Lily

As Captain Ryan Campbell stepped into the C-17, he felt like he was in a dream. He could hardly believe that he was alive, that he had survived four years at war and that he was finally going home. The pain and weariness that had become so habitual that he barely noticed anymore, were gone. Now he felt relief. He felt hope. Pressing against each other in the small aircraft cabin, his men were talking about looking forward to hamburgers and cheese fries. About warm beds and cold beer. But Ryan knew what he was looking forward to the most. In a few short hours, he would be with Lily. Beautiful, beautiful Lily – the love of his life, the apple of his eye – Lily.

He still remembered vividly the day he had seen her for the first time. He even remembered the date - April 15 2002. The moment their eyes had met, he had known he was hooked. His first words to her, “Hi! I’m Ryan”, had come out in an awed whisper, barely audible. It had seemed to him that everything that had happened in his life up to that point, had been so that it would bring him to that instant – that instant when he first saw her radiant face. As the powerful memory surged through him, he was surprised by how many tiny details he had noticed about her on that day. He remembered noticing her eyes – her big, warm, beautiful brown eyes with little flecks of green that added mischief and charm. He remembered looking at the delicate flap in her earlobe and wanting nothing more than to kiss it. He remembered her soft, black hair and the heady rush he had felt when he had first inhaled its wonderful fragrance.

That was almost six years ago, a year and a half before he had been deployed to Afghanistan. So much had happened since then. He wondered if she had changed. Was her favorite color still blue? Did she still like to listen to the same song when she awoke in the morning? Did she still talk in her sleep? Weeks before he had had to leave, he would stay up all night just to watch her sleep – so that he could memorize her peaceful, content face. He wondered if she would even recognize him now. He knew he would. He would know that smile anywhere. But all they had had of each other for four years were memories and photographs from the months that they had spent together. He had one of those photographs with him today. It was from the first time they had gone to the beach together. They had spent the entire day laughing and singing and ,every now and then, daring to wet their feet in the ice-cold water. In that photo, her hair was glistening with the orange glow of the setting sun and the joy and magic of the entire day were frozen in her happy smile. He tightly gripped the photo in his palm as he waited for the aircraft to land.

In the few letters that he had been allowed to mail from Afghanistan, he had never known what to write. Or rather, he had never been able to find the words to express everything he felt. No words seemed good enough to tell her how much he loved her, how much he missed her, how he longed to just feel her in his arms again. How could he tell her that she was the reason he stayed alive? That the distant hope of holding her hand again was what helped him through the terrifying reality that faced him every day. That during times when it felt like the very air he breathed reeked of death, remembering the sweet scent of her shampoo was what comforted him. That in those hopeless moments when he had been convinced that he would not survive, that his life would end in that hell-hole, the only thing that kept him going was the memory of the delight on her face as she stood at the door watching his car pull up.

“This is it!”, said Lieutenant Tommy Farlow as he helped Ryan out of the aircraft. Ryan could hear the other planes landing too. It was, as it is said, a hero’s welcome. There were banners everywhere proclaiming pride and love and prayers. An officer walked up to the aircraft and announced that there would be a ceremony in their honor later that day. But all Ryan had eyes or ears for was Lily. He scanned the crowd in eager anticipation. When he couldn’t find her, a wave of apprehension swept over him. Would she even be there? He had not been able to call before leaving but he had been assured that she would be informed. Even if she was there, would she love him the same way she did four years ago? Would she be awkward, seeing him after all these years? Would she be afraid? Would things ever be the same between them? Would he ever be able to make up for the time they had lost? And then he saw her. She was searching for him too. He waved frantically to catch her attention. As their eyes met, a smile of recognition flashed on her face and she started walking toward him. She looked like an angel, in a periwinkle dress with a matching flower in her hair. “What will I say to her?”, he thought. “What can I say that will tell her how sorry I am to have missed all those years? What could I possibly say that would tell her how much I have been looking forward to this moment? “. She was running now. She was getting closer. He could not move. He just stood there, arms outstretched. There were tears in his eyes as he knelt to the ground, overwhelmed. She ran into his arms with surprising force. All his doubts seemed insignificant, and his fears vanished into nothingness, when she whispered in his ear, “Welcome home, Daddy”.

THE PURSUIT OF 'EXCELLENTCE'

There is no dearth of adages that tell you how to survive this confusing-exhilarating-depressing-difficult-breathtaking-wonderfully satisfying-suspenseful-thrilling-horrifying-intense-happy-sad-all-at-the-same-time roller coaster ride that we, with deceptive simplicity, call life. However, there are some that strike you instantly as rules worthy of putting up on your wall so that they catch your eye a moment before you bang your fist in. I came across on such quote recently - "Life is not meant to end by going quietly to the grave.. but rather in a full-on power slide screaming "HOLY SHIT! What a ride!!!"". This seemingly playful statement made me think more than many obscure and profound thoughts have because, lets face it, most of us go into our quiet graves more regretful than content. We remember loves lost, opportunities missed, lands unseen, words never said, joys never felt, feelings never expressed, paths not followed,promises not kept... it always ends with could have, would have, should have. The helpless despondence of it all makes these among the most unseemly phrases in the English language.

But thats what life is supposed to be, right? Dont the imperfections, the sorrow and the horrors just add to its glory? Why do we invariably die dissatisfied if we know that its all in the game? Maybe it has something to do with who we blame for our less-than-satisfactiory existence. Even though we spend our entire lives passing the buck around and blaming the teacher-the boss-the parents-the spouse-the other driver-God-nature for our misfortunes, it is when time is stealthily slipping away, that we realize that it was, all along, our own miserable selves who were to blame! A person who has played the best he could, given the cards he was dealt, does not resent life when at his deathbed. A person who has left no stone unturned in becoming the most complete human being that he could possibly be, does not regret lost opportunities at the end of the path. A person who spends his life spreading joy and love to everyone he encounters does not shed tears over undeclared love and unspoken feelings. A person who has spent every waking moment reveling in the wisdom of the past or discovering the immense possibilities of the future does not deplore the insignificant hurdles or the tiny disappointments. The man who dies in peace, is the man who sees joy, grief, love, loss, success and failure as opportunities - opportunities to better his life, opportunities to become a stronger person, opportunities to be more helpful to those less fortunate than himself, opportunities to learn from his mistakes, opportunities to correct the follies of his ancestors, opportunities to leave behind a world that is, atleast infinitesimally, better than it was before he was part of it; the man who dies in peace, is the man who sees life as an eternal challenge - a neverending pursuit, of excellence.

Longing....

alas....my bed is empty
but my eyes are full of dreams
i am with you when i close my eyes
so wonderfully near you seem

Awakening is not even a distant thought
Until the truth of the day comes bursting in
Dreams must vanish, life must go on
There's miles to go, before I can dream of you again.

Bitter it may be, but truth it is
that we're a world apart, and nothing can be done
but even in solitude's painful grip, I know
that i'd rather have lonely dreams than none!


P.S : Thanks to mulloy for creative collaboration

from bling jewellery to reality TV

'The wheels of change'... ever wondered why we use that particular phrase? Is it because, with ‘change’, we associate a rapid, uncontrollable movement...an inevitable fluidity of principles, economies, traditions, ideologies, of beliefs, policies, relations, borders, of rivers, glaciers, mountains and volcanoes, of love and of war... I mean, what doesn’t change?? They say the only constant in man’s phenomenal evolutionary history has been CHANGE. Well, if its motion that we wanted to signify, why not say, the 'trains of change'.... and if it’s the incessant influx of new ideas, why not, 'the rivers of change'? Maybe it’s got something to do with the way wheels move.... up-down, up-down, up-down...cyclically...up-down, up-down, up-down... We see this, let’s call it ‘cyclicity’, everywhere... in every new dawn, in every drop of thawing snow heralding the arrival of spring..in religious theories of reincarnation and in the most fundamental law of science ‘matter can neither be created nor destroyed. Only changed from one form to another’.
The old cliché 'what goes, comes around' is exemplified in the world of fashion...by what’s hot and what’s not. Boot-cuts and bell-bottoms made a comeback a few years ago, and so did block and floral prints. What was considered criminally ghastly last year is a must-have this season. Your mom may not understand the aesthetics or the logic behind carrying a mobile phone and a tiny purse in a gargantuan bag but 'Bling is THE thing!'. All this said, bling jewellery is a completely innocuous indulgence and retro fashion isn’t killing anybody. However, not all things ancient have harmless modern avatars. For example, gladiatorial combat – the epitome of the decadence of the ancient romans, is back with a vengeance in a new, glossy, revamped form – Reality TV...and it’s turning every drawing room into the colosseum and every viewer into a sadistic, blood-thirsty roman..
The barbaric romans, in all their depravity, enjoyed as a spectacle, the brutal murder of helpless prisoners by Caesar’s legions, the savage conflicts among the enslaved gladiators, the inhuman scenes of torture and the blood curdling slaughter of slaves by animals... What is called reality TV is inherently based on and thrives upon the same thing- human sadism and the perverseness of what we consider entertaining... Here however, there are no victimised slaves and no inflictors of cruelty... the viewers are gratified, true... but they’re also victimised unknowingly...
When we see our basest instincts, our meanest thoughts, our numbing mediocrity reflected on screen by the rich and the famous, it probably smothers even the tiny scruples that we may still have about being bitchy and mean and well, mediocre...it gives us the confidence that, if we choose to, we could also become rich and famous by just being our vile, below-average, lazy, mundane selves.... We see celebrity participants snapping at each other and watch in rapt attention as they make mean, below-the-belt, racist comments... we enjoy it when wannabe performers are verbally assaulted and utterly humiliated by so-called judges and we also revel in the sniping and the bitching and the tantrums of the judges themselves...We have sunk to such macabre depths of perversion that we are now telecasting wars and executions... Whats more terrible, is that it doesn’t seem like it’s going to stop here.... as we smell more blood, we get hungrier, greedier and keep asking for more..more..MORE...
In today’s world of faster cars, bigger paycheques, looser morals, ephemeral passion and instant gratification, it does indeed seem like we will remain, for quite some time atleast, in the hypnotic hold of a monster that we created ourselves, a satanic beast that feeds on greed and boredom and dissolved morals, a poison that is nurturing human vice so subtly that we aren’t even noticing anymore... the hypnotic hold, of the Big Boss...

My name is Vishnu....

My name is Vishnu. I am seven years old. I live with my mother and my four year old sister outside Andheri railway station in Mumbai. My mother sells flowers and gajras at the railway station. I sell newspapers in the evening. Our house is made of plastic and is a very pretty blue colour. We got it from the vegetable market where they throw out all these plastic sheets and I picked out the colour myself. I have been going to school for two years and I already know the alphabet and even some small words. But my mother says that I may not be able to continue going to school because people don’t buy so many flowers any more. I told mom that chumki didi, who begs at the railway station, makes more money than us but my mother scolded me and said begging for money is bad. Even Raju bhaiya says that mom is right. Decent people did not beg for money. I didn’t know what decent meant but I wanted to look like a big boy so I pretended to understand.
Raju bhaiya is my best friend. He is twelve years old and very tall. Bhaiya says he is also poor but I think he says that because he thinks it makes me feel better. He has a tube-light and a table fan and it doesn’t rain inside their house. So he must be rich. He said he also used to sell newspapers at the station like me when he was a small boy. Now, he has his own bicycle and he delivers newspapers to the big houses in Juhu. On Saturdays, he takes me with him in the morning to see the big houses and the rich people. Sometimes, if the gate is not very high, he even lets me throw the newspaper inside. On my birthday, Raju bhaiya gave me a big ball. So we went to Juhu beach to play and I also shot balloons at Mohan kaka’s shop. I like shooting balloons because I am very good at it. Mohan kaka lets me shoot balloons on nights when it’s cloudy and there’re not too many people at the beach. He smiles and pats me on my back when I hit balloons in all my five shots. I like it when he does that. We went back on Raju bhaiya’s bicycle and like always, he let me ride it for a little while and, like he does almost every day, he told me that when he opens his own shop at the railway station, I can have his cycle. Raju bhaiya says that it is his ambition- to have his own shop. I have always wanted to grow up and be like Raju Bhaiya. Now I have a different ambition. I want to win a gold medal in the alimpix.
I remember that afternoon very clearly. It was pouring with rain and we were waiting for Raju bhaiya to come with the evening papers so that I could go to the station and sell them. I wanted to go play in the rain until he came but my mother would not let me. The last time it rained like this, my sister and I played for a long time and she fell ill the next day. The doctor said that my sister had something called new-moon-ya and scolded my mother for not taking care of us. My mother had to pawn her only gold chain to buy the medicines. It was a very nice gold chain. So I behaved myself and sat quietly. Raju bhaiya looked very excited when he came. I asked him what had happened and he said “India alimpix mein gold medal jeet gaya”. I didn’t know what that meant so i asked him. He seemed to be in a hurry and he said “For now, it means more people will buy the evening paper today!! Now go!!”.
I took my plastic sheet raincoat and ran out with the papers yelling “India gold medal jeet gaya! India gold medal jeet gaya!”. Raju bhaiya was right! Even people who would usually shoo me away called me and asked for a paper. Raju bhaiya had given me TWO bundles today and I had sold them all. My sister and I had an extra vada-pav at dinner that day. I was very happy. I asked bhaiya about the gold medal that night and he said that some man from Delhi had won a gold medal in the alimpix competition by shooting all the balloons. I said I can also do that. But bhaiya said it’s a very big competition and that people like us cannot win that. I think he didn’t know but pretended to know because he also wanted to look like a big boy. That man from Delhi has made so many people happy. He has given an extra vada-pav to so many children like me. I also want to make many people happy. I also want to make my mother smile again by giving her the medal in return for the pretty gold chain that she lost because of me. I also want to win an alimpix gold medal. Can someone please tell me how? Please.

blink

Mornings are beautiful.....whichever corner of the world you wake up in.... mornings are beautiful..... the freshly laundered sky....the luxuriant trees basking in the dawn and the dew.....with nature’s maestros exquisitely proclaiming another new day on their branches....oblivious to the attention or, in a growingly fast and unappreciative world, non-attention of others..... mornings are beautiful..... the sights, smells and sounds of a Chennai morning are extra beautiful to me.... now more than ever....because it will be a very different sun that will greet my bleary eyed stretches a month from now.....mornings in this nook of the earth are particularly early....as early as 4 AM..... with the tangy smell of the coast wafting in along with the uplifting aroma of fresh filter kaapi.... the elevating strains of suprabhatham in MS’s ethereal voice..... a tradition almost as emblematic of a Chennai household’s sunrise as kaapi....the newspaper sellers and doodhwalas whizzing past on their bicycles....passing maamis nonchalantly drawing intricate kolam’s..... while the men sit nearby with The Hindu in front of their noses savouring their brews along with the news.... mornings are beautiful.....

Interestingly, it is not mornings that I wanted to talk about.... as I was basking in yet another beautiful Chennai morning on my front porch, my thoughts turned to this rather boring crime movie i was watching yesterday in which a cop busts a criminal at the last, crucial moment even though he had almost no reason to believe that this respected honourable man was the bad-guy.....his awed partner (a feeling we were supposed to mirror, but sadly, it was too predictable and the clichés were too many..) asks him how he did it....and our man sagaciously says ‘I saw it in his eyes’.... and this pushed my thoughts to a rather fascinating book I recently read called ‘blink’ by Malcolm Gladwell.... now though our movies and their heroes proclaim it rather smugly, we do our own share of face-reading quite a few times everyday..... we try to gauge the boss’s mood before asking for a day-off.... we try to perceive what kind of product the customer will be interested in, not just from his face but also from the way he dresses, the way he walks and talks and the shoes he wears....we steal looks at someone across the restaurant because we feel he/she’d be a good companion.... we can ‘instinctively’ tell if a person’s a good orator or a good teacher just by looking at him..... extensive research has been done on body language.... we read articles that claim to be able predict if a relationship will last just by analysing the first kiss.... we know a loving touch...a comforting hug.... a critical eye.... a scornful stare....a flirtatious glance....an envious look.... we just know.... this knowing is not based on anything literal.... it’s not something the person explicitly said! It is just something we infer....so, we, normal mortals, engage in this occult science of mind-reading enough and more.... it does seem like a pretty useful ability to have, doesn’t it....

In ‘Blink’, Gladwell explores, among many other subjects, Autism.... he says that one of the most intense and evident effects of Autism is the inability to read faces... autistic people find it difficult, if not impossible, to do what we do automatically, to interpret non-verbal cues such as gestures and facial expressions .... to understand anything beyond the absolutely literal.... this is supposedly caused by the malfunctioning of a part of the brain called the fusiform gyrus.... the person might have a very high IQ....may have impressive degrees from prestigious institutions...but he will face problems in the most routine of practical situations because of his total lack of perceptual understanding..... we commiserate with these people....we feel sorry for them and try to imagine how difficult it must be for them to cope with daily situations.... but we should stop to wonder..... is our celebrated ‘ability’ all that it’s made out to be? Don’t most of our failed relationships break because of things that we didn’t say and thought understood or things that we didn’t mean but were unconsciously implied.....Don’t most of our caste-based and religious conflicts arise because of generalised and baseless judgements made based on anything but what is actually said.....aren’t all our prejudices based on assumptions and presumptions based on colour, ancestry, history and geography rather than on the person in front of you and what he has said and done....conscious and intended prejudice is not its only form.... it is a fact that juries in the USA take significantly lesser time to convict coloured people.... these juries aren’t entirely comprised of racists and xenophobes.... but this chauvinism is imbued in our very essence....don’t we instinctively cringe and feel a little more threatened when we see a two hundred pound African American man on a deserted street than when we see a blond man in a crisp business suit? unconscious prejudice is as bad as, if not worse than, its conscious form....Maybe we need to pity rather than laud ourselves for this burden of ‘mind-reading’ that we carry.... maybe we need to base our judgements more on fact than on the figurative.... maybe we need to appreciate the literal and tone-down the symbolic.... maybe we should learn to overlook, atleast sometimes, the implications, the inferences and the innuendo.... maybe we all need a malfunctioning fusiform gyrus once in a while....

Day 2 : Part 3

Blown and bloated beyond recognition by the much awaited, incredibly delicious and indecently devoured meal ,we literally had to roll out of Master ji’s kitchen. Taking into consideration the physical travails awaiting us in the coming week and also the inconvenient propensity of spherically shaped forms to roll downhill, we decided to take a walk in an attempt to return our distended forms to human proportions. Having already explored one part of the village, we decided to head in the other direction. It led gently uphill and we could see majestic coniferous trees and vibrantly beckoning rhododendrons at a distance. As we passed what would be the official starting point of our trek, Kris was told that masterji had summoned him for discussing some important issues about our trek. He left rather haughtily, chest puffed out in pompous importance. (kindly remember that given that the starting shape itself was a grossly engorged caricature of the human form, this puff of pride, though unnecessary, was an achievement in itself). Vaguely wondering what it might be that Masterji had called Kris for, we resumed our walk, periodically punctuated by excited screams and spellbound whispers as tiny springs, hidden streams and yawning valleys provided enroute entertainment.

It was already late afternoon and the sun was well on its westward journey. The colours of the ensuing twilight added to the drama, bestowing a mystical shimmer on the roadside streams and making the already intense red of the rhododendrons gleam as if on fire. This ethereal setting further enriched by the ghostly white flags billowing in the wind and the whispers of the rustling pines, kept us mesmerized for quite a while. Kris came back just as the night was creeping in and we decided to get back to the village.

Masterji had told us to stock up on chocolates, biscuits and dry fruits for the climb since we would not encounter many shops, or rather, any civilisation at all, in the days to come. Now, ‘stockin up’ and ‘chocolates’ and ‘biscuits’ were all terms that were dear to our guzzling hearts and we took to the task with gusto. The owner revelling in what was probably the sale of a life-time, we left the store with food that could have fed an army for a month and smiles that would have put the Cheshire cat to shame. After putting away our rather substantial hoard, we unabashedly trooped to the kitchen for dinner (yes! For more food! Any problems? We did take a long walk after all!). The savoury scent dismissing any qualms about the repetition, we treated ourselves once more to dal and cauliflower while masterji happily chatted away enthralling us with his accounts of the thrills and dangers of trekking along with some highly useful tips and tidbits. Among these tidbits was the rather sinister statement that the first three kilometres would take the wind out of our lungs. In response to the looks of open terror on some of our faces (identity protected in order to maintain some semblance of respect), he said, in what he assumed was a very encouraging tone, that if we could survive those (i would like to re-emphasize the IF in 'if we could survive') we would, most likely, make it through the remainder of the trek. A highly intriguing choice of words, wouldn't you say? With eager expectation overpowering any inhibitions that may have arisen, we hit the bed hoping to hurtle into the dawn that just couldn't come soon enough.

P.S : In case you’re wondering what happened to Kris, whom we shall rechristen as Banta for the time being (as in Santa and Banta, our leaders) when we were on our walk, here it is. Though Mr.Banta has some lofty and obviously spurious yarns about having been called upon to make critical decisions and do some meticulous planning, here’s our (totally honest and definitely not exaggerated) version of what he had to do. Since Mr.Banta took it into his head to be our “leader” and representative, he had to perform some ancient Sherpa rituals to protect himself and his group of “followers” from the wrath of the mountains. According to these, the leader is taken to a goat pen having about a hundred goats. Of these he has to identify the female goats (by looking ONLY at their faces! they’re sacred goats remember!! So no peeking! hence the afore-mentioned critical decision making), count (and remember) their teeth and bathe in their milk in the centre of that pen at twilight. All of these must be done with utter reverence or one might annoy the sacred goats. Though we’re still having some trouble in getting Kris to admit that he did all this, our account is based on Stuart’s extensive knowledge in this area and on strong factual evidence.