A FRESH NEW MONSOON MORNING...

It's that time of the year when this southern city gets some of the most exotic showers... There would be continuous downpour with cold breeze across and this turns the atmosphere really pleasant... There would be a continuous wrap-around of a silvery layer around you, you would shiver if you're not in your thickest woollens, and every now-and-then you would crave for some warm coffee or soup... Yes, the city replicates the weather of a hill-station, and if you happen to skip the remembrance that you live not in one, and thus look outside your window casually you truly get the feel of living in one... It's mesmerizing, it's heart-warming and yes it's really blissful to live here in this pretty city... And, if you're a little different kind you can and would want to do so much more in the downpours... How??? Well, if you're the romantic kind, you can just stand in middle of your terrace, letting the silvery drops drench you; and after some time you would start dancing along with them, yeah the perfect dance in the rain (and if you have a partner equally romantic he can join you in the dance making you feel so much more special)... If you're the adventurous kind, you can take a ride through the rain on your bike, thus letting your machine rush against the force of the pouring and feel like a conquering hero (and if you can't drive don't worry, you can ride pillion and feel almost the same and even better)... If you're the poetic kind, you can make yourself a huge mug of coffee or hot chocolate, sit in the balcony watching and listening to the tapping of the drops and scribble down your random feelings on your notebook (well, these days on your tablet)... Or if you're just 'into yourself' kind, you can sit there in your balcony for, who cares, how long, enjoy your lazy sips and can just be lost in your own thoughts, thus making the most of being with yourself... So, the list of things you can do in this weather seems to be endless...

And, yes this endless possibilities is what makes me get excited every-time the city experiences a stormy rainy day... I end up getting into all of these 'kinds' depending on my mood that day... Someday I get romantic, some day adventurous, someday poetic and someday purely philosophical... But in whichever form I am, I enjoy the rains to the last bit...

It was one of these days when the rain started even before I was out of my bed, and kept raining all afternoon through the evening... Everything around was in its dreamy best, with chilly breeze making you shiver through your skin, and thus making you feel just so amazing... And there, it was me, tucked in a warm sweater below my overcoat (I think people think I'm crazy to wear over-coats even though it's not that cold here, at least it doesn't snow here, but then I like to stay safe you see), with my socks and boots on, with a huge take-away mug of cappuccino in hand, in my little car driven by my driver...I reached office, started working, took little breaks in between to enjoy the view through the glass-clad windows, ordered coffee every half an hour, sipped lazily throughout work, had a couple of skype meetings with still sipping my continuous supply of coffee, reached a point where I saw the clock display 7 pm, and thus almost ended the day... The rain was still pouring, and suddenly I realized I wanted to be in my adventurous self... So I bade good bye to my car and the driver, called up my best friend to summon him to appear near my office with bikes, and convinced him to take me on a ride through the rain... Well, my poor friend wasn't too happy with the idea as he knew I would certainly fall sick cuz of the cold, but then of course he had but no choice to get ready and come to take me through the continuously pouring rain...

Thus started my adventure in the rain... It was raining actually very crazy, and the sheer force of the pouring acted on the bike, but then the flashy and strong bike did its job really well to ride through the force... My friend must have been angry on me for making him get wet like this, but considering he's my best friend, it was justified... And as for me, it was a bliss... I was in my winter clothes, so the cold could hardly affect me, and the rain??? Well, that was the most amazing part of that ride... I loved every bit of the downpour... After a while I let go of my head-gear... The rain drenched my hair, the droplets started crawling through my neck, and the breeze got into my warm clothes... Ahh!!! Thrilling was the feel... Every time I get into the rain it just takes my breath away, it makes me melt with happiness and thus makes all my negative feelings wash away... Yes, this ride did the same too... The exhaust of my hectic work schedule got pleasantly washed off, and I was truly happy...

And suddenly then I witnessed the other side of the pretty shower... And yes, it wasn't as pretty as the shower itself, rather it had a completely contrasting story to tell me... Somehow my happiness looked very shallow in front of it, and yes, the rest of my ride was engulfed with the after-effect of this scene...

Well... This southern city is known to be one of the most expensive cities to live in India, and why not??? In the recent couple of decades the city has witnessed tremendous change in infrastructure, flashy up-market residential buildings, high-end retail spaces and thus large scale commuting media, a lot have been added to the ever-growing infrastructure everyday... But then amidst this, and like many other cities and societies across the globe here too exists a world which is a far cry from this developmental proofs, rather do we call them the unfortunate counter-part of all this bling??? Yes, this is what I witnessed during my adventurous trip on that crazy monsoon evening...

Since the downpour was continuous, the roads of the otherwise planned city was flooded... I could see 'road-blocked' signs on many streets and could see the water flowing across... However, what wasn't visible was the fact that this downpour was also washing away a lot of hopes and dreams of many thus changing their lives... What I wasn't able to see is that there were many thousand families and their kids living in those small hut-like (these huts are not like the ones we go to stay during our luxurious trips to wildlife and beaches) shapes, and the rain had washed them all away, thus making them rather homeless... I would not have noticed any of these, and thus would have continued with my exciting ride, wasn't it for those small kids next to a manicured nursery...

This nursery happens to come on the road which leads me home everyday... It was some acres of land with perfectly grown potted plants which are sold to decorate people's (of course the ones who can afford to buy them without looking at the price tags) homes, mostly apartments... The red roof of the nursery reaches out to the adjacent main road, thus there's about a foot of shade that protrudes out towards the road... As I passed by the nursery on that cold rainy evening, I saw some kids sitting under the shade in front of the locked gate... There was a baby too in a slightly grown up girl's arms... I glanced at them, stopped singing 'It's raining mannnn', and as I often do, started making reckless and not-so-thought-out remarks on the kids (like, 'Look, they're trying to steal plants on this rainy day', 'Oh God! Those awesome plants will be dead in these kids' hands', 'Don't these kids have better things to do than stealing plants on a rainy day', and many alikes of these, which make me shrink in shame now)... I was going on and on although I knew my friend was irritated to the core... And then there it was, he lost his patience, snapped at me, and told me something which made me quiet for a while... He told me these kids of course couldn't have anything better to do, cuz they come mostly from the huts next behind the nursery, and since it was flooded now so their homes must have got washed away... And while their parents (if they have any) must have been trying to collect all their belongings these kids were trying to save themselves from the destructive rain by taking shelter under the nursery shade...

Well, that was something I didn't need on that pretty evening when I was enjoying the bliss of being drenched in rain... But, it was true, it was happening in front of me and I could see getting drenched in that continuous rain wasn't even close to being a bliss for those kids, rather they were craving for some shelter, may be some warmth and maybe, I wish maybe, for some food too...

Before I could say anything, we were far away from the kids... My friend dropped me home, and I took a hot shower to get rid of the cold... I wasn't excited any more, not cuz I reached home and I wasn't in the rain anymore, but cuz my excitement stopped looking so glamorous to me... It's not that I didn't know about kids who didn't have homes, it's not that I didn't know of people whose houses had got washed away in rain and flood, it's not that I wasn't aware of these sides of a city-live. But then what disturbed me was the fact that I wasn't ready to witness these with my own eyes... Reading these on various media was heart-sinking, and witnessing it in front of my eyes was a devastating experience... The door bell rang, my friend was back to drop some yummy food and coffee for me, which would have brightened my world on an average day... But today I wasn't too keen on being happy anymore... The scene of those distressed kids kept replaying in my head... I told my friend about my pain, he listened carefully, and knowing I was too depressed to hold on to, told me that I could do something to change what I saw, at least I could contribute to do so... I knew I had to do this...

I searched on the web for people who work for underprivileged kids, and started going through various aspects of what they've been doing... I didn't know how much time had passed by while I was doing so, but when I decided that I was quite ready knowing what to do, it was 2 in the morning... I let out a sigh... In my hand was a list of people whom I was going to contact the next morning, trying to understand if I could be of any help in helping those kids who can't enjoy the rain cuz they know they wouldn't have a home to go back the next moment... It felt good...

I walked to the balcony of my house, the rain wasn't there any more... The coldness was far lesser than the evening too... I wished if I could know whether the kids I saw were able to sleep at all... I looked up to the sky, like the clouds sailing relentlessly my mind too kept wandering... Along with it I wondered, what if the rains were as joyous for all as it was for me... I whispered a 'Goodnight' to the sky, and waited for them to bring the sunlight the next morning... In my heart I was longing for a new beginning with the new morning... A fresh new monsoon morning...

A PENCIL, CHILDREN'S DAY... AND CHEERS TO NEVER GROWING UP...

So, I had lost my pen and the diary again... Yes, it’s turning out to be a cyclic process in my life... I buy a pair of diary and pen together, use it for a while, and even before half the pages of the diary gets exhausted and half the ink in the pen, I lose both of them; then I buy the next pair, lose them after a while; buy them again; and thus the process goes on and on... And, yes, you guessed it right, every time the fault is mine (no, I mean seriously)...
Well, I was extremely disgusted with myself this time, both for the diary and the pen... The diary, being one I use at work, had a lot of important notes and information that I keep needing often, and the pen was a moderately expensive one (which I certainly can’t afford to re-buy anytime soon), and thus the guilt was real bad... And, since I needed a pen to scribble all through the day, I decided to use a pencil instead... My work-place, being a creative agency, has a stock of pencils, coloured once, sketch-pencils and also the plain ones... I picked a simple HB pencil and decided that from now on this would be what I would do most of my scribbling down...

I managed to locate a pencil sharpner, and started shrarpening the pencil... But then as usual, I broke it instead... So I asked a colleague of mine to help me with the job, and he happily agreed.... We sat in the balcony attached to the office just next to some green orchid-plants, and he started sharpening the pencil with a blade... And, just then, yes then, suddenly I recalled those days from my childhood, when I used to sit with my Dita while he used to sharpen my school-pencils, fill ink in my pens, and hand me over my fully loaded pencil-box...

And, suddenly I realized, only the other day, which was ‘Children’s Day’, I had thought about all these past years that I have passed through to experience the current day... And, somehow, although I’m not a person living only in the past, yet I ended up walking down the memory lanes, to re-live many moments from the same... And, thus, now I realize, although with every passing day a part of the child in me grows up, a part still stays the same, a child still...
Yes, a lot have certainly changed since the time I knew I was growing up... Have passed through a lot of phases, have learnt and unlearnt a lot of things, have met and lost a lot of people, and most importantly have fallen in and out of a lot of emotions... But the growing up never stops... From the phase when preparing for the exams was the only difficult event in life to the phase when managing finances to day-to-day maintaining a house (however small it might be) all by myself too doesn’t look like a mammoth task, life, for a moment too, has never stopped... From the phase when the first red-rose just brightened up the whole world to the phase when all the bouquets went directly to the bin, life changed so fast... From the phase when a heart-break could seem like the end of life to a phase where even many heart-breaks didn’t even stop the casual retail-therapy, the pace of life was like a hurricane... From the time when the first pay-check made the world go round to the phase when pay-checks and cribbing turned parts of the same parcel, life never slowed down... And, along with all these phases neither does growing up ever bothered to slow down... So we grew up, rather really really fast...

But then, did I actually grow up??? I don’t think so... Every passing day certainly does add on to the number of days I’m existing on this earth, but it fails to make me grow up... The child in me is somehow too arrogant to get out of my system and let me grow up... Somehow the grown-up world looks way beyond complicated to me, for me to even take a liking on... And thus I still long to be a part of my small world that I had when I was considered a kid... The small frilly clothes that I wore, the short hair that I had, the black-beaded anklets around my tiny ankles, the colourful colouring books that I had, the fairy-tales that I believed in, and the 10 chapter school-books that looked never-ending to me then, each of these is what I long for... And, most importantly I long for those moments when I could sleep hugging my Momu, with one leg on her; I long for those relentless chatters to Dita over every event that had happened during the day; and I long for those lazy afternoons when me and my little brother fought over colouring books and pencils... And, each time I long for these I realize, I have certainly not grown up... Cuz, apparently the grown-up world is much more practical than that... You don’t cry over small priceless pleasures, you don’t bother to stick around your past, you move on continuously and you focus only on fulfilling your larger ambitions in life... If these are true, then of course I haven’t grown up, neither is there any signs of doing so in the near future...

I know, nobody in this world really does grow up ever... We do pass time and thus turn into an adult someday, and along with it tend to take on responsibilities that the societal norms allow us to... We go to college after school, learn things, and get into a professional life and dream of achieving the highest high someday, thinking that would certainly make us feel complete, and bring happiness... But then this is so not true... End of it all, everyone finds true joy in the minute details of everyday life, and not in the biggest achievements of any sort... Hence, the small bubbles on the coffee makes us feel better than the coffee itself, we don’t stop buying the tiny chocolates that we used to have during our kid-days, we prefer relishing on what our mums cook to an expensive meal at a 5-star, we still sift through the pages of the old albums, and we still upload the pictures from our childhood in our messy hair and tiny shorts... Yes, we never grow up... Nobody does... My Dita has never grown up, he still weeps every time I fall sick; my Momu never grew up, she still starts singing when she buys new shoes; my Bro never grew up, he still comes crawling to me to get me buy him t-shirts; my best friend never grew up, he still gets insecure when I don’t give him time; and yes, I never grew up, I still fail to understand the so-called real and thus grown-up world... Had any of us grown up, we would have much beyond these emotions, cuz we would have been free of any insecurities...

Suddenly I came back to reality on my colleague calling out my name... He hands me over the pencil with a perfectly sharpened tip, just like the ones my Dita used to get me... I smiled at him and thanked him... I don’t know for how long I was soaked in my own thoughts, contemplating on the negativities of growing up... But since I’m back now, I realize, yes, it’s so so so much better not to grow up, cuz being a child you can experience that what you can’t if you you grow up... And, that ‘that’ is the purity with which you view everything that’s exposed to you, that ‘that’ is the innocence with which you live your life, that ‘that’ is the un-conditional love that you have for everyone around you, and most importantly that ‘that’ is the carefree feeling that tells you that it’s alright if things are not right, right now, it would certainly be alright when we grow up...

Cheers to never growing up...

CHEERS TO PUPPY LOVE... IT MAKES THE WORLD SHINE...

It was raining the whole of the afternoon... To be precise the rain started way back in the morning, continued till noon, stopped for a while and started pouring again... The cool breeze with the almost continuous pouring has turned the environment into one amazing and dreamy one... And, it being an off day (yes, finally I’ve managed not to work on a Sunday) I preferred to stay in bed the whole of the morning... Yeah, yeah I wasted the beautiful morning, but it didn’t occur to me till this moment, and even though now it has, considering the amount of trauma that I have been going through the past quarter of the year, I completely deserve to do anything on this earth at any point of any day...

Well, coming back, after the long sleep, and the considerable amount of lazing around, my mind was completely fresh, and hence after a long warm shower, I made myself my much needed coffee... With the huge mug I came to the balcony, where the scattered raindrops in the wind welcomed me with a chilling lingering on my face... Yes, this is what I needed after all the continuous over work of the last few months... And, I was at peace... I pulled a chair to the edge of the balcony, sat with my legs stretched and started sipping on the steaming coffee... And, yeah, as usual I got into a mode of trance with indulgence (sounds familiar??? Yeah, that’s how I feel every time I look into the beauty of my surroundings and get happy for nothing, cuz for me these simple pleasures are the most craved and indulged moments of life, that can make me go completely insane with happiness)... And, yes... That’s when I witnessed something which I would found out to be one of the most delightful events in a very long period... And, this is what this write up of mine is about...

As I was looking out to the rain-washed surroundings (almost empty roads, less vehicles and hardly anyone at sight), and was turning amused by the prettiness of it, I caught glimpse of a teenage boy (preferably in his mid-teens) crossing the road in hurry... Through the silvery layer of the light drizzle I saw a bouquet of what I figured to be pink lilies in his hand... He crossed the road, turned towards the block where my house is and kept walking in the same speed as he was crossing the road... At the first thought, I was a little put off by the idiocracy of the boy, as it really did look foolish to carry flowers in hand and run in this drizzle, cuz it was in fact very cold outside... But then of course he was on a mission to accomplish I’m sure, and hence looked completely oblivious to what I thought or what I felt... Anyway, by now little curious, my eyes followed his moves, and kept looking at till the time I realized he was heading towards the girls’ hostel that’s at the end of my block... And, yes, my stalking eyes did follow him to the gate of the hostel, and waited there to see what would happen next...

The boy took out a phone from his pocket, dialled somebody and spoke for a minute... As he waited, I saw a girl coming out of the hostel with an orange umbrella in her hand, and stood next to the boy... They hugged for half a minute, the girl took the flower bouquet and the boy left after a couple of minutes... The girl went back inside... As my eyes still stayed on the boy, I saw him turning back once he was some steps away from the gate... The girl was standing on the balcony... They waved at each other, and in the next couple of minutes both of them got disappeared from my vision...
The whole thing happened really quickly... The drizzles were still on, and I was still watching it in my conscious mind... But, in my unconscious one, I was thinking about the teenagers I just saw... May be they’re friends or may be a couple... I wasn’t sure, but what I was sure of is the fact that they were in love... Cuz, the passion I just saw was nothing but pure and innocent love... May be it was some special day for them, or maybe it was just a simple occasion, or maybe there was no reason, but the boy took his chance to get flowers for the girl... And the continuous rain, cold or anything for that matter couldn’t stop him from doing so... Instead of preferring to stay back indoors and enjoy a hot soup or a mug of coffee, making the girl smile seemed more important to him... And, that’s how when the entire world was busy avoiding going out, all this little boy wanted to do was to see his sweetheart, for what, 5 minutes...

And suddenly I was amused... At the same time was thinking about my own teenage years... Life was so much simpler and was so pure were the thoughts and the feelings... And, yeah passion used to be at its best despite of all the odds... I remember those days, when we had gone through similar days too... From the little pocket money that we had got, we used to save for Valentine Day’s roses, or Friendship Day’s bands, or for gifts for those who had touched our hearts... Love was all about those small moments when holding hands used to be an event, hugs used to be the solution for all that seemed destructive, and yeah, just a text with ‘Don’t worry, I’m always with you’ meant the world... Love didn’t imply to expensive gifts and so called future-plans, all it meant was the priceless smiles on his/her face for reasons unknown, all it meant was the stolen stares in middle of a busy class, all it meant were the innocent glances in a crowd of friends, all it meant was the text on the mobile exactly when you missed that person, all it meant was the planning to go on the college trip with the difficultly saved pocket-money only so that you can spend more time with the one you had a crush on, yes, in short all it meant was those innocent feelings that were far and far away from all the complexities of life, all the practicalities of life, all the materialistic ambitions of life and more important than anything, far away from any manipulations... And, now, on today’s date, it’s certainly not the same anymore...

Yes, we’ve grown up, and thus have ‘in a convenient way’ turned matured in terms of the way we look at life... And that implies that we’ve learnt to see life in a much more practical way... And, yes that’s where my problem with the concept of ‘being matured’ sources from... Cuz, at the bottom of my heart I realize by turning matured I also have turned to be manipulative... The innocence that I had while looking at the world is not there in me anymore... And even if I would love to deny this, I honestly can’t... And why do I say so??? Cuz, at this ‘matured’ stage of my life, of course I wouldn’t fall in love with someone without analyzing certain things... Of course I wouldn’t fall in love for the sake of ‘love’ itself... Well, maybe I would, but the chances come down to 5% in the bigger picture... Cuz, now my love would revolve around many other factors along with love... Maybe I would want a secure future with the person, socially and financially, and maybe I’m not wrong if I do so... But then, the moment any other reason than only love is attached to the feeling, does it stay ‘love’ anymore??? Of course doesn’t... And, why only love??? For that matter any other relationship or feelings have got fringes attached to it these days... Nothing stays innocent, pure, and of course in its true state anymore...

The worst part of all that I’m feeling right now is the fact that, despite knowing all of it, despite knowing that I’m not being honest, I don’t want to change it... If I may say so, I certainly can, but I don’t want to... Cuz, at the end of the day, I don’t want to be a victim of my innocent feelings, thus sacrificing on anything that I wish to have... And, so I would definitely choose a mid path, where I’m safe, my feelings stay intact within myself, and yet all that I can be happy with (or seem to be happy with, or may be I assume I can be happy with) are in my access... Such is the desire to be happy, where knowingly or unknowingly I get willing to sacrifice the real source of happiness despite knowing it’s just a concept I’m making myself believe in...

Suddenly the cold wind messed up my hair, and along with it I came back to reality... My coffee had turned cold, and sprinkles of the drizzle had started sitting on the edges of the mug... Lazily I took a sip from the cold coffee... But my mind still kept lingering on the sight of the cute teenagers, and I knew it would keep doing so for some time more... Cuz, somehow I still want to be that care-free teenager like these two, who wouldn’t mind doing anything for the sake of feelings, emotions and at the same time be happy about it... Cuz, somehow I still believe in the innocence of feelings rather than being conscious about the practical implications of the same... Cuz, somehow I still believe the true happiness lies in chasing what’s right as per the heart says, and not as per what the brain says... Yes, I might sound foolish to the materialistic world, and even to myself, but this is true, and that what even my heart knows at its deep down true state...

As I finished the coffee, I smiled at myself, and wished we all stayed kids, and never grew up... Who says puppy love is kiddish, foolish and not true love??? If you ask me it’s the truest and the wisest form of love... Cuz, it doesn’t understand anything than love... It knows how to love without expecting anything back... It creates its own world where only love and emotions prevail, and nothing that’s complicated and manipulative... And, the best part, it knows how to make the other person’s life shine bright no matter what the real world is like... And, what could be better than that??? Cuz as opposed to the world of grown-ups where we’re not sure of the existence of anyone else than ourselves, if atleast a bunch of kids and teenagers happen to exist who think of other’s happiness, life would have anyways turned much prettier, and brighter on any given day...

Cheers to love, to the innocent, crazy but completely honest and true puppy love... It surely makes the world shine...

LONGING... FOR THOSE REASONS TO BE ALIVE...

Well, summer has already arrived in the city... And, somehow the unpleasant vibes created cuz of the heat have engulfed the once garden-a-city-and-now-a-concrete-jungle this southern space... You can’t step out of home without your sun-glasses, number of juice and water bottles turn uncountable on your desk, and you stay energy-deprived till dusk... To add on a rotten cherry on top of this unpleasantness of mine, I've got to deal with a job that leaves me with no time to even think that I need to crib... Yeah, apart from my glorious trips to every coffee shop down the corner to pick up some quick coffee, and the occasional trips to the grocery stores to pick those dozens of melon and aloe vera juices, I've given up on shopping, chilling, and merry-making... So much so that, these days all I eat is home cooked dal and two spoons of plain rice... Well, let’s not talk more on that, I mean, that is absolutely not the reason why I'm scribbling today... It's been really long, that I haven't put any of my thoughts down, and apparently that's cuz I'm turning into a complete non-driven character, blame it on my laziness or blame it on my job or blame it on my pathetic habits of ignoring a million interesting things around...

Nonetheless, it's my birthday week, and that gives me enough reason to at least scribble something, if not for anything else, for the plain reason that before I complete a-quarter-century of my life, I need to have a small scale evaluation of my life so far... And, yeah, it turned out that, I did a good thing by deciding to do so, cuz, I realize, it's high time I got back on track to realize that, no matter how happy or sad I seem, I'm actually missing out on a lot in life, and yeah, that makes me deprived of a million things that I should be doing right now, or be having right now...

Coming back, over the weekend I decided I would get myself some time in a lonely corner of any coffee shop in the town, and would start scribbling down my thoughts... And, the thought of having a longer than usual weekend made me twice the happier to stick to the plan... However, practically that was more like a day dream to me, as it turned out on Friday morning that, I would spend the weekend working... And, well, I realized that I would again end up not putting down even a single letter of my planned blog-update...

And, from then on, I've been constantly looking for a handful of minutes to make my plan take shape... And, in that endeavour I realized that actually there's a restless inside me to do so... Although I was li'l vague about the reason behind initially, as and when minutes turned to hours, I realized why... There's always this thing in me that makes me adjust to things without cribbing much, till a point that's the highest of all my tolerance level... And, the moment it crosses that I start getting suffocated... And, yeah, that's what's happening with me in this event too...

And, then I decided, no matter how my today turns out to be, I would definitely find some time for myself today... And, thus, I'm sitting in this coffee shop now, taking out my frustration by scribbling down on my blackeberry with my perfectly manicured nails and without bothering they might break...Well, as usual, it was a pathetically hectic day today too... Had started the day so early that at this point in time I hardly remember it was today itself, and not yesterday... And, only when I get my credit card bills I would know exactly how many mugs of coffee I've gulped down during the day... Yeah, that's how I survive these days... Totally in trance, cuz of heavy dose of coffee... Nonetheless, I don't mind, cuz end of the day I get a sense of satisfaction for what I'm doing, yeah, unlikely to say, but I love my job...

As I ordered a mug of strong coffee, along with a chocolate dipped pastry, I let myself sink in the couch, and also in my thought... I felt a li'l better... It's been really long since I last sat like this... I remembered the days when I was in college... Over-priced coffee wasn't something me and my friends used to indulge in on a daily basis, but then every time we had gone to sip on some, we used to make sure that that stayed as a memorable event... Not cuz of the coffee, cake and the paraphernalia, but cuz of the floating laughters, cuz of the endless conversations, and cuz of the small happiness of coming to a place like this coming true... But then, those days are over... And now, even though these are places that I (and for that matter a millions like me) visit as a norm, where's the overflowing happiness??? In fact, there's no excitement in anything I do these days, cuz, the thing that's lacking in my life at this moment is the habit of enjoying the small moments of happiness, with the people I love and I care for...

Yeah, there was a time, when no matter how difficult life was, I used to smile always, with a content heart... I was small, hardly knew the complexities of life... Those days in college, the small pocket money used to be something I used to be waiting for from the middle of the month... It was a small amount, but used to bring mountains of happiness... After clearing monthly rent, keeping aside a li'l for travelling to college and back, and doing the li'l grocery shopping for the month, I used to count the money left, to plan for the most-awaited visits to the amazing (and pathetically expensive) food places, and coffee shops... Those visits used to be very limited in numbers, but the happiness that each of those events used to bring saw no limits... And yeah, the loaded memories that used to get piled up from each such day had only one thing to say, that, life was full of happiness, and certainly lively...

And there's today's day... When, those moments of happiness have turned into rare commodity... In midst of running from office to office with a prospective of climbing up the ladder in so called career, these moments of simple bliss have gone into becoming rarity... No doubt, from a distance this is the life I was dreaming back then in college... A well-paid job, a good place to work, and all the luxury of strolling in the expensive outlets of the city... But then, now I realize in midst of fulfilling all those dreams, I’ve turned into someone who doesn’t find a moment to indulge in what actually is called happiness... Not that I hate my life... In fact I’m extremely passionate about my life and each day of what it brings to me... And, everyone else around me feels so too, that I’m happy and content in my life... Not that I’m not... But then there’s always a longing inside me for the simple pleasures of life and the joy from meaningless million things... Cuz, somehow I believe in the concept that happiness and joy that come from these sources are the purest... And, somehow when I realize that I’m not happy in that way, it leaves me to wonder if I’m still alive...

I remember those days in college, when we used to plan for sudden trips on the highway... And, so do remember those multiple stop-overs by the roadside tea stalls on the long non-ending highway... And then, there were those economic trips to the close by tourist places on Friendship Day, Valentine’s Day and birthdays... Those were fun times... Away from the load of college texts, and from the extreme busy-ness of the city, those were our own time of freedom... Who could touch our happiness then??? We were free birds, waiting for the open sky... Yeah, there were stress-phases too... Exams, assignments, always short-on-cash wallets, pending gifts to best friends, budget shopping for V-days, last moment trips to book-stores, and more... But, each of these occasions used to be eventful... No matter whether we struggled, or were in stress, somehow the jest for life was never less... There was always a bunch of rays of endless hope to say that life is so alive... And, certainly happy...

I can’t really find a reason behind why I happen to gather restlessness over my life that I lead today, neither can I make myself understand why in the first place I need to consider myself deprived of real happiness... Nor can I find an answer to end my restlessness of all sorts... And, as I go deep down finding the root of all these, I vaguely realize, maybe somewhere deep down inside me lives a child that refuses to turn complex, refuses to understand that chaos is a part of life now, refuses to get carried away by the so-called norms of leading a successful life... Then I look at my parents, and realize there are reasons why I feel so... They, unlike many others, refused to get carried away by the glamour of material life and still believe that happiness and other truths of life come only from simplicity... And, in reality, that’s such a fruitful concept... If I look at them I realize, they’re happy and completely content... The race for keeping upto the world could never make them run so fast that it brings exhaust... They take their own pace to be where they’ve decided for themselves... They don’t consider the social norms that restrict them to not explore the path of real happiness; neither they care about how others perceive them as... What matters to them is the fact that they want a peaceful and truly happy life... And, they’re surely successful in what they wish ‘success’ to define as...

Yeah, on the contrary, in the effort to make something big in life (that’s how we, the generation of ours define it), I’ve got so stuck in making the bigger picture that in that process, I’ve lost out on realizing that the smaller bits need to be taken care of first, to make the bigger one look eclectic... Maybe, I’ve started losing out on the vision that says the fun in any journey is not the destination, but the journey itself... Or maybe, I’m starting to stop being myself... Or maybe, it’s my plain failure to see the beauty of my everyday life, cuz maybe all I’m being used to doing is running after a mirage of happiness, which actually is a false rendition of my expectations...

The sudden laughter from a group of young girls across me brought me back to reality... I hadn’t realized that my coffee was over, and the pastry untouched... I quickly started to pick up a piece from it... But then, back in mind, I was still loitering in the world of randomness, of random thoughts... And, I knew I would still be there for some more time... But somehow I felt a li’l relaxed, cuz i also realized that maybe I’m starting to know what’s been eating me up all these days... Maybe I’m giving more importance to the everyday chaos rather than trying to find a reason to smile in middle of it, like I used to do when I was not so grown-up...

Suddenly, I realized, before I start the second-quarter-century of my life, I need to come to a conclusion that leads me away from the chaotic restlessness of my life... And, somehow I’m determined now, that, no matter what, I would make a way to reach to the freedom that doesn’t get me obliged to stay loyal to an expectation of a larger life... Rather, I would re-learn the art of finding peace in all that is true, real and ethereal... I would again smile staring at the moon there, find some time to wander on the deserted walkway, find glory in living without expectation, find reasons to laugh without a motive, and most importantly find reasons to be happy always...

In a word, I would find a million reasons to be alive...

THIS NEW YEAR, DON'T RAPE US...

(On behalf of million scared and disturbed soul, that belong to the fairer sex... )

Well, it’s been really really long, that I haven’t updated my blog, or have written (or scribble) anything, anywhere… I’m not sure why so, but, I know for a fact that it’s cuz I wasn’t able to find anything really inspiring that can leave me with no option other than putting it down on black and white… But then, as the year is coming to an end, and as I realize this is actually an end of a very very very disappointing year (at least for a huge bunch of people I know), I ended up deciding on the scribbling that I’m doing right now… It’s, as usual, not going to be something completely intellectual, and for that matter would be of no consequences for many, but, again as usual, it’s something that’s disturbing me from last couple of weeks… And, I find no other way to calming myself down than writing this, and yeah, posting on my social networking page… I know, I might land up in nothing in the receiving end of this, and might get no solution from what I scream out loud here, but still, I wish, just wish it would at least make me just rethink on the sad phase that I’m in these days… And thereby would help me take a fresh take on things I need to forget in order to be little happy in the new year…

Well, the demeaning events (or should I call them crippling nightmares) that have been taking place in the country I live in, are the sole source of the suffocation that has engulfed me these days… I was never a feminist, and I never intend to be one… The reason being, the society, the family I come from has never taught me to differentiate humanity on the basis of gender, and I always have cultivated the feeling of equality in my heart and soul, from the time I was a kid… But then, as and when I’ve grown to be a young lady who’s independent enough to stay away from her own family to fulfill her educational and professional needs, I started witnessing a different picture in the world we live in (or should I say the country I live in)… And, apparently that’s what reality is about… And, sadly enough, things seem to be never in anyone’s hand (at least not in those’ hand, who are at least meant to have them)… And, thereby all the screaming and shoutings that we make, all the cribbings that we do, all the protests that we hold, end up only in one thing… It’s NULL…

And, that is why, I’m writing this… To the ones who hold such demeaning motives towards us, ‘the women’… To the ones who think we deserve to be treated the way they do, to the ones who abuse us only cuz ‘we are the fairer sex’, to the ones who can’t see beyond the physical appearance of us, to the ones who fail to realize that one of us only had brought them to the beautiful world, and to the ones who fail to respect the very word ‘Humanity’…

Yeah, it’s an open letter to ‘All you, there’, who come in the bracket of doing things that in general bring down the standard of the human civilization…
Don’t you ever realize, that there are million other things in the world that could make you happy, rather than abusing and exploiting a female body… How do you fail to realize that we are one of the most beautiful creations of God… How do you afford to forget that the world that has given you the opportunity to enjoy its beauty, it was introduced to you by one of us… How difficult it gets for you to understand we’re as delicate as a flower when it comes to all the exploitation and abusals you carry on us… How do you not remember that someday even you would have a princessly daughter like us… How do you forget all the adulation that you had received from the likes of us in the form of your mother, sister, grand-ma, wife and lover… And most importantly, how do you not understand the basic fact of human civilization that we need to equi-live along side, and in a respected way, in order to sustain the so called civilization that we’re in…

Have you ever wondered, or bothered to wonder, how we’ve been raised by our parents… No matter how difficult it seemed, our Dads brought us up like a Princess… He never said a single demeaning and dis-respectful word to us during the course of our growing up days… He believed that we’re no less that our counterparts from the other sex, and hence we are treated never less… We are treated like the most delicate flowers when it comes to handling us, we are given the best of education possible by our parents, and we are taught traditions and cultures… We are taught to respect the elders, be equally competent with you, and also walk along with everyone else… Then, why do you think we can be treated the way you do… Do we deserve to be molested in public places… Do we deserve to be stripped by gangs and mobs… Where’s the respect we deserve, the respect with which we’ve been brought up, and the respect we can demand cuz in return of what we give…

Yes, we’re taught to be brave exactly like our counterparts… We’re taught to be capable of fighting with you for our rights, and we are taught to never let our share go cuz of you… But, along with all these, we are also taught to respect everyone, and be the strong base of a family… And hence, we never drift apart from carrying our responsibilities… That’s why, when we grow up we get married to one of you, be a wife, mother, and many other, in order to keep everyone happy… And, barring exceptions, we always carry each responsibility very well… Have you ever realized, in this course of converting ourselves from a strong independent daughter to a responsible multi-role-playing responsible woman, how much do we give in… Have you ever realized the depth of each sacrifice we make… Have you ever realized how broader a heart one requires to be a woman that she is… And, for all that, do we really deserve to be treated like an animal on roads… Do we deserve to face the brutality that you show us… Where’s the appreciation of all that we do for you, as your mother, as your sister and yes, as your wife???

You say, we make you get brutal with us… Do we really do that… We can never think of that… We’re delicate at heart… When you pain us, our heart gets cracked, it gets bruised… But the next moment, when you sweet-talk, we forget the pain and be there for you again… Doesn’t this make you realize how vulnerable we are… Yeah, we’re strong, but that’s to support you live your life, that’s to make sure that you don’t get weak, that’s to bring out the strength in you, in lesser words, that’s to take care of you… We condition ourselves, without the hint of complaints, in order to adapt to your faiths, beliefs, and life… Our only motive stays as making you happy… Don’t these say how delicate our hearts are… If we are the way we are, do you really think we invite you to trouble us, to be brutal with us… Don’t we deserve the same treatment that we give you… And, isn’t that more than enough for the non-violence we deserve from you…

You say, we don’t act proper to avoid the abusals and molestation from you… What make you believe that… Is it the way we smile, is it the way we talk, or is it the way we dress up… Do you know the facts… We believe in fantasy... We believe in the dreams we see, we believe that the world is a place that’s so beautiful and everything here has so much to offer… Yes, we wear pretty clothes, we get decked-up, and we wear make-up… Yeah, these are the small pleasures that we live for… What if we love wearing shorter clothes… What if we love flaunting our hair… What if we want to feel like an angel above the sky… That doesn’t say that we want you to be brutal with us… That doesn’t say that we want you to molest us on roads, and for that matter anywhere… Don’t we deserve to stay beautiful, at heart and in this wide open world…

Yeah, we want a little care, a little love and most importantly a little respect… Be a little tolerant towards us, at least for the sake of what we’ve been giving you all our lives… For the sake of the love that you’ve received from your mother, for the sake of the adulation you’ve received from you sister, and for the support that you’ve received from your partner… Yeah, be a little open to understand that we’re not just a physical commodity that you’ll manhandle, we’re not all flesh and bone that you would turn to a butcher, and yes, we’re far beyond being only a sexual object… We’re the ones who’re equally responsible for the world that’s existing today, we’re equally responsible for making the world beautiful, and we’re equally important to the society the way you are…

So, it’s a voice that comes straight from the heart, mine and of many alike’s, ‘US’… This new year, please don’t molest us… Please don’t trouble us on the dark road at 9 at night, please don’t eve-tease us, please don’t bully us, please don’t trouble us when we want to have a little fun with our friends, please leave us alone when we take a private bus, please don’t beat us up with iron roads, please don’t strip us, and most importantly please don’t rape us…

WAKE ME UP WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS....

(Scribbled while strolling on a dreamy Goan beach, when I met the 'ME' that always longed for the one who got away, long ago...)

Well, September ended, and as always I didn't intend to wake up... After so many years of coming the lyrical and musical excellency of Greenday's famous lines into existence, it's more like a cliché so say anything about waking up when September ends... But eventually, everyone does find his or her own reasons to connect something to this cliché of September ending, and yeah, waking up...And for me, certainly does September bring a layering bruise, each year, atleast so for the last 4 years... Well, for reasons strictly to my personal failure in love, and with an impression insanely irresponsible to everyone around; September happens to make me wish I was asleep all month long... Yeah, September truly was a more than a month in my happy days, making me the closest to my love once, which eventually also turned into a month I would like not to experience, for, it made me away too, for ever from him... And that's how, I'm sure, year on year, I would keep gathering these layers until one day I decide to rub all of them off, maybe suddenly out of the blue, or maybe after a certain amount of precautious efforts... Till then, I would, maybe I would, keep weeping along with the lyrics, and keep repeating the, by now cliché, phrase...

Coming back, it was Goa this September end, and it was a carefully planned attempt to get away from the monotone of my so called busy life... And that was why, I hardly had anyone completely familiar along with me while I decided to land in the coastal town of South West India... Unlike other trips of mine, I needed to be on my own, and that's how it was, when I actually realized barring one, I knew noone in the group... Last week of the month, weekend, and also almost done with the monthly chaos, more than enough reasons for a quick getaway... And while we decided to make a budget trip, I was too, although reluctantly, fine doing so, as I needed a different sort of experience... It was li'l insanely for someone like me, who hates troubled travelling, but nonetheless, somehow we managed to land where we intended to, after travelling for almost around 16 hours, not to forget, after changing our vehicles twice...Somehow, the spirit was high, and that's how we appeared to be still energetic... And finally when we landed in the beach town, we realized, well, it was worth the trouble....Yeah... Sea, beach, sand and some amusing vibes, yeah it was actually something that lifts away the chaotic frustration from any mind...

As the experience of the small town started getting into my nerves I realized every bit of those reasons why this tiny li'l town was what it was to the people all across the globe... Everyone seemed extremely busy being in their happiest states, noone bothered what others were upto, and everyone greeted everyone with a smile on his/her face... Somehow the whole ambiance was brilliant, and worth being away from the city... And, suddenly I gathered the feeling that maybe, maybe I would start everything afresh in all areas of my life, once the 4 days long trip saw its end, for, I was sure of getting my mind refreshed up, and also my soul rejuvenated during my stay here... And surely I didn't want to sleep off the last days of September, to wake up once it ended, cuz certainly I was hoping to enjoy more with open eyes than dreaming away in sleep... Well, hardly had I known that no matter however I kept repeating it to be a cliché; I would anyways land up, as always, being a part of it...

It was precisely, 29th of September, on a much hyped beach of Goa... After roaming on endless beaches all evening, it was time we took a li'l rest, and what better could have been than the warm sandy beach by the continuous waves of the Arabian Sea, under the starlit turquoise sky, and not to forget a mixed floating musical backdrop... Yeah, this was how I always wanted my evenings to be, and that added the extra bit of amazing fulfilled twist to my experience... I was happy, in a really happy state, and in my own world of pure indulgence...Right then, yeah right then, in middle of the ecstatic environment, I was hit by a sight that brought me down straight to where I had always started... To there, where, my sorrow haunted me, my bruised soul screamed, and yeah, there where I never willingly wanted to go back, but eventually ended up going back again and again...

On that silvery beach, to my left, at a mere distance of 15 meters, was a group of guys, most likely to be bachelors, in their own world with an enormous amount of liquors, fags and of course music... In that group of around 10 guys, there were 2, strumming on their guitars, and the others joining them in singing out loud, sometimes continuously, and sometimes in bits and pieces... Although, there was no staged harmony in the musical tribute, yet it was no less than a bunch of sheer careless joy floating around, cuz of the vibes from the music created by those almost hung over guys in the gang... We, the group I was in, started enjoying the scene and the music too, and in no time, we joined the gang of guys, only to realize we did good doing so... Well, till then nothing apart from the joy and music had caught ours, particularly my attention...But, at one point, suddenly I felt my heart skip, violently, and I realized, I was almost in the verge of being numb with surprise, or should I say shock... And what caused that??? A sight that I never thought I would experience in this way, atleast not in this sudden, non-planned trip of mine... Yeah, to my horror, or terror, or to my anonymous emotional shock, I spotted a face in that gang, which, once upon a time, was the most important one in my life... A face, that used to inspire me all through, to think beyond; a face that used to remind me always that I was loved and cared; a face that always used to show that I was special; and yeah, a face that used to have all the reasons to make me smile... And now, I saw that one face, humming along with the beats of the guitar, just, just a few meters away from where I was sitting… I was in utter loss of words, and maybe expressions too, cuz, I didn't know how to react and, thereby, in a word, I stood still where I was... Yeah, in that small crowd that face was there too, that resembled the person, with whom I was in a relationship for a very long, or a very short, duration of 4 and half years...I couldn't really understand whether it was my illusion, or he was really there... Maybe he was actually him, or maybe he just resembled only on face... But, the bygone 3 years that we were not in touch were more than enough for me to gather a layer of dust on my confidence to be happy to see him....

I didn’t know how to react, I couldn't decide whether I should pay more attention to him to find out if he was the same guy I was assuming him to be, or should I just run away from the place, to just escape from the already turned strange situation... My eyes were unfaithful to me, and despite my cruel attempts to resist, they concentrated on that face... And, then, there he was, taking a pause from humming, and suddenly staring back at me, and also waving at me, for, he knew I was continuously looking at him, maybe taking him to be somebody else... Then, and only then, I realized, all this while, I actually was in an illusion, cuz, no doubt he had a similar face, but if I was li'l more attentive, I would have known that he was not the same person I was thinking him to be...

We exchanged li'l gestures, exchanged pleasantries, and I pretended I was enjoying the music and the evening... But, inside me had already started a battle... I was unable to figure out why I had to mistake a stranger's face to be someone I was not supposed to think of... I had no clue why on earth, of all the people, this one particular face, I keep going back searching for, almost all the time, which had decided to part ways from my life years ago, and at a point I needed him the most... I failed to understand why after gathering so much bitterness from his actions I still managed to fool myself around not to scrape away his memories from my mind... I didn't know, and could never justify, why I, despite being always repellent towards accepting pain, still brought back memories that hardly spared my heart of bleeding... And, I had no answer to myself, why on earth, of all the moments I choose the happiest and also the saddest one, to hallucinate about him around me… And, this time, while it was my happiness that was supposed to keep me occupied, I decided to spot someone resembling his face and thus brought him back to my world… And, honestly I fail to understand, why I did so…And, that somehow makes me realize, that, maybe it’s been always like that, that whenever I’m in my own world of happiness, and joy, I end up looking for that particular person around me… Maybe it’s always been like that, that I actually never let that person leave my memories and my imagination… Maybe, it’s always been like that, that I kept that person alive in my world of fantasy and illusion… Or, maybe it’s always been like that, that I decided to be this way forever, atleast to be with him in my world of dreams…And, honestly, this doesn’t make me really happy, in my practical state… And, in my consciousness, I always look for opportunities to just stay away from all of it… But, alas, an illogical idiot and a lost-in-love heart don’t have much differences, and maybe, maybe that’s why similar evenings like this one would keep coming back repetitively to my life, and yeah, I’m so certain about it…

The silvery moonlit beach was no less than a fairytale land, the whispering waves made the already amazing place even more dramatic… As I got back to my senses, recovering slowly from the shock of the sudden moment crossing my path a while ago, I decided to take a walk down the edges of the dancing waves… I took my slippers off and soaked my feet in the sandy water… I felt fresh… As I walked a li’l inside the water I realized, maybe, maybe my memories are like these waves; that come to touch the edges again and again, but also go back to unknown limits the next very moment, and that’s how they’re meant to be… And, actually, that’s a good thing, cuz, what’s the point scraping away some beautiful moments from life, only cuz they somehow got overshadowed by some bad ones… And, so, it's alright even if my memories bring back that one person to my life again and again... Somehow, the thought made me feel a li’l better... I started letting myself loose on the soaked sand…


I looked back at the still happily singing guys... They were now playing Greenday… ‘Wake me up when September ends…’… I smiled in the dark... Yeah, like every other year, this year too, I found my reason to hum the same… I smiled to myself… But this time, I smiled with a certain freshness in my breath… Cuz, I was certain, maybe like this evening, and the past many, every year I would continue finding the same, and well, that would again be a logically completely unrelated, but strangely related reason to me…Nonetheless, I would not be scared to love to get lost in the feeling... But I would also make sure that, I would wait, to get woken up, when September actually ends… Cuz, like the way the waves go back inside the sea to be the calm surface of water, I'm sure my life would also find reasons to get normal, once the disturbing rush of memories fade away...

INDEPENDENCE DAY... FREEDOM, INDEPENDENCE... AND A MYTH...

It was Independence Day yesterday, and everywhere I see, everyone is expressing their love for the country, love for the people and the happiness on the historic event that happened 65 long (or very short??) years ago… I can see million posts on almost all the social networking sites wishing one another a very happy day, I can see the tri-colour flying in every possible location, I can see huge hoardings congratulating the entire nation on being able to call ourselves a free nation, I can see various organizations organising events on the occasion, I can see million articles on newspapers quoting political leaders addressing the nation and of course I can see a million colourful programmes on various channels that boast about how happy, progressive and well-advanced we are, and not-to-forget what an amazing future we’re moving towards to… And, if I actually decide to ignore the reality that in real exists around me, I should be really happy, for, being able to be a part of the glorious country, and hence I have every reason to be proud of the society that I am in… But apparently, this is far from the truth, and in a true sense, I’m ashamed that I was born in a place that boasts about all the fake-ness, that boasts about being an arrogant lot of indifferent crowd, that takes pride in the fact that they contradict themselves in occasions more than they can ever think of, and yet they’re so very ignorant about these facts that, one who shows a little awareness actually looks like a fool…

Well, right at this point, I sound like an anti-social, anti-India, anti-progressive (I laugh as I type this phrase), and anti-independence little creep… And, I’m sure if this goes out on any public media, I might land up in some terrible situation where no one would be able to help me save myself… And if I’m unlucky (and bad luck decides to smile wry at me), there would be a lot of mishap getting created around my post… Might be it could turn into a political issue too, one gang saying that I’m influenced by their opponent, one saying I’m a spokesperson to their opponent, and so on and so forth…. Yeah, what not… Do you think I’m dreaming… Hell, no… Anyone with a little knowledge on Indian politics, management and society as a whole, and especially how the society works, would know that I’m actually talking sense… Yeah, India is a proud place where anything and everything is possible…

Well, contrary to what I sound at this point, and to be frank, I love my country too… In my school days I was known for writing about the country so well that everyone thought I had taken some special classes to know the length and breadth of the country… But the fact was, I truly loved the place I was born in, and somehow I had developed an intense love, affection and respect for the land… But when I grew up, I could see a different picture of the country I was so much in love with… I know, it’s a place where ‘Unity exists in diversity’, but then, it’s also a place where every minute there’s some or the other negative event taking someone’s life away from him… On one side if this is a place where everyone can claim to be a part of the diverse yet happy society, on the other side, this is the same place where one needs to be afraid every minute lest it’s his last moment in life… And, that’s how I’m in a fix, and thus not being able to decide whether I should feel proud of being a part of this land, or should weep by a riverside thinking why on earth did I choose to be born on this particular place… Nevertheless, life moves on… And, so even I move on with my daily life, without complaining about anything much, rather trying to adjust to the society I’m in, at any given time…

But, the reason why, I’m so negative about celebrating Independence Day is the fact that, at this moment, I truly don’t feel that I’m a part of a free land… And, do I have enough reason to justify it??? Well, yes… I have more than enough reasons to do so… There’s so much happening around me these days that I’m bound to feel negative about calling myself free… Freedom has turned into a term which looks glorious only in black and white, and not in real… I have freedom nowhere… If I want to raise a voice against anything I would definitely be killed (at least that’s happening around me so far)…

Well, let’s forget about these bigger issues; let’s see what happens on a day-to-day basis… Oh! Did I tell you that I’m a girl??? Well, yeah, that squeezes my freedom even more… I have no freedom to go and sit in the park in the corner, cuz some stray dog-alike human beings might come and rape me… I can’t wear my short clothes and walk on roads, cuz some dirty leech-alike creeps would come and try molesting me… I can’t fight back anyone eve-teasing me, cuz I’m a poor girl and if I do I would be treated like shit… And, to put a cherry on the top, I have hardly any faith in the security system of the country… And why not??? Here, the security system itself boasts about being one of the most corrupt ones in the world… And, yeah, so do I see any freedom for myself?? Of course not…

And, when time passes by then I lose my freedom even more… Yeah, if I’m marriage ready (as soon as I turn 25 plus)I would be forced to waste no more time with myself, rather to get married… And, if I happen to fall in love with someone from a different religion, caste or community, I would be forced to part ways from him, and no matter how much I suffer and protest I would be forced to get married to someone who is perfect for me as per the social norms, and even if I die of suffocation in that association, I can never leave… So where’s my freedom…

Well, I don’t want to sound like a social worker, nor like a feminist and neither like someone who fights hard against the powerfuls to bring in huge social change… All I know is that, in this country we’re missing even fundamental rights to live, and then we boast about freedom… How ironical…

If I ignore the mammoth issues of life, and look at having a normal simple life, I can’t do that… What’s more, yesterday when the whole country was celebrating Independence Day, I was sitting in a corner of my room, fearing to go out… The reason?? Well, there were lot of rumours (I seriously wish, they’re just pure rumours and nothing more than that), that there were red alert in and around this Southern city, and we, the outsiders are directly or indirectly made to get out of the place as soon as it is possible… And what caused this??? This is nothing but the aftermath of a riot that had taken place back in my home-state Assam, within various ethnic groups… And, the situation was so terrible there that it had turned (or made to turn) into huge political issue, and also got christened into communal riots… No one knows the actual facts, and the truth… But who’s suffering now??? Of course the ones who were by no means responsible for the entire episode… The morning newspaper brings the news of thousands of students and working professionals fleeing from the city back to their home-towns… What does that imply??? It surely tells us that we by no means have any freedom… Our constitution says that an Indian can live in any place inside its boundary as per his wish… But, is that the fact in today’s picture?? Well, of course not… Apparently we don’t have the basic freedom of following what our instincts say… Then, why are we celebrating independence???

Yeah, every bit of what’s happening around me pains me, it bruises my soul, and along with every bit of increased pain, my faith in the celebration of independence decreases… I’m shattered to see how typical we’re behaving… I have friends from all communities, religions, castes and regions… But, at this point of time, I don’t know what would be the right thing to do… I know, I myself is not the least of discriminating kind, and I never believe in these sort of biases, but am I in a situation to believe that even others around me are not… Can I blindly say that the friend who happens to be my best friend and hails from a different religion would stand by me in my crisis at this point??? Even if I want to believe so at the bottom of my heart, yet I can’t ascertain myself… Such is the negativity of the situations that are being created… And, certainly the ones suffering are the ones that belong to a neutral and innocent crowd…

I’m afraid… Of getting out even at as early as ten at night… Of taking an auto or a cab alone to work… Of talking aloud in a crowded place… Of passing by the place where I know other community crowd resides… Of picking up a cold drink from the bakery at the corner… Of picking up my breakfast from the departmental store… In fewer words, of doing anything that’s capable of drawing attention of anyone stranger… Yeah, such is the state I’m in, at this point… That says that I’m actually afraid to live… I’m afraid of breathing lest that causes others aware of my presence… And in this situation, do I need to celebrate Independence Day??? Do I have freedom and independence???

I know, this note of mine is and would stay as nothing but a relentless outburst of the anger, anguish, pain, frustration and helplessness inside me… Yeah, I’m angry… I’m anguished… I’m in pain… I feel frustrated… I feel helpless… Yeah, there’s no way to make myself understand that I live in a free country… Free of what?? Free from whom??? Isn’t it just an illusion that we’re free??? It is... And, yeah, that’s why I refuse to get involved in any celebrations that talk about freedom, independence and of being content… Instead, I would like to pray the unknown, and wish for a day where freedom would actually exist… I know a mere prayer does nothing to the corrupted and sadistic society, but I would do it only for the fact that, it makes me feel a bit safe, and also makes me believe that even if the world around me conspires to kill my inner faith, somehow I should still keep it up… Cuz, like every beginning has an end, these horrors and terrors would also see their end, and thus would bring a tomorrow where we would actually know and realize what real independence is…

And till then, let’s keep fighting for the basic freedom to live…

THE LITTLE SOMETHINGS... FOR A BETTER WORLD...

Well, it was a long hectic day, and on top of that the amount of rushing-arounds that I had to do today had actually made me, in a word, freak out… To add on a juicy cherry on top, my brother, who happens to be a little ahead than me on the insane-meter, was driving me almost crazy… He’s been under medical observation, and it’s me who has to be his PA for his every single meeting with doctor… Yeah, you guessed it right, starting with scheduling his appointment, to carrying the right document, to collecting reports, to discussing them with the doctor, to buying medicines, yes, each of these I have to do… My blackberry is loaded with reminders of each of these events, and at times I fail to understand whether my poor phone has any other things to do at all or not… Yeah, today too, the same schedule repeated, and no wonder, I turned almost insane and freaked out by the time it was 6 in the evening… But, the reason why I’m writing this note is not to describe or complain what’s wrong with my life, instead the reason is something special… And, I’m certain of a thing that I would actually not going to forget this incident for a long time in the future…

Well, it was almost 6 and we were supposed to meet the consulting doctor for my brothers report discussion at around 7… After a long fight and pushing hard, my brother got ready to see the doctor, and accordingly he was supposed to reach the hospital in around 45 minutes… I had almost an hour in hand, and the hospital being just ten minutes from my place, I decided to put an effort in lifting my mood up before I met my brother, and accordingly I decided to sit in the coffee shop from where I pick up daily coffee… As I came out of my place I realized it had been raining and so the rain-drenched dusky evening was a magical one… Well, my mood started brightening in that turquoise evening light… I picked up my coffee, started sipping the same and then waited on the main road looking for an auto to reach the hospital which was almost 4 kms away…

This part of the whole evening is something I actually would have liked to avoid… I hate autos and auto-guys with my heart and soul…Every morning when I wait for one, they would bug me asking for extra money over and above the actual fare, or most of the times they would refuse to go where you need to go, and some other times they would make you literally beg… Yeah, there’s not a single point for which I can say I would ever appreciate these 3-wheeled vehicle… Today too, with an irritated mind and an unknown disgust I waited for an auto… After a while, when the signal behind opened, a row of autos came by… I waved many of them, but finally I could make one stop by, and when it did I got into it… With my playlist on my ears, I hardly bothered to look at the guy driving the vehicle and asked him to put the meter down… As we got ourselves into the midst of the non-ending traffic on the main road, my irritation level rose up… But then since I was not hurrying up, I didn’t let my anger rise up to my head… Millions vehicles of all shapes, sizes and types had crowded out the city-road and wherever you see and your eyes can reach there was a sea of these… And, why not??? This is the time almost half the offices in the city gets over and everyone, in an attempt to reach home early, gathers on the road, turning it into an endless procession of vehicles… Today too, the same thing was very obvious, and it actually didn’t surprise me much… We were moving ahead, leaps and bound, and well, as predictable, it was taking forever for the jam to get cleared…

And, suddenly then happened something which is what I’m writing this note about… Well, it was a small incident, but then, something that blew my mind away… And, certainly it was something that told me that if anyone wants do something for someone’s good, you don’t need to have a lot of resources, nor you need to be someone highly influential… You can do it with what you have, and by being what you are and yeah also, how you are…

Yeah, coming back to what happened, as we crossed half the distance, on that crowded road, we halted at a place, almost 300 metres from a signal… The signal was closed, and so we had no choice but to wait there till it opened again… Suddenly, there was the siren of an ambulance which was rushing from behind, and it was apparent that it was in a hurry… The sound was irritating and so I increased the volume of my music on my ears… But, to my surprise, the guy that was driving the auto I was in, got down… And, for the first time, I saw his face properly, and also saw that he was an old guy, of more than 45 age, but he looks older than that, owing to, I’m sure, the fact that he has a not-so-easy life… He rushed towards the ambulance first, and came rushing back towards where his auto was… Looking at his strange behaviour, I peeped out of the auto, and realized that the ambulance has a heart-patient… But nobody was much bothered, and hence there was no improvement in getting the traffic cleared, infact there was nobody who was in a situation to do anything to try clearing the non-ending rows of cars, and buses, and bikes, and autos… To my surprise, there was no traffic police too, in the signal… But, well, obviously I didn’t bother to get out of my seat, and thereby doing anything that could help the patient in the ambulance…

And, that’s what this particular guy from my auto was trying to do… He was trying to gather everyone in helping to get the ambulance move through the crowd of vehicles… And, as opposite to what I defined as insanity, his effort seemed to make sense in a while… He ran to the signal, spoke to each of the cars and other vehicles, and somehow managed to clear a path amidst that horrific traffic… And in around 7 minutes the ambulance moved ahead, its siren kept blowing, and soon, it disappeared at the distant roads… And, by then, even my auto was on track again… Predictably enough I was shocked and I was wondering how on earth this seemingly clueless guy decided on his own to help out someone who was in actual need…

Soon, I reached the hospital I wanted to be at, and paid the auto-guy what he deserved… I had to get 5 rupees back from the guy, but I told him not to give it back, as I felt it was really not necessary… Cuz, today, what he had done was something that has by no means any comparison to anything money could buy… For a change, and for the first time in my life, I realized that all auto-guys are not bad, in fact there are some people who are exceptionally amazing and great… And, this particular guy happens to be one of them…

As I walked into the hospital, I realized, truly, it takes only one simple moment to make yourself do something great… You don’t really need to be someone with everything around to be useful to someone needy, all you need is just a heart that wants to help others… And, certainly, no matter what you are, what your strengths are, all you need is a streak to put that extra bit, that makes you do something, which no one else could think and be able of doing…

Yeah, it’s that little something that we do, which can brighten up someone’s life; yeah, it’s that little help that we offer which can let someone live a better life; it’s that little warmth that we share which can lighten up someone’s life; it’s that little effort that we put which can save the li

fe of someone who’s in his death bed… And, to do this little something all we need is just little wish and a heart, which beats a little for everyone around… Certainly, it takes only a little from us, but it surely does turn the world into a so much better place to live in...

A WAY TO HAPPINESS...LI'L DROPS OF HAPPINESS...

Well, it’s not a very happy evening today…The dinner that I didn’t eat, the medicines that I didn’t take, the endless mugs of coffee that I was not supposed to intake and the evening walk that I didn’t go for and which could have lifted my mood up, all-together I had a terrible time this evening… Basically it was an evening I would like to forget as soon as possible… Well, for those who think I’m a drama-queen, and also over-reacting, and not trying to fix what’s not right, well, it’s not that… I actually am going through things, that I would most likely like to avoid, and since at this point in time, I’m not able to do so, this evening, my mind and heart both together had decided to decline my further commands, and thereby had refused to work just right… It’s not that I could blame any of the both, or for that matter anyone else too, and hence I was almost struggling to find a way that let nothing spill out further, of my almost insane brain…

Nonetheless, as I saw no end to the frustration, and knew, there’s hardly anything that could cool me down, I decided to do something that could somehow make me feel it was still me, and not some un-named spirits getting into my body, in fewer words, I was trying to decide on my last resort… After some thought, I took my guitar, and went up to the terrace, and decided to strum something random… As I reached there, I occupied a corner of the huge space, and knew that that corner would be the place I was going to stick to atleast for the next couple of hours… The breezy surroundings made me realize that I actually did the right thing by coming upstairs, cuz, the atmosphere around me was nothing less than magical, and the magic somehow could easily get into my spirit, making me tenderly drowsy…

I sat there, staring at the sky… The weather, although windy was not cloudy, and the sky, with the tiny golden stars on it, was replicating that of a golden studded mattress… I stared at it, and as I did so, I realized there were droplets of water getting accumulated in the corners of my eyes… Soon, there were two streams of tears, silently and without me knowing, running through my cheeks… As they reached the hollows of my neck, I could feel that I was crying, but to my surprise, I couldn’t figure out why… As I wiped them off, and took my eyes off the sky, I started wondering why I started crying like a kid, all of a sudden… Though I couldn’t come to a conclusion on the reasons behind my tears, I could feel that those were not some tears of sorrow, rather I was really happy… I realized, somehow the starlit turquoise sky had taken my sadness away… And, strangely enough, after spending a long evening without smile, I smiled for the first time for that evening, a smile, which was rather a bright, a very bright one…

I started strumming my guitar… Well, I’m not a terrific player, of course owing to the fact that I’m a terribly terrible one when it comes to practising the instrument on a daily basis… And so today too, I hardly could play the song that I was trying to play, and so I ended up creating some chaotic free-flowing music of my own… But I realized, it hardly mattered, cuz I was completely enjoying what I was doing… I was completely in sync with the musical peace that the breeze was blowing with, and I felt, I had turned to be a part of it… Maybe, the magic of the place had got into my inside, and I was just not being able to help but get myself in the mood of getting drowsy with ecstasy…

I didn’t realize how much time had passed by… As I kept my guitar aside, I got up and put my playlist on, on my ears… I happen to have an amazing collection of music (atleast to my own understanding), from various genre, starting with Indian fusion, to Sufi, to Elektronica, to Rock, to soothing country and folks, yeah I keep everything stored in my playlist… This acts as my saviour in million occasions, when I’m down and blue, when I have a bad day at work, when I have a heart-break, when I have a rather bitter argument with my loved ones, and when I realize I’m beyond my own control, and well, not to forget even when I’m genuinely happy… Yeah, in each of these situations, this playlist makes me realize how worthy, heavenly and timeless those seven chords are… And today too, as I tuned my playlist on I realized, I was going to enter in a world of sheer joy and calmness, which otherwise was really turning into a rare entity atleast on this particular day… And, yeah, I was so right… As I started listeninglist to the , a song played which said, no matter what, I should never cry, rather shed tear of joy, cuz I’m alive… I realized, maybe I should have tuned my playlist on even before the evening started, cuz, if I had, by now I would have completely got out of the pain and agony that I was going through, all afternoon, towards this late at night…

It was turning really late… My long curls were completely messed, my eye-lashes were drenched with dew-drops in the breeze, my skin was turning dry cuz of the continuous wind, and I was cold too… But, inside my chilled body, I had a heart, that was warmed by the magic of the evening… I failed to understand how, but the purity that the beauty around me had, had actually made me come out of the terrible sorrow that I was going through… I realized, there could never be anything better than the simplicity and purity that the priceless elements in the environment around me create, to heal the pain that the materialistic world around me brings me to face… I realized, there maybe a million materialistic things that I find my happiness in, but the ones that could actually make me happy and find peace of my mind in, were the ones that come at no cost… The starlit turquoise sky, the deep darkness with the silvery moonlight spread across, the unknown fragrance floating around, the soft velvety breeze, and yeah, the un-named magic, every single thing in the lot just turns me drowsy, tenderly drowsy…

I realized, as the night progressed, I was completely away from the frustration that was running through my veins, I forgot about the unknown chaos that was not letting me sit in a single place, and most importantly, I came out of the restlessness that was not letting me see other reasons to be happy… And now, in the midst of this priceless magic, I found myself back… I got back to my own self, and I realized life is much more than getting hassled by mundane incidents and of course accidents…

I placed my guitar back in the bag, closed my playlist and rose up to my feet to walk back to my room… Yeah, back to a chaotic world again, but I knew this time I was not going to lose my cool again… Cuz, I had already realized, even if I did I also knew what could be the best way to come back to a state of peacefulness, and thereby a state of pure bliss…

Yeah, amidst the chaotic schedule of mundane duties, I found a way to enjoy my share of happiness... My share of calm and priceless happiness... And, most importantly, my share of a bunch of li'l drops of happiness...

TERROR...AND A WAY OUT...

Well, it was raining all afternoon, towards evening today... The continuous downpour with its rhythmic beats, the gentle breeze leaving my curls totally messed, and the magical darkness around, yeah, it was a perfect evening in my dictionary...And the best thing I could think of doing in such a pretty weather was to land up at my favourite coffee joint, have few cups of hot coffee, and of course letting me be with myself.... It took just five minutes for me to take the final call on this, and in the next five minutes, I was in my destination, the brilliantly lit coffee shop... As I got into the shop, the downpour sped up... Well, I didn't complain... Rather I realized, I was actually going to love it... I placed my order while taking the most comfortable seat in the corner of the shop, and in next five minutes my table had all, that I needed... An aromatic mug of strong warm coffee, a plate of chocolate-sauce-dipped chocolate fantasy, and of course my much-adored phone in my hand... As I started sipping on my coffee, I decided to surf net too... And as I did, I realized, even if I was not following aggressively, a lot was going on, around me, and these were actually things that should have made me worry in a rather serious way...

Actually, it's been almost a couple of days now, since I first came across the horrifying news of a school-kid, a young girl getting molested by a gang of men... Well, this is certainly not the very first time that I've come across something like this, but this is mere one, among those many soul-shrinking times, that makes me pity on the society we live in... And, this time, I'm actually disgusted and also unable to take it at all, for, the place where it happened is the same place I belong to, and for a matter-of-fact, I always had high, in fact very high regards for the place, at least owing to the fact that, people there always have a broader and much more advanced approach to living life, if you consider on a normal scale... But alas, I was so wrong!!! I forgot, that ultimately, it also is a part of the continuously degrading society, which, in million occasions, forget about the basic humanitarian ground, on which we need to stand upon in a real sense, as a part of the most evolved race, i.e. the human race... Alas, in millions and millions occasions, we just forget that, we need to evolve more, if possible, not the other way round which might lead us to the cave-age, in which we were no more than other animals... Well, I think, I shouldn't blame the innocent animals here, I hardly think despite being dumb and less intelligent than human beings, an animal would by any means bother to molest a fellow female... Does that leave us worse than them... Well, I have a strong feeling, yes, it does...

I'm not a hard-core feminist and I don't scream out asking why we're not treated equally as the male counterparts of ours in the society... I have no such demands that we should also be made to go through everything that a male needs to go through... All I believe is that, as human beings, we all, regardless of males and females, are supposed to have the basic right to feel free of doing things which by no means disturb others' existence, and thereby not making the societal balance shake... I believe, everyone in the society needs to have the feeling of belonging-ness to the same, and this would come only if we are let live in a way in which respect is a common entity... I believe in order to realize that we're a part of the modern world, we need to have the basic rights to feel free of choosing the ways to living, of doing things of our interest, and of course of making the small happinesses pave their way to our daily life... But, just cuz someone is female why she needs to sacrifice on these points, that remains beyond my understanding and beyond my imagination too...

Coming back to the molestation of the school kid, as the media says, she was eve-teased first, with sadistic remarks... This is one point I always refuse to take... Why does it always happen that when a girl is alone on streets, male counterparts turn into nothing more than street-dogs... I, myself have experienced it in million occasions... On the streets of big metros, small towns and suburbs, everywhere the picture stays the same... And, if someone wants to ask me if I was in my shortest clothes in those times, for them to know, well, I was not... It hardly matters for anyone with such a desperate attitude to leech after a female, to consider what she's wearing, what she looks like and what she's doing at that place... The mere fact that she belongs to the species 'Female', is more than enough for these low lives to bring themselves to get involved in anything that by no standard can be called decent and humanitarian... Such is the society we live in...

Coming back, I was mentioning about the incidents (guess 'accidents' or 'mishaps' would be apter terms) I had faced in the similar line... Well, fortunately (at least as far as these situations are concerned), I'm a totally lazy person, and thereby I hardly take a walk along streets at any point in any day, and also avoid taking public transports when it's crowded... And that leaves me opt for a cab or an auto in most of the times (and which also by no means safe at all)... Still there are certain rare occasions when I have no options than taking a walk, and the incidents that I want to talk about have all happened in some of these times only...

The first time when I faced something really ugly was during Ganesh Puja in Bangalore... It was almost 3 years back, and it was the last day of the weeklong festival, and so, was the time when a procession had taken the idol to float it in water in a nearby lake, a way to say goodbye to Ganeshji for that year... Well, I was coming back from my evening grocery shopping, and as usual my hands were occupied... The crowd was approaching from the other end, hence I decided to stay back on the other side of the street to avoid the same, and once it was pass me, I thought it was time I could take my steps back home... But suddenly I realized, there was someone trying to pull my shopping bags, and the moment I looked towards him, he slapped across my face... I was horrified, but as soon as I could realize what was happening, I tried screaming at him... My scream did make few other people gather... But the irony was, not to help me, but to irritate me even further... Some of them started commenting on me for being Nepali (which I am not), some called me 'Chinki', and I was all alone in a crowd of disgusting looking, dirty-eyed gang... Thankfully, the episode couldn't take a sadder turn than that, cuz few of my friends, who belonged to that locality fortunately had turned up for their evening tea at a stall nearby, and they came rushing to help me out... Of course they wouldn't have let anything happen to me, but I still wonder, what if, they hadn't turned up at that moment that day... It makes me literally shiver...

The second time, when I had to repeat facing such ugliness was a time when I was not keeping well, and hence had gone to get food from a nearby outlet... Well, it was a little late, but I was not alone... I was with my friend on whose bike I had gone out... After we got my parcel, my friend went to fetch his bike from the parking, and I was standing just outside the store, which also happens to be the main road... Two minutes on that road, and I could see my friend coming back too... And just at that moment, someone came rushing from nowhere and pulled my jacket... And before I could respond to it, my friend came rushing, and so did two other strangers, and they scared this low-life away, and I was rescued... Nothing much happened to me, apart from my heart turning infuriated against this sort of disgusting desperate males, and that of course is nothing positive...

Well, these were just two major mishaps taking place in my 25 years old of feminine existing... I'm not listing the minor setbacks that I come across on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis... That's cuz my whole point is not to list down all these negativities, and thereby screaming, and complaining about how difficult it is to live in the society I live in, and how bad it is to be a female... Certainly that's not my focus... My point here is, why is it the way it is??? A healthy society needs both males and females to unite together to think about and thereby walk towards what we call as 'progress'.... But, how would it be possible if one decides to trouble the other one in doing so, and thereby creating a crippled mankind???

Every negative action on females leaves me get worried on this one point, and that has nothing to do with who's better and who's not... And this point being, on the thoughts of the ones who get unknown pleasure in doing wrong to the females in the society... And, this has everything to do with, why does everything end up in bias???

I turn worried and speechless seeing the in-genuine behaviour towards a girl doing things as per her own norms... I fail to understand, why people don't realize how the simple thought of letting one live by her wish can stop creating all these troubles... I do not find a reason why it's so necessary to trouble the girl walking on roads alone, instead of being focused on the jobs that we need to finish before that particular day ends... I'm so certain that, that way, we would end up having a much more productive day than otherwise we would have...

The saddest part of all what I say, and did now too, is that, I can't do much more than just cribbing, writing it on my personal blog, and keeping all my friends informed when I have to end up being alone in a place, so that the moment I smell terror, any of them can come in my rescue... What else can I possibly do??? I don't wear my favourite pair of shorts while going anywhere alone, lest I might draw attention of un-necessary gazes... I avoid wearing my elegant and sexy looking formal frocks, lest I draw eye-balls of few testosterone-driven idiots around, I don't wear anything sleeveless, lest some irritating strangers bug me.... Well, how much can I possibly avoid doing??? The list doesn't end, neither does the list of probabilities and consequences that I might face when I'm alone on streets end... Do you see a point why I'm worried??? I'm sure you do...

On a personal level, I always prefer to just stroll around the place I live, click some random pictures of the beauty around, sipping on some take-away coffees, sitting on some deserted bench to scribble in my diary, getting into the depth of a new novel, or for that matter, just spending some time, only with myself while roaming around aimlessly... But sadly enough, I don't do any of these outside my house, cuz, that leads me getting few un-necessary, un-worthy strangers to take peek and thereby stalk me, and thereby leaving a scope to get harassed by them... Yeah, for this plain reason, I never walk alone on roads, I don't like to even sit in a cab alone, and what worse, I don't even want to step out of my house during weekends... Cuz, weekends bring everyone out of their respective homes, leading to creating a massive crowd, and bigger is the crowd, more are chances to get myself in trouble... Huh, how much do I need to think... I wonder, whether a guy actually think, or has to think from so many perspectives, or rather, do they even consider these to be something that need to be considered at all??? I don't have the answer, neither do I have an answer to what if I stop caring about the crowd around??? Difficult??? Yeah!!! Most certainly it is...

Well, I didn't wish to put this up on my blog... Cuz I realize, it's my relentless cribbing on something that I have no way and energy to change... Cuz, I realize it's not at all in my hands that I could do anything to change the way people, oh, the desperate lot, looks at females... Cuz, I realize, exactly like me millions others too, have the same set of complaints against the way the society operates, especially with these irregularities... But unfortunately enough, noone manages to have a ground to fight these... And, the story remains the same, one set always trying to take advantage of the weaker lot and the other set, like me, always trying to avoid these situations, and thereby ending up adjusting in so many aspects that it doesn't stay funny anymore....

News channels, Facebook, Twitter everyone is extremely engaged in reporting about the incident taking place in the city I come from... It shrinks my soul, it makes me scream out loud as to why it had to be that way, it makes me curse the gang who didn't bother to think that she could also have been any of theirs sister or girl-friend and so...., it makes me rethink of the modernity that we so proudly talk about... Basically it makes me just worry on as to on what grounds we would still be called as best of God's creation... We're certainly not the best that God created, cuz, we have proved Him wrong, all the time...

As I finished my coffee, I saw a gang of girls rushing into the coffee shop... A gang of teenagers with a bundle of relentless laughter, a bundle of non-restricted happiness, and in their glamorous and prettiest best... They made me feel little better... Their spirited and joyous attitude actually refreshed me... But, at the same time, I just wished, none of them have to go through anything that the innocent school girl had to go through, and that too, just cuz of being the fairer sex... I just wish, each of these girls, and everyone out there gets to enjoy the beauty of being a female, and not the other way round where they need to be scared of being the same...

I just wish, someday, somewhere we see a light, that leads us to a broader way.... A way, away from all these terrors, away from all the pain, and yeah, towards a space, where everyone breathes equal...