild ride to warm us up. The ride is called the "Parachute" and it was a mild one with a free fall kind of feeling from a height of about 25 storeys. Was overwhelmed a little to be on such a great height and nothing to hold on to cuz all other rides have a protection in front of you but the parachute just had a flat chair with a wooden plate to be fastened near the belly. Anyways the start was a good warm up to get me all excited for more rides. Next we ventured the "Superman: Ultimate Flight" which is one of a kind ride. It makes you lie face down and soar head first through a twisted steel track, diving into highly banked curves, spirals and jaw-dropping pretzel shaped inverted loops. It made us wait almost 30 mins to get into the ride but the ride was worth the wait. Next we headed to "The Great American Scream Machine" and as the name suggests all you do sitting on this one is scream. It though rated as one of the extreme rides in the park was one of the worst rides for me. It had some very fast and steep curves which are sure to give your neck a major pain or worse even a cramp. It looks impressive with an elevation of nearly 18 storeys, seven monstrous loops, one corkscrew and two boomerang loops. But ultimately after riding so many amazing rides in SF, Jackson, atleast i wouldnt rate it as a recommended one!! Next we headed for the Kingda Ka i guess...and the wait was worth every penny. Next we headed for the El Torro...the ultimate in wooden roller coasters i guess. When i saw this one i was kinda scared as it had steep drops and had nothing in the front to protect you...and this being a wooden ride i was not very sure if i really was ready for a risk like that!! I kept on asking my friend if they will stop it if i get a nervous breakdown in the middle of the ride... :) We waited to fill in the first row as it looked like a pretty thrilling ride..and must say hats off to the ride!! It was one heck of a ride...while the Kingda Ka gets over in like a fraction of a minute...this one is a long one with some really terrifying drops and twists! Another ride that i absolutely thoroughly enjoyed at SF. Next i guess we needed a break from all the screaming and were really on the lookout for some decent food! We grabbed some pizza, coke and fries...and were relaxing watching passers by...was fun! After all the hogging i was like so hungry for more rides but i guess no one else wanted to join me!! We still made it to the Bizzarro which was one of the most soothing rides of the day for me.. :) And then we headed to return as the wind was like really wild and it was too dusty at SF. There were pollens flying in every direction and there was an irritating kind of allergy on the wind i guess. On the way out, i tried my luck at almost all the toy games...none of which proved lucky for me...i just lost it like with a half a point difference!! Before coming out i tried the twister...which was again one more of an extreme ride...and again something that i enjoyed much! Grabbed some nice collectibles before getting out of the park. I was just happy thinking how much of a good day i have spent. And if this was not enough...we even stopped by at the Jackson outlets to shop for branded stuff.....i am a definite shopoholic!! I loved the SF experience so much...am sure am gonna miss all this once i am out of US. There were a few rides like the nitro and the Batman ride, which i missed and would love to have the SF experience with all the rides possible...it was damn damn good day!! Am so so gonna miss all this!!
Have you ever found yourself sitting helplessly tensed about some issue in Work place, Personal Life or in the life of a loved one? Guess thats something very common, all of us at some point in life do fall trap to some or the other kind of tensions or worries even if we employ fool proof methods to wade off the same. In those times you will always have conversations going on in your mind. Sometimes conscious, while some other times completely unconscious. Your mind tries to analyze the situation, and give answers to your doubts.
I have been pretty tensed and confused about things at office lately and i really dont know which way to proceed or even if i chose a way i dont know how to be sure why to chose that particular way! There literally are battles in the mind and they sometimes bring out different emotions on the outside. I ask myself a question and then satisfy myself with an answer. And then my mind analyses why i chose to answer it that way and tries to find out if theres a better way to answer the same. That inturn gives rise to another answer and again another question and its answer and so on. I did an interesting thing today since i was so tired of thinking and thinking. Instead of letting the conversations in my mind go on, i just jotted down the thoughts as and when they appeared (with whatever answers my mind was making out). I dont say doing so gave me some kind of solution to my confusions but atleast having written it down, gave a kind of clarity to my thoughts. Some strange kind of satisfaction of finding answers to questions that keep arising in mind whenever my mind is at a constant thought process.
Questions in life dont always find the correct answer, actually there is no correct answer to so many questions that our mind comes up with, but still we go on. Even if we make some wrong decisions life just goes on to complete its destined journey. Having conversations with ourselves is as inevitable as Life and Death, but how we deal with it is what makes the big difference. As long as our life exists, our mind tends to continue its work and as long as it does that the conversation in our minds will never cease to exist. Let our conversations with ourselves do something Good for us.
Each new day starts with new desires new dreams and new ambitions. May be it does for everyone or may be it doesnt.
Talking to a friend yesterday a very basic topic sparked the conversation. Everyone wants to be Happy! So very true, Everyone just wants to be HAPPY. Is that so difficult? Is that something so very complicated to attain? I feel its not difficult to achieve Happiness, its just difficult to keep oneself satiated with the feeling of happiness. If i think of my days in New York, I have been staying away from the love of my life for a year now. I dont have close friends here whom i can jus go to and pour out my worries or pains. I dont have family members who can take care of me if i fall sick or am in need of any help. My company doesnt pay me a fortune to lead a luxurious life here. I dont have the BEST working environments and am so surrounded by office politics that i feel vulnerable to breakdown and lose. I am not even so very accustomed to this country that i can jus go places on my own. My brother stays in the same country but i havent been able to visit his place more than once in the last 1 year!! Life in a nutshell hasnt given me the optimum environment to be happy and enjoy a good life here. But still, i cant think of a single day when i had been extremely unhappy or depressed being here! Its jus that one learns to make the best of what is given to him/her. And when you learn that, you spontaneously learn to ask for more from life as well. Once you start enjoying your present circumstances, you think of ways to make it the best possible, to fill it with all the BEST things that you can afford at that stage! It is easy to just always be unhappy and longing for something or the other. But at the same time it is just as easy, to be satiated with whatever we have and enjoy it to the fullest. In our pursuit for making our lives better, for achieving the maximum of everything, We forget to enjoy the BEST of the present. Many will say that if we dont make attempts to make our lives better, others will be ahead of us and we will be left behind. The competition will eat us and not let us be happy! May be thats true as well, as i see people these days their race for being better and ahead of others starts much earlier than even the minute the first ray from the Sun hits the ground. Life is no doubt about the survival of the fittest, but at the same time it is all about being happy and enjoying all that has been bestowed on us.
I once heard it somewhere that the easiest thing to do in life is "To give advice to others". I am no one to give advice to anyone but am hoping that the few who ever get to read my post might know that i went thru quite much of experiences in my life and have learnt some bit about it. Life aint so complicated as we make it or think about it. Life aint about winning everytime cuz everything has its time. Life aint about planning so much about the things which are beyond our control cuz everything falls in place when we let HIM lead it for us. Life is just about living every moment every breath that has been given to us. Life is a blessing and we just have to Live.
Am reading a rather unusual book these days. Its called Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. I have just started reading it and as much as i have read, it depicts a custom common in China called Foot Binding. While reading itself i feel it sounds so brutal, that i cant imagine what pain is involved in each stage of the custom. Young girls at the age of six are forced to go thru a mandatory custom called foot binding which is a mandatory preparation for a girl to become perfect for her future husband and In-Law's family. It is painful and involves even breaking of the bones of the feet but is believed to give a girl the perfect small feet which is the most desirable trait for a girl to be married to a good family. Each of their foot is bent in such a manner that the toe touches the heel. After the foot is bent in such a painful position it is bound with tight bandages, and then some pointed shoes are forced into their feet in this awkward state and they are made to walk for some specific amount of time in those shoes. Some days into the process the bones in the toes start to break and blood oozes out of the broken areas! Picturing such a sight is beyond disgust. This procedure is believed to give women the perfect small and pointed feet which will raise their status in society and hence give them a good marriage from high society. I dont want to comment on the custom or the book right now but i was just thinking how lucky i am that i am not a chinese. I cannot imagine the pain that those girls will be going thru at such a tender age!
While reading all this i couldnt help but think why girls all over the world have to go thru something or the other to prepare for their future as wives? I was just thinking how scared i was when i was a small girl and i had to get my ears pierced! I couldnt help but smile when i thought about how much of a fuss i made over small things. I have always been scared of piercings...and i remember my parents struggling in those days to put earrings in my earlobes :) I still remember i was so scared that when the jeweller came the first time i cried and made a whole big scene, i was in my grandma's place then and the jeweller had a traditional equipment to do that! I cried so much that even the neighbours started asking what exactly was happening and why was i crying so much...and when they knew that it was just for piercing my ears...they all laughed at me and said you cant cry for such small things! But i was still small i was just 5 or 6 at that time and it was scary for me!! Back then i coudnt have imagined what pain a chinese girl would have gone thru at that age! Anyways finally i did not get my ears pierced that year and my parents used to buy the stick on or button earrings for me! Guess each culture has something to offer to girls as a preparation for their wedding! In india they say that the parents start preparing for a girl's marriage right from the day she is born! Thats a girl's life is it? The day she is born she starts her long journey of preparing herself for her wedding...making herself pleasing to others so that she should not suffer in her husband's family! I cant argue with why all these things happen only to a girl but i do sometiems muse about these customs and their origin.
How much ever you talk about the Women's liberation and equality for women etc etc...nothing changes at its Roots. I can still remember the days when i was just a small girl and my mom used to tell me to learn things cuz i was a girl. Its always so common to see indian mothers telling their daughters learn cooking, learn cleaning, learn to be patient learn to be tolerant etc etc. Ok if these are the qualities of a WIFE why cant the boys be taught everything from their childhood as well? Why dont they learn their responsibilities from their childhood? why is it so that the boys parents allow their boys to get as spoilt as possible and wait for their Daughter-in-Law to come. They expect the daughter-in-Law to come equipped with necessary qualities to correct their spoilt brat!? Why are the sons not taught the skills of treating a lady right, or caring for others or financial stability by saving for the future etc etc from their childhood, so that by the time they get married they are atleast ready to become true HUSBANDS? They being bachelors are allowed to do everything, go every place, eat and drink every spoilt thing but when a girl does the same things they say she wil not get a good groom if she continues to do that!! Why are their no rules or preparations for the groom but only for the bride?? I know many people will say that things like this dont happen in present days, and guys are better than what i am depicting above, but even i have crossed the stage where my parents were looking for alliances for me and i know how safe and pure a girl has to keep herself if she has to get married in a respectable manner to a good guy from a respectable family.
Anyways...reading about the unusual and painful tradition in China, i was just too stirred to remember my childhood days. I still remember how much of a doll i was to my dad, i was almost inseparable from him. To him i was the most precious thing he would thrive for in his life. I can imagine what he would have gone thru when he was giving my hands in another person's hand. All that he and my mom went thru in preparing me for this day was finally coming to happen. And i know soon i will be going thru the same circle of event that they went thru in their lives...thats the Circle of Life!
Strange but true...how many ever changes you challenge to impose on this one circle...the core of it remains same. Life is short and goes in a circle...we just keep shuffling ourselves from one circle to the other...while our life circle remains just the same!
