Your happiest moment :

While filling slam books in school, I’d often run across this question. And my answer would inevitably be: When strangers to me call me by name.

Today I was talking to a friend of mine whom I call Puchku. He is one of the 5 people I had sent my book to. Apparently he was with a friend of his Moon (whom I happen to know through him) and a common friend of theirs - say Sun . I have never met any of them in my life.

So, there they were- chit-chatting at Frescos, with some nice tiramisu and pints of beer. Somehow, my name dropped in and each one said how they enjoy reading my blog. ( I have never talked to Sun so didn’t know about his patronage. I have talked to Moon quite a few times and she’s really generous with compliments and has even asked me to take up writing professionally )
Incidentally, Puchku happened to carry my book ( along with a couple of guitar plectrums, a math book, a novel, a radio, a walkman, a laptop etc etc).
Moon said she liked reading my blog. Sun opined that somehow he liked my previous posts more ( sorry about that, after my book got published, I got a bit conscious and had been trying to be “politically correct” for sometime. It’s lethal for my writing I guess. Will give it up soon . )

Moon concluded that if 3 people who never met this gal are talking about her blog, sitting in an Italian pub, then she ought to be SOMETHING.


Lol. I don’t know about that. But yeah when I got to know about that incident, I felt I was having some tiramisu myself. The taste of a heavenly dessert sure filled my mouth

It happened a year back too. I was at Pizza Hut with a friend when someone recognized me and asked if I were “Aparna Kar”. Now a person’s name is the sweetest melody to him/ her. And I really love being addressed by my full name. ( One of my friends knows it- and he calls me “Aparna Kar”. Rarely Aparna or Appu but mostly “Aparna Kar”. )
And of course the offer I got at an ad agency because the creative director happened to view my blog.

When strangers to me call me by name: has still remained my happiest moment.
Recognition comes a lot later. You have to dedicate yourself to a cause, pursue it with passion; as if you needed it like the air you breath in.
I did nothing really- except do what comes to me naturally: write.
And when people come up to me and say: You know what’s the best thing about your book? After I was finished reading it, I felt I had just met somebody, somebody I’d like to meet again.
Or someone says that I wept while reading the post titled XYZ. Or someone from California or Manchester or Timbuktoo wants to purchase my book because they feel they could empathize with what I scribbled- I feel elated and humbled at the same time.

And it makes me love what I do- because I know, somewhere it is bringing a smile to a face. Even if you consider it dhopper chop, id est, total bakwaas :P