To juniors… with love

Flashback: In the fresher’s party you were raw, you were carefree. The effervescent attitude of yours had lit up the evening of fresher’s and everyone got enthralled by your à la mode demeanor. You personified zeal, zest, and zing!

Cut to few months later: In the farewell event, you showed that how quickly you have matured. The transition from being raw to being ripe is incredibly mesmerizing. Now, you have grown urbane and suave!

Right from invitation to reception, you were extremely businesslike in your approach. Every event of the evening was orchestrated to spawn an everlasting memory. Everything from ritzy razzmatazz to glitzy glamour was specially designed to cast a spell on the audience.

The evening was a breathtaking painting with the brushstrokes of lights, dance, and music. And this painting had all the hues of rays, rhythm, and ragas. Every performance was brimming with professionalism. The performers were connoisseurs of their art. Anyone could hardly tell that performers were amateurs.

The evening, wrapped with affection, attraction, and emotion, will remain etched in our memories forever! From our side we extend our good wishes to you for a tomorrow where your dreams are your reality.

Best of Luck!!!!!!!

Farewell…

A day, that has both the deafening silence of bereavement and the tranquil din of togetherness, is termed as the farewell day in college campuses across the world. On this day watch reverts and brings back memories of past to that day, as the surfs bring gems to the shore with every lapping from the depths of the sea.

On this day, emotions are on display. Body sways with the intoxication of achieving a milestone, but heart feels heavy and eyes feel soggy. Memories of past come unbidden to mind and very slyly try to influence a perforce smile on lips. People want to smile and cry at the same time on this day. Such emotional ambivalence is rare to experience save for the occasion of farewell at colleges.

When we come to the college confines, the immediate feeling is to rush back to home as soon as possible. We count seconds, minutes, hours, and days for the arduous sessions to finish, as soon as possible. We wish the college building to crumble, so that we can get rid of classes and assignments. The faculties seem rigorous ringmasters and we curse them from the deepest corner of our hearts.

But every feeling of animosity and negativity gets washed away in the gust of the occasion.

Hostel room starts feeling more homely than home, friends start to mean more than siblings and faculties get elevated to the level of parental figures.

In the beginning, every moment was cumbersome; in the end, every moment is awesome. In the beginning, every moment it felt like leaving the place; in the end every moment, it feels like settling down in the college forever.

Peers, who were competitors all along, seem bosom friends. Juniors, who were always meted out the behavior of second class citizens of the college, seem the apt heirs to carry forward the legacy of the college. Faculties who were stern disciplinarian become sweet embodiment of blessings.

Everything seem surreal on this day, everything seem mercurial on this day. This day is the final chapter of the bulky book of college life and everyone wants to carve one’s indelible impression on the forehead of this day, with utmost fervor and zeal.

Farewell day conceals in itself memories of past and promises of future. On the cusp of past and future, farewell day is the last chance to fill your experience-bag with one more friend and with one more moment.

Don’t hold back! On this day give full latitude to tears to laugh and smiles to cry.

Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!!

I desire you!

When you were not there, things were bleak and bland around me, life had everything but the chirpiness of your voice and sweetness of your presence. I don’t know when the God decided to relent and to gift you in my bag of destiny. But what I know is that now you are in my life, and my life has colors of rainbow and fragrance of flowers.

I consider myself lucky that in the crowd of myriad people, the universe chose me to be a part of your life. You are the music of naughty cascade, notes of carefree rivers, and sounds of serene sea in my life.

Perfect is nothing! But you are the synonym of perfection for me. With you, this word becomes sensible, adorable, and palpable for me.

Nights used to have stars but for me the sheen in them came only after experiencing your smile. The Moon had its beauty but for me it became beautiful only after seeing your face. The Sun had its blinding radiance but for me it got its meaning only after seeing the soothing glint in your eyes. Nightingales used to be melodious but for me their voice became mellifluous only after hearing you.

A day is only of twenty-four hours, and now I curse those who kept it so short. Can’t there be a day that is sans the calculations of seconds and minutes? I wish to be with you in a time that is timeless. I wish an evening with you when Sun is ruddy but never sets and soft fingers of winds play with your hair and I enjoy this moment without a wink. Can’t there be a moment that is infinite? I want such a moment with you. In the infinity of that moment, I would like to make my affection for you deep and quiet.

My craving for you is as pure as a child has for her mother, my doting for you is as sure as for a child by her father. But still I wonder, am I right in feeling this way? I don’t know. Perhaps in this not knowing is ensconced an enigma that keeps me with you even in those times when I am without you.

When Colors Speak…

We as humans have always been eager to express ourselves. We have used everything from voice to dance to let the world know how and what we feel about a particular thing. Anger, fear, and danger: we have communicated our every expression with the use of several modes of expression. But we have kept aside one thing to speak for our exclusive feelings of love, compassion, and affection, and that is colors.

The way colors dissolve in the air and the water; we want our feelings to dissolve in the heart to fill it with cloying emotions. We want to remain reticent on some occasions and want only colors to blare for us. Colors represent our excitement, exuberance and energy for life.

Colors are poetry of our soul. Colors are rhythms that reverberate across the human psyche to blow a sense of renaissance. Colors refute the existence of something that is dull and drab. Instead of stagnation, they (colors) believe in the concept of incessant speed.

Since colors in themselves are life, God painted everything with color. From blue Sky to grey Earth and from white Moon to red Sun, everything bears the blessings of God in a color or the other. Colors convey to us that the different shades are different emotions of life and the way these different shades remain vibrant, one should also remain vigorous through ups and downs of life. At least this way one can negate the negativity that forces us to submit to challenges. So, colors suggest courage to conquer the commotions of life.

When colors utter, the sound becomes chant of a hymn, when colors sing, the notes become voice of a raga. When colors dance, the expressions become as celestially enthralling as movements of heavenly nymphs, so why not let the world be wrapped in the trance of these movements, forever!

When Annihilation Comes Calling….

Helpless eyes, frantic silence, unbearable pain, unremitting tear-streams, deafening cries: these are some gruesome components of a fateful situation. Japan is going through this poignant state and intelligentsia spread across the internet platform are busy weighing how humans have been mean in order to exploit the nature and how the tsunami is the result of human’s own deeds or misdeeds.

This time is not about moaning how humans have been to the planet earth, but to show a sense of humanity and to reduce heart-rending experiences, of Japanese people, as far as possible. The history will not remember us for our candid and scathing remarks, but for our considerate and compassionate actions.

Whenever any calamity strikes it brings people together. Happiness separates, grief binds. Such is the way of life!

But there are some super-humans, who are leaving no stone unturned to create dismemberment in this togetherness.

No doubt the moments of catastrophe conceal lessons in it to be learnt. But we should not be analyzer of downsides at this very juncture. The picking up of pros and cons at the time of devastation is macabre. It only shows how brutal and cruel we as human beings can be in order to prove ourselves intelligent.

Panic stricken people, debris strewn streets, ruined homes are enough for any normal human being to move to tears and pray for fast recovery of people of Japan from this cataclysmic situation. But there are some sections of people who think that rubbing salt to an injury will make them sound wiser than other ordinary human beings.

But I guess that this time is all about being human not supra- human. We need hearts that are made of wax not of stone, we need souls that are congenial not callous!

We should pray in unison for a better tomorrow and a brighter Sun for Japan.

Life is a Tryst!

Life is a tortuous odyssey instead of a straight journey. It has more mysteries than the essence of the word mystery itself. We get nonplused at the enormity of happiness and grief that we encounter during the experience called, life.

We meet people, we experience them, they come to know us, and they become part of our lives. They are not connected to us through blood, but despite that, they sob when we suffer and they support when we fall. They dream for us when we are sleeping, they root for us when we are languishing.

Can we fashion names for such people? We can call them friends, pals, well-wishers… but will these words be able to do justice to or capture the volumes of emotions that this relationship contains? I guess no.

This beyond- christening relationship is the apogee of the emotional pursuit in a human’s life.  Perhaps, it is only within this relationship that humans travel miles and feel that how short the journey was? It is also perhaps only in this journey that travails seem less troublesome and tears come to eyes unbidden. Why? I wonder!

Who are these people we feel weak for? Who are these people we feel sick for?

Can we define?

Perhaps in this inexplicability, the grandeur of this relationship lies. It has its charm in being nameless. Names confine. And this relationship flourishes when it is nameless and beyond confinements.

Though, there is no apparent strings of names that binds this rapport, yet something is there that attracts us, something is there that calls us.

Times come amid the journey called life, when we have got to change directions. However close we want to remain, nature forces us apart. Is there any message in this event? Is it any type of acid test that tries the tenacity of this rapport? Instead of considering this an intervention of demon, can we take it as deity’s interference who wants good for all the parties involved in it?

Again I am clueless.

But one thing I am sure of is that these people will remain indelibly imprinted on the surface of soul until the end of this lag of life and who knows we might meet again in the next lag!

But, I would like to remain in this lag, for the time being. Do we consider that once parted will ever remain parted?

No!

As I stated earlier life is a tortuous odyssey and on a bend of it we will meet suddenly and be surprised to a tee. The heart will experience moments of bliss on that day. Can we experience the rapture without being ruptured? If no, then brace up for poignant moments of today in certain expectations of fortuitous tryst of tomorrow.

Yes, we will meet again!

For You…

When it is ‘for you’ it has to be special; when it is ‘for you’ it has to be extraordinary; and when it is ‘for you’ it has to be inimitable. Hasn’t it? Such is human tendency. We always want the best for ‘Yous’ in our lives.

Why is it so?

Because when we want to give, we want to offer the best. The emotion of ‘giving’ is in its purest form when it etches lines of smile on the face. In this already selfish world, smile as an offering is precious. So, always try to ensure that your ‘you’ is never bereft of a giggle. It will cement the relationship in a beamy way.

And when smile is there, happiness will get scattered in life. Every ounce of life will get soaked with energetic aura of hope. Things will start falling in place and prosperity will rain to drench you to a tee.

Fashion dreams for your ‘you’ that is sans adversity and life-full of strength. Carve chapters that give confidence of a life that has characteristics of a river-flow and tranquility of a sea. Fill your  you’s eyes with sparkle of gems and radiance of galaxy.

When it comes to ‘for you’, you won’t like to give her/him anything that is less than the soar of an eagle’s wings and purchase of a banyan tree. So, that even if your ‘you’ flies away in the skies, he/ she has a strong rapport with the aroma of your breath. And this way your ‘you’ will always come back to you.

Embellish your  you’s life with dulcet sounds of a flute and mellifluous chanting of morning prayers. Gift your ‘you’ the serenity of pristine dew and eternity of flowers with every hue!

Valentine’s Day: When love sings and heart dances

Love: a sacrosanct emotion that fuels purity and responsibility in life. When devotion becomes divine, love becomes sublime. When every vein of heart becomes strings, and every heartbeat; notes, it means that love has vanquished you and someone has won you.

When roses become more important than rouge and hours get converted into moments, love is ruling the roost. And Valentine’s Day is an occasion to let the emotions unleash and acknowledge a beautiful event in your life. As a day, it summarizes eons that have been drenched with the emotion called love.

The day is not about being shallow like a brook but deep like a sea. Show your emotions for someone in a way that respects yardsticks of morals and values. Any vigorous but vile expression of love is not love but manifestation of satanic aspects of a human.

Cards, gifts, flowers: all try to make the day unforgettable. But then, can these materialistic and ephemeral things match the holiness of unqualified feelings of care and affection?  Surely not! But again, we, as humans, want to cherish moments. And what better than a bud of rose or a gleaming ring, that translates your emotions in all possible artistic manner in absence of your artistic quotient?

Indian and foreign cultures are replete with love stories that are awe-inspiring and sheer platonic in nature. Today’s materialistic world, that respects flesh more than it respects the emotions, needs to take a cue from Radha –Krishna, Romeo- Juliet, and Laila- Majnu. Only then in real terms the word ‘love’ can be defined by them. Otherwise it will remain hollow and superficial.

So, on the Valentine’s Day, weave a dream for your beloved that is dreamy than the word dream itself and wreath beads of stars that is starry than the stars themselves. All in all, make every effort to preserve the warmth, cloyingness and accountability breathing within the word called: LOVE.

RAM

Amid the kerfuffle of temple and mosque, we seem to have forgotten the soul of lord Ram. We have stopped feeling him. Ram, in Indian culture stands not only as a symbol of religion but also as a symbol of hope. He is our belief that a turnaround will surely be; that clouds will surely rain; and that the Sun will surely rise.

Ram is succor in the times of utter hopelessness; Ram is rudder in the times of mere haplessness. Ram is beyond the circumference of temples. He is extensive, he touches emotions and he heals commotions.

He, as a notion, is inspiring. When chips are down he is the dint of mind and the courage of heart. His appeal is across the social strata. And this only shows the sinew of his charisma. He differentiates not. Be they weak or strong, be they right or wrong, Ram is recourse of every one.

He is grit of the winners; he is sob of the losers. He is innocence of the childhood, he is enthusiasm of the youth, and he is satisfaction of the old. He is amulet for fear; he is tissue paper for tear. He is hope of the next moment; he is prayer of the next dream.

When everything seems daunting and defeating, he is spunk to hold on the fight. He is there in decisions, he there in reasons. He is in throngs, he is in solitudes. Without him everything is hollow, without him everything is shallow.

He is water for thirsty, he is bread for hungry, and he is glint for blind. He is in every sort and every kind.

Ram is in the altitude of the mountain, Ram is in the latitude of the fountain. He is bosom of the earth and he is the lap of the firmament. He is transparency of the ocean and he is vibrancy of the motion. He is fragrance of flower, he is vehemence of power.

Even technologies couldn’t resist the charm of Ram, A laptop or desktop is futile in the absence of RAM. Thus Ram is integral to everything that is pivotal to everyone.

May Ram freshen everything that is rotten, may Ram enliven everything that is forgotten!

Beneath the New Year

We have crossed a milestone, one more year in the book of years passed. And we are happy, not because of the New Year, but because we could get rid of the previous year. A year, which was getting quite tough on us. Our dreams were not seeing the light of the day, our hopes were hopeless and our prayers were unheard. Now in the New Year we have new hopes; new dreams; and new goals.

This year we would like to solace ourselves that we would see less of tears, less of blood, and less of pain.

This year we would wipe the dirt off the mirror and like to see our world and our people better. A new leash of trust needs to be there for the crumbling friendships to get rejuvenated, and a new leash of confidence needs to be there to look deep down within ourselves to rinse us off our foibles.

Though the New Year is about new beginnings, but we must not forget the incomplete tasks that were also new, someday in the past. The sheen of newness of this year will fall pale if we fail to complete the incomplete works of last year. The castle of the New Year will be stronger only if the cornerstone is made up of the past experiences.

The New Year is about soaring aspirations and about sprinkling stars on them. It is also about stealing happiness from the hullabaloo of life and securing a serene moment. It makes sense that the New Year also cares about, among other mundane wishes, staying away from making the nature wither.

The pyrotechnics of the New Year is only worthwhile when it lights up the eyes that are brimming with gloom; when it illuminates the soul that is teeming with despondency; and when it rekindles an emotion called humanity that is grappling with utter anarchy.

Friends!

Forever, Reliant, Indispensable, Indelible, Darling, and Sincere: these are the attributes without which the essence of the word, friends, remains hollow. If your friends happen to lack any one of these six traits, then you need to rethink as to the status of your friendship.

No doubt, life is tough! But friends help diffuse the draconian plight of life to a stage that is smooth and easy. Friends are the sail that helps fight the typhoons of life. Sans friends, life is life- less.

In this materialistic and self-centered world it is well-nigh impossible to find the pristine emotion of friendship. But then who said that miracles have stopped to happen in the world? Yes, real friends and true friendship are yet to be extinct.

The world is fraught with souls that are illuminated with virtues of the notion called friendship. These people appreciate the others to a tee. They are compassionate, but they don’t pity their friends’ state. Instead, they provide succor to their friends that helps decimate the pernicious guffaw of calamity and introduces the tranquil chortle of bliss. Real friends are not like the shadow of self that leaves one, when there is gloom. They are like streams of breath that is always there, through thick and thin.

Real friends reject hierarchy. They enjoy sailing in the same boat and weathering the storm with the united dint. There are times when misconceptions creep in but these submit before the inimitable trust and pure affection.

Real friends may fight with you but they fight for you as well! They sob when you cry; their eyes well up, when your heart pains. Likewise, they are delighted, when you are ecstatic. They celebrate your steps of success as if it is their own and their prayers are full of wishes for you.

Real friends are the fortitude in the times of strife; they are the hope in the times of despondency; and they are the grit in the times of grim. Sheer serendipity helps us find our friends in the course of life, and it is also an onus on the part of all friends to preserve the friendship by strengthening the invisible, but completely present, fabric of friendship through indefatigable efforts.

Friends are answers of our prayers to god; they are evidence of divine interference in the world. Those are lucky who have friends to unfurl their heavy heart before and confide their secrets in. Friends are precious; we should try our utmost to save ourselves from losing these gems that proffer shine and shimmer to our life!

Pain and Human

The words rhyme fortunately or unfortunately. God created humans and gifted them a pouch (holding pain) advising to use it with discretion. Since then, pain has helped define many a chapters in the history of the human society. On some chapters, we can feel proud of, but on some; we feel ashamed!

The pain is glorified when a pair of hands with chisel and hammer carves life out of an inanimate stone; when a pair of hands repairs an ailing body part; and when a pair of hands bundles joy into a microchip.

Pain becomes sublime when human endeavours float in space, swim in air and run on earth. Pain is integral part of every invention of human history. When a filament glowers, an engine roars, and a rocket soars, pain gets honoured.

For eons human beings have endured pain to lessen pain. However, history is also rife with illustrations where humans have afflicted pain to worsen pain. Hatred is one element that has contributed enormously to augment the pain factor in human life. With all weaknesses of mind and soul, humans have scripted venomous and virulent stories of all time. The ideologies, sometimes, got so flagrant that the most uncouth form of humanity got revealed.

No part of the world is untouched of the abject notions. In the name of race, cast and creed, the pain has been administered to human beings all around the world. Be it miasmic gases, naked daggers or earth-ripping bombs, they have helped establish the reign of pain.

Whenever, a body is blown to smithereens, is ripped like a cloth, or suffocated in a closed chamber, ignominious becomes the humanity. When one set of lips laughs at the other pair of wet eyes, pure form of pain perishes and the ugly gets procreated.

There are two types of pain. One etches beatific smile on lips while other draws horror to the eyes. There are already innumerable avatars of nature that give pain to us in shape of natural calamities, death, injuries, etc.., so why add the extra potion of pain in life. The humans should take pain to refine themselves once and for all, so that negative façade of pain gets obliterated and pain is always referred to as in a context that is life- enriching not life-snatching!

When She Smiles…

When she smiles gloom dies,

When she smiles bloom sighs.

When she smiles meaningful becomes life,

When she smiles happiness becomes rife.

When she smiles life gets confident,

When she smiles strife gets absent.

When she smiles, blissful becomes surround,

When she smiles, beautiful becomes around.

When she smiles, rainbow glowers,

When she smiles, glee-bow showers.

When she smiles, earth becomes more new,

When she smiles, sky becomes pure view.

When she smiles, dew gets sheen,

When she smiles, hope gets umpteen.

(Dedicated to a friend who inspires life.)

Meaning of Being Sachin Tendulkar in India!

Indian middle class population is by and large busy with anxiety of future and concerns of today. Amid ever increasing demands of life, people seldom find an occasion of respite. Workload of office, tension of work commute, tight monthly budget, increasing prices of essential commodities, you name them and you will find a problem or two clutching this stratum of Indian society. In such situation, there is one fad of this class that helps it forget its problems and that is: cricket!

It is said that cricket is religion in India. Then there must be a god of the religion. Yes, this religion does have one. And the name of the God is: Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. This name has been synonymous with hope and dream for the middle class. With the flight of the career of Sachin Tendulkar , dreams of middle class also soared. This player gave the middle class belief to surmount the insurmountable and achieve the unachievable.

Through his cricketing skills, he showed that dream is slave of spunk, ambitions submit to grit and goals respect perseverance. There is always a vicarious happiness across the middle class, whenever Sachin is happy. Through his centuries and wickets, the middle class lives its own dreams. The deeds of god inspire generations to resist giving up and desist giving in. Like an indefatigable warrior he fights the cricketing battles to rewrite the meanings of competition, competitor, and victories.

As an indomitable competitor he describes the game in his own way that is just and sublime. Cricket has also got a definitive ambassador in him.

World at large is indebted to him for various occasions that he brought to the destiny of the game named cricket. Indian middle class in particular has witnessed several festive moments thanks to swashbuckling endeavours of the diminutive wizard. Sachin has filled new coloures to Holi and new brightness to Diwali. The power of the Sachin’s sleight turns a frazzled face into a sprightly pool of beatific emotions.

Sachin Tendulkar signifies rectitude that makes a life meaningful and fortitude that makes a person adorable. If we can cultivate these two attributes of Sachin in our life, then we can also make our life teeming with achievements like Sachin’s !

The Past Perfect!

Past is always glorious, bewitching and enchanting -- be it a life of a society or a nation. Past always conjures up a sense of supremacy for societies around the world. ‘We were this or we were that’ gives a velvety shed from the scorching challenges of present. Every society longs for a revisit of past. It wants to revisit the glory of past that it is bereft of in the dominance of present.

Several wars have been fought on the face of the earth to revisit the golden dream of past. Societies and Nations alike have sacrificed tranquility of present to repeat the sheen of the past. Blood and brutality has been used several times in the space of time to move the clock backwards.

The penchant for past is inseparably embedded in  human psyche. Whenever we, as a nation or as a society, mention the word past, we tend to skim only achievements and ignore debacles. And this tendency to embrace glory and avoid gloom is a cardinal force behind our infatuation for past.

Whenever archeologists excavate traces of forgotten civilizations, the integral to the exploration is always the word ‘imposing’. In a way we congratulate ourselves on being the heir of a magnanimous legacy. And that is why, there is hunger to dig earth layer by layer.  

With the word past, the word pride is subtly intertwined. And when societies rummage for their past, they actually try to delve for their pride that is buried under the dust of time. The major chunk of present is expended cogitating about the past that was immaculate and the past that was perfect.

Basking in the past provides soothing refuge to the tumultuous present. And many a times past has been inspiration to achieve something in present that is awe inspiring. Dwelling in the past is ok as long as the present is not being sacrificed. If present is strangulated perforce to make the past alive again, then a precarious situation emerges that engulfs the future as well.

So, we should always take care while submerging ourselves into hallucinating effects of past to give proper respect to our present and future. It is better to sprinkle experiences of past on the destiny of present than to expunge the opportunities of present for the nostalgic hubris of past.