p4poetry.com

A new web-site that has opened as recently as April 2008 and known by the name http://www.p4poetry.com has suddenly come up on the cyber-space. Owned by Raj and Renuka Halve, this website aims to promote Indian poets writing in English or any of the vernacular languages. It provides a platform to anyone with the yen to write verse. I joined up about a week ago, and have posted only one poem so far. However, I was in time to attend their first-ever Meeting in Mumbai held in the evening on Saturday 10th May at "Pause" a Wine resto-bar located in Bandra. Present at this meeting were the owner couple, the webmaster Vikash, their colleague Preeti Datar (who I have had the privilege to know earlier through www.writing.com), and about 12 others, among them, a professor of English, a software consultant, a professional writer-poet (a Sikh who writes absolutely lovely Hindi verse), another Pediatrician (Dr. P.V. Vaidyanathan), and others. After formal introductions, we had a poetry-reading session. I had the pleasure to hear some beautiful Hindi poems. Above all, the experience was unique because of its venue - a lovely place to hang out. Incidentally, it is owned by the Halves (read that as the plural of Hal-vay).

I read "Child's Lament" and a small comic poem as my contribution. The best poems were read by the Sikh poet and the English professor, a lady. I hope to establish more contact with all these worthies in the days to come. The plan is to have at least one poetry reading every month.

Inas appears for a group discussion and interview

Some of you may be aware, at least, that I have a daughter, all of 17 years of age by the name of Inas. She was all set to enter the world of medicine as a student, but about a month ago, after talking to a relative who works in the HR department of Taj Group of Hotels, Mumbai, she has increasingly shown interest in becoming a hotel management graduate! To keep her interested in this line, and to divert her from medicine, was never our, the parents' goal, but we could not help her getting completely enamoured by the attractive profession of being a manager in a five-star hotel. Thus, I secured for her a book with general knowledge questions to read, and at the same time, bought application forms from three HM colleges in the city. She studied eagerly, and appeared for the written entrance examination of one of these colleges on the 4th of May. This was followed by a "Group Discussion" and then, a personal interview where the principal and one of his friends asked her a few questions and so on. This got over yesterday. Now, we must wait for the results of the exams ...

I have a sweet friend called Stephania, who is a little under 16 years of age. She has set her heart on writing a blog. It has been fun to teach her, via Google Talk on how to create a blog. I am using my own blog to show her how things are done. She is a keen student, and is learning fast. In between, she probably yearns to take a sip from her dad's beer bottle! She swears, waxes lyrically, pauses, looks utterly confused (I mean, her words sound as if she is utterly confused) and it is finally, I think, dawning on her as to how to create her profile.

It seems that the first long introduction she wrote never got saved, so she is having to write a new one again! I am still with her on GTalk as I write this blog entry ...

Okay, here is the link to her blog: Stephania's Blog

Looks like she just completed her profile ... let me read it!

Okay: here is what she says: Well, I'm funny, friendly, good with people, love learning new things. I have the willingness to experiment, pretty open to ...

Go ahead, and check out the rest!