The last book of the 'Twilight Saga' and possibly the worst. The first three books were wonderful, flawless - they had a rhythm to their pace and they were very gripping. Come Breaking Dawn and I got this feeling that Stephanie Meyer (SM) herself had no idea how she should go on, like maybe the story suddenly stopped flowing in her head, like she had the writer's block and still she wrote, just to get on with it!

Her conflicts were all over the place. It seemed like she just drifted past each obstacle; in a sense she was very superficial. She never did address the crux of each event that she created. All the issues that came up were resolved instantly without any struggle. And where there should have been a struggle like perhaps Bella dealing with herself being a newborn - that part was skipped right away. Bella was born the perfect vampire, no struggle at all. There was no drive in the story.

She was very repetitive too! There has to be a recap of the previous books, sure but it should have been done subtly and not taken up pages and pages of the novel. If i wanted to know what happened in those books, I would've just read them. Also her vocabulary seemed to be limited. If Bella was "stubborn, plain", then Edward had "a smooth velvet voice" and Jacob always had a "fist of rage" and they all seemed to be "wary" very often! I had to re-look up my definition of the word "wary" after I read in how many different contexts it seemed to have been used by SM in the book.

I got disinterested in the middle of Book Two of Breaking Dawn. In my opininion, the Twilight series stopped being a fantasy series at 'Ecplise'. Breaking Dawn was purely fanfiction - the favourite characters were happy in the end like she's named her last chapter "The Happily Ever After"  so she can keep her fans happy. It stopped being a story SM wanted to write and became one that her audience wanted to read. She killed her own story and lost a lot of fans, me being one of them.

It’s raining outside – a good sign in this time of drought but it doesn’t personally feel  too good. My feet feel cold as I take in a particularly long drag. I feel my senses awaken as the smoke hits my head.  My heartbeat increases. The rain falls down harder and faster and my hands clutch the wheel as though it were my dying mother.  My head is spinning now. The traffic gets worse. A white Maruthi drives itself into the sidewalk a little ahead. There is chaos. My heart is racing at this point and my senses are so awake that I can feel every beat, one after the other, throbbing against my chest like a wild creature trying to escape. Sounds of horns all around me of vehicles trying to meander their way around the accident, anxious to get home, seem heightened, and echo into my ears.  My head seems to be in unison with my heart, hammering in tune with its beats, making it difficult for me to even blink.  Everything but time moves in slow motion, like my life thus far.

As I inch forward in this utter chaos, Fear hits me like the smoke did. That is what my heart was trying to get away from: fear. Fear of being ridiculed in front of someone I look up to. Fear of having him look at me in a disappointing sort of way. Fear of having my already shitty college look even shitter in front of all those intellectual people. Fear of being tongue-tied, of losing control of myself when questions are being thrown at me like light bolts. I suddenly realise that I am not prepared mentally and physically to face all those people. I don’t have a presentation ready. The paper is beginning to fade in my head. It’s getting too cloudy up there with all the smoke and all the Sims. The lens seems to be getting out of focus.  And I have exactly seven days to get back on track and chisel the wood. Is there still time, or is it already too late?

On another brief visit to Ahmedabad recently, I lived at the MICORE guest house. It was a pleasant experience. I got to see peacocks that would dance for me in the rain, langoors randomly crossing the roads; I found and tried Sosyo, an exotic soft drink that used to be sold around India in the times when Coca Cola was banned. I finally had the Pav Bhaji at Honest that I always wanted to but couldn’t make it. I got to watch at least two movies during my brief visit there: Harry Potter, unfortunately in Hindi, and Luck, which was so horrendous that I left during the interval. I also paid visits to my Paying Guest apartment and met all my friends there. I looked for my water-bottle that I left in my room, I guess, like many of my other water bottles, it was either stolen by one of the girls or by the langoors. there was one peculiar thing that I noticed about this city though. Like Pune, this place is also a two-wheeler city. But what struck me odd was that all men and women, wore dupattas/scarfs/pieces of cloth arounf their face instead of just buying and wearing a helmet! They reminded me of moslem women in hijabs, somewhat!

I worked a lot too. I wrote out a 4000 word document that included analysing 130 questionnaires. It was tough fitting all that into 3 days. Tough indeed. But it was a fruitful visit, all in all. I got my cheque of Rs 6000 and my certificates also! I’m glad I did this internship and enjoyed working hard for a change.