Time to move on

Farewells, goodbyes - these are never easy. There is so much to say, so many talks to talk, so many things to do, so many secrets to share, so many laughs unlaughed, so many memories never made. Yup, goodbyes are tough. Especially when they come one after the other, jamming up your calendar racously all pounding for their pound of your tears. Yup, goodbyes are never easy. Oft, they just land up - like unbidden cacophony from a neighbour's drill machine and demand their fair share of your attention like a phone that's ringing off the hook. But oft, they get lost in the humdrum of everyday life and vagaries of an ever-changing weather.


The year of the grand experiment (yes, am gonna stick to calling 2010 that!;D) was witness to a lot, from vada pav to mysore bhaji, from Bangalore to Ahmedabad (thanks to a spicejet flight detour!), from boss ke haath ke paranthe to behen ke haath ki chai! And many many goodbyes - some cementing old ties for times to come, some forever...But somehow in all that was happening or not happening around me, I lost track of time and of me..


Bam! Suddenly, its February,! Life is back to normal (or something like it), I am back to facebooking but somehow, in all this I got away from writing - again!

You know, but there is just this imp in me that doesnt give up (:D:D), so here it is - m moving my blog to http://eksaalbaad.blogspot.com/ Naya saal, naya din, naya energy (bad hindi! and late by a month!). Will keep hitting the keyboard for this one now!:-))

Endnote - reasons and seasons

The D-day has arrived. The year is up. This is it. Or is it?

One of my friends asked me - "was it worth it?"

Honestly, I don't know.

But I truly believe, life is worth it - all the choices and decisions we subject it to!

Of course, I have changed. It was supposed to be a life-changing experiment remember? Of course, I am not in touch with a lot of friends, people who at some point in my life were essential to my very existence...

But change is good and life is as much about letting go as about hanging on. As a wise lady once said, some walk into our lives for a reason, some for a season and that's that!

So I leave you to contemplate the mysteries of the universe while I continue to endeavour in my quest for self-discovery - one way or another, its the journey that matters!! ;D

Meow!

end end-note: Can't believe I took 45 minutes to pen this down! The holiday has made me rusty! But will park that for another day;-))

when time stops...or the essence of a deadline lies in the fulfillment of a quest!

Maybe a year is not enough,

Maybe a life is not enough..

Maybe the quest of our existence is not to find God or truth (as Gandhi believed) but to find ourselves..

And if for that we need a lifetime, maybe that's ok too!

The price of freedom

What makes a leader? Is it the ability to inspire? or is is merely old-fashioned didactism?

I don't know.

Fear, shock, anger - This week's events on the global stage have been outrageously horrifying to say the least. Are we well and truly free? Or is freedom a state-controlled myth? Does a leak of "sensitive" documents really give anyone, even the most powerful state in the world, to hound, threaten, coerce and as some leaders have suggested "assasinate" an individual for merely publicising something?

Is big brother just a television show? or did Orwell get it right and what he saw is no longer limited to the pages of his seminal work, 1984?

Is freedom of speech a myth? maybe the notion of freedom itself is a myth. For if, the United States as the biggest power needs to protect its "national security" so fiercely, what happens to the rest of the world?

Is this really about Wikileaks leaking sensitive documents or is this about how-could-one-organization-dare-to-bare-global-leaders-in-front-of-mere-mortals? How dare you, a fly, challenge the power and the flight of the eagle? 

I feel sick, saddened and sorry. This is the legacy we pass on to our children. Be powerful and you can do anything you want. Afterall, the world is a regulated, well-ordered stage where all the men, women and children are merely performers and the human race, though seemingly unshackled from the leagcy of imperialism and narrow caste-class-colour-based biases, remains a mute spectator to whatever has been decreed - whether by China (don't you dare attend the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honouring Liu Xiaobo) or US (just google wikileaks and the angst of US policymakers will flood your search). We are evolved you see and far superior to our poor ancestors who neither had the gifts of technology nor the ease of life we are used to. If in the process of an "easier", taken to be a synonym for 'happier', life we have to consent to minor adjustments like surrendering to state control, then so be it. Afterall, there really is no lasting harm.

Acton got it right, way back in 1887 - "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely!" 

Though he noted his this for individuals, and the effect of power on men in power, the phrase sums up the life and times of today as the distinction between leaders and states gets blurred - it is the individuals who define the character of the state.

Arm-twisting is the new norm and just as the line between individual power and state power gets blurred, the line between democracy and totalitarianism too becomes a blur. Afterall big brother does know best.

Is it Assagne who dictates the freedom of the press or is it Clinton?

You decide.

Pink - its my new obsession!;-)

For pink is the colour of fashion!

Yup, its that time of the year again - when the quilts come out and people vanish below them..When garam garam chai is best served with mathi and achar...when cakes are plummed up, not iced….When a morning walk is best walked at 11 and the day calls it a day at 6…when heaters warm frozen souls and welcome hugs thaw frozen hearts, Yes, its time to say hello to winters!! And here I am, in the heart of the capital, finally catching up with dilli ki sardi after a hiatus of 3 years. Admittedly, I was home for holidays, but this time it’s a season and not a reason that'll see me around!

Meanwhile, while Father Claus is getting ready for spreading Christmas cheer, and Delhi University is gearing up for ruining it with a mere week off to revel in the festivities (is that fair, I ask you??), this season, its not just red and green but definitely, clearly, strongly, pink! Specifically fushia if I may!!:D

Happy December my friend, the pinks will pink me up for sure!;D

Meow!

Chalte Chalte bas yun hi mujhe kuch kehna hai

एक मुठी ज़िन्दगी
दो भीगा ज़मीन
बस ऐसे ही कुछ मुख्दूं में है
कैद नसीब तेरा ...

वक़्त बदल जाता है
दुनिया बदल जाती है
कहने को तोह इंसान की
पहचान बदल जाती है l

पर मूढ़ के देखो तोह कुछ नहीं बदलता
किसी को हक नहीं तोह किसी को सहारा नहीं मिलता ...

ऐसे में एक जो है
वोह तुम ही हो खुदा
अपने आप की, अपनी किस्मत की
बस तुम ही हो दुआ ...

न छोड़ अपना साथ
कहते हैं मिआं
सितारून से आगे जहाँ और भी हैं
यहाँ सिअक्दों कारवां और भी हैं  ll

बस यूँ सोच लो की आगे मुकाम और भी हैं
सुनते सिमत्तेह हैरत-इ-होंसला और भी हैं ll

The boy who lived....

Oft in life, when we look back, all we see is a trail of broken promises - some effusive, some unsaid, unwritten. It is at times like this that a simple story of love brings home the truth of life itself - life is not about the broken promises, it is about the fact that there were promises and that by itself is promising!:-)

This is the story of love, of fear, hope, destiny, but above all, of a promise - a mother's promise to protect, nurture and save her child - a promise that forms the basis of humanity itself. From the sea of human suffering that washes over us everyday, this is the story that warmed my heart under the cold lights of a hospital room on a pre-autumn lazy, chatty Sunday afternoon..

Once upon a time, in a slum not so far away, there lived a boy. In a land known for the ills that plagued it in the post-monsoon rush for CWG "all-is-well" preparations, this slum, like many others, was witness to something more virulent during the life and times of the Delhi Games, something even more dangerous than Kalmadi himself, the smaller, ostensibly humbler, dengue bug with its brothers-in-arms chikungunya and malaria.

He, a tiny bundle, malnourished, was bitten. (We are still not entirely sure of the cause of his illness.) She, illiterate, knew not what to do. With a child almost certain to die, with not a paisa to her name, with a husband 'missing-in-action' for 3 full days, the decision was waiting to be made - to prepare for a burial or to venture into the unknown maze of city wheeling-dealings and claim life back for her child; the choice for this lady was clearly between sticking to being the passive wife or venturing ahead as an active mother.

One silver bangle was all she had when she set forth. That and the belief that her boy would live, had to live. They say, help comes to those who ask for it. And I believe, faith has no power like a mother possessed. In a city known for random rapes and chauvinistic autocratic autowallahs, it was a random autowallah who came to the rescue - a trip to one of the few hospitals with enough available facilities, in a locality far far away, with no expectation of being shabashed, he was in my eyes, a true hero. Not that she dint offer to pay, she did have the bangle you see, but a simple "behenji mujhe paap lagwana hai kya" before he rode off summed up that something bigger that we all hide in our hearts - the desire to be good, and that once in a very rare while manages to fight free of our facades of "worldliness" and "street-smartness" and translates into true heroism, acts that may be limited to our own private world but exalt us in our own eyes.

The hospital staff was quick to react and all red-tapism was forgotten as the whole universe rallied to save the boy - right from the nurses and the doctors who donated a part of their own salaries, to attendants who stayed back after duty-hours to help and offer moral support to the mother, to other patients who cheered the boy every time he managed a feeble soporific smile and the visitors who with medicines, clean clothes, their time and words of encouragement saluted the brave spirit of a simple, illiterate woman who knew only one thing - how to be a mother!

Sometimes in life, it is the little things that inspire - one silver bangle for instance...

Part 2

The rise of nations, the fall of fiefdoms, man on the moon and women's right to vote - among a lot of other developments, the rise of the human civilization in the last few centuries has been marked by these successes on the march towards perfection. The march to civilization has invariably been preceded by uncivilized behaviour!

Apart from close room wheeling and dealings, some active, some passive, mostly bloody developments have always been a part of any change - in ideas, in boundaries, in evolution. Note that here I am referring to the evolution of the human race and not Darwin's conception of the origins of man.

In a lot of literature then, evolution is marked by revolution - aka the shedding of some token blood at least, even if its just an assassination!

Early this week, I got a chance to be witness to some bigger, greater and more powerful at work than what has passed so far - I saw 'Soldiers of peace'...

In an era that is marked by hate and discord, by bombings and madmen posing as leaders, where caste/class/religion-based politics are the norm, or ethnic cleansing a part of a nation-state's identity itself, where nuclear knowledge is used as insurance and kickbacks by the armaments industry are vital to any government's survival, in a world where a lot seems to be topsy turvy, somewhere, suddenly, this came as a glimmer of hope and I hung on...

Agreed, the film is a simplistic look at definition of violence itself. Agreed, it puts too much faith in the individual himself and seemingly absolves governments of their responsibility to ensure, nurture, and sustain peace. But the film works. Watch it to believe me!

This part of the evolution of the human race is about a journey, a mindset, a "hate the sin and not the sinner", and sustainability of the planet is critical to sustainability of the human race itself, a literal "put yourself in the other's shoes", challenging the existence of the notion of the "other" itself!

Is this an evolution in the true sense of the word? Does it even make sense to be so naive, so simplistic? Are we really heading for a crisis otherwise? Can violence be replaced by constructive criticism and acceptance? Or by humane and imminently less bloody means of negotiation and reconciliation? Are we evolved enough to be able to play to rationality and not silly "I you" identities when it comes to issues of national and international importance?

I don’t know.

But I hope. And that, my dear friend, is good enough to start with!

Out of charge, out of mind and how evolution does not always lead to a revolution - Part 1

So, my laptop has been acting up. Nothing dramatic, just the new commonwealth bug I presume. Things don't work, fall apart, u know, the usual. So my beloved runs out of charge every two hours or so. Nothing unusual, you might comment, however, consider a wire-dependant net connection coupled with erratic electricity supply and a sneezing fit that refuses to go away and voila, you have the perfect Bhavana recipe for 'not being connected often enough' ::read that not logged in the whole freakin 24 hours::!!

Simply put, I am losing my mind over this - the limitations of technology, where mere thoughts are not enough to post on a blog, one has to physically log in and type; where mere images are not enough, one has to search/draw/paint/link whatever one is trying to depict; and where, on the eve of the Commonwealth Games, we are still grappling with one crisis after the other, rains notwithstanding! Argh!!!

Its wet when its not humid and traffic-jammed eternally in the capital city aka meri Dilli!

Yup, am the perfect image of the angry young woman right now!!!!

Yours,

cribby!

P.S. Of course, there are bright spots but the focussed person that I am, want to revel in the anger-phase a bit more so will dwell on those only in the next post, happy waiting and hating !!;P

Achoo! Atishoo!

You know why when we sneeze we say atishoo? We are simply asking for a tissue! :D:D

PJ Alert in reverse!! hehehe

One of my dear friends used to love to comment whenever asked to pass on a tissue - this tissue has issues!

But seriously, I mean, how horrid to be used so, to wipe anything from dirty hands to bat boogers, from soaking up split tea on the table to cover up a bleeding cut. A tissue's job description is the stuff either legends or your worst nightmare are made of! But it’s not ephemeral like Raymonds' “A complete man”! A tissue is v.much there, not that it has a choice, but still, its there and that is what matters..

Maybe, the naive simplistic creatures that we are, we arn't seeing it right. Maybe its not "use", but 'usefulness'? So we don’t use tissues but actually find them useful and extremely so? In their simplicity lies their "we can't do without them" relevance. This is akin to saying we don’t merely use water but find it critical to our existence....

If only a tissue could be man. Or men could be as good/useful/dependable/multi-facted as tissues:: sigh::, maine abhi tak shaadi kar li hoti, by God ki kasam!

yours,

sneezy! Hand me a tissue please!

Finally, Da Bangg!

when the crowd hoots as Sallu Bhai cracks open a door

and rolls with laughter when the evil men’s bones crack;

Where the wit has one asking for more

and the whistling sounds like part of the sound-track..

Where the lead actress is fully covered yet sizzling

and the item girl has a thousand men nuzzling..

Where the dialogues are rude, crass yet real,

Where the fight sequences look surreal

and an "ordinary" thanedaar has enough power to command ten cars

where a cop is corrupt yet fair

where the villains all look like grizzly bears

For that heaven of melodrama

I pray

Dear God, let Bollywood awake

Into that magic of movies, let Bollywood, forevermore break!

Amen!

P.S. Needless to say, I enjoyed Dabangg, lock, stock and barrel. Dear Bollywood, can we have more such completely unreal, surreally brazen-comic-book-style-action-sequenced, crassily-rustically-dialogued, magically-cutely-romantic yet realistic dramedies with mad-bad heroes please!!