The place was dimly lit yet it bustled with the vigour and zest of an ongoing festival . The little wooden door was left ajar and onlookers could catch a glimpse of the cozy atmosphere inside as they bustled around with their daily chores .

The place reminded little Prithu of an old weary looking shack , yet he couldn't contain his curiosity to know what lay behind those rustic walls.

Prithu lived with his family in a small one bedroom apartment across this misty looking cottage. He'd never stepped foot in it , rather none of his family had . Despite having a dreary look , he'd heard that the place held some treasures that his clan couldn't buy .

Nevertheless for the past twelve years , he'd always held a fascination for those sundry people that visited it . He wondered, what was it after all that so many people who looked so different found in this place ? Indian men with their lovely dressed ladies wearing classy attire , young boys and girls who seemed to have given their college a miss, unknown foreigners known in his local community as 'hippies' having strange drawings all over their bodies ...and many more fascinating people , he'd been witness to all, entering this tumbledown place . They all looked so smug and often came out carrying big brown bags , which he thought contained savouries from some strange land .

That evening Prithu’s father scurried into the house babbling with excitement. In a flurry he narrated to Prithu how he'd managed to get a job in the little shack in the opposite lane . Finally , thought Prithu , he'd know what happens in there . The innocent concerns of twelve years of his life would find their answers in a jiffy, after all appu would tell him, exciting stories of the place he thought of everyday , maybe if he was a good boy , he'd get to take a glance at what was inside ...

It was time for appu to leave and Prithu blissfully slipped back into his reverie with even more excitement than before , for now he'd soon be a part of it .

At around seven in the evening , a deafening roar awakened the lazy neighbourhood around the shack . Prithu ran out as fast as he could to see what the sudden pandemonium was about .

People everywhere , lying around , crying in desperation , lots of men in uniforms , flashlights had gathered around his mystery shack. The smoke shrouded his eye sight and Prithu became a part of the deadly inferno.

The chant of 'German Bakery has been bombed' echoed all night long . At last , he knew ….

A week ago, I was sitting on the last bench of an extremely boring lecture in class. The teacher was trying her best to teach a management subject, but due to her poor linguistic skills fell short of conveying her point . Then , she posed a question to us , 'Do you never understand what I teach because I'm getting a miserable response, let me know, so then I can change my style' ...

Well, any third person would feel sorry for this dame and label us as a ruthless and indisciplined mob, who care a hoot for a teacher . There's a young lady trying to communicate and we, stand like a united unyielding barrier who just won't relent .

Delving deeper into the issue, the issue I want to raise here is that, we go to college to learn and learning needs to be holistic. How is a class in which a teacher comes into class, displays a few slides, speaks a few sentences in broken english, be remotely interesting .

When such a monotonous class is on, I always put myself in the teacher's shoes and ponder about how I'd teach .. and I somehow find innumerable ways to make the class interesting - a few being discussions, real life situations enacted , a few videos , examples from the current scenario ...

Try and talk about or explain something that students will relate to. Give them something to think about and get practical !!I mean , what use is a bunch of theoretical conclusions if you just can't apply them to life ?

Alas , when she gave me a chance to convey all of this to her , I didn't . Why ? Well, because it would've made no difference . In an ideal world , we would be taught that way and she wouldn't be the one teaching us , it'd be someone who knew the language, someone who didn't just read it off a book , someone who exploited their resources to no end(internet), someone who actually cared enough ......and we are spectators to this method of teaching have slowly started losing hope in our educational institutions .

Give a thought.....

My teachers always told me, close your eyes and ponder about what you imagine yourself to be ten years down the line. Harbouring dreams, of being a broadcast journalist I imagined myself being at the scene of war , maybe somewhere in the middle east, reporting some gruesome activities amidst a lot of confusion and anarchy.

I posed a question to me, why is it that ten years down the line do I still foresee so much violence, have I grown accustomed to it, or is it that I've not seen it any other way for a long time now.

A thought crept into my head, that how tamed our mind is today, to the age of warfare, mistrust, death and deterioration around us . How tuned our routine is to read the morning newspaper and see headlines eliciting carnage. How events like rape,robbery,murder,suicide are just being hyped at and the hoopla surrounding one dies after another one comes by, and how we have smugly adjusted to this cycle.I am baffled at how my definition of the normalcy of life has significantly changed and how I have come to live normally in such abnormal circumstances.

It was the year of my very first Board Examination, the hype and hoopla of the boards had surrounded me for like a year now (yes from mid ninth) and after being a little baffled and frightened at how important the boards were , often quoted as 'They're the turning point of your life' like a zillion times by my teachers and parents, I had started studying very scrupulously. I felt that my life depended on them. I used to maintain a diary at that time, and now when I read it again, I am bored and shocked at myself. Almost every page, talks about how I have been a bad student and how I needed to improve!!! I was a little disappointed at the 'me' a few years back, because in retrospect I feel that without having all those guilty feelings of not putting in much effort, I'd still have managed to do well, because at any point and time in life, its really necessary that all you need is a goal, and focus. Once there's a reason(not will ) there's a way to do it , and I had my reason. In any case, I was disappointed for overburdening my diary with my guilt trips instead of something creative and making an interesting read.

Like a real student, I used to get very bored while studying because for a long while thats all that had been said, around me and at me ! This is an excerpt from those times .....

I was feeling stagnant,like the still water on which mosquitoes breed

Like a painted picture, dead, not suited for the artist's greed

Like a torn doll not painted anymore

Like a red toe, bloody and sore ...

I was a stale egg on which fleas feed

A little fresh air and some music was all I did need

I stood pale and sleepy with my senses numb

I can't describe better my dreadful boredom !!!!

PS: I did well and hardwork is the key to success :P just don't center your life around one particular thing and don't let others do it too !!

Past ramblings....(2)

The poem the 'Frog and the nightingale' was my favorite in the tenth standard. In my opinion, it was one of the best examples of sarcastic humor and had a very amusing rhyme scheme....My friends and I could remember only the first two lines of the poem and we made up the rest ...The result of our boredom, turned out to be a trifle bit less boring, and I loved it !!

There was a frog in Bingle Bog

Who lived beneath a thick green log

He hopped outside in the middle of the night

To see if he could find some food in sight

But, no! alas! That could not be

He was blind and he could not see

He called his friend from way up there

And raised his hands up in a prayer

But unfortunetaly his prayers went in vain

His thoughts were marred by the slime in his brain

But his hunger he could not overcome

His tummy went rum rum rum rum rum

Eventually he was nearly dead

As his empty stomach could not be fed

As he lay and breathed his last

He was killed by his unending fast

And hence ended the story of the Bingle Bog Frog

Who lived beneath the thick green log

By the three mouseketeers

In fond memory of the bingle big frog.

Past ramblings....(1)

I am convinced that some of my older posts in my 'enthusiastically started but never pursued' older blogs are way better than what I pen down these days,I am posting some of them here ....

Why is understanding the intricacies of the self sometimes so difficult...

why can i lend a patient year to the whole world and solve their problems in a jiffy while mine are unfathomable....

why when i want to hear the inner voice echoing through my heart is it so difficult to drain the screams of everything moving through the corridorsof my little brain....

why when i know what i want from life and my brain thinks perfectly straight..do i want something thats not going to lead anywhere but will provide momentary bliss...

why is penning down thoughts being more confusing than thinking in itself...

why am i sure that what im convinced about this moment will turn hazy this same moment tomorrow....

why does impulse take over the calmness and thoughtfulnessof my actions ....

why do i cause so much hurt to those who love me while all my time goes in being polite and amicable to those who 'll probably not register that i exist after my meeting.....

why is it that sometimes relationships go so sour that i fail to recognise the very person who i shared the most of my life with.....

why is it a herculean task to somtimes accept life the way that it is ......

why ???

This is a memory ....

A long time ago , I had been to a beautiful place amongst the highest mountain ranges this world has seen ....Himalayas. It was a trek organised to Har ki Dun, or valley of God .

The total duration of our trip was for 7 days , everyday being a novel experience , one of its kind . I especially loved the different terrain that I encountered on each of these journeys .

From a rocky area ,to grasslands , and beautiful meadows I treaded sundry paths . In a seven day span , I saw how wonderous and varied nature in a hilly region could get .

But the memory is of no different day , its just of a small moment in the entire travel .

After a long and tiresome walk we had just reached our camp area in the route ,a small station called Taluka , not different from the others .

It had a small gallery in the girls dormitory . On reaching , everyone unpacked and went downstairs to join the whole gang, engaged themselves in random group activities .

I on the other hand was drawn to that one gallery, the picture outside was beautiful, I still remember it vividly. I was staring at two mountains , immensely huge , their peaks covered in snow like icing on a gigantic chocolate cake, the white shining in the misty twilight.

That day, I felt like such a tiny part of this universe, yet I felt so proud of being a part. A part that mattered on one hand to all those who knew me , around me , and yet a part whose prescence or abscence made absolutely no difference in the bigger picture ...the balance of this universe would still remain intact, if i didn't exist. Like a speck of dust, which actually had no meaning . Yet, there I was engaged in petty problems of my own head , lost in my own existence, finding my meaning to life and to why I was .

As these philosophical thoughts crept my mind, i noticed this cute little house next to ours .Two local ladies were looking at me and our pulton that had arrived. They were so far, I couldn't hear them and neither could I fathom what they were saying . I waved and smiled, they reciprocated, I asked them something in hindi, as loudly as I could, and they replied, I really didnt understand what they said, but our incomprehensible communication pursued for a while. At last, I went back in as the evening drew its blanket and the cold made it difficult for me to stay outdoors .

I felt strangely content , a small relationship in this world, which would make no difference to me or to them, but it made me feel happy . We didn't understand each other but i made a new friend, momentary but it lasted !