Enjoy the fragrance of rose before it fades

The best part with we human being is, whole life we always crave for what we don't have and do not enjoy what we possess. Be it job (I can say this as an experience software labour), salary, car, home. As a matter of fact family too.

Yesterday I went to hospital for routine eye-checkup. As I was waiting for my turn doing nothing, I saw a father holding his 8-10 months old daughter in his arms, who must have recently learned to hold her head on her own; a weird (not so weird) thought came to my mind. "Did I hold my daughter when she was 8-10 months old". I was not able to remember that. Not that I've a bad memory but somehow I was not able to remember that. As I was having plethora of time waiting for my turn; an old saying in hindi "khali dimaag shaitan ka ghar" means mind can go wild if sit idle suited me perfectly well.

That was picture perfect scene; I really can't describe in words for sure (Thanks to my limited knowledge of English, I am no Salman Rushdie either). To hold an eight months old baby, who is too small for this big world, who doesn't have a name yet to tell, whose eyes are too small to look beyond his/her parents, whose demand is not much but just food, sleep and little care, whose skin is vulnerable for even softest towel, is just an out of the world felling. Believe me! It's not that I didn't hold my daughter when she 8 months but the time flies so fast that we can just wish for that moment to come again, but which is unfortunately not possible in present world. May be we've to wait for scientist to invent time machine.

We spent our childhood cribbing for heavy bags, class tests, exams, limited or no money to spend and dreaming to be adult as soon as possible. Didn't enjoyed really. We wasted our college days cribbing about the college, bad teachers, not enough books in library, slow internet speed, not having beautiful girls, distance of the college from city, not enough job opportunities etc. (really a long list) but we realize that those were our one of the best days of life only once we came out of the college. And suddenly we find ourselves on the wrong side on 30s remembering those old days. We still remember those 5 paise colorful toffee (orange in taste), 50 paise kulfi which we had to share because of limited money, stealing tiffin boxes, cycle races from school to home and wish to live those moments again.

We've parents whom we really don't care (hard to hear but that's true) and left in their world. We cried and wish them back when all of a sudden we hear the news that they are no more in this world. We've never thought of them when they were 2500 kms away living in this overly populated world (recently we crossed 7 billion mark as earth population) yet living alone. All of sudden we come to know that now no one exist to ask the health of ours over phone, no one exist to suggest to have a food on time, no one exist to scold about our generation, no one exist to complaint about the knee-pain of theirs, no one exist to scold the company for not giving us enough leave, no one exist who can gives blessing from the deep of their heart, no one exist who have hopes of we coming back (or going back!, confused) to their world.

Once, one of my friend  admitted to me that how he miss his father now though he used to fight over small stuff when he was alive. He wanted to buy old RX-100 while his father opposed that. His father wanted him to find a job in Delhi (he got that but he hide) but he moved to Bangalore (for his girl-friend;she left him off-late). He himself feels that if you see all this from bird's-eye view, it all looks too trivial. I could have waited for the bike for some more time. I could have asked my girl-friend to stay in Delhi, but I didn't want to live my parents. I was blinded by my friends who were going to pubs, discs and posting their pictures in orkut and facebook. Nothing would have changed really when I used to go to pubs once a week rather than once in a month.

We all (including me) knows all this and I am pretty sure nothing is going to change even after writing/reading this. After all we are stupid human beings. There is no point in saying, "Start living the moment right away. Don't wait for something to happen, because that never happens". Running behind something he doesn't have is the basic nature of human. I am also doing it. But let's wait for a moment, relax, think what we have, appreciate it, enjoy it and then make afresh start again. Better enjoy the fragrance of the rose before it fades, how true!

Burden of 26/11 - II (Third Anniversary)

Once upon a time, Vasco de Gama came to India. That became history, which everyone aware of. Little more than five hundred years after the history was made; in 2008 a team of 11 people (not a cricket team or hockey team) came from western border of the India, without legal documents and permission. They preferred to take sea route rather than road because they felt it was safer. And that turned out the right decision for them.

Once they landed in Mumbai, for next 60 hours whole world watched massacre which happened in Mumbai. How the life itself cried for saving its own life. We saw how Taj Mahal palace was burning for 3 continuous days. There were many children, who were waiting for their parents to come back home, but they never saw them after that. Everyone noticed how TV channels made a mockery of, one of the worst attack happened in India. To me this was the most efficient (read worst) attack because of enormous death per person ratio which roughly was 164/11=14.9 in just 3 days. Of'course the financial casualty is lot more.

All of them were dead, but one of those 11 villains Ajmal Kasab was captured alive, but we had lost many of our security personal in return. But the story doesn't end there. The most tragic story begins there. It's going to be 3 year since that day, but Kasab is still alive, enjoying his worthless life. Not only alive, he is using Indian tax payers money. For the first year (26/11/2009) Kasab used our 30 crores. By 21st February 2011, he already eaten out 100 crores. And still he is using it. In fact he'll still use it till 31/01/2012 at least. That is the day of final hearing on his case.

It is an irony to see that the hard earned money of an Indian is wasted on Kasab who tried to violate our integrity, who took many lives of human being, made many children orphans. I know one day people will forget 26/11, people will forget Kasab but the question will remain, which other country would have been treated Kasab as the way we are treating?

Midnight's Children - Story Telling at its Best

1993 Man Booker prize winner, and Best of the Booker really deserved that. Perfectly crafted beads converted into a great story. And the way Salman tells the story is really marvelous. The story has its own turns, ups and downs but everything creates more interest than earlier. As soon as you start feeling comfortable with the story and start guessing the next, story turns and take you to whole new world of Saleem Sinai's (main character of the book) life.

Saleem Sinai, lead character of the book was used to narrate the story. He is one of the few children born at midnight, the midnight India got independence. "... On the stroke of midnight, as a matter of fact. Clock-hands joined palms in respectful greeting as I came"........`"A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new; when an age ends; and when the soul of a nation long suppressed finds utterance...". His life started and get intermingled with India freedom and after; gives a colorful and first hand picture of India after independence.

With approximately 100 books in my shelf, I can say one of the best so far. Real thumbs up, a must read.

PS: For new readers, size of the book can be intimidating and tough to go through 400 pages but its worth the pain. This read will convert you in serious reader for sure.