Quick Tales, courtesy the Griff

Peter Griffin sends this notice. Do please participate, everyone, and tell your friends.
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Hi all,

We're delighted to be able to tell you about this contest we have just got up and running. We're presenting it in partnership with LiveJournal, one of the oldest, most respected names in the community blogging world.

It's a pretty simple challenge we have here, one that will particularly appeal to all the fiction writers among you, but not too intimidating for those of you who like other forms of writing to give it a bash.

Can you tell a quicker, snappier story than anyone else? Would you care to pit your story-telling abilities against those of your peers?

Quick Tales, the LiveJournal - Caferati Flash Fiction contest, asks you to tell us a story in 500 words or less. On offer: delicious cash prizes, global visibility and the chance to be part of a book.

You probably know what Flash Fiction is all about - we have run Flash Fic contests for the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival for the last three years, and FF tags and memes have been floating around the blogosphere for ages - but, just in case you do need a few starting tips, see this page: http://livejournal.caferati.com/contests/what-is-flash-fiction/

The contest is open to residents of India who are members of LiveJournal's India Writing community. (If you're not an LJ member, joining is free. Click the "Create a LiveJournal Account" link at the top of any LJ page.) The theme is "Journal," and your deadline is 7th September.

Prizes? The top 5 winning entries take home cash prizes of Rs 19,999, Rs 16,000, Rs 12,000, Rs 8,000 and Rs 4,000, respectively. And the rest of the top ten get paid accounts on LJ for one year. Each of the top 100 entries will also be highlighted on LJ's India Writing community - http://community.livejournal.com/india_writing/ - for the world to see. (Short-listed stories may also be included in a book that LiveJournal plans to publish at a later date.)

Go straight through to our Quick Tales microsite - http://livejournal.caferati.com - for all the details, and don't forget to join India Writing, which is the place where all the updates will be happening. Live Journal has more plans for writers in all languages in India, and that community will be HQ.

We'd also be very, very grateful if you chose to tell your friends about it, and, if you have a blog or personal site, or are a member of other writing communities, to link to the site - http://livejournal.caferati.com - as well.

Good luck, and we hope to see your entry soon!

Peter, Manisha and Annie
Editors & moderators, Caferati

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http://www.caferati.com/

An unfortunate picture exercise

I really don’t know how to describe my picture, it was of a man serving cakes to a little girl in a dinning room (or so I thought) but here’s the end result. And Rimi di hope you get well soon and become your usual roaring self in no time.

Tamosha couldn’t believe that this was indeed happening. She had been awaiting this day restlessly for so long and now that she was finally there, dinning in a five star hotel soon to meet Sharukh Khan, the little girl didn’t know where to hide her excitement. Mr. Sharukh Khan was in Kolkata for a charity event and a letter had reached her school stating that he wanted to meet few terminally ill children and spend a day with them. Tamosha didn’t understand what ‘terminally ill’ meant, but she knew that the words qualified her for she had heard them often enough to realize that.
The Reception at Sonar Bangla had been nothing less than royal. The multi-course lunch was unlike anything Tamosha had ever seen. She had even worn make-up and played at being a grown up. Her parents would have never approved of that! She was missing school again, but that wasn’t unusual, with blood transfusions lined up every month things weren’t exactly in her hands. But this was probably the first time she was enjoying the preferential treatment she received. Regular absence from school often made it difficult for her to keep up with the school curriculum but her teachers never scolded her the way they did others and she almost resented the partiality. She grew angry at the feelings of inadequacy this aroused in her. Her parents said she treated different was because she was special but Tamosha was a big girl now and she knew that it was not because of what she was but it was because of what she was not. She didn’t fit in her class, she wasn’t ‘normal’ like the other girls, and she envied them for it.
Tamosha had felt death when her grand mother died and it had made her recognize how vulnerable life was. It also brought the realization that she too would one day be what her grandmother had become, rings, bangles, perfumes and a wooden almirah full of sarees. She too would metamorphorise into some physical objects that would stand out as a rude reminder of a lost self. Was it then strange that she couldn’t never really write anything in her “my aim in life” essay? The future seemed like a dark void, they never talked about it at home.But meanwhile she smiled, and the little lines on her temple gave way to two charming dimples that blossomed on her cheeks. Hmm…the muffins were going to be delicious.