An excerpt from Shantaram

“The soul has no culture. The soul has no nations. The soul has no colour or accent or way of life. The soul is forever. The soul is one. And when the heart has its moment of truth and sorrow, the soul can’t be stilled.

One of the reasons why we crave love and seek it so desperately is that love is the only cure for loneliness and shame and sorrow. But some feelings sink so deep into the heart that only loneliness can help you find them again. Some truths about yourself are so painful that only shame can help you live with them. And some things are just so sad that only your soul can do the crying for you.”

Good bye old friend....

One of the greatest phenomenons of our time has finally come to an end. “Harry Potter”... nothing I write would suffice to say what a profound place it held in my life… Well I have to say good bye anyhow…. So well here are the se7en things I’d like to say for you dear friend:

1. I know it’s a fantasy but how I wish to live in a constant repudiation of the prosaic reality in favor of this fantasy!!!!!

2. If it were all for real, then the one person I’d have liked to be…would be Severus Snape. Harry and Voldemort come at a close second. However if asked to select and idol.. I think I’ll have to go with Harry -:D

3. Hermione is the best friend, Dumbledore the greatest mentor and McGonagall the best teacher one can ever have… and anyone would be lucky to have brothers like Fred and George, parents like Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Godfather like Sirius and a Ginny to love -:P.

4. The bonds with all these characters run so deep that when some of them died, it felt as if an integral part of my own existence had been lost.

5. It is painful to realize that it has finally come to an end, that there is no more magic to look forward to. Well I bade you a poignant farewell guys.

6. Harry Potter’s been one of the closest friends I ever had. I just hope my love for you never fades, and I take it with me to the very end.

7. And at last Thank You J.K.Rowling, for giving us Harry Potter. It truly was a magical experience growing up with him. It’s an honor to have lived in a time when Harry Potter was written and published. -:)

This one seriously is NERDY.. :P :D

Our actions, decisions, thoughts go a long way. Even the tiniest of effort on our part may have a profound effect on the entire system. I say this in the wake of a realization that why it is that we do what we do at my internship in my department. I always thought it had something to do with increased productivity, but well that was more wrong than right. Though increased production will be an outcome in the long run, work measurement is basically intended to bring about a balance in the activities. Work measurement of a process gives out the entire work content of that process in terms of time taken(including allowances for fatigue etc.) for a qualified worker to do that job given he were doing it all alone. Now that might look a bit absurd at the beginning for in an industry never is a process, a one man activity. But then this time content gives the production department a general idea as to how many men are required to do that activity if the cycle time for that process were fixed, while ensuring maximum involvement of every single person involved in the process for that cycle. This is of significant consequence when that process is one of many on an assembly line, for the lack of proper manpower allocation for every single station may result in an imbalance b/w the cycle times of various activities taking place on the line. This in turn will lead to regular stoppages of the line which would then result in a delayed production. Now all that jargon later what I mean to put forth is that, work measurement verifies the demand for manpower made by various departments. So we see that a thing as simple and mundane as time study to measure the work content of a process, can lead to a person securing or not securing a job. Now one job is of no serious consequence to an entire plant but for that particular individual it might as well be the means of providing for a family who have no one else to look up to save him.

Now that is thinking a bit on the extremes but it’s possible nevertheless and though this realization doesn’t change the fact that work measurement is a highly boring job and I wouldn’t do it given other options, it does bring out a certain appreciation for the fact that our actions might have an effect, way far-reaching than we can imagine.

On a side note though I know it all looks very nerdy but then a very nice person whom I’ve known for quite some time now, said to me once that it’s your blog. So does it matter what others think of what you write there? :P :P

To Heaven And Back

When I come to the other side of the bright light I’d like to meet strangers whom I can instantly call friends.

When my eyes adjust I’d like to see myself standing in a small children’s park, very small one, hidden from the world, it's floor covered in dried leaves and broken twigs, old dust covered swings, a small bench shaded by leaves.

When I look around I’d like to see the familiar, smiling faces, the ones that accompanied me here.

When exhaustion overwhelms me I’d like to be reminded that I can sleep here and now... It’s home.

And when my eyes burn with tears I’d like to be reassured that don’t worry you’ll find us all here and everything the same when u come back........

The Path Ahead...

Very recently the realization hit me that I am 20 years old... I’m about halfway through my B.Tech.. And in 2 years I’ll be on my own. I’ll have to fend off for myself. And I got apprehensive about the rate at which the time was passing... I thought it was all happening too fast.. What if I am not ready to look out for myself, to face the challenges in life??? And I found myself wishing for the time to stop, for the things to stay the way they are, to know people as they are now. Life’s simple right now, not much worries, and troublesome issues when examined meticulously are no issues at all. Future on the other hand is uncertain and to a good extent chaotic.. Now I am a great admirer of chaos but what if it gets on my nerves.. Am I ready to work towards that one purpose?? Do I have that level of competence?? Troubling questions but I found the answers and comfort in an unexpected sort of way.

I came back home and just this morning I saw my one year old cousin crawling up the stairs on his knees, running around on his tiny legs, happily pointing at unimportant objects. To quote Meredith “How do we get from there to here??” I don’t know... Watching him made me very happy and then thinking about it later made me write this. It gave me hope. That tiny guy can’t think or understand much, he is much more vulnerable than me, and yet he is growing up every second, he doesn’t realize it but his body does and it’s not afraid. It is inevitable and to wish to the contrary would be unnatural and selfish. And it’s not just inevitable its necessary. However beautiful the present might look to us we have to make that foray into the uncharted waters of future, in order to understand, to become what we want to. I realized that its not always essential to be ready for everything, we are in a constant phase of learning, and we’ll just learn to fend off for ourselves in due time. We have to delve into that chaos to find the peace of our mind, and we’ll just learn to control our nerves. All that I am required to do is to let go of the fear and just go about it normally.

I’ve frequently heard, man comes and goes alone.. The latter part I disagree with, he takes at least one thing with him, Memories. They are the treasures we accumulate over our entire life and its something that no one except us, not even God has claim to. And we need them, to quote Dr. Christian Shepherd “to remember and let go”. Looking back I realized that all the memories that acquired were only because I grew up and if I made rest now wouldn’t I miss on all the memories that I will gather over the course of my lifetime.. Now that’s something unaffordable.. They are too precious to be thrown away and compromised with.. I think I can let go of my fears now, I know that there will be time when I get worried and feel unsure about I future, the apprehensions will always be there, but I am sure I’ll be able to let go and move on.. I guess that’s what “Growing Up” means......

Reunion.............

I sit on a starry night on a cliff watching the clouds drift over the full moon....plunging me into darkness and then pulling me out...... A cool mountain breeze blows over ruffles my hair..... It has a familiar touch... I haven’t seen anything so idyllic in a long time..... Its an escape from the facade of a controlled existence, from a life governed by purpose..... This is one of the most serene moments of my life but it has a sort of incompleteness about it...... I look back on my life and I suddenly realize that it has been a very long and tiring journey that has led me here. I am suddenly overcome by fatigue, I feel old, I feel that I have been transported here somehow...I try and think how but can’t remember....I can’t remember how long I’ve been here.... I look around once again for any sign of existence for the umpteenth time and once again all I see is the panoramic beauty.....the majestic mountains kissing the clouds, the wind howling through the woods and the river roaring as it flows..... It all looks familiar....and yet I can’t seem to remember how..... I can hear familiar voices inside my head...... calling out to me....they fill me with a feeling of calmness and completeness....Is this all inside my head??? Is it a dream....the voices continue to grow inside my head.... and yet how can they be inside my head...they seem to be coming from every direction...they bring back faded memories..how long has it been???? I rush towards them into the woods....and the voices have stopped and the vacuum returns...I keep walking...now its a kaleidoscope of memories.... I can’t see a thing.....its as if I have been blindfolded...I have no sense of time or direction..I keep moving.....noiselessly it starts raining..I can only feel the soft touch of the drops, not their sound...the world has become surprisingly quite.....its as if a barrier broke down...now its an avalanche of thoughts, emotions, memories.....I can hear you, hear all of you....I feel something warm trickle down my cheek..... I am sorry I let u fade.....I am sorry I can’t make up for all the lost time......how do I kno I lost all the time, I don’t kno......I just did lose it all......and then I hear all of you..more clearly than ever.....u are not angry....u are just calling me to yourselves.....u say u forgive me...u say I needn’t worry....that this is home...... I feel the chaos inside me ebbing away.....the feeling of calm and peace and contentment returning and I suddenly realize how I kno this place.... I have been here in someone else’s dream.....I am now running toward the source of the voices and I suddenly burst outside the darkness and into an area flooded wth the brightest and warmest light I have ever seen....I it fills me up..I can feel it running through me....and I open my eyes and see all of u there....smiling, beckoning me over.......this is home.....u have all been thinking about me, waiting for me......home is where someone thinks of you.....my eyes are flooded wth tears.....I am not able to express how happy I am to see u all once again....I just want to tell how badly I have missed u all but I am unable to speak....I just feel myself drifting towards you.......in your arms..... I kno I have found my closure.....and I kno its time to move on................................

...................From My Childhood................

Excerpt from ‘The Time Traveller’s Wife’
“One of the best and most painful things about time travelling has been the opportunity to see my mother alive. I have even spoken to her a few times; little things like “Lousy weather today, isn’t it??” I give her my seat on the El, follow her in the supermarket, and watch her sing. I hang outside the apartment my father still lives in, and watch the two of them, sometimes with my infant self, take walks, eat in restaurants, go to movies. It’s the ‘60s, and they are elegant, young, brilliant musicians with all the world before them. They are happy as larks; they shine with their luck, their joy.

I see how my mother is with me. Now she is pregnant, now they bring me home from the hospital, now she takes me to the park, now she takes me to the park in a baby carriage and sits memorizing scores, singing softly with small hand gestures to me, making faces and shaking toys at me. Now we walk hand in hand and admire the squirrels, the cars, the pigeons, anything that moves. “

Reading this just made me want to go back in time and see what my parents were like when I was this young, what did I use to do when I was young, how did they spend time with me then, what would they be like then? Now it’s not like I haven’t seen the photographs of those times or don’t know what they looked like back then. It’s just that how was life for them back then?? I just think there can't be any other form of love that is as unconditional, chaste, and pious as the love parents have for us. I don’t think anyone is able to experience the level of happiness parents feel when they first set eyes on us, unless he/she becomes a parent himself/herself. If we stop and think it’s unfair for the chid not to be able to comprehend or understand what his parents feel for him at that time but somehow he/she does feel their happiness. And I think comprehending or understanding is rendered useless when we hear our parents’ account of our childhood. The reality couldn’t have been as beautiful as their account, partly because you share their joy of telling these anecdotes in hearing them, partly because parents’ version makes it more soothing than understanding it back then could ever have been. Just try and picture that one moment of your baby self playing or laughing at nothing in particular and no one else to watch, but them. At that moment they are oblivious of everything in the world because at that moment you are their world, nothing is more important to them in that one instant except your smile. Whatever problems they might have in life, becomes secondary to that one moment of your happiness. I remember one of Anupam Kher’s dialogues which he says in response to Ranbir’s question “Why did you stop taking photographs papa when it was your passion?” his reply was “you grew up son and had no more time for pictures and for me photography meant taking just your pics.” I’ve seen my pictures when of my one year old self sitting in my mum’s lap on a boat in Nainital, my dad sitting alongside. I don’t remember myself looking cuter than that ever, don’t remember mum looking more beautiful and dad looking more handsome. Talking of cuteness I remember one or two pictures with Mona. There’s this one where she is shouting at me, one where I have my toy pistol aimed at her. Photographs are the best way to preserve memories, just thinking of them makes you smile but they do bring some poignance with them. You look at them and think that life cannot go back to being that simple, that beautifully ignorant and innocent, but that’s the beauty of childhood memories, the tears they bring are not of sadness but of hope and contentment that true happiness does exist in the world and it's right there inside ourself, we just need to reach for it.