it almost takes one and half hr for me to reach home from office. this is the time i utilise in retrospecting about the nagging yet neglected questions of my life - george clooney in ER or eric bana in troy or which is more preferable butter chicken /fried prawns. the shops, people, hoardings also grab my attention for sometime. once i noticed this ad by one of the insurance companies. it had the picture of a child and the caption was something like this 'for your child to have the perfect education, which is IIT then IIM get an insurance.' in india your dreams are almost fixed the minute you are born. if you are a girl at least u r given the choice of not having any career, but every second male aspires to join the coveted and much revered IIT. why is it so important to follow these stereotypes? why is your success measured in terms of which B school you graduated from? somehow fulfilling the simple pleasures like learning to float on your first swimming class is far more important to me than learning socially respected pretentious golf. i gave a real hard thought and have finally made the top 10 must do-list (the list is bound to change in 3 months time). here they are (arranged in no particular order):

1. marry anthony bourdain. if thats not possible then host a travel show in the manner of anthony bourdain.
2. trekking pindari glacier and reaching top of the peak and recording video saying i love my mom.
3. color my hair blonde.
4. have an affair with a french guy after i am forty.
5. retire in the himalayas. own a wooden house and behave like Mr. Heckles. of course die by 65.
6. act in an ekta kapoor serial with full make up and heavily sequined sarees and roll my eyes in front of the camera.
7. write a book. bit of ayn rand, virginia woolf and j k rowling.
8. join interpol and be an undercover spy with a cool background music.
9. convert to kabbalah.
10. dress like 18 th century jane austen heroines.

i have many more on my list and i am sure there will be more to add in the future. i agree many of these are unrealistic. but i choose to not to make my dreams a toothpaste like mass product.