Beyond the Obvious

To a poet, everything in life means something. A dead grass is symbolic to a fallen fighter, after having weathered a war. A green grass is symbolic to a downtrodden class, oppressed under the feet of more powerful, nevertheless showing unbreakable spirit to revive at dawn. To a realist, a grass is a grass, dead or green. A realist sees life,with all it cruelties. A poet sees a beautiful life. I tried to be a poet all my life (to explain crudely, someone who could rhyme short sentences). But somewhere along, the realist in me took over.

 Being a religious illiterate, visits to temple for me was more of an excursion than anything else. I don't know if it pleased God, but it pleased my mother. There was this young guy whom I always saw on Saturdays at the temple. He never went inside, just stared on from where the stairs began. First time I saw him , he looked an average 20 something, probably staring at a pretty face. I too followed his line of sight, only to be disappointed. He was staring at the deity.

On subsequent visits, I couldn't help but notice him. He never went inside. He wasn't accompanying anyone. He didn't come to pray. Didn't look like a beggar either. He looked a man aloof from this world, probably an atheist, in some sort of competition with God. Or perhaps, was in some serious trouble, came for favour or forgiveness , but his ego didn't allow him to bow before anyone else( so what, if it was God himself). Or perhaps, he was a writer and staring at God filled him with positive energy and inspired great creativity. Perhaps I had overstretched my imagination on the last one. Whatever it was , this guy was not normal. Maybe someone betrayed him, he was expecting some payback.

I finally decided to  ask him. I was just hoping  he doesn't break down while narrating his sad story. Yes, his was definitely a sad story. I decided I would keep strong, give him the strength and support he needs. I was prepared to be the dumping box he so needed to relieve himself of sadness, that this cruel world had put him through. I would give him hope, God wanted me to play messiah to him. I needed to ask him. So I gathered all strength and approached him.

I looked him in eye.
 "Ka bhai, roj aise hi.  Kya hua?"
He looked around. I got a sinking feeling he wont answer me. I asked again.
"Batao batao, Kya dekhte rehte ho"?"
"Mauka dekhtein rehtein hain. Jeb kat te hain". ( " I am a pickpocket" )
The world suddenly came crashing down on me.
" Thulla ko bata dein?"
"Aap nahi bataeinge. Pata hai humko"

He slowly smiled and walked away. I never saw him again, not on Saturdays, or any other day. I still find it hard to believe what he said. Was he so disturbed that he committed suicide?  Unlikely. I probably need to take myself off. I hate to listen to it, but something inside tell me, "Dude, it was so obvious".  I was never meant to be a poet.

Life and its reasons are simpler than what it seems. Cheers.


PS : Originally written for http://campusdiaries.com/stories/beyond-obvious . Website by a friend. Do visit.

Growing Up: A Spiritual Suicide

The concept of 'growing up' has always fascinated me. As I apply it to myself; I am constitutionally mature enough to marry(21+), my elder sister still often refers to me as 'baby' and my mother still gives me instructions like ''chalti gadi mei se haanth bahar mat karna''.( Of course, the pompous 'me' thinks very high of myself ).  So how does it happen? We all age. Only few of us grow up. Growing up is a bit of an enigma. We never will know what it exactly is. As I see around, the schema of grown ups scares me. Responsibility  thrusted upon rather than taken up, fake camaraderie for selfish gains, compromises and sacrifices. In a sense, growing up requires one to give up on oneself, life turned into a show to please others. This sort of 'growing up' doesn't appeal, unfortunately practiced by most, the code of civility  excessively formalized.

Societies has rules for themselves. Individuals too ( if not, should have). Often, they might be in conflict, but the societal  rule prevails. Adhering to the societal rules by individuals is seen as more acceptable. The stigma of 'rebel' is a big deterrent.( Here I am talking about the real rebels, not the rockstar 'saada haq' types). When you are young, the rebel tag seems acceptable, as we grow up, somehow, the society gains the upper hand. My teacher in  school once said something that truly affected me ( she said that while defending complains against me) , ''We must accept people with their faults''. Accepting one's own weakness is tough. Our discomfort with our own faults makes us forego rules that we set for ourselves, embracing the rules society sets, so as to appear more acceptable, camouflaging our weakness. This phenomenon is sold to us as 'Growing up' and maturing. It actually is spiritual suicide.

I am a believer in absolute freedom. My idea of life is probably radical, and I have no intention of propagating it, simply because it may not be correct. Yes, at my age ,  I can live it my way, but the very thought of surrendering my philosophy for something more acceptable is scary. I would definitely age, and would want to grow up and mature, but as I want to be, not as the world wants me to be. Perhaps, that would not be possible. In that case, I would rather never grow up, and have my mother give those cute little instructions all my life :).

 Cheers.

Misplaced Joy? Maybe Not!

I was coming off a long break. Coma of sorts; no life , just alive. A bad broken marriage, alcohol addiction, minor health breakdown, long and painful rehabilitation thereafter. Anyways, my bad days are behind me. I am a happy man again,  at least, trying to be. I wanted to escape out to a new place. So I applied at a few places, finally got selected for this job in this backward state small town.
This is the first time I have come to a place so remote. This town is fresh, well off and well equipped. My flat was next to my colleagues'. His wife was very welcoming. She served me breakfast and tea at her flat.
"Aye Ravan jee, suniye...... isko aap apna hi ghar samjhiyee......kuch bhi chahiye hoga, humko boliyegaa, samjhe gaye naa".
She was comforting, laughing along as if she had known me for ages. She was talkative, asked me a lot of questions.
" Aur parivar- mehraaru kab laa rahein hain". She asked. I smiled.
"Nahi hai". I replied
"Arre haan!! ye bataye the ki talaaq ho chuka hai". She said.
That was innocently rude.It got a bit uneasy. She looked sad as she said it. It looked genuine. I soon settled among them. Everyone around called her ''bhabhi". She was such a sweetheart, very nice and caring . I too started calling her "bhabhi". I was settling well in this new town, new life, new house.
Next morning, I left for office early, so couldn't have my breakfast. I punched my attendance, saw around the office, nobody was there. I went out to have my breakfast. A roadside tea stall was very close by. A boy, about 10,  was serving there. I sat there for a few minutes. He came to me.
"Kya loge sahab?"
"Dosa laa do". He went to the other customers. He looked playful, was agile, artificially well-mannered in asking customers. I observed him. He came back to serve me.
"Naam kya hai?". I asked
" Buddhhun".
"School jaate ho?"
"Haan, dopahar mein khaawe laa jaatein hain"
"Ghar mein aur kaun kaun hai?"
"Maa hai. Kuch kaam nahi karti. Deen bhar taari pikar par jaati hai"
"Aur pitaji?"
"Arre oo to nahi hai. khoob daaru pee liya tha uske baad dam chal gaya ghume laa.. wahiniye paneeye mein palat gayaa.". He laughed while saying the last words. It was funny to him. He went on to serve others.
I left the stall feeling hollow. I couldn't understand what it was. I had thought I would try to explain him the importance of going to school. I decided against, he wouldn't understand. Its unfair to expect him to understand, he doesn't know when he will get to eat next, will he even get to eat next,  maybe it was a crime to give him hope, a hope for a better life. Maybe he just didn't want a better life, his own was too good for him, laughing playing around. What sort of man laughs while telling perhaps the most tragic event of his life. Insensitive, insane, irresponsible. Too harsh , he was just a kid. His story was sad, he was poor, it made me feel sorry for him. But he wasn't asking for it, he wasn't using his sad life as an excuse. He was fighting it out.  I felt strange, I just couldn't decide what I felt for him.
As I walked back, I took a glance at him. He was busy, didnt seem to care. Maybe his was indeed a better life. He could laugh through his sorrows, if at all he felt them. I had made myself feel terrible over a broken marriage, which was bad anyway. When comparing his sufferings to mine, I just thought,  was I even suffering? Surely it wasn't worth it. I decided to be happy. For the kid, he was enjoying himself.  For myself, I had a life to live.



PS: This happens to be my 25th post. Took me 3 and a half years. Despite not being naturally gifted as a writer, I am glad I have continued for so long. Some of the best compliments I have received have been from unknown people ( mostly surprised at the disconnection between my age and content). One such is attached below (not the only one though, excuse me for self-patting).

I thank everyone, who has ever had patience to go through my scriblings. I value it. It feels nice. Cheers.

Impracticality of Perfection

When Mahatma Gandhi historically professed to offer the other cheek, I am quite sure he was posturing. No man, by nature, can be so graceful.( honestly, I hardly find any grace in this submission , but my awareness about the stature of the man is restricting me from being any harsher). His words have become textbook lessons, one of the most impractical suggestions ever made(subject of numerous jokes, and rightly so). When Siddharth Gautam renounced the world for greater good, we largely miss the fact that he had been very unfair to , infact betrayed, his wife and child, who were his responsibility. Sure enough,  the world would have managed without another religion.
   When 'learned' men preach, mostly they talk impractical nonsense. 'Love your enemies'. "Don't be tempted, this world is 'maaya'". Really, why blame maaya , an otherwise seductive name for a woman, for all the miseries of the world.( Imagine that daku-type baba on India TV preaching all this). Still it attracts people. Some of these talks attract more people than, say, a Metallica show in India would. Maybe its comes with age. (Still, so uncool). I mean, where is the fun in listening to an old gentlemen, talking about life and what not, in a partial gay-ish tone (I just recalled how Asharamji Bapu  speaks).
The very basic flaw in their preaching is that they teach perfection. Like,  "Forgive your enemies". These are obviously the correct things to do. Ideally this is how it should be. But we dont live in an ideal world. You expect such behavior  from, I dont know, may be Lord Ram, not from lowly humans. But then, even Ram doubted his wife's fidelity. Perfection is elusive. Men are designed to be faulty. God didn't create something that could later challenge their supremacy. Ego, perhaps got to them. Practicing what they teach , at various levels, asks to basically cut your natural instincts. Anger, for instance, is a very raw,  very  honest  expression. It doesn't have any pretence. It cant be curbed. At best, you can hide it. But why hide? It's like making someone who has hurt you feel happy( or not bad) , at your own expense. Its obviously a  more social things to do. But at times, when it's more important how you feel about yourself, than any long term gain, just let it loose.
      What I have advocated is an easier option. If indeed anyone is capable of doing better, that's the way to go. But there is no shame in having flaws. It was always meant to be that way. Perfection is boring. If ever everything right said was practical, there would be no wars, no progress. All desire for attaining perfection, starts from our uneasieness about ourselves, which , as I see, is the first imperfection.

 

Nothingness

'' I deserve better.''Ravan told himself. On beach, a bottle of breezer in hand, a beer bottle in store. The setup was perfect. He had come prepared. This was going to be a long evening. Alone. All to himself. Like he has always  been. He was sad. He was staring at the beautiful sunset. The sun was setting into the blooded ocean. Sun stabbed the ocean, while she was embracing him. Betrayal.
"Wow!!". Ravan thought. He wanted to see the depressing side of everything. He did fine with the ocean-sun thing. All he wanted to see was murderous humanity at its ugliest. It suited his mood. He saw few bikini-clad firangs. Damn. He turned around.
''Dont look!!! no!!! dont!! You are sad''. He convinced himself.
"Ok, just once''. He compromised. He glanced. And then, he was back to look for the darker side of everything.

Ravan was sad. He had to settle score with God. He had come to talk to God. This was his "Aaj Khush to Bahut Hoge Tum'' moment. Earlier, he left his home, his friends, his parents. (Not much money, he would HAVE to return back,3 hours later). Alone. He walked. He had imagined this before.
 "One day, I will be sad, and walk all the way. Walk, walk and walk. Till I reach the end of world". Fuck! Reality struck him. Forget end-of-the-world.
"This world is spherical." He tried to be logical. First time ever that he had managed to convince anyone. So what, if it was he,  himself.  Settle for the beach instead. Ok. Now what? He let his imagination run wild. Lightning struck him. Damn, he was going to be John Abraham( Jism). YES!! (fist pumping, and all). Firstly, he had to be alcohol-ed. Not much of a transition from asshol-ed, that he already was. This was going to be his first time. He bought a breezer and a beer.

The beach was beautiful. Crowded. He left his idea of being John. Another day. Some common sense, finally. He sat at some distance from the ocean. He was sad. Why?. He wondered. He hadn't flunked any exam. His girlfriend hadn't dumped him. Just sad. He thought for a while. Why was he sad. He had no answers.  Maybe a PMS analog for men. No, didn't seem like it.Fashion. He thought deeper. He understood. A day earlier,  a childhood friend of his, Megha, had put a facebook status-
"Sad.:(:(:(:(:(:(. Life sucks :(:(:(:(:(:(. ". Since then, only thing that seemed to matter to his immediate universe was Megha's sadness. She was pretty. Very pretty. Prettier than his girlfriend. Guys commented. "Awwwww... no dear, life is so beautiful,  just look within to see the beauty of life ". This comment was the benchmark. This had to be beaten. Afterall, she had liked it back. So what, if it didn't make sense. It sounded good. Another comment came in.

"No megha, promise me ur not sad... NO, please, u cannot be sad. Please, for me...smile once."

 "WHYyyyyyyyyyyy???? What happened?? Oh God! I wish I was there take u from the grave of sadness to the bliss of happiness". Another gem of emotional outburst came in, after cross checking from thesaurus. Ridhima, a classmate of her commented."drama, nataunki".

Ravan saw the funnier side of it. He also updated "Sad. Life Sucks". (minus the smileys, to sound a man). No one commented. Finally Megha commented.
"Why dear, dont be sad :)". He wanted to be honest to her. Since then, he had actually tried to be sad. He realised. He wasn't sad. Just foolish. Breezer and beer had brought sanity back. He looked around. The bikini firangs were still there. He stared. The sun was just about to completely sink. It looked beautiful. He tried to see a meaning to it. There's wasn't any. There needn't be any. Somethings just have a nothingness about them. Accept it. Move on. He walked back, humming "Awarapan Banjaarapan".

PS: These are the first lines of the book that I intend to complete at some point of time in my life, hopefully over the next 2 years.

The Unconquered Lady Luck

In an interview I saw some time back, Abhinav Bindra on being asked about his gifted talent, said that talent is  highly over-rated. Shooting is 99% luck. He won an Olympic gold. It couldn't have been this simple.Good shooters must be able to control breath, the millisecond instability in breath intake can lead to a misfire. There must be many other issues, which he must have trained hard to perfect. Yet he says it's luck. May be he was playing to the media, just trying to be over-modest. The 99% figure is debatable but I have always been a believer that luck is the single biggest factor in success, more so in failure.

We often see B-school theories on success coming up. But there can never be a completely correct theory on success. For the simple reason that success is relative. Any theoretical formula for success would include hard work, self-confidence , patience, and few more qualities that is easy to describe on paper but hard to achieve in practice.  Luck is often ignored, at best included as an unknown factor. For success, it's best to back your best qualities. People can rely on their hard work, confidence, any other personal quality, but luck? I am not sure how do describe it. I myself do it so often. It takes tremendous amount of courage and preparedness for the worst. Ok, maybe I am over glorifying it. May be it's an escapist approach. It probably, takes an enormous brain folly, intellectual breakdown, vaporization of all senses, common uncommon,  to bank on luck, when the stakes are high. Anyone who comes up to me and tell me he would be able to do-this-do-that because , of all things , his luck would favour him, wouldn't earn my respect for sure. At best I'd consider him a fool only, yet to learn the realities of life.(the Hindi superlatives of fool would be so apt, otherwise). Luck is a mistress, might give the sweetest experience, but you can never own her, never rely on her.

Luck hardly finds testimonials by successful. When it comes to failure, luck is the prime culprit. Human tendency is to take the credit for success, but blame others for failure. Luck is an easy scapegoat. Its easy to blame luck. This hypocrisy has a reason. Even the best preparation may not warrant the best performance. Luck can always play the spoilsport. Even the best prepared is not sure of success. Perhaps the inherent 'fear of the unknown' within us is an acknowledegment of importance of luck. A good luck downsizes hard work requirement. No matter how much pride we take in working hard, an easy success is always sweeter. Luck does that. All of us are superstitious to some level, so that so that we can have that little extra from our luck. The sad part, about all this,  no matter however hard we may try, we cannot make our luck. Maybe, its God's style of making us realize beyond all reason and development of our limitations as humans.Something we keep forgetting.

 "Luck never gives; it only lends." ~Anonymous

Of 'Sluts' and their Walk

Some time back I came to know about Slutwalk. It was trending on twitter. I remember that was the day of Slutwalk London. Slutwalk is a rally that originated in Canada after a police officer commented that , "women should avoid dressing like sluts" to avoid being victimized. (click-wiki article) Hence the term 'slut'walk. It is scheduled to happen in Delhi sometime soon(25th july, tentatively). In west, it generally consists of young women scantily dressed to convey their rebellion. (God! this is their idea of making a hard-impact statement). If  that happens in Delhi, all you can imagine is a rally of 200 DU girls followed by 5000 lechers. Sensing that, the organisers have indianized the rally. Also it's being called Besharmi morcha to have a local feel. (click-Slutwalk Delhi). So far so good.

Nobody denies that women have been suppressed in our society and that is largely beyond their control. Another way to say that is men are basically 3rd class animals having no respect for rights of others(that includes women, naagin (jehrili ones), etc), fit only to be slaves, but due to historical blunders in the process of evolution, occupy a superior position. That is such a disgrace for human race. Maybe not that bad, but yeah, to a large extent it is because of the men that women have to go through their worst experiences. Crimes against women are committed everyday, it is such a shame, nobody denies that.


Whenever there's a debate on gender equality, emotions take over logic. So, to set things straight, the instances made henceforth refers only to 'empowered' women, who get equal treatment as their brothers from their parents, well educated, in totality have equal or better qualities as their men colleagues. As for the other  not-so-lucky women, mostly in villages, we would like to say we understand your sufferings, keep fighting back, we support you.


Now that I am done with the disclaimer part I'll come to the point. Gender equality must be demanded consistently, not selectively when it benefits you.When the issue is to reserve seats in Parliament, then it's all good. But If a review of anti-dowry laws is asked, it is seen as a step to curb women rights.  Most law experts would tell you that it's the most misused law in India. Reason: it largely works on the principle of  'guilty until proven innocent' as opposed to the other laws in India. Even Kasab was 'innocent until proven guilty'. I will restrict to these two instances. The larger point is made.

There was an incidence in Mangalore some time back, where some women were beaten in a pub. It became a national issue, and rightly so. But I was rather amused by the reaction to that. There was a proposed 'pub-bharo' movement, and suggestion that it was an attack against women empowerment( going to pub empowers women!). Some discussions implied that modern women dressed in a certain way( that way, Rakhi Sawant also qualifies as modern). Of course modern or not, a women has a right to wear what they want. But how does wearing a certain way make one modern? This way, basically women, like men,themself describe themselves more by what they wear , and not how they reason, think . And also, you get a feeling( in their argument) that they are competing with men at all times. In any case, if the parliamentary reservation bill ever gets passed, it would because of the 80% male MPs. Politically incorrect to say, but thats a fact.One area where you cannot deny them credit is there innovation in protesting. PETA photoshoots to protest 'cruelty against animals' are legendary. Slutwalk, a rally of scantily clad women, what better way to attract attention and make the world 'aware'.


Expecting a dominant species to give up their position for the larger good of society is a bit far-fledged. Humans won their right to be rulers through their skills. Men must have done the same way, when the competition narrowed down to 2. Mistakes were committed. Blaming the winner can be a consolation, never a solution. And if walks could reverse historical blunders, be rest assured, it's going to be a long walk. Very long.