Sans the better half

The pain of losing someone close, close enough to quickly forget the loss, is what has engaged my mind all this while. My maternal grandmother (Nani) left for her heavenly abode on 6th of this month. The news was something which we knew was going to float, keeping in view her bad health, but was something which we were never, not at all, prepared to hear.

Writing this blog, as if putting a spell on me, has made me weep silently. Having seen her for a lifetime, I can determinedly say that some part of her is alive in me, and of course, in the people who had met her too frequently to call her an acquaintance. A true sweetheart, she shall stay irreplaceable in my mind; nor do I intend to ever let her memories go off it.  

In all the ceremonies which had to happen post she cashed in her chips, I saw a lot of relatives, who I had seldom seen before, coming, crying, sympathizing, condoling and leaving for their homes—as if doing some formality. I saw distant relatives explaining why the death should not be cried over much, as she was really ill, has left flourishing family behind, had seen three healthy generations or was just old enough to live anymore. I also saw people joining in just to catch up with other relatives and to exchange numbers. This really broke my heart.

 

Despite the overfriendly mannerism of our sweet relatives, I see a person who has been, undoubtedly, affected the most because of what happened to my Nani, my maternal grandfather (Nana)—the man who had spent more than 55 years of his life with this lady. Honestly speaking, I had never seen my Nana publicly cuddling my Nani or showing his affection in any manner out in the sun. For the best part of my life, I believed that my Nana doesn’t love her at all. My mindset, how amazingly, got changed in just four days!

Their bond has been a very queer, yet an interesting one. My Nana has been chronically dependent on my Nani, right from the time when he got married to her, for all the things you could think of. My Nani was literally his right hand. When old age approached both of them, they had this cute way of expressing love to each other, by just being there. One’s aura always helped the other get over any disease, big or small, without much fight.

I could say that they never loved each other, I never saw my Nana running extra mile for my Nani, doing anything which could make her smile, but I now see that the love that they shared was above earthly matters of pleasing or appeasing. The presence of one was love to the other. The feeling that the togetherness will defeat all the problems defined their love. Old age hasn’t been easy on anyone, but standing with a big bat to fight them out together was love to my grandparents. I remember my Nana complaining to me that Nani doesn’t bother to have all her checkups done on time and my Nani saying, ‘Inki mat sun, inko kuch pata nahi hota’…
 

 
Now, standing at this point in his life, I see my Nana the loneliest person on this planet. Fighting with old age alone will be looking heck a big task. I see their love now, more evidently. I see him looking at her bed and losing to some thought process. I see his eyes, as if waiting for some miracle. I see my Nana crying his guts out, giving up to the fact that death defeats all. There’s no big bat to fight this away. I salute their love which was there, invisible to all of us. The love was in togetherness, the love is in the aura.

Embracing the unconventional

We belong to Gen Y as they call it—the modern lot, the lot who knows what it has to do, the right time to do it and takes full responsibility of its deeds. We are open-minded and thus, stand with open arms whenever anyone talks about accepting any sort of change. Any topic which could be a subject of buzz around, be it LSBT, cross-cultural or cross-country matrimonial alliances, BDSM relationships, voicing out loud one’s opinion in public, keeping a baby without getting married, is easily accepted by us. Huh? Wait, what instance did I quote in the end? Ugh! 

I am jotting down the news I heard during random talks over coffee with friends about a girl who was pregnant without being married. We must have seen this in numerous movies and this also must be happening with millions of girls around the globe. Contradicting the popular belief of aborting the child the moment one gets to know, this girl decides to keep the baby, understanding the fact that she will have to do all parts of the job alone. Though she has secured the support from her parents, which itself is a big thing—too big to digest in one shot, the society still looks at it scornfully; we, Gen Y disgust it. This student of LSR, walks with her head held high, and gels pretty well with the fact that she already is a mom now and the world knows how!

I would really want to know your first reaction to this, had this happened to someone close or too near to let her thoughts go off your mind easily. There is not anything weird, for there are divorcees who live with their kids after parting with their spouses; in fact, this is the same saga told in a twisted manner. Despite everything, why accepting this doesn’t come easy?

I should have been proud of her, as being modern, this is something which is expected of me and from people belonging to the same circle, but why this girl finds herself a part of random coffee conversations between people who don’t even know her by face? Why is she a subject of mockery by teens, a subject of disgust, a topic to discuss and blackguard? No generation is modern enough to reject the ideologies of the previous generation and walk with a white page to write down its own. Some theories do trickle down to the next generation and determine the general behavior.

I do want to change my attitude towards the thing I have come through, tell the girl that having made the decision to keep the baby, she has survived the challenges to hold up her own light for the world. She is, in fact, sending out a message to all the girls who have been through similar situations but had to give up to the circumstances, not to ever doubt their gifts or value they hold to the world. It is important for her to ground herself to this new reality, to be retold that she is not crazy. Together we are lighting up a pathway to a beautiful future of peace, prosperity and joy – a world where heart and soul are the beacons one is guided by.

I would like to thank her for sharing her light, an era of true modernism is dawning, at last!

I am the Meaning of My Name

At times, (like many others, I’m sure) I get deeply annoyed when some random person comes up to me and asks the meaning of my name. Quirky enough? I don’t like to explain to each mortal on the planet what my name stands for.

I know, I have this weird sensitive nerve which gets bothered the moment someone, anyone, asks what my name betokens.

Flashback — I’ve always wondered the intent of my name—looked it up in dictionary, searched on Wikipedia, Googled it out but poor thing, I could not find the exact implications.

During my childhood, whenever my mom used to cuddle me, I remember putting this question up to her. Reason — I never was convinced by what she replied, sweet. Why, on earth, don’t I find this written anywhere but my mom’s cerebellum that my name implies sweetness!

Now, having been deeply disgusted for a long period of time, I have somewhat learnt to live with the fact that my name indicates nothing. It’s just a ‘short n sweet’ colloquial word. I try to forgive random people poking me by asking what my name indicates or those who reassure themselves by asking if this is a nickname. I forgive them all!

Also, the category who toils hard in listing out the word which sound alike, like China, Cheenu, Cheeni or Cheecho and the class which spells my name incorrectly. I, with a heavy heart, forgive them all!

Of late, when I hadn’t encountered any such thing in my life span, I strangely thought that people around me have grown over the fact that they could possibly make fun of my name, and thus, me. But very recently, while having lunch with a few colleagues, I suffered being the subject of mockery and reason was good old, my name. I was feeling so sorry for those guys who, I realized, could not mature over their infantile brain despite their bodies becoming huge to challenge a mammoth’s. On the spur of the moment, a ray from heaven or my brain thought of a way to figure out this problem once and for all.

(Mind you, this is for everyone who is living with an offbeat name.) Since we didn’t name ourselves, we don’t have to entertain amateurish mentality of kidskins here n there. And most of all, we recall the person, the individual, when we remember anyone in our mind! Does anyone try to guess the meaning too—Yes? Dude, I want to meet you and see how contrast a variety the genes of human beings can sport.

Take this for an instance, when I say Roger Federer, I don’t scratch my brain hard to look out for the meaning of his name in my vocabulary. I hardly care. I get moony about the tennis star, his aura and best of all, his work. In the same manner, I believe, when people would recall my name, they should draw in their minds a rough image of how skillfully I work, how efficiently I communicate and how pleasing I look and not what my name implies. So a declarative message to one n all who are yet to come up to me to explore the meaning of my name— I AM THE MEANING OF MY NAME!

*Case closed!*

Footloose in Old Delhi

I surfed, I liked and I visited… all in one day! For once, I decided to get off my backside and head to the spot where the revelries are. Many yet to go to but I had to start from somewhere. So, here I am, all ecstatic, having roamed aimlessly in Old Delhi and for being able to take out one complete day for the same!
I have always wished to be off the hook in an unknown city; always dreamt of moving without purpose in a completely strange (of course, not a place devoid of human beings :P) place. I often feel jealous of my friends, who have a job which demands travelling. Though I wonder why they aren’t particularly excited about it but anyway, since I can’t cross the boundaries of the state every now and then, I decided to wander inside it.
Old Delhi, a place where three genres of people might get maximal pleasures — a foodie, a shopaholic and a photographer. I took my bestie, my mom, along with me. You anyway need an ATM close to you, don’t you? :)
We started our exploration from Jama Masjid, which is a huge mosque in a place gasping to breathe for space.

STATUTORY WARNING: You might as well skip a beat having taken a look at the whole huge area.

Surprisingly, they say that over 25K people can pray here at one time. Built by Shah Jahan, it took nearly 6 years to complete this mosque. I’ve always wished to catch hold of a time machine so as to go back in time and see all these crowned heads rule, especially the Mughal emperors.

Moving further, we went to Karim Hotels and Al-Jawahar, which are there right at the footsteps of Jama Masjid. Their kababs, rolls and gravy will certainly gratify your taste buds! Having savored the delicacies and getting some of them packed for people at home, we moved forward to Meena Bazar. Colloquially referred to as Thieves’ Market, I personally found it to be nothing but hype. Brushing past through it, we moved to Dariba Kalaan, followed by Kinari Bazar.
If you are one of those who love to indulge in silver or junk jewellery, this is the place for you. We could not resist ourselves from purchasing various knickknacks, including silver earrings, toe rings and a few bangles. Kinari Bazar is known for wedding stuff. So, if you are of an age approaching the so-called legitimate one to get married, my advice for you would be: NEVER go there with your parents, no matter how close and open you are with them!
After satiating our desire for junk jewellery, we headed to Chandni Chowk, where we had jalebis at ‘Old and Famous Shop’ and dahi bhalle at ‘Nataraj’. By now, we were all drained and exhausted, but the feeling of having walked past all the crowd puller places in Old Delhi was truly out of the world, for once, we saw Delhi like never before. Here are some of the memories that I managed to capture in my camera.

The New-Age Protagonist

I have seen people who revel in Hindi cinema more than they do in anything else. They have spent all their lives swearing by the fact that the hero is the protagonist and he has to beat off the villain and his aides by the end. He has got to be the man with real sense of responsibility, humor, care towards others and fear of god.

The so-called male protagonists are so easy to be spotted amongst the crowd; for they are the ones who never turn their eyeballs to a hot chic passing by; they always abide by norms and regulations of all the possible laws in the world, including fundamental laws of Somalia; they always end up fighting away a bunch of villain’s aides despite their 32-inches-sized chest or lack of any possible knowledge on martial arts; they respect their parents heck lot and end up tracing them (if have had parted) by the climax despite them being in different continents; and they are easily provoked by their favorite antagonist, leading them to activities like punching hard or spicy arguments.

Thus, these people define their recipe of a ‘hit’ movie. For them, if any of the above clauses misses, the movie doesn’t do well in the box office. Well, I bet say that I have discovered a lady who is so gracefully defending the current trend and is still making a lot of name and fame for herself—the lady who is so seamlessly attracting eyeballs that she has become a hot favorite without anyone really realizing that; the lady who has given birth to an offbeat cinema which has, as a matter of fact, been loved by everyone including critics; the lady, none other than Vidya Balan.

J    

Giving a knuckle sandwich to all those who relied on Khans and Kapoors to make a movie hit, Vidya has shown to the world how the sole content-oriented subject can make news as well as money. Having watched both her movies in which she has acted protagonist (The Dirty Picture and now, Kahaani), Vidya has given way to a new age, female-protagonist era. For some reasons, I am welcoming this era with open arms, as I don’t have to rely on the senseless romance or meaningless act-and-take-revenge stories for good entertainment.

Strangely, I am not a PR executive of Vidya who is getting heftily paid for building her image or a die-hard fan who is extremely ignorant to her flaws. I am not even a film critic who is susceptible to nuances and can easily catch any aberration. I am just a lover of good cinema who would surely demand full worth of my money, time and emotions invested in a movie. And for a change, I totally admire this wind of change!

Watching from the stands

They say playing in the arena and watching the game from the stands are like night and day; both might not narrate the same part of the story and one might just take back home a hundred versions or a thousand perspectives to chew over.

I remember one of my close friends quoting her experience of a random party that she was compelled to attend. Being advised by a dentist, who was more concerned of his fee than her molars, to not touch anything which could harm the expensive root canal treatment, she kept her hands off the hard drinks and surprisingly, ended up enjoying more than the times when she was happily drunk, anyway unable to notice things happening around.

According to her, she lived every moment of the elation and also laughed off several bloopers which drunkards around were unwittingly landing themselves in, unaware of the fact that some exceptional, conscious mortals might have their eyeballs fixed on them. She also imagined herself doing the same, enjoying the tastes of varied IMFLs, and catching all the limelight having made a monkey of self. Anyway, she said it was total fun watching hardy guys puke, oh-so-sensitive girls fall on the dance floor, happy-go-lucky types cry while pouring their emotions out and elderlies dance like no one’s watching.

According to her, being amongst the party animals and eying on them while sipping fruit juices were two distinct experiences all together. While former would leave you least concerned about the world around, the latter would give you hundreds of hush-hush stories to gossip about and thousands of instances to watch and fracture your rib cage while laughing.

I experienced a similar case of watching a game from the stands during this holi. Since we were not supposed to play along this year, we basked in watching others make merry while soaking themselves in colors, water, filth and, of course, bhang. Here are my tablets of observations, coated with loads of sarcasm:

 

1. I saw oh-aah-ouch girls merrily throw water-filled balloons on random guys and hiding away when the guys gave them what these girls eagerly sought after, their attention!
2. I noticed several haw-Namaste-nahi-bola aunties rub gulaal off each other’s faces while complaining about their hard-to-tame kids.  
3. I also managed to catch a glimpse of henpecked uncles have a day off their wives and get mirthfully drunk in the daytime.
4. I viewed the world around me so jubilantly drenched, from their crowns to cuticles, in colors unknown, only to wash them off during the later half of the day.
5. I observed one of the self-proclaimed dudes of our society, under the influence of his favorite ‘unknown’ liquor, listen to the same song blare in his car in the repetitive mode for the entire day.
6. I relished watching numerous kids run in unison to color and wet every new member, only to add the person targeted to the group and further look for a new target.
7. I viewed several ageds enjoying the euphoria which so gave them a break from their usual dull lonely routine.
8. I loved the smell of gulaal around, which filled the air with loads of toxicity and agents to cause allergy.

In short, I saw this holi from the stands and realized how I missed getting mad along with the crowd, being totally mucky this one day of the year, only to wash the stains off the rest of the 364 days. J

You know me how!

Have you ever adopted a plant or a pet? If yes, you will better comprehend what I am trying to put forth. Witnessing a life grow in front of your eyes is an experience of a lifetime. And if you have a sibling, who is about the same age as yours, you might as well accuse me of copying your thoughts and putting into words.  

Reaching at this point in life, where the meanings of most of the words don’t actually remain the same and it’s the tone in which you say them what actually counts, when the pitch of your voice unknowingly reflects your mind and your acts need to be moderated aptly before they are being exhibited, I have felt a coldness creeping down my spine each day as I’ve stepped closer to being a young adult.

Spilling out my sentiments has never been this tough, as all I am feeling is a sudden dearth of words and an almost choked mind. Sharing a lifetime — the best part of our lives, when the life itself does not seem more than a word, when tough is tying the laces of shoes, doing one’s homework, preparing for exams, convincing parents to give a 5-rupee note, asking for ten more minutes to sleep, playing for an hour more, when fear is of not doing the homework, of being caught lying, of scoring low, of mysterious ‘ghosts’, of not being with each other, of getting scolded; the golden era when we actually break the cocoon of innocence and venture into adulthood, from just liking to crush, infatuation and love, from school dress to branded clothes, from a transparent relationship to a more so a translucent one — can be summed up in no other word than ‘magic’. The feeling transcends all other types of emotions in the world.

All that I fear is things just might not remain the same, say after a couple of years. But I am happy to have a person with me who knows me more than anyone else in this world, who I have literally grown up with, who has seen me crack from a seed and finally become a fruitful tree, who has been there like a roof, a shield and who has stood by like a true ELDER BROTHER. No matter what life makes us face tomorrow, I pray that the love between the siblings remains as fresh, as immaculate, and as overwhelming as it has always been.

PS: I am really sorry for an emotional one, but that’s me *rolling tearful eyes* J

If there is anything in the universe that can't stand discussion, let it crack!

When like minds play the game, the output ends up being a mean of their average intelligence, but when unlike minds sit down to conspire, the end result could be something as lethal as hydrogen bomb. That’s what I have chanced upon today. In a way, the experience was enough to light up my days and invoke positivity.

It was kind of a déjà vu; reason – I have always had someone in my thoughts going against my conventional thinking. May be, I found it too low to chew over every time. Though the reason behind the reunion was rather blue, the end result was blessedly amazing. I found someone who is witty and whose wit can bring out the wackiest side of a person out, knowingly or unknowingly. Needless to say, I am happy having met him. 


Here are the droplets of the wisecracks spilled all over:

1.      Why do we have to take all the self-opinionated souls on this planet seriously?

2.      There is nothing wrong in being ‘comfortably religious’… everyone else too is.

3.      There is nothing incorrect in dreaming big too, just study about the bigger picture more! J

4.      A creep’s life sucks — ask a creep. I am sure; he won’t have anything to tell! J

5.      If you’re stuck in the middle, either make your way to the top or life will make sure that you end up cleaning the bottom!

6.      Eye contact shows that you are ready for anything but shit.

7.      Lastly, it’s OK to have an opinion, but the correct knowledge will make you stand out. After all, you got to have a reason for everything that you do, the reason that will make all the difference.

In all, a learning experience, the one which forced opened numerous doors of my mind and let in fresh air of indulgence. J