Hobbies - Then and now

This is a write up I prepared for a competition in WOW(Women of Wipro). That's a crazy link they provided - I'm not able to submit it ... Despite cutting it short to fit their word count. Baad mein jao competition, here is the complete article as I wrote in the first go.


When does a person actually take time to sit and think about his hobby? Frankly put, I would say when he has to fill up any application forms, and mostly that will be tailored to sound just perfect for the post that is applied for. The hoppy thus becomes professional! It loses its whole definition (The dictionary defines hobby as an activity or interest pursued outside one's regular occupation and engaged in primarily for pleasure). Looking at the fast pace at which the world keeps changing it’s a fact that when people get stuck in the rat race of moving on, they hardly find time to keep track of their interests. The struggle for existence takes priority over ones passion. Hence he has to actually think hard before answering that tricky question – What’s your hobby?

That’s the generic way of putting it. Talking about me, my interests are short lived which I justify as an invincible element of growth. There was a time when philately, currency collection, why even empty matchbox collection fancied me. My day was done if I manage to do a high profit exchange with my classmates and trust me that would be a serious affair and we used to have mediators for each transaction. After I got into my high school, Nancy Drew, Hardy boys and Famous Five took most of my time. That was like an addiction for me. Thanks to my school library, they had the entire collection. My college curriculum put a big loud full spot on my reading. That was when Music fascinated me. I had a brand new CD player and good huge speakers at my disposal. I liked to roam and my two- wheeler gave me all the freedom to roam around in town and most importantly, come home late. Soon after landing up with a comfortable job, my culinary interests took over everything else. I used to spend a lot of time thinking of what to cook in the evening. The liveliness and colors of a big city lured me and I loved going out to eat and shop. When I was suddenly left with lot of money and ample spending options for the same, the shopping freak in me gets all what’s needed. As time passed my definition of travel also expanded its boundaries. I got chances to travel in and out of the country both officially as well as personally.

Now that I have spent four years here, I feel that I have outgrown many of my interests. And as my age demands, I started paying more attention to my fitness and weight. I was never so keen about maintaining good physique but as the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. So I spend a good amount of my time exercising which I enjoy doing. Since I chose aerobics, I don’t feel that as a compulsion. It’s good to move to the fast rhythms and nice to see quick results. And most importantly it’s not an individual item. When coupled with simple yoga postures in the end, it takes care of you mind and body as a whole. It’s not about losing weight, not even about becoming trim – it’s just a feel that you are healthy and fresh. At the end of a session, you feel light and if you take a brisk walk out, it’s just perfect. Every day in the morning, you don’t have to spend 15 minutes of your time juggling in your wardrobe trying to decide which dress to wear for the day that will make you look slim and hide your tummy. After all it’s nice to have a hobby that you love doing with great rewards as bonus.

Apart from that there is one thing that has caught my attention lately - photo collage. I take time to get the pictures printed out, arrange it in stick albums or get it framed with nice tags. And since that has become my gifting trend to almost all the occasions to anyone I know, I get teased enough by my friends. No matter what, everyone will enjoy those rare moments of theirs to be framed. And although it’s a habit with me, it’s always new and special to person receiving it. It’s like going back to your school days when you work with glue sticks and paper cuttings.

Moving on to my next pastime, I have suddenly become a cleanliness jerk! I have always believed in a little amount of mess. When my mother used to scold when I was a kid for not arranging my things properly, I used to say that I love to place all the things messed up around me. It was usual for me to pile and push all my clothes into the wardrobe and close it with maximum pressure before anyone comes to my room just to hide him/her from the horror of the first-look of my room. But things have now started changing, maybe again as I believed, part of growing up. I take time in cleaning up my room, arranging things in place. I love to play the perfect host for a dinner with neatly kept curtains with the guest room spic and span!

I feel that the remnant of a good reader is still in me and I have started to pen down my thoughts in my blog. I update my blog more frequently these days and with more sincerity. Although I started it just like an email-ID, it has more or less become my identity. My readers count has increased and I treat it like a personal diary of mine.

Thanks to my fiancé, I have now started to appreciate some of the all time classics of Hollywood. I was always a passive movie watcher, and the very thought of watching an English movie continuously from start to end without missing a dialogue used to make me feel bored. I started to watch the most popular of English movies and should say, couldn’t just help appreciating them. So these days, I love to spend some time to watch the evergreen classics from time to time.

Apart from all these, I love to walk and to observe people. I no more complain about bus not being on time or the busy traffic since the place around never remains static. The street vendors, the aunty sitting next to me in the bus, the nasty motorcyclist, the unruly rikshaw driver – all become the characters of my instant play. I have overlooked the beauty of all other places, with a simple self judgment that no place can match the beauty of my hometown. Not that I have suddenly changed my mind, but I have opened myself to explore and admire the intricacies of my surroundings.

Above all, I believe in activity. I feel that one should be always busy to avoid any tensions. Choosing a hobby is a personal taste. But to make a healthy individual, one who is physically fit as well as mentally stable, there has to be something happening around him. Each individual has to pursue a hobby of their interest different from their work on a routine basis to maintain the vigor in life - That spark that keeps him going!