And the King departed...

The Aura has ascended, away from the physical world, up to the greater world which must have yearned for it since long. It belongs to the King who blessed several lives for 75 years, and will rule several hearts forever.

This King built his mighty empire of ideals, principles, genius, knowledge and loads of affection in all those great years. A month ago he left it in the hands of his 8 princesses, who took it to faraway corners of the country. And further we, the grand-kids, blessed with a tinge of his genius, continue to expand his empire.

In the calm town of 'Kolaras' near Gwalior, Nanaji grew up to be this wonderful lawyer 'Advocate Chintamani Jain'. Such was his genius, agility and impact that dawn of his 70s could not stop his practice. His growing storehouse of knowledge impressed me whenever I visited his libraries: the personal with myriad flavors ranging from PG Woodhouse and Jefferey Archer to Premchand and Maxim Gorki along with the pious Jain literature, and the Advocate's with racks and racks of books which all appeared same to me!

All the visits to nanaji's place had this in common: as soon as you enter the front graden, a loud, enthusiastic call, with that unique tone of kiddish affection was the first voice you heard; then 2 coarse, hard hands, caressed your cheeks, which was the first touch you recieved and finally the owner of this voice and hands soon planted a lovely kiss on your forehead. Irrespective of you being a teen or an adult, you could not resist the child in you! Can't help but miss it.....that feeling of assurance and protection.

I remember my latest meetings with him, as travel enthusiast Nanaji planned trips to visit his daughters and their children too! He could not feel prouder and happier looking at his grand -children ascending up their family and career ladders. As much he spoke with pride of his kids, the prouder I feel when I introduce myself as his granddaughter.

How much I write about him, his grandeur was unsurpassable. I sometimes secretly fantasized of my future family meeting him, while myself feeling proud of my own descent! But the sudden call of fate did not even let me see him for the last time. I now can just wish that our paths cross again in these cycles of life.

Though I knew it before, but still the truth has fallen upon me, and asking me to take moments out to caress the roots of your being, your self, and to take time off to get lost in the adorable lap of grandma or the experienced talks of grandpa....before they depart!

Mumbai->Bangalore, t->th

The long hands of fate have finally managed to pull me away from the '6 year old haven' and put me in this city, now called Bengaluru. Yes, I haven't been able to find any associating adjectives for this city yet. I have, knowingly or unknowingly, been trying to draw comparisons, and romanticizing about the 'enervated link'. When the link was flourishing, I sometimes just 'stood still' admiring the 'always running road' visible from the big balcony of my hall. While it kept telling me that life goes on and on....I moved on.
I no more belong to it, and now, I can empathize with all my friends and acquaintances who had had this experience.
New links are still in the process of development. A few things I could think of when I entered the new city: how careful I used to be while spelling the names of my gult friends, taking care of all the th's and a's. But now all t's are th's and I just feel lucky to have no t's in my name. It does help me escape the uncontrollable annoyance when one finds a modified version of one's most possessed identity. Silence of the night, and even the day, makes me nostalgic about the days when I wanted some peace around. I now yearn for some noise around, some more communication. Another one as expected is the weakened language links, which I have to learn to live with or to manage with.
This is all for the day 1 experiences of parting from the old and meeting the new, hoping to find the optimistic me here again!

PS: Just realized the first optimistic point. This experience helped me get back to my most satiating past time : writing :-)

Multitasking....

Of late I am just too bored of my laziness, this lethargic period.....which has gone to the extent that I am reluctant to think and write simultaneously [:(]...my last post was a sample where I tried to reflect on my mood using an old composition, which was not that relevant, but for my laziness, it worked. The lazy female in me was willing to just sit and think and think and think and then happily loose all the thoughts in eternity. And she finally came up with this idealess, messageless post since I was too keen on scribbling something in my blog.
Here this goes as some multitasking I am doing after ages it seems....thinking and writing simultaneously [:D]
I am again lost in ideas now....the past 2 months have been happening part of my life, which continues till date, could have been much more happening but for my laziness to react to them..... be it the surroundings, the city, the family, the friends, or the movie spree with mummy-papa, or the health and healthcare(be it for others or myself), or the few books i managed to read, or the change in year part of date...... I am just soo less energetic to act or react!

I want this lethargy to come to an end with this post, I wish it does as writing is something which brings some enthusiasm back to me, but yeah, only if this can be called some writing !

PS: I just recalled the writing and rewriting and more rewriting and writing I did for an application, which finally didn't work for me.

" पहचान "

ज़िन्दगी बहती चली जा रही है
दिशाहीन सी, बस हवा के संग
कभी हर दिशा में दिखता है रास्ता
तो कभी हर रास्ता बंद आता है नज़र
कभी लगता है कि वो सही हैं
तो कभी लगता है सही है ये मन
बस, इसी उलझन में खोती जा रही है वो पहचान
जो जब थी तो बदलना चाहती थी आज में
पर आज जब है तो फ़िर
बनना चाहती है वो बीता कल .......

Excellent philosophy of Life..........

Got a forward today with the title as above, and content as below:

Life is....

"Leaving the house in the morning, dressed in clothes that you bought on credit card for work,

driving through the traffic in a car that you are still paying for, putting in petrol that you cannot afford,

in order to get to the job that you hate but need so badly,

so that you can pay for the clothes, car, petrol

and the house that you leave empty the whole day,

in order to live in it"

Just realized this was my gtalk status for quite some time....and look, life is no more like this for me, at least now :P. I m actually staying+living in the house these days, and to tell you this is gr88. After the happenings of 5th November, and after an insight into so many seemingly positive after effects, i once again admire the satire in the statement above.

Am trying to read through the works of fate to figure out where is it trying to take me now, and taking my time for that. Talking about living in the present, the train has stopped at a platform with lots of paths to tread on.....leaving me wondering which to! The present looks good, but as I said, it carries all the fears.....actually.... its more of excitement now......with a tinge of adventure He has put in......nice flavors u have got!

One more point I always wondered about the mighty One there, but never mentioned at this place....we must learn it all from Him. He is an excellent Manager, a superb planner(but really ruthless sometimes)....mind you He would never let go His resources waste....so be ready to roll! Some might understand this today, others may someday......can't elaborate anymore :)

Khatrooon ke.....Khiladi !!

I bet 'Akshay Kumar aur 13 haseenayen' performing stunts on the Indian version of 'Fear Factor', debuting today, wouldn't have considered the tough competition thrown by 'UPA and/vs NDA and/vs CPM and/vs SP and/vs JD and/vs ............ and/vs the haseena Mayawati and/vs the haseena Sonia Gandhi ' performing political stunts being covered 'beautifully' by all the '24 hour News channels'. Let me just walk through all the major points of the fun I had watching TV today:

Live Lok Sabha session:
-- Deputy Speaker announces: 'Gentlemen (??), please note that dinner will be served at 9:15 in room number 21'
An opposition leader: 'Nahin, hum namak nahi khayenge, hum to aaj unko harayenge, to namak kaise kha sakte hain!'
-- Laloo the 'Angry old man' shouting all the weird curses in the Parliament: A must watch!
-- Shibu Soren taking time to nap in the 'serenity' of Parliament lost in the sweet dreams coming true after assurance of his deal, before the N-deal
-- Advaniji making all the efforts with his old, shaking voice to crumble down the UPA govt.
-- All the 'shayars and their shayaris' finding a subject and platform in Parliament today

News channels rocking:
-- 'Sansad chale chalo' , with all the 'Khiladis' walking proudly towards their 'Ranbhumi' with the background music as 'Koi humse jeet na paye..chale chalo'! (One of my favourite movies is spoofed ruthlessly here :( )

Newspapers screaming:
-- Naidu: Congress says its going for N-deal for the sake of development, but at the cost of ethics, moral values...Rs 35, 40 or 50 crore for each MP..... Shekhar Gupta: But if the Congress loses, then the other side paid even more!

Apart from this, office is also a happening place: With a colleague of mine popping up with a small game to test our 'understanding of horse-trading/defections/numerology and some politics too'. The game requires a participation fee of Rs. 5 (what else a common man can afford for a political game with inflation touching 12%). What you have to do is just to place a bet on whether the UPA govt. will fall or survive tomorrow with your estimate of the number of seats it gets.

humphhh...what else could be a more dangerous game than this one being played since the beginning of 'coalition era'.... risking our nations' present and of course future! Sorry Mister Akshay Kumar, you missed this idea!! I bet it would have paid you much more ;)

He was there......

25th May 2008, it was my to be last day after a week long stay with my grandparents and rest of the family in Kota. I had to return back to work in Mumbai. The same time was chosen by our respectable minority of 'Gurjjars' to put up their demands for their 'true rights' by depriving us of our rights to travel across the country. No wonder my train scheduled from Amritsar to Mumbai had to twist and turn and by pass us('us' because i was to be accompanied by my chachi and cousins who were heading to Mumbai for vacations) on its route to Mumbai. We were desperate to get back the same day, hence random inquiries were made and we finally decided to board another train scheduled at 5:30 pm same day, but obviously, no reservations available. No wonder again, that it was the only train running on those tracks. A friend of my father had taken permission for one person to accompany one of his acquaintances in AC 3 tier coach. Another was expected to help us out with a berth somewhere, since he assured us to board the train. But, how could one expect this crisis time to turn to our needs. As soon as i called him back, he said you know na, TTE says no seat, now manage somehow please. I felt betrayed, but the times explained it all, hence had to accept the situation. Now, we were two females and 2 kids without a reservation all the way striving to go through it. Parents, unlces, baba(grandpa), with the usual worries...all kept calling for an hour, asking my chachi and kids to get down at a nearby station where someone was to be sent to escort them back home and send them the next day. But, looking at the worsening situation of trains, we decided not to give up today in the hope of tomorrow. Also, I was counting on my previous experiences of traveling without a reservation with friends and even in ladies general coach once. Hence, we decided to continue our journey, with none of us getting down.
Thanks, but no thanks to a few of our co passengers who had let us sit in the coach for around 4 hours (with a few of them throwing scowls at us as my notorious cousins 'behaved kids') after which we followed our decision to get a penalty for sleeper class. All these 4 hours my brothers had been asking me..didi, do something na, where is our seat? When will we get a seat?

Now, after the penalty I took my aunt along and one luggage to find some place in the sleeper coaches. The coaches were jam packed with all sorts of people feeling lucky to have found a corner in the train. I could see some 'Reeboked', and 'Adidased' TShirts with Lee Denims, often not visible in sleeper coach, today finding comfort on the boiled up floors, all full of sweat. Without stopping much here and there we observantly and despairingly crossed one coach. The next one had similar scenes awaiting and we were still finding our way out through the packed 'pathways' that suddenly a voice came from somewhere behind us....'jagah dhundh rahe ho??'...i turned back and said....involuntarily with a miserable expression...'haan...ticket confirm nahi hai'....he replied 'agar aap manage kar sakte hain to mein ek berth de sakta hun...jo 7 coach duur hai...actually hum bachchon ko yahin adjust kar lenge...par 7 coach duur hai actually'......for one moment i felt is he kidding with us?? But then i said yeah....'hum kar lenge..actually humare saath 2 bachche bhi hain..to ek bhi mil jaaye abhi to bahut hoga'. Then he asked us to follow him, and we did, continuously for about 10 minutes to reach a compartment surprisingly uncrowded. I was elated to see an empty middle berth and the empty luggage space too(our luggage count was 4). I thankfully threw a glance at the benefactor, who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere just for our aid! I had not noticed the very first moment I saw him, but till now i had... he was a middle aged man with quite a lot of grey hair and a faint but quite noticeable smile bearing the calmness of his demeanor. I asked chachi to occupy the place and went back to fetch the luggage and kids. All my way back i thanked him galore. In the heat of May while crossing Rajasthan in a sleeper coach, I felt fully charged to fulfill my responsibilities. In a few minutes after two more rounds of shuttling, the kids and luggage were at our newly found place. We arranged all of it, and with a silent approval (no frowns and scowls) from our fellow passengers we finally spread a bedsheet in the middle of berths and made ourselves cosy. We had space for a 'luxurious journey' back to Mumbai, all because of a miraculous appearance of a stranger. I could now come back and join office the very next morning and we were appreciated for bringing all of us safely and not that worned out, all thanks to him or HIM...dunno who had descended!!


PS: The incident was soo noticeable for me because it was the same day that I had spent some time with a few people sharing their 'divine experiences', listening to them all half heartedly. But at some moment in the train I had recalled them all thinking if it was true the same divine power has a chance to prove it for us now.