Thank You

(Image courtesy: good-wallpapers)

It was 'Thank You Day' on Friday last week. I didn't know it. Not even when my boss held out a bag full of Eclairs and simply said, 'Thank you' to me. I asked 'Why?' and she repeated 'Thank you' again. So, I took one Eclairs and said 'You are most welcome'. It was only when we were told to head upstairs for the celebration did I realise what day it was.

On the way back home, it made me think. Who would I be thankful to? The more I thought, the more names and faces cropped up in my mind. There's so much to thank for and so many people to be thankful to in life. Our lives can never really be our own in its entirety. We owe a lot to many people right from the moment we were conceived in our mothers' wombs till the time we breathe our last. Perhaps beyond too.

One single life is never really a journey taken alone. There are too many people who shaped our way, created milestones for us, laid down the foundation of the roads we now travel upon. There are those strangers too who stood on the sides helping us replenish our energies by handing out drinks and food, and whom we may not even remember by faces forget about by names. But they made a difference somehow in our journey.

Several names appeared in my mind. My school teacher who made me realise that I mattered, I was somebody too, and encouraged me to voice my opinions and share my thoughts. My best friend in school who always stood by me and stood for me, even when he risked making enemies with few other classmates. He showed me what it means to be a friend. I am still learning to be one. My first love who showed me what it meant to be there for your love and how I failed miserably in doing so. I have always lived up to that lesson ever since. My best friend in college who knew me all too well and told me some harsh truths about me no one else could have or cared enough to tell me.

Over the past decade or so, I have truly come to know what a remarkable person my mother was and how much of her I see in all three of us. She was a person who lived in subtleties and expressed the most in silence. When I recall some of the innumerable moments I have shared with her, I see another side of her I never saw before. Maybe I was too young to understand then. I am thankful to have had those moments and to be able to relive them again. I see so much of her in my sister too, even though they are very different persons. I have lived most of my early years with my sister so we have a different kind of bonding than the one I have with my brother. And in the recent past I have grown to admire, respect and love her so much more. I am grateful to have her in my life. Although I can be a pain sometimes like most other brothers tend to be!

My life in Delhi brought few good friends and few mentors who took me under their arms ready to guide me in my professional life. I will always be indebted to my first boss for his trust and confidence in me. It will take me a few more years and a couple of other jobs to realise just how instrumental he had been in shaping my career. One of my colleagues played a vital role in my actual media world education. I have followed few of his rules and broken quite a few more! And as I find myself in a new job, I am grateful for all the past experiences and to my past mentors. I am thankful too for the opportunity that I have received at a time when the odds were against me. I know fully well the responsibility which entails this trust and I remind myself everyday of the work ahead of me.

I have been fortunate to have a family who supports me and loves me no matter what and who makes me feel I belong. I have been fortunate to find friends who somehow understands me better than I do and are not afraid to show me the mirror when I falter. I have been fortunate to have had teachers and mentors who nurtured and moulded me to better prepare for the world ahead of me. I have been fortunate to have had the chances which came my way despite the innumerable mistakes I have made. I have been fortunate and that's why I am grateful.

Our lives are never our own for so many people have had a hand in making it what it is. No one ever really makes it on his own. And as I laid down in my bed that night I offered a silent 'Thank you' before going to sleep.

Feeling The Best Despite Not Being At Your Best

I used to think that if you are feeling low or not-too-well physically or otherwise, it was impossible to enjoy no matter how much things seemed promising. I have been proven wrong on more occasions than one; the latest just recently.

If you have a good humoured outlook towards your setback, you can still conjure up enough confidence to have a good time. It greatly helps if you have some crazy friends around who are more than willing to hit the high notes with you.

The way I am as a person, it is never easy to come out of my shell. And ill health adds another layer to my reserved nature, rendering me unfit for society. However, this time I decided to have a blast nonetheless, laughing at my own hoarse voice induced by the flu I caught a few days back, blowing the guts out of my nose even in public whenever the warning bell rang or startling the heavens out of people with my frequent hysterical sneezes. Of course I covered my face with my handkerchief, unlike few closely related people I know!

I have realised that I have more often than not ended up having a good time when I had hesitated going out and meeting people in the first place for various reasons. Having had zero or negative expectations made the unexpected delightful experiences so much more pleasurable.

You are down in life only when you accept that you are sincerely in the 'downs', chasing away all the positivity from your life. When you change your outlook and see that a good time is independent of circumstances but entirely dependent on how you react to them, you realise you can still feel the best and have a good time even when you are not at your best.

Here's to more good tiiimmeess.. acchhhoo!! Excuse me!

NUNGSHIBI - OUR ADORABLE PUPPY

[Sharing a post from my other blog (http://todearmom.blogspot.com) about Nungshibi (meaning adorable/lovable in Manipuri), my pet dog.]



I have to tell you about Nungshibi. I completely forgot. She was a month old puppy when brother brought her in on his way back from office. She was injured, bitten by another dog and the only one among her siblings to survive. The same day sister and I had come back from Shillong and we were so surprised to see her. She was really hurting and in a really bad condition. Sister, who always wanted us to have a pet at home, was ecstatic. But brother spoiled her excitement somehow when he said he is just getting her cured and then letting her go. Weeks passed and I was taking care of her, washing her wounds and bathing her, cleaning her mess and feeding her. Sister would keep on pleading with brother and us to keep her. I didn't mind keeping her. And when I took her to the vet, suggested by Sunny, I made up my mind to keep her. What really made me sure was that the name of the clinic read Max Vets. I knew it to be a sign, considering how much I loved our Max and how he had to spent his days at home away from us in his last years. I had always felt bad about it. I still do sometimes when his thoughts come to me. The last time I saw him on my visit home, he seemed weak and wanting of love.

It hasn't been easy though, bringing up a pet in a city, especially in a neighbourhood like ours with hardly any access to a clean green park at a walking distance. Since I have been in charge of caring for her from the time she came in, potty training her to do her business was quite a task and a test of my patience. Every time I was about to lose my patience and scream or shout at her I keep reminding myself of how you took care of all the pet dogs we had, whether it was Ruby or Jumbo or even Max. You were always so calm and patient and they loved you the most. There are rare occasions when I do lose my patience. I guess some things are not easy to learn.

Once it was confirmed that she would stay, naming her was a challenging process. Sister insisted on Julie and even succeeded to some extent. I on the other searched the net for some fancy foreign language names. Came up with few even. I started to call her Juliski combination of Julie and Iliski, Turkish for relationship. When I told Sunny, he was like, "Why do people get so excited about foreign names and all? Why can't they simply use the language they speak? At least name it in your native language if you have to else choose something in Hindi or English." He was right and I promptly thought of some names. Finally I selected Nungshibi. She must have had an identity crisis during those initial stage when she would be called by so many different names. I would call her something and sister would insist on something else. Then brother would try his own versions and so would Bishnu.


She's around six to seven months old now and really strong for her age. And quite a rebellious little doggy she is. Sister keeps on complaining, so do the rest of the people who drop by at home, that she is so aggressive and over-excitable. Her colour is same like Ruby and Jumbo. We had thought of calling her Ruby but I didn't want to.

She is sleeping beside me now. It's funny the way she goes to sleep. She would walk slowly and then all of a sudden fall down on the floor and go to sleep. The first few times I thought she hurt herself or something. It's way more funnier to see the way she actually sleeps, funny little poses, lying flat on her back and her legs stretched out:


Then there's one where she tilts her head ninety degree to her body, I was worried sick she might have twisted her neck or something when I saw it the first time.

She helps me keep sane. Like Max did when I was staying alone at home while all of you were away. Some nights I would get up from bed, not being able to sleep and walk out on the verandah, sit and stare at the stars. Max would come sit next to me and I would talk to him about you and about how I felt. I do that sometimes with Nungshibi when she's sleeping because when she's awake she's hyper. There's no time to be sentimental or nostalgic. It just vanishes away. That's how much she can keep one busy.

You would have loved her a lot and she would have definitely love you the most.

Love

Train-ing Days (My College Trip)

I was reading something about trains on one of the blogs I follow and it reminded me of the few memorable train journeys I have undertaken in my life. Here's an account of the most memorable one I have had so far:

It was the year 2001. A teacher in a college in Bishnupur, Shillong was having a discussion with the BSc. IInd year students about a study tour and where they would like to go. Several names popped up; some quite far-fetched, considering the budget constraint. The students feared they would end up going to the neighbouring state like the batch before them. Most had not even ventured out of the small state so they wanted to make the most of the opportunity and travel far and wide. Few places were short-listed. Andaman was the most exciting among them. As days passed and teachers were having meetings among themselves and with the principal, the signs of a neighbouring visit seemed more and more evident. Then one day the teacher came in and announced that the principal has finally agreed. However, Andaman has been ruled out. The students were disappointed to hear this. Then she added, we are going to Chennai and Bangalore. Everyone cheered up. But there was a tiny problem - instead of the earlier amount the students would now have to dish out Rs 3500-4000 each. After talking among themselves they all agreed to it.

Soon followed a journey which is etched in my memory and which has become a milestone of my growing up years.

We went on a sleeper class reservation and it took us a little over fifty hours to reach Chennai. After spending two days in Chennai we headed for Bangalore and reached there at night. The following night we were on our way back to Guwahati. It was a study trip in principle but in actuality it was anything but that. We went on tours in both the cities, visiting all the tourist hotspots. Luckily for us some of them had affinity with our purpose of visit as well. Like the time when we went to see the zoological park (since the trip was organised by the Zoology Department) or when we visited the science museum.

The first thing that got us super-excited was when we, for the first time in out lives, saw a beach. One of the many reasons why we were so charged up about the trip to begin with. We visited two beached in Chennai - Golden beach, which was part of a theme park and the famous Marina beach. We ran to the shore, getting our feet soaked in the water, running after the waves, splashing water at each other. We took lots and lots of photographs. There were very few people at the Golden beach. The reason might be that entry is not free or because it was a hot afternoon when we went there or maybe both. But Marina beach was full of people, from families on an outing to couples walking together, from groups of friends chilling out to health-conscious joggers.

The tides were much higher at the Marina beach. It was intimidating. Only few people were in the water. Most were, like us, standing far behind waiting on the wave to hit the shore. There was an empty coconut shell floating on the water. It found its way to the shore and soon enough an impromptu football match began. Our teachers joined in as well. It was surprising to see ma'am M.K.K. and J.D. in such spirit. We couldn't picture them to be fun at all from what we knew of them in the classroom. It was a welcome change and we had a great time playing together.

But the most fun had to be the train journey. The train became our world for a few days and we were living it up in there - visiting each other's compartments like neighbours, striking up conversations with fellow travellers, singing and playing card games together or just looking out the window watching the world outside as we pass them by. We still talk about the time when someone found a cockroach in her egg curry and swore off the train food. Or even the time when us boys were running for cover when news about eunuchs boarding the train reached us. It wasn't new to me since I had gone on a train journey but my friend was terrified by the idea and covered himself from head to toe in a blanket on the upper berth. I was hiding on the berth opposite him. It was hilarious to see him holding on to his blanket and pulling his legs in when one of them grabbed him by the feet. Ultimately they gave up and went around for some other targets. We have a great laugh about it whenever the topic comes up.

On the last day of our trip in Bangalore while riding back to the youth hostel, we were at first laughing and singing along with the music. By the time we were just few minutes away from the hostel, there was a silence in the bus. Most of us were staring out the window, a sense of melancholy taking over us.

That night we all had our dinner together at the hostel mess. All the seats around the long rectangular table were occupied. Somebody aptly remarked that it felt like it was our own 'last supper'.

It's been years since the trip. Since then, life has led us to many different places. Most of us have lost in touch with each other, only few still remain known to me to this day. Others grew far apart in time and in distance. As I think about the trip now, recalling and reliving those moments, I can't help but wonder somebody somewhere else might just be remembering those fun times as well.

Hopeful New Year!

One more year comes to an end. Another year is dawning in just over a few hours. And there are so many things going on in my head. What do I expect from this coming new year? What do I expect from my life and from myself in the coming year? At first I had thought of making a list of my new year resolutions but I opted not to. It is pretty depressing when things don't go the way we want them to. It will be miserable when it's a list of things you had set out to do from the beginning.

More than expectations, I have hope that I will be able to become more of me and less of how I think I ought to be. More beliefs and less doubts. More conviction and less fear. That's what I hope for the most. To be able to be honest with my feelings and my thoughts and show them not just feel or think them.

It's already few minutes past midnight. My hopes are being born as the year grows by the minute. Hoping to have a Happy New Year!

Rain: Return Of An Old Friend

When it used to rain before, we would not know. We lived in a concrete building and if we were inside our rooms with the curtains pulled down on the windows we would not know when it rained. So, most of the times the clothes hung outside to dry would have to wait a long while getting soaked all over again. And we missed several opportunities of playing in the rain because we would not be able to hear it fall. The paper boats were saved from drowning in the make-believe river of the backyard drain, sailing through a heavy stormy weather. The dry and recently washed clothes we worn would take a heavy sigh of relief every time we missed the rain. Having been soaked for hours in cold/hot water then being beaten about on the cemented floor and hung out to dry, they favoured being warm in the closet and feared being worn by us. They dreaded the moment someone opened the closet, praying hard they were not picked. Some had tough luck, becoming our favourites, we would wear them umpteen times till they turned pale and their threads came loose. They had to undergo stitches several times and would always end up getting dirt-faced. They feared rain the most and so it was a matter of great relief when we missed the rain. They hated being damp and wet.

Then we moved to a tin-roofed house and even a slight drizzle would alarm us. We were out and about in an instant gauging the rain and if it wasn’t too heavy we would leave the clothes be. If it rained heavy, we would free them from the clutches of the clips and gather them all inside. In a really heavy downpour most of the clothes would end up getting wet no matter how quick we were. We would in turn get wet as well. It would not stop us from venturing out onto the verandah to feel the rain fall on our palms and if we were game enough, we would get all soaked, dancing in the rain. Sometimes in our excitement we would forget about the slices of radish or pieces of amla left to dry atop the roof and they would spitefully turn out to be not-so-good achaar once they were dried up, spiced up and bottled up.

However, for most part they were all happy, the clothes and everything else since we lived under a tin-roof. The problem was with us because we would start thinking it was raining on hearing the slightest of sounds resembling the rain.

...........................................................

We did not resist the rain then. We took it as it came. No great surprise or worry succeeded it. Then the inevitable happened. We all grew up and the excitement of the rain slowly faded away with the years we added to our lives. We ran from the rain most of the times – running for a dry shelter and even if the shelter was long way away and we were bound to get wet, we'd still keep running, shielding ourselves with a notebook or a plastic bag or even a handkerchief! Oh! We really didn’t like the rain I guess. At least that was what the rain felt, who had just dropped by to give us a childhood greeting. But we were growing up or already grown up and forgot about our childhood friend.

Years later when most things had changed and I yearned for something old and something familiar, something to help me retain or regain the lost days of the yore, I found I had lost most of it to the heat of life. Pretty soon I realized I had lost so much more than a few rainy days or fun-plays in the sun. Then in the evening of a rather warm day it rained, first slow then heavily. I did not resist it. I soaked myself in it, reveling in the memories of all the days lost and gone, shedding tears for all those lost and gone and smiling in the return of a childhood friend who gave me warmth in his wet embrace. I do not resist the rain anymore.

When I Met An Old Friend

To meet an old friend is always a pleasure, especially when you have gone through a lot in life with the same person. They have seen you in your good times and your worst as well. They have been there for you and you have been there for them. So, a meeting with such a friend is always a heartening experience to say the least.

Today I met with a dear friend who has been through a lot in life much as I have been in mine and have seen each other in our worse of times. Today too is no better a time in our lives. I have my own set of problems and he has his. And we are at an age where most of our counterparts have already found their footings and are excelling at whatever they are doing. Our trials have been tough. Our success minimal. At the end too much time invested with too little outcome/success to account for while time keeps a tab of the passing years on our faces and greying hair on our scalps.

The sense of responsibility never leaves our minds. And this is one reason why there has not been much of a risk taken by him on his part. He had trodden carefully and calculatingly. Somehow in his own words, the ‘bad luck’ phase of his life still seems to be continuing. For most part, things look promising and all efforts are in place from his side but some other things which are completely out of his control puts an end to his dreams.

Even though I too feel the sense of responsibility I have taken decisions more freely and taken a lot of risks being the ‘child’ in the family. A doting elder brother and an always supportive elder sister eased my risky ways. The problem now is the fact that I have not been able to turn the career risks I have taken into anything worthwhile. I am still in this phase but what gives, even if a little solace is that I have been doing some of the things I greatly enjoyed doing. The thing is I could have done them without playing the ‘Brave-heart’ ( or fool-heart??!).

There are thoughts and ideas running in both our heads. We can talk about how to do those things. We can talk about how it can be executed and what all formalities or procedure we need to follow. The problem, however is if at all it will work out and will we be able to take any more chances now? I can see him achieving what he dreams of. He has always been a hard-working guy with his head placed firmly on his shoulders. He just needs the right time and there will be no stopping him. I am, like always, doubtful of myself and my big ideas. Let’s see how things go for both of us.