शिखर ,फिर गुमनामी की रेत

तुम सफलता के  शिखर पर हो ,कैसा लगता है वहाँ?

                                                कैसी हवा है दोस्त ?

                                                                                                         

हवा बहती  नहीं यहाँ ,सिर्फ दबाव है उसका ,

मैं महसूस करता हूँ वह दबाव..                                                             

एक अजीब अनिश्चय ,चिरस्थायी सा भ्रम,

कि इसके आगे ऊपर और कहाँ ,किधर है राहें 

दिखाई देती है सिर्फ एक राह ..बेहद संकरी ,नीचे जाती हुई..

इतनी गहरी  कि अस्तित्व गुम होता नज़र आता है .

                                                    नुटन ने कहा था ,हमने सुना था ,

हर ऊपर जाने वाली चीज़ का अंत नीचे आकर होता है

तब क्यूँ चढ़ना कठिन  और उतरना आसान भला 

रेत के किले कि तरह ,मिटटी के घड़े कि तरह ,तराशी मूरत कि तरह ,

ज़रा सी जो चूकी नज़र, फिसलन लिए जाती गुमनामी के अंधेरों  में,

                                                   बेनामी के अथाह मरुस्थल में धँसने पर ,

गूंगी रेत का कण कब बोला है भला कि ,

फलां आदमी यहाँ शिखर पर पहुँचा था 

माया कि दलदल में फिसलकर नीचे गिरा था ..

और इस गुमनामी कि रेत में कहीं गहरा  धँसा है .

Palmistry,Love Signs and More

Most likely things you have been told after a palm reading session :
--you are a very loving person

--you are a loyal friend                                                                            
--you always give more,expecting much less in return
--aap dil ke saaf ho
--life has taught you a lot
--you are very responsible
--where ever you may be you are always thinking about your family
-- nothing comes to you easily,your life is full of struggles
--you still haven't got your due
--you are much more worthy of what you have got in life,thoda support hota toh aaj kahaan hote aap ..
--aap ko muft ka paisa nai pachta (You can not digest easy money)

Astrology,palmistry,tarot reading,tea/coffee cup reading,aura reading ,numerology and the like never fail to amuse me.My first meeting with an astrologer was in third year of college when I accompanied a friend to her family astrologer.She always consulted him before taking any major step and since I was going through a rough patch at that time,she thought it fit to tag me along.A tiny room was full of people with varying degrees of grim expressions on their faces.Each 'consultation' took about thirty minutes,at the end of which the bhakt touched guruji's feet and left .I told dad about my meeting and he was swift in talking me out of my brief inclination.

Nothing that was told to me had made any  sense anyway, nor did I follow any instructions thereafter but the whole idea of there being a science which could see through people's personalities or predict their future,intrigued me.So for a couple of years I read a lot of astrology and palmistry.I also read and researched about body language and stars and signs.Linda Goodman was my favorite and her books  'Sun signs'' and 'Love signs' were on the tip of my tongue.I took pride in looking at a person and many a times guessing his Sun sign correctly.

A lot of time was whiled away in college canteen and at the katta, discussing the future of  new college couples .We predicted the success and failure of their relationships at our end with the help of  love signs.Many bets were won. Colour based mind games and personality and body language analyses were a major source of entertainment during college trips.I used a lot of above mentioned statements while reading palms and it never failed to generate interest and awe.The impressed 'client' mostly a junior bakra would come to know of the truth much later :p

During one such college trips,a rather shy classmate of mine extended his palm for me to read.After the customary disclaimer in place,I asked him what he wanted to know.Tell me anything that I do not know about myself ,he said.Since every other guy/gal was interested in knowing about his/her love life or lack of it,I thought I would tell him about that.I told him that he was not heading for a love match and that in all probabilities,he was going to have an arranged match.He smiled and walked back to his window seat.

My 'Vidya' met with a tragic end as I fell in love with my best friend , after insisting for a long time that we were friends and nothing more.It was the same shy guy I later married.So much for my prediction :D On his part, Hobbs  has never teased me about that prediction ,I wonder why?
Haven't gone back to those texts since then. I miss all the fun though... :)

Are you listening?

How many times have you been asked -'Are you even listening?'
How many times have you asked the same question to someone else?

                                                                  image courtesy Google
Continuous rants on visual media,social media,Lit fests,bring out this one factor very prominently to fore,that we as a society ,love to talk and hate to listen.Freedom of expression is not only about being fiercely vocal about something,it also involves passive listening.What we see all around us is everyone doing the talking and no one making an attempt to listen .The impatience to cut the other person's talk to put forth one's own views is all too evident on the faces of so called opinion makers,panelists and anchors.

Passive listening is exactly that-passivvee.If it has an active thought process in the background,then it becomes hearing not listening.To listen,we need to surrender momentarily to the thought process of the other person.Even in debates.Even the silliest of opinions have to be listened to ,not merely heard.Listening makes you learn,listening makes you earn,respect as well as money.Successful salesmen are good at both,talking and listening.If he fails to listen to the requirement,he fails to sell.


Krishnamurti (and I am inspired heavily) said that listening is one of the highest and greatest arts in life which does not come easily but when it does,brings great understanding. 

Contrary to popular and seemingly more logical belief, concentration is the enemy of listening.Hain!!Yeh kya? ...Actually,it starts very early in childhood when you keep telling a child to concentrate in class.When forced,concentration leads to lack of attention and hence narrowed down listening.Not convinced?Think about it,think about incidences in your childhood when you were forced to concentrate on a talk,how everything else except the subject came alive suddenly .I have been on both sides of the desk so I know that forcing someone to pay attention does not guarantee good listening.

It is said that to enhance listening without making it seem lite a task,is to try listening to a far away sound,shifting to a  closer sound,still closer and finally sound of your own heartbeat.it takes time but you get there slowly.

Listening develops patience,increases your analytical capabilities, enhances managerial skills but above all it prevents foot in the mouth syndrome.Politicians need a crash course in the art but alas it is the most difficult art to impart.To many it comes naturally and those gifted ones ,are known as  matured and saintly.

'Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage'-Pubilius Syrus

So...Are you listening?!

One earthly morning

Last weekend on my way to Pune I was greeted by the rising Sun.Nothing unusual in that, except that I got a chance to absorb the myriad hues and capture a few of them.Unfortunately,I was not carrying a fancy camera. 

From ominous Black to gentle grey as the Sun blinks open its eyes ...

The Grey blends into the Red ,Yellow and Blue and bids adieu to the Black with its outstretched slender arms..
                                                   

 

The Orange bordered  Yellow spreads its wings spinning an intricate web across the magnificent canvass..

The Blue making its presence felt through the Grey while the the fiery Orange looms large.

The celestial ,omnipresent Sun in all its mystical glory is indeed sacrosanct.The unearthly,readies the earth for another day of life before it  hides behind its own brilliance.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Outdo yourself book challenge by Book Vixen 2012

I join another book reading challenge hosted by Book vixen - the outdo yourself book challenge.I read 42 books for the South Asian book reading challenge plus a few more authors and I aim to outdo myself this year.:) I have Smita,to thank, for it is through her blog that I got the link for the two challenges.

                                                                       

South Asian book reading challenge 2012

 New year starts with another book reading challenge hosted by S Krishna .happy to be part of it yet again!
I intend to add a lot more non fiction and travelogues and cook books too for this,just to keep up the variety.Suggestions are most welcome!                                                                   

South Asian Reading Challenge 2011---List of books .

                                                                       
I came to know about the South Asian reading challenge by Swapna Krishna of skrishna's books in the month of May and I took it up just to see how many books I can finish reading by the end of the year comfortably without pushing myself too hard.I am pretty happy with my score but would have loved it, had it been a total of fifty.

I generally pick books after I read a review or if the author is someone I like reading.This was challenging for me because I had never read so many books from the region,in a row.I did get bored in the middle as it was kind of getting monotonous so I  included a few other books as well in my list of  good reads.In all I enjoyed about 52 books .

Listing below all the titles that  I read from 15th of May till 31st of December.Wish I could review as much as I read ...This year I plan to change that.Just saw a book review challenge floating around and I think I should take it up!

Here goes the list in no particular order :

1.Between the assassinations-----Arvind Adiga
2.Eat pray love-------------------Elizabeth Gilbert
3.Love life and all that jazz--------Ahmed Faiaaz
4.God save the Dork-------------Sidin Vadukut
5.Dork-The incredible adventures
 of Robin Einstien Vergese--------Sidin Vadukut
6.Life is what you make it--------Preeti Shenoy
7.35 bubblegums and candies----Preeti Shenoy
8.I have a dream----------------Rashmi bansal
9.Connecting the dots----------Rashmi Bansal
10.Roads to Massoorie--------Ruskin Bond
11.Funny side up--------------Ruskin Bond
12.Laughter omnibus----------Ruskin Bond
13.Two states,story of
my marriage--------------------Chetan bhagat
14.Horn ok please-------------Karthik iyengar
15.Highway on my plate--------Rocky Singh
16.Down the road---------------Ahmed Faiaaz,Rohini Kejriwal
17Almost Single-----------------Advaita Kala
18Urban shots-------------------Various-edited by Paritosh Uttam
19Last man in the tower--------Arvind Adiga
20Palace of illusions-----------Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
21Oh shit not again-------------Mandar Kokate
22.Right fit wrong shoe---------Varsha Dixit
23.Xcess baggage-------------Varsha Dixit
24.Dreaming in Hindi----------Katherine Russel Rich
25.Packof lies-----------------Urmilla Deshpande
26.Lives of strangers----------Chitra Divakaruni
27.I am another you----------Priya kumar
28.Bombay duck is a fish-----Kanika Dhillon
29.Love lust and life----------Azaan Ahsan
30.Landour days-------------Ruskin Bond
31.Polyester prince----------hanish Mcdonald
32.Interpreter of maladies----Jhumpa lahiri
34.Home--------------------Manju Kapur
35.The immigrant------------Manju Kapur
36.One amazing thing--------Chitra Banerjee divakaruni
37Holy Cow----------------Sarah Mcdonald
38.Love and longing in Bombay--Vikram Chandra
39.Brick Lane----------------Monika Ali
40.Can't die for size zero---- -Vrushali Telang
41.The great Indian Love story--Ira Trivedi
42.There is no God-------------Khushwant Singh

I am all ready for the next challenge!

The sandwiched generation

My sudden interest in family weddings and alumni meets has surprised me more than anybody else.I have been thinking and talking about it a lot lately, as to what has brought about this change in me.The magic figure of forty crept in and suddenly picture became more clear.I realized that post forty we do become more sensitized to our roots,our past,our old friends and relatives.Strange but true.

We are anti establishment when young,both at a personal level and in the society.We are rebellious,brimming with new revolutionary ideas that we sincerely believe will make a difference,we are ready to take on the world head on,'dekha jayega'is the mantra,kya fark padta hai-we say and I care a damn is the attitude.
Toh!!with a raised eyebrow is the answer to any question and we see the elders shrink.They shrink because they know we can .They trust......it is just that they feel that small tug at their apron strings.They ruled till then  and now it was the time to hand over the reigns.It is realization time, that suddenly they 'care', worry,get affected and have begun playing safe.

As we cross the all important figure of forty,most of us have achieved at least the basic goals in life and have created our own cozy space in the universe.During the journey,we traveled at a breakneck speed without a care in the world for anything and suddenly one day 'what will Mrs Deshpande think' crosses our mind from nowhere for a fleeting second! Of course we manage to brush it off immediately,we know better than our parents , but the point is..the thought does cross albeit briefly.Also,we no longer argue with our parents and before we know it, we become the sandwiched generation.

The great sandwiched generation has two generations of child-beings to attend to.The grass is not greener on any side of the fence and both generations graze in your comfortable mental space till you go green in the face.The elderly child-beings and the YAs(young adults-your children) are persistent and ziddi to the core.In my opinion,English language has no word that matches up to 'ziddi' because this one word sums it all.Both generations,years apart in their thinking,vie for your attention and are sometimes fiercely competitive in the process.The best part is, these two kid-generations get along like a house on fire.Both can be very demanding when it comes to your attention ,so just when you get ready to settle with a big mug of liquid to sip the pleasures of your labor, your presence is urgently demanded.

My parents call  every evening after I come back from work, to keep in touch with my life.It is sweet of my parents to do that really, since I am definitely more occupied than they are but what do I do with their uncanny ability to catch me precisely when I have shampoo in my hair or some such inopportune moment when it is next to impossible to take the call.I swear mom,I have not instructed Muffin to simply say that I am in the bathroom...I AM IN THE BATHROOM .Kids know it is my parents calling when the mobile rings for a short while , immediately followed by the land line ( they hate the mobile ) which rings incessantly ,till I fall over myself to pick it up ,dropping everything else in hand.Phone call is brief,mainly about me and family,my day at work and health.Dittto queries are thrown back to them by me and its peace and quiet.Hell breaks loose if there is delay in answering the calls and I can not think of not answering ,nope.My evening tea after work is after this routine ,always.

The kids who refuse to answer calls from older generation cite the following :
me-(yanking the glued-in earphones)-The phone was ringing!
them  -Phone rang?When?I did not hear it
         -waise bhi, it is always nanaji/naniji for you..it is never our call
         -I did not want to sound like a liar by saying that you were in the bathroom AGAIN !
         -Why can't you call them first thing after you come back mom,really,how difficult is that?
me (mumbling)-How difficult indeed..
Cookie-Okay ,emergency mom,get ready fast ,we gotta go shop for A's homecoming party,Pink day at college and B's birthday bash and while at it we might as well pick up stuff for the upcoming  Pathology presentation in college.
Muffin-Have you seen my blue-black ab guard?I need that for the Tuesday match at school.
me-What happened to the blue-white ab guard we bought for the last match ?
Muffin -I need the blue-black not the blue-white for this match.

My space is thus encroached in totality,I am sandwiched and my days begin all over again in the evenings !